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PFS

PFS may refer to:

Medicine

 * Patellofemoral syndrome, a type of knee disorder
 * Prefilled syringe, a syringe with a predetermined dosage of medication
 * Prefrontal synthesis, in neurology, the conscious purposeful process of synthesizing novel mental images
 * Progression-free survival, time without tumor progression in oncology
 * Post-finasteride syndrome, a term associated with adverse effects that persist beyond the discontinuation of the medication finasteride

Organisations

 * Premium Fulfilment Services (PFS Group), National provider of 3PL solutions with operating companies in the US, UK and EU.
 * Penang Free School, a well-recognized English school in Malaysia, in the state of Penang
 * Philadelphia Folksong Society, a Philadelphia organization promoting folk music
 * Princeton Friends School, a coeducational Quaker school in Princeton Township, New Jersey
 * Property and Freedom Society, an organization devoted to the promotion of property rights

Finance

 * Personal finance society, a professional body for financial advisors in the United Kingdom
 * Personal Financial Specialist, a financial planning credential granted by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants
 * Primerica Financial Services, an independent financial services company in North America

Technology

 * Perfect forward secrecy, a property in cryptography
 * pfs:Write, an early PC word processor
 * Planetary Fourier Spectrometer, an infrared spectrometer used by European Space Agency on their Venus Express Mission
 * Playstation File System, the filesystem used on the PlayStation 2 hard drive
 * Professional File System, a third-party filesystem used on the Amiga
 * PlaysForSure, a marketing certification given by Microsoft to media players
 * Prepare for Shipment, a status which indicates products are ready for shipment from Apple Online Store
 * Pre-Feasibility Study, an important preliminary study to determine if a mining project is economically feasible

Other

 * Peace and Friendship Stadium, an Indoor sports Arena in Piraeus, Athens, Greece
 * Picture Frame Seduction, a Welsh punk rock band
 * Port security (Port Facility Security)
 * Pha̍k-fa-sṳ, an orthography designed for the Hakka Chinese language
 * Puta falta de sacanagem, an expression related to the Brazilian rock band Restart

title: PFS


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Dublin County Council

Dublin County Council (Comhairle Contae Bhaile Átha Cliath) was a local authority for the administrative county of County Dublin in Ireland.

History
The county council was established on 1 April 1899 under the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898 for the administrative county of County Dublin. Its headquarters were established at 10–11 Parnell Square in 1900 but, due to the cramped conditions, it transferred to 46–49 O'Connell Street, Dublin City in 1975.

In 1985, County Dublin was divided into three electoral counties: Dublin–Belgard (South Dublin from 1991) to the southwest, Dublin–Fingal (Fingal from 1991) to the north, and Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown to the southeast. At the 1985 local election and the 1991 local election, the election was held within these electoral counties.

On 1 January 1994, under the Local Government (Dublin) Act 1993, County Dublin, the County Council and the Corporation of Dún Laoghaire were abolished, and the electoral counties each became administrative counties. Dublin County Council was succeeded by the councils of:
 * Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown County Council
 * Fingal County Council
 * South Dublin County Council

The city of Dublin has been administered separately from the county since before the establishment of the county council. Its local authority is Dublin City Council, styled Dublin Corporation until 2002.

The archives of Dublin County Council are held at Fingal Local Studies & Archives.

Legacy
Both the Parnell Square property and the O'Connell Street property were transferred to the Fingal County Council on the abolition of Dublin County Council. These offices were a key location in the events described in the Mahon Tribunal – a tribunal which inquired into re-zoning and planning irregularities in the 1980s in County Dublin.

From 1994 to 2014, the Dublin Regional Authority served as a coordinating body for the area which had been administered by Dublin County Council, as well as that of Dublin City Council. The area is now part of the Eastern and Midland Regional Assembly.

Motto
The motto on its coat of arms was Beart do réir ár mbriathar in Irish which means Action to match our speech.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Dublin County Council


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While You Were Out

While You Were Out is an American reality series that aired episodes on the cable channel TLC. The format of the show is similar to TLC's Trading Spaces (which, in turn, is based on the BBC TV series Changing Rooms). While You Were Out adds a suspenseful gimmick by keeping the entire redecoration a secret from the homeowner.

The series was revived in 2019, as a collaboration between TLC and new sister network HGTV.

Premise of show
The series began with the following premise: An individual sets up a friend or family member with a surprise room redecoration. A typical example of an episode would be a wife who wants to surprise her husband by having the living room redone. The person being set up is sent out of the house for two days on a phony premise, such as a vacation.

While the person is out, the friend or family member with the help of a designer redecorates one room in the house, though gardens have also been made over. The initial budget for the makeover was U.S. $1000, later raised to $1500, and then $2000.

The designers must work with the homeowner to come up with a design, shop for supplies and redecorate the selected area within a 32-hour time frame, though during the beginning of the show's run, the designers designed a room, and it was a surprise to the helping homeowner/friend when the host and designer showed up on the first day. While the redecoration is in progress, a "secret shooter" trails the person who has been sent out of the house and tapes an interview with the unsuspecting person. The footage is then used for the purpose of quizzing the spouse, friend or relative at home. If the person who sets up the individual answers the questions correctly, they will win a prize that further enhances the room's décor.

At the end of the show, the person being surprised returns home to the redecoration, and their reaction is recorded. The surprised person is then quizzed for the opportunity to win a further prize.

