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The stakes in Athens are fierce. The difference between an Olympic gold or silver medal could be a one hundredth of a second on the track or in the pool; an inch on the pole vault or shot put.

The athletes who make the Olympic cut are blessed with the right combination of physical and psychological traits, including an intense competitive drive and an unrelenting determination to be the best. This is the stuff of champions.

Steroids are not just for elite athletes--they can be used by anyone who wants to change his or her body image. The Centers for Disease Control's Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance report shows more than a million youth taking steroids, and the numbers have been rising every year.

Eventhough parachutes seem to have been used in China since the 1100s and that Leonardo da Vinci of Italy had invented devices similar to parachutes nowadays, worldwide skydivers state that the French inventor André-Jacques Garnerin is the one to make the first parachute. In 1797 he jumped from a balloon over Paris using a parachute and kept on making other jumps in France and also in England.

In World War I , that is between 1914 and 1918, the military began using parachutes in their missions

A starving, sick street dog was as part of an exposition in Managua, Nicaragua, in August.  Guillermo Vargas Habacuc found the dog tied up on a street corner in a poor Nicaragua barrio. Guillermo Vargas Habacuc then paid children to catch the dog.  Guillermo Vargas Habacuc then brought it to the 'showing'. The dog was not given food or water and died the dog in a corner of the salon where it died the following day. 

In 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast which is acknowledged today as one of the first Thanksgiving celebrations in the colonies. This harvest meal has become a symbol of cooperation and interaction between English colonists and Native Americans. Although this feast is considered by many to the very first Thanksgiving celebration, it was actually in keeping with a long tradition of celebrating the harvest and giving thanks for a successful bounty of crops. Native American groups throughout the Americas, including the Pueblo, Cherokee, Creek and many others organized harvest festivals, ceremonial dances, and other celebrations of thanks for centuries before the arrival of Europeans in North America. Historians have also recorded other ceremonies of thanks among European settlers in North America, including British colonists in Berkeley Plantation, Virginia. At this site near the Charles River in December of 1619, a group of British settlers led by Captain John Woodlief knelt in prayer and pledged "Thanksgiving" to God for their healthy arrival after a long voyage across the Atlantic. This event has been acknowledged by some scholars and writers as the official first Thanksgiving among European settlers on record. Whether at Plymouth, Berkeley Plantation, or throughout the Americas, celebrations of thanks have held great meaning and importance over time. The legacy of thanks, and particularly of the feast, have survived the centuries as people throughout the United States gather family, friends, and enormous amounts of food for their yearly Thanksgiving meal.

For more than two centuries this policy enabled Japan to enjoy stability and a flowering of its indigenous culture.

During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Japan became a regional power that was able to defeat the forces of both China and Russia.

The economy experienced a major slowdown starting in the 1990s following three decades of unprecedented growth, but Japan still remains a major economic power, both in Asia and globally.