Newsletter Archive

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Half of of India’s 1.3 billion people defecate in public. The Indian government is building millions of toilets in an effort to end the practice by 2019. The problem is that many Indians think doing their business out in the open is a healthy habit. That’s where a new Bollywood film about a man’s struggle to build a toilet for his wife comes in.

Someone in the US state of Massachusetts won the $759 million Powerball jackpot Wednesday night. If you think lotteries are a newish phenomenon in the United States, think again. Lotteries are a tradition begun by the earliest colonists. Even the folks in charge of Jamestown ran lotteries to fund the colony.

Confederate statues aren’t the only racist monuments in the US, according to some Native Americans who point to numerous tributes to men who participated in atrocities against their ancestors. Recent racially charged violence in Virginia has prompted many American cities to remove or relocate statues related to racism in the United States. Here’s a list of some likenesses Native Americans take offense to, starting with Christopher Columbus.

VIDEO: A battle is brewing in Congress over President Trump’s proposed border wall, which could cost $1.6 billion to build. The US-Mexico barrier would be constructed along the varied terrain of Del Rio, Texas, where VOA takes a ride with the US Border Patrol. The people there who know the area best — from law enforcement to local residents — explain why Trump’s wall is more complicated than Washington realizes.

Some California neighborhoods are tree deserts, despite a 2007 Los Angeles pledge to plant 1 million trees. Millions of California trees are being lost to pests, disease and the kind of construction that leaves little space for nature.

VIDEO: Nature’s splendor is on full view evenings in Tennessee when fireflies in the Smoky Mountains synchronize their lights, which makes for a dazzling light show.

VOA on Facebook: A Muslim model makes waves — and history — by becoming the first-ever contestant in the Miss Universe Great Britain pageant to skip wearing a bikini in what she views as a step forward for all women.