Shizuka Arakawa
is a retired Japanese figure skater. She is the 2006 Olympic champion and the 2004 World champion. Arakawa is the first Japanese skater to win an Olympic gold medal in figure skating and the second Japanese skater to win any Olympic medal in figure skating, after Midori Ito, who won silver in 1992. She is also the second Japanese woman to win a gold medal at the Winter Olympics, following skier Tae Satoya. She was the only Japanese medalist at the 2006 Winter Olympics. Arakawa retired from competitive skating following her Olympic win and began skating professionally in ice shows and exhibitions. She also works as a skating sportscaster for Japanese television. Personal life Arakawa was born in Shinagawa, Tokyo, Japan, and grew up in Sendai and its suburbs. She is the only child of Koichi and Sachi Arakawa and was named Shizuka after Shizuka Gozen. In March 2000, Arakawa enrolled at Waseda University and graduated with a bachelor's degree in social sciences in 2004, whi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Simsbury, Connecticut
Simsbury is a town in Hartford County, Connecticut, United States, incorporated as Connecticut's 21st town in May 1670. The town is part of the Capitol Planning Region. The population was 24,517 in the 2020 census. History Early history At the beginning of the 17th century, the area that would become known as Simsbury as of 1670 was inhabited by indigenous peoples. The Wappinger were one of these groups, composed of eighteen bands that were organized not formally as a tribe, but more akin to an association, like the Delaware. These bands lived between the Hudson and Connecticut rivers. The Wappingers were one of the Algonquian peoples, a linguistic grouping which includes hundreds of tribes. One of the Wappinger bands, the Massaco, lived near, but mostly west of, what became known as the Farmington River, in the area that would become known as Simsbury and Canton, the latter as of 1806. In 1633, Windsor was the second town in Connecticut settled by Europeans and the f ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sapporo, Japan
is a designated city in Hokkaido, Japan. Located in the southwest of Hokkaido, it lies within the alluvial fan of the Toyohira River, a tributary of the Ishikari River. Sapporo is the capital of Hokkaido Prefecture and Ishikari Subprefecture. As of July 31, 2023, the city has a population of 1,959,750, making it the largest city in Hokkaido and the largest north of Tokyo. It is the fifth-most populous city in Japan and is Hokkaido's cultural, economic, and political center. Originally a plain sparsely inhabited by the indigenous Ainu people, there were a few trade posts of the Matsumae domain in the area during the Edo period. The city began as an administrative centre with the establishment of the Hokkaido Development Commission headquarters in 1869. Inspired by the ancient cities of Kyoto and Heijō-kyō, it adopted a grid plan and developed around Odori Park. After the Second World War, it replaced Otaru as Hokkaido's commercial and business hub, and its population surp ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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1972 Winter Olympics
The 1972 Winter Olympics, officially the and commonly known as Sapporo 1972 (), were a winter multi-sport event held from February 3 to 13, 1972, in Sapporo, Hokkaido Prefecture, Japan. It was the first Winter Olympic Games to take place outside Europe and North America. Host city selection Sapporo first won the rights to host the 1940 Winter Olympics, but Japan resigned as the Games' host after its Second Sino-Japanese War, 1937 invasion of China. The 1940 Games were later cancelled. All the cities awarded Games that were cancelled due to war have since hosted the Games (London, Tokyo, Helsinki, Sapporo and Cortina d'Ampezzo). Sapporo competed with Banff, Lahti, and Salt Lake City. The Games were awarded at the 64th IOC Session in Rome, Italy, on April 26, 1966. In preparation, the Japanese constructed new largescale facilities at Sapporo and conducted a trial run a full year in advance of the Games. An international sport week was held in February, 1971, to assess the city' ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hiroshi Nagakubo
is a Japanese former figure skating coach and pair skater. With his skating partner, Kotoe Nagasawa, he became a five-time (1967–1971) Japanese national champion and competed at the 1972 Winter Olympics, placing 16th. After retiring from competition, Nagakubo became a coach at the Howa Sports Land Skating Club in the Aichi Prefecture. He ceased coaching on September 3, 2017, due to family circumstances. During his career, his students included: * Shizuka Arakawa * Ryuju Hino * Takeshi Honda * Rika Hongo * Haruka Imai * Yura Matsuda * Rin Nitaya * Akiko Suzuki. He coached Suzuki from the early 2000s until her retirement in 2014. * Sota Yamamoto * Yuhana Yokoi Yuhana Yokoi (; born May 19, 2000) is a retired Japanese figure skater. She is the 2019 CS Finlandia Trophy bronze medalist and the 2020 Challenge Cup silver medalist. At the junior level, she is the 2018 JGP Armenia bronze medalist, and two-tim ... Competitive highlights ''with Kotoe Nagasawa'' References Ex ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hamster
