In a remote outpost in Siberia, the cold is no small affair. Eyelashes freeze, frostbite is a constant danger and cars....
In the coldest village on Earth, temperatures sink to -88F
In a remote outpost in Siberia, the cold is no small affair. Eyelashes freeze, frostbite is a constant danger and cars are usually kept running even when not being used, lest their batteries die in temperatures that average minus-58 degrees Fahrenheit in the winter.
Oymyakon, a settlement of some 500 people in Russia’s Yakutia region, has earned the reputation as the coldest permanently occupied human settlement in the world.
It is not a reputation that has been won easily. A few weeks ago, a cold snap sent temperatures plunging toward record lows, with reports as extreme as minus-88 degrees Fahrenheit. The village recorded an all-time low of minus-98 degrees in 2013.
Dark 21 hours a day in the winter, the town has been an object of international curiosity as its reputation for fearsome cold and the resilient residents who withstand it year after year.
The winter diet is mostly meat-based, sometimes eaten raw or frozen, due to the inability to grow crops in the frigid temperatures.
Bathrooms are mostly outhouses; the ground is too frozen for pipes. The ground has to be warmed with a bonfire to break into, such as for digging a grave.
Somewhere in the world, there’s a painting that looks like you. And Google will find it.
Apps that involve uploading one’s face, getting feedback and sharing the results aren’t always a great idea. But the latest iteration of the Google Arts & Culture app, which promises to scour more than 1,200 museums in over 70 countries to find one’s art doppelganger, has become a viral hit.
Though the Google Arts & Culture app has been available since 2016, the find-your-art-lookalike feature was released with its latest update in mid-December. (“Take a selfie and discover if your portrait is in a museum,” the release notes read, before also promising the usual “bug fixes and minor improvements.”)
In recent days, scores of people - including plenty of celebrities - have shared their often hilarious results on social media, helping Google Arts & Culture climb the App Store’s charts to become the most downloaded free app.
