Dama

Dama or DAMA may refer to:

Animals

Business, science and technology

Culture

Geography

Dama, Syria

Dama (Arabic: داما‎) is a village in the As-Suwayda Governorate of southwest Syria. It is located in the heart of the Lejah lava plateau, 29 km north west of the city of As-Suwayda. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics, Dama had a population of 1,799 in the 2004 census.

History

Dama and neighboring villages are thought to be the place where Saint Paul took refuge after escaping from Damascus.

The village, like most of the villages in Jabal ad-Druze, was an old Roman location. Many of its houses are still in their original condition. The inhabitants are mostly Druze and their main occupation is agriculture.

In 1596 Dama appeared in the Ottoman tax registers as part of the nahiya of Bani Abdullah in the Qada of Hauran. It had an entirely Muslim population consisting of 74 households and 28 bachelors. Taxes were paid on wheat, barley, summer crops, goats and/or beehives.

Dama played a major role in the late stages of the Great Syrian Revolution (1925-1927). It hosted the important Dama Convention which resulted in the refusal of French proposals and the collapse of negotiations between the Druze rebels and the French. It was also the site of some of the last battles in the revolution fought by guerrilla groups led by Emir Adel Arslan.

Fallow deer

The fallow deer (Dama dama) is a ruminant mammal belonging to the family Cervidae. This common species is native to western Eurasia, but has been introduced to South Africa, Fernando Pó, São Tomé, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mayotte, Réunion, Seychelles, Comoro Islands, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Cyprus, Cape Verde, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, United States, the Falkland Islands and Peru. It often includes the rarer Persian fallow deer as a subspecies (D. d. mesopotamica), while others treat it as an entirely different species (D. mesopotamica).

Description

The male fallow deer is known as a buck, the female is a doe, and the young a fawn. Adult bucks are 140–160 cm (55–63 in) long with a 85–95 cm (33–37 in) shoulder height, and typically 60–100 kg (130–220 lb) in weight; does are 130–150 cm (51–59 in) long with a 75–85 cm (30–33 in) shoulder height, and 30–50 kg (66–110 lb) in weight. The largest bucks may measure 190 cm (75 in) long and weigh 150 kg (330 lb). Fawns are born in spring at about 30 cm (12 in) and weigh around 4.5 kg (9.9 lb). The life span is around 12–16 years.

April (1998 film)

April (Italian: Aprile) is a 1998 Italian semi-autobiographical film directed by Nanni Moretti. Moretti also played the central character, a filmmaker who has to deal with Italy's political situation, his own goals as an artist and becoming a father.

"He wants to make a musical comedy but he can't get started. So instead he talks about his life, his new baby, his desires and fears. Finally in the very last scene he begins."

Moretti's wife, son and mother appear as themselves.

Plot

Following the general election of 1994, won by the centre-right coalition led by Silvio Berlusconi, Moretti is encouraged by a journalist friend to make a documentary about the current political situation in Italy. Two years pass, another election is held and Moretti makes no progress with his documentary. He begins shooting another project, (alluded to in Dear Diary) a musical about a Trotskyist pastry chef set in the 1950s, but becomes disillusioned and distracted by his wife Silvia’s pregnancy, which preoccupies him more and more. His son Pietro is born and the centre-left coalition Ulivo wins the election. He continues to try to shoot his documentary in Venice and Puglia but the film is never finished. On his forty-fourth birthday he realises that he must stop hesitating and he finally begins shooting his musical in earnest.

Liberation Day (Italy)

Italy's Liberation Day (Festa della Liberazione), also known as the Anniversary of the Liberation (Anniversario della liberazione d'Italia), Anniversary of the Resistance (anniversario della Resistenza), or simply April 25 is a national Italian holiday commemorating the end of the Italian Civil War and the end of Nazi occupation of the country during World War II.

History

The date was chosen by convention, as it was the day when the National Liberation Committee of Upper Italy (CLNAI) officially proclaimed the insurgency in a radio announcement, announcing the seizure of power by the CLNAI and the death sentence for all fascist leaders (including Benito Mussolini, who was shot three days later).

By May 1, all of northern Italy was liberated, including Bologna (April 21), Genoa (April 23), Milan and Turin (April 25), and Venice (April 28). The liberation put an end to twenty years of fascist dictatorship and five years of war. It symbolically represents the beginning of the historical journey which led to the referendum of June 2, 1946, when Italians opted for an end to the monarchy and the creation of the Italian Republic, which was followed by the adoption of the republic's Constitution of Italy in 1947.