Hamsters are rodents (order Rodentia) belonging to the subfamily Cricetinae, which contains 19 species classified in seven genera. They have become established as popular small pets. The best-known species of hamster is the golden or Syrian hamster (''Mesocricetus auratus''), which is the type most commonly kept as a pet. Other hamster species commonly kept as pets are the three species of dwarf hamster, Campbell's dwarf hamster (''Phodopus campbelli''), the winter white dwarf hamster (''Phodopus sungorus'') and the Roborovski hamster (''Phodopus roborovskii''), and the less common Chinese hamster (''Cricetulus griseus''). Hamsters feed primarily on seeds, fruits, vegetation, and occasionally burrowing insects. In the wild, they are crepuscular: they forage during the twilight hours. In captivity, however, they are known to live a conventionally nocturnal lifestyle, waking around sundown to feed and exercise. Physically, they are stout-bodied with distinguishing features ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Beanie Babies
Beanie Babies are a line of stuffed toys created by American businessman Ty Warner, who founded Ty Inc. in 1986. The toys are stuffed with plastic pellets ("beans") rather than conventional soft stuffing and come in many different forms, mostly animals. Beanie Babies emerged as a major fad and collectible during the second half of the 1990s. They have been cited as being the world's first Internet sensation. They were collected not only as toys, but also as a financial investment due to their high resale value. History Warner introduced Beanie Babies in 1993 at the North American International Toy Fair/World Toy Fair in New York City, New York. Manufacturing began in 1994, and the toys were first sold in stores in Chicago, Illinois for around 5 U.S. Dollars. There were nine original Beanie Babies: Legs the Frog, Squealer the Pig, Spot the Dog, Flash the Dolphin, Splash the Whale, Chocolate the Moose, Patti the Platypus, Brownie the Bear (later renamed Cubbie), and Pinchers the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Exile (Japanese Band)
Exile (stylized in all caps as EXILE) is a 17-member Japanese boy band. Hiro is the group's leader, who debuted as a member of Zoo under For Life Music, but Exile have released their singles and albums under Avex Group's label Rhythm Zone. Hiro and Avex's president Max Matsuura came from the same high school. In 2003, the six original members of Exile founded the management and entertainment company LDH which has debuted many successful groups and soloists ever since. Exile is the representative group of the company. In total, they have sold over 15,600,000 albums. History Pre-debut The current leader, Hiro, was originally in the pop group Zoo before they split up in 1995. In 1999, he started a new group called J Soul Brothers, which later changed its name to Exile in 2001. (But the name of J Soul Brothers was later revived by Hiro again in 2007 when he helped to form another 7-member group under the new J Soul Brothers moniker.) Debut and second generation Atsushi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Nippon Television
JOAX-DTV (channel 4), branded as (NTV) or Nippon TV, is a Japanese television station serving the Kantō region as the flagship station of the Nippon News Network and the Nippon Television Network System, owned and operated by the , a subsidiary of the certified broadcasting holding company Nippon Television's studios are located in the Shiodome area of Minato, Tokyo, Japan, and its transmitters are located in the Tokyo Skytree. Broadcasting terrestrially across Japan, it is also the first commercial TV station in Japan, and it has been broadcasting on Channel 4 since its inception. Nippon Television is the home of the syndication networks NNN (for news programs) and NNS (for non-news programs). Except for Okinawa Prefecture, these two networks cover the whole of Japan. Nippon Television is one of the ''five private broadcasters based in Tokyo'' and is the first commercial broadcaster in Asia. Nippon Television Holdings is partially owned by the Yomiuri Shimbun Hold ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Mai Kuraki
(born October 28, 1982) is a Japanese pop and R&B singer. After releasing her US debut single " Baby I Like" in 1999, Kuraki signed with Giza Studio and released her Japanese debut single " Love, Day After Tomorrow" in 1999. In 2000, she released her debut album, ''Delicious Way'', which debuted at number-one and sold over 2.2 million copies in its first week. The album has spawned four top-three singles, "Love, Day After Tomorrow", " Stay by My Side", " Secret of My Heart", and "Never Gonna Give You Up". Eventually, the album sold over 3.5 million copies nationwide and became the best-selling album in Japan in 2000, and has been the ninth best-selling album in Japan of all-time. Her second album, ''Perfect Crime'' (2001) debuted atop in Japan and has sold over 1.3 million copies nationwide. After the success in Japan, Kuraki targeted the American market again, with the English-language studio album '' Secret of My Heart'' (2002), however it failed to enter any charts in the U ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Beyoncé
Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter ( ; born September 4, 1981) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and businesswoman. With a career spanning over three decades, she has established herself as one of the most Cultural impact of Beyoncé, culturally significant figures of the 21st century through her vocal ability, musical versatility, and List of Beyoncé live performances, live performances. Credited with revolutionizing the sound of popular music, Beyoncé is often deemed one of the most influential artists of all time.Sources for Beyoncé being one of the most influential artists of all time: * * * * * * * * Beyoncé rose to fame in 1997 as a member of Destiny's Child, one of the List of best-selling girl groups, best-selling girl groups of all time. Her debut solo album, ''Dangerously in Love'' (2003), became one of the List of best-selling albums of the 21st century, best-selling albums of the 21st century, producing the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, ''Billboard'' ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |