The Islamic State of Afghanistan was the name given to the nation of Afghanistan during the rule of the United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan government. After 2001, the country was renamed Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.
Leonard Cohen
Leonard Norman Cohen (September 21, 1934 – November 7, 2016) was a Canadian singer, songwriter, musician, poet, novelist, and painter. His work was mostly about religion, politics, sexuality, and personal relationships most notably seen in his best known work "Hallelujah".
Cohen was added into both the Canadian Music Hall of Fame and the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame as well as the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He was a Companion of the Order of Canada, the nation's highest civilian honor. In 2011, Cohen received one of the Prince of Asturias Awards for literature and the ninth Glenn Gould Prize.
Cohen was born on September 21, 1934 in Westmount, Quebec into a middle-class Canadian Jewish family. His mother was Marsha (Masha) Klonitsky and his father was Nathan Cohen. Cohen's father died when he was nine years old.
During his high school years in Westmount, Cohen learned and played the guitar many times and wrote poems. He studied at McGill University.
Cohen started a career as a poet and novelist during the 1950s and early 1960s. Cohen did not start his music career until 1967, at the age of 33. His first album, "Songs of Leonard Cohen" (1967), was followed by three more albums of folk music: "Songs from a Room" (1969), "Songs of Love and Hate" (1971) and "New Skin for the Old Ceremony" (1974).
His 1977 record "Death of a Ladies' Man" was co-written and produced by Phil Spector. In 1979, Cohen returned with the more traditional "Recent Songs", which blended his acoustic style with jazz and Oriental and Mediterranean influences.
"Hallelujah" was first released on Cohen's studio album "Various Positions" in 1984. Cohen wrote around 80 draft verses for "Hallelujah", with one writing session at the Royalton Hotel in New York where he was reduced to sitting on the floor in his underwear, banging his head on the floor. This became Cohen's best known work. "I'm Your Man" in 1988 marked Cohen's most popular album with the song "Everybody Knows". In 1992, Cohen released its follow-up, "The Future", which had dark lyrics and references to political and social unrest.
Cohen returned to music in 2001 with the release of "Ten New Songs", which was a major hit in Canada and Europe. His eleventh album, "Dear Heather", followed in 2004. After a successful string of tours between 2008 and 2010, Cohen released three albums in the final four years of his life: "Old Ideas" (2012), "Popular Problems" (2014) and "You Want It Darker" (2016), the last of which was released three weeks before his death.
Though never married, Cohen had two children: Adam and Lorca with his girlfriend Suzanne Elrod. He was also romantically linked with Marianne Ihlen, Janis Joplin and Rebecca De Mornay.
Cohen died in 7 November 2016 of leukemia and from complications of a fall in his sleep at his home in Los Angeles, aged 82.
His funeral was held on November 10, 2016 in Montreal, at a cemetery on Mount Royal, his congregation Shaar Hashomayim confirmed.
As was his wish, Cohen was laid to rest with a Jewish rite, in a simple pine casket, in a family plot.
Jeff Buckley
Jeffrey Scott "Jeff" Buckley (November 17, 1966 – May 29, 1997) was an American singer and guitarist. His father was Tim Buckley. He was also a musician.
Buckley died after drowning in the Wolf River in Memphis at the age of 30. His body was found on 4 June.
Buckley was born in Anaheim, California. He was the only son of Mary Guibert, a Panama Canal Zonian and Tim Buckley (1947-1975). Buckley is of Greek, French, Irish and Panamanian descent. Buckley was known as Scott "Scotty" Moorhead as a child. This name was based on his middle name and his stepfather's surname. His father died when he was eight years old.
Buckley died at the age of 29 on the evening of May 29, 1997. His death was ruled as an accidental drowning after he went missing after going swimming in the Wolf River Harbor which is a slackwater channel of the Mississippi River. His body was found floating on the surface on 4 June.
Stigmata
Stigmata are marks on a person's body, that are like the wounds Jesus got from being crucified.
They supposedly happen to other religious people like Saint Francis of Assisi, as well as Jesus. The marks include nail holes in the hands and feet, as if the person had been crucified, but without that having happened.
Those who believe in stigmata say that actual nails were not used, but the holes just appear as a miracle. Those who do not believe say it is not a miracle. They have other ways to explain those stories.
Flag of Turkmenistan
The flag of Turkmenistan was adopted on January 24, 2001 as Turkmenistan's national flag. It is often described as the most detailed national flag in the world.
It features a green field with a vertical red stripe near the hoist side, containing five carpet guls (designs used in producing rugs) stacked above two crossed olive branches similar to those on the flag of the United Nations; a white waxing crescent moon, typical of Turkic symbology, and five white five-pointed stars appear in the upper corner of the field just to the fly side of the red stripe.
The green and red colors appear in this flag because they have been venerated historically by the Turkmen. The waxing crescent moon symbolizes the hope of the country for a shining future and the stars represent the five provinces (Welayatlar) of Turkmenistan-Ahal, Balkan, Dashhowuz, Lebap, and Mary.
The five traditional carpet designs along the hoist represent the five major tribes or houses, and form motifs in the country's state emblem and flag. These Turkmen tribes in traditional order (as well as top to bottom) are Teke (Tekke), Yomut (Yomud), Arsary (Ersary), Chowdur (Choudur), and Saryk (Saryq). The Salyr (Salor), a tribe that declined as a result of military defeat before the modern period, are not represented, nor are several smaller tribes or subtribes.
The wreath is one of the odder parts of the flag, added against the rules of heraldry and breaking up the carpet pattern. It was added as an afterthought to represent the "status of permanent neutrality," which was accepted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 12, 1995.
Philolaus
Philolaus (ca. 480 BC – ca. 385 BC, ) was a Greek Pythagorean and Presocratic. He argued that all matter is composed of limited and unlimited things, and that the universe is determined by numbers. He is credited with originating the theory that the earth was not the center of the universe.
Coat of arms of Turkmenistan
The coat of arms of Turkmenistan was created after Turkmenistan gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. The eight-point green starburst (known as the star of Rub El Hizb (۞), a symbol of Islam, to which a majority of Turkmen profess) with golden edges features in its center a red circular disc which carries sheaves of wheat, five carpet guls, and centered upon that a smaller blue circle with a lifelike (rather than heraldized) depiction of an Akhal-Teke horse, a source of pride for the Turkmen people. A variant of the emblem, which included different colors and rounded, was used from 1992 until 2003.
The five traditional carpet motifs on the red disc represent the five major tribes or houses, and stand for the traditional and religious values of the country. These Turkmen tribes in traditional order are Teke (Tekke), Yomut (Yomud), Arsary (Ersary), Chowdur (Choudur), and Saryk (Saryq). The Salyr (Salor), a tribe that declined as a result of military defeat before the modern period, are not represented, nor are several smaller tribes or subtribes.