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Giorgia Villa Goes Viral over Parmesan Sponsorship Deal after Gymnastics Silver Medal

FILE - Italy's Giorgia Villa competes in the women's uneven bars final during the European Gymnastics Championships in Munich, Germany, Sunday, Aug. 14, 2022. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)
FILE - Italy's Giorgia Villa competes in the women's uneven bars final during the European Gymnastics Championships in Munich, Germany, Sunday, Aug. 14, 2022. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)
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Giorgia Villa Goes Viral over Parmesan Sponsorship Deal after Gymnastics Silver Medal

FILE - Italy's Giorgia Villa competes in the women's uneven bars final during the European Gymnastics Championships in Munich, Germany, Sunday, Aug. 14, 2022. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)
FILE - Italy's Giorgia Villa competes in the women's uneven bars final during the European Gymnastics Championships in Munich, Germany, Sunday, Aug. 14, 2022. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)

Giorgia Villa missed the Tokyo Olympics because of a sprained ankle. At the Paris Games, despite lingering back injuries, the 21-year-old gymnast made history.
With their silver medal behind the Simone Biles-led US team's gold, Angela Andreoli, Alice D’Amato, Manila Esposito, Elisa Iorio and Villa matched Italy’s best result in Olympic gymnastics, a feat the country achieved in 1928.
It was Italy's first medal in 96 years in the women’s team final, and Villa contributed to that with a score of 13.766 on uneven bars.
But it wasn’t that solid performance that made her a social media sensation. It's her previous role as an ambassador for Parmigiano Reggiano cheese that has put her in the spotlight.
Immediately after the final on Tuesday, images of a 2021 advertising campaign showing Villa in a leotard next to a giant wheel of the hard, grainy cheese, one hand resting on a large chunk of it, began to circulate on social networks. It has not stopped, The Associated Press reported.
“Olympic silver medalist Giorgia Villa sponsored by Parmigiano Reggiano: could it be more Italian than this?” one user asked in a message accompanied with pictures of the gymnast tumbling over a wheel of cheese and doing a big split over four of them.
Sport Consultants Impresa e Sport said Villa, who also was part of the team that ended Italy’s 69-year medal wait in the women’s team event at the 2019 world championships by winning bronze, was named ambassador for the cheese in 2021.
“Since I was a child I’ve always loved this amazing product, a symbol of excellence and Italian culture,” Villa said when the sponsorship deal kicked off. According to Italian media, the deal ended in 2022.
Parmigiano Reggiano is no stranger to working with top Italian athletes including tennis player Jannik Sinner, former NBA player Nico Mannion, Paralympic swimmer Giulia Ghiretti and fencer Matteo Neri.
Villa, who started doing gymnastics when she was 3 years old, could not compete in the all-around because of her back problems.

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Varieties

Two Holy Mosques Exhibition Welcomes Visitors for Founding Day Celebrations

The exhibition is open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 1:30 a.m - SPA
The exhibition is open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 1:30 a.m - SPA
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Two Holy Mosques Exhibition Welcomes Visitors for Founding Day Celebrations

The exhibition is open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 1:30 a.m - SPA
The exhibition is open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 1:30 a.m - SPA

In celebration of the Kingdom’s Founding Day, the Exhibition of the Two Holy Mosques Architecture in Makkah is welcoming visitors to explore a comprehensive historical journey.

The exhibition presents the evolution of the Two Holy Mosques through rare artifacts, historical photographs, and documentation of successive Saudi expansions, according to SPA.

The halls highlight the Kingdom’s long-standing dedication to serving the Two Holy Mosques. They combine heritage and modern technology to present the architectural development of Islam’s holiest sites.

The exhibition is open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 1:30 a.m.

Varieties

Photos Show Filming of Ramadan TV Drama Series on the War-scarred Streets of Syria's Aleppo

Extras stand by as a television crew films an episode of the TV series “Al-Souriyoun al-Aada” (“The Syrian Enemies”), based on a novel of the same name that was banned under Bashar Assad, along a transformed street in central Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
Extras stand by as a television crew films an episode of the TV series “Al-Souriyoun al-Aada” (“The Syrian Enemies”), based on a novel of the same name that was banned under Bashar Assad, along a transformed street in central Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
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Photos Show Filming of Ramadan TV Drama Series on the War-scarred Streets of Syria's Aleppo

Extras stand by as a television crew films an episode of the TV series “Al-Souriyoun al-Aada” (“The Syrian Enemies”), based on a novel of the same name that was banned under Bashar Assad, along a transformed street in central Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
Extras stand by as a television crew films an episode of the TV series “Al-Souriyoun al-Aada” (“The Syrian Enemies”), based on a novel of the same name that was banned under Bashar Assad, along a transformed street in central Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)

Ramadan in the Arab world is a month of fasting and prayer by day — and television by night. For decades, families have gathered after the iftar, the evening meal that breaks the daytime fast, to follow the season’s highly anticipated drama series, produced specially to air during the Islamic holy month.

In the week before Ramadan, a television crew in central Aleppo was busy preparing one of those productions, with a battered street in the historic city transformed into a scene from decades past.

Lamees Al-Ali, an extra in the series, poses for a photograph during the filming of an episode of the TV series “Al-Souriyoun al-Aada” (“The Syrian Enemies”), based on a novel of the same name that was banned under Bashar Assad, along a transformed street in central Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)

Classic 1970s cars lined the curb. A horse-drawn cart rolled through the frame. A vendor in a red tarboush, a brimless cone-shaped hat, stood beside steaming pots of sahlep — a sweet, thickened milk drink flavored with spices and associated with winter evenings.

Just outside the camera’s view stood a stark reminder of Syria's more recent history. Collapsed buildings and damaged facades testified to Aleppo’s role as a major battleground during the country's civil war. However, with costumes, props and careful framing, the production temporarily carried the street back to what it portrays as a more innocent era, according to The AP news.

A television crew films an episode of the TV series “Al-Souriyoun al-Aada” (“The Syrian Enemies”), based on a novel of the same name that was banned under Bashar Assad, along a transformed street in central Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026.(AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)

The series being filmed — “Al-Souriyoun al-Aada,” or “The Syrian Enemies” — is based on a novel that was banned during the rule of former President Bashar Assad. The story examines painful chapters of Syria’s past, including the 1982 events in Hama, when government forces crushed an uprising led by the Muslim Brotherhood, killing or disappearing an estimated 10,000 to 40,000 people and leaving the city in ruins.

As filming continues into Ramadan, the production reflects both a cherished seasonal tradition and Syria’s complex, layered history.

Varieties

How Bomb Cyclones Form and Create Dangerous Conditions 

A man works in a snowstorm, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026, in New York. (AP)
A man works in a snowstorm, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026, in New York. (AP)
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How Bomb Cyclones Form and Create Dangerous Conditions 

A man works in a snowstorm, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026, in New York. (AP)
A man works in a snowstorm, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026, in New York. (AP)

When turbulent weather with whipping winds and heavy snow is in the forecast, meteorologists sometimes warn that a storm could “bomb out” or become a bomb cyclone. But what exactly does this mean?

According to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, certain storms undergo bombogenesis, which happens when a storm’s central pressure drops at least 24 millibars in 24 hours. These storms are sometimes called bomb cyclones. Storm intensity is measured by central pressure, so the lower the pressure, the stronger the storm.

Such rapidly strengthening storms are capable of producing heavy rain, blizzard conditions and intense winds that can create dangerous conditions such as downed trees and power outages.

“If you’re watching TV at night and the weather report comes on and you’re hearing ‘bomb cyclone’ being used, that usually means there’s quite a bit of active weather going on,” said Andrew Orrison, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in College Park, Maryland.

Bomb cyclones can happen in any season, but mainly occur during fall and winter when frigid air from the Arctic can creep south and clash with warmer air masses.

“It’s really the clash of those air masses that really kind of helps to generate the areas of low pressure in the first place,” said Orrison.

Regions in North America that are prone to seeing bomb cyclones include Alaska, the Pacific Northwest and the Great Lakes region.