One of the aspects that made both Trading Spaces and While You Were Out stand apart from previous home renovation shows was that they openly depicted conflict between the cast, crew and homeowners. These conflicts were usually fairly friendly, but sometimes devolved into rather bitter arguments. While You Were Out, in particular, revealed many personality quirks of both the cast and guests.

On some occasions, the individual to be surprised disliked the redesign of the home. Teresa Strasser's final episode has become infamous for just this reason. The homeowner returned to find that his deck had a large hole in it, and subsequently launched into a lengthy tirade while his wife wept.

The premise of the show evolved somewhat as the series progressed (see below for details).

History
During season 1 there were four quizzes. The individual who was arranging the surprise (referred to as the "homeowner") for their loved one had to answer three of the quizzes. For each quiz there was a "booby prize" in case the homeowner failed the quiz. Normally the "booby prize" was a fun, toy version of the real thing (for example, a globe pencil sharpener instead of a real globe). The show was first hosted by Anna Bocci, who swiftly departed and was replaced by actress and writer Teresa Strasser, who remained for the rest of the first season. Strasser never considered herself terribly handy but compensated with her empathy for the homeowners—their travails drove her to tears on several occasions—and a sometimes dark sense of humor. During the Strasser era, the humorously "sneaky" aspect of the show was stressed, and many episodes began with Strasser and the designer hiding in a van or a neighbor's house early in the morning and observing the departure of the unsuspecting makeover subject.

At the beginning of season 2, Evan Farmer came aboard as host. An actor, singer and former boyband member, Farmer was much more high-energy than Strasser and was a skilled carpenter in his own right. While Strasser's humor had been verbal, Farmer tended more toward physical comedy. Farmer also enjoyed a teasing relationship with the show's designers and carpenters: where Strasser tended to lead with a nervous, mother-hen approach, Farmer was likely to chide the crew for wasting time or for their personal quirks such as Jason Cameron's sideline as a bodybuilder. New music and some new graphics were introduced, the quizzes were reduced to three, and booby prizes were eliminated. The homeowner only had to answer two quizzes, and the unsuspecting person would answer the third quiz. The third quiz question was always the same: Why did the homeowner want to do the room makeover for their loved one? Only once did an unsuspecting person get the answer wrong and lose the prize.

Both Strasser and Farmer had considerable difficulty letting guests lose prizes; on more than one occasion, they would offer "hints" so obvious that they essentially gave the prize away.

In the beginning of season 3, the budget was raised to $2,000 and quizzes kept the same. Toward the end of season 3, the quizzes and secret shooter were eliminated entirely. The homeowners also became more involved in the designing of the room.

Originally during the first season, once the rooms were finished, the carpenters drove away with the show's work truck, leaving only Strasser and the designer to greet the subjects and get their reactions. During one episode, however, the build ran so long that the carpenters were not able to leave (although the truck was hidden to avoid ruining the surprise), and they participated in the final reveal. Since then, the format changed so that once everything was finished, the truck was driven away and the carpenters were present at the reveals, allowing them to see the reactions and accept the subjects' thanks themselves.

Season 4 was the show's final season, with the concluding episode airing on August 5, 2006. The final episode was beset with problems, including illnesses on set and Farmer's flight not arriving until the final day of the shoot. The episode ended without an obvious acknowledgment that it was the series finale, although Farmer did passingly refer to the final scene as "the end of the era" and designer John Bruce addressed the camera in close up to say, "Thank You, While You Were Out."

Due to the success of the show in Latin America, Mientras No Estabas was created for the Discovery En Español channel. The show's name is a literal translation of While You Were Out and is hosted by Arturo.

In October 2018, building upon its successful revival of sister series Trading Spaces, as well as Discovery's recent acquisition of Scripps Networks Interactive, it was announced that TLC and HGTV had jointly ordered a revived, fifth season of While You Were Out. The new season, which premiered March 16, 2019, featured teams representing personalities associated with TLC, and personalities associated with HGTV and DIY Network. New episodes aired simultaneously on both channels, with TLC airing a cut of the episode focusing on the participants and their personal lives (as with the original series), and HGTV airing a cut of the episode that featured a larger focus on the renovation process.

Other variations
Over the series, the producers have created different formats of the show including:

 * Bringing in designers or carpenters from Trading Spaces (and vice versa—the carpenters from While You Were Out have made several appearances on Trading Spaces)
 * Having "on the fly" designs in which the designer does not see the room until the day before the makeover begins, although the carpenters and host are sometimes allowed to see it early. Late in the series run, they started filming the carpenters and designers shopping for supplies on what is called day 0 (the day before general taping).
 * Remaking a room with a celebrity guest. These guests have included Penn Jillette (for his partner, Teller), Shannon Elizabeth (for her then-husband), Miss Alabama 2003 Catherine Crosby (for her then-boyfriend), and football player LaVar Arrington, for his brother.
 * In 2004, the series aired a crossover with another TLC series, What Not to Wear, billed as Double Crossed, in which the surprisee secretly received a makeover from the show while the home was being worked on.
 * Royal Renovation: An entire home was redecorated; the episode featured 3 designers: Nadia Gellar, John Bruce and Chayse Dacoda, celebrity guest Stacy "Fergie" Ferguson and a budget of $10,000.
 * For one episode shot near Atlantic City NJ. the home owner allowed Farmer, designer Chase Dacoda and the day's carpenters to gamble with $500 of the budget money the day before investing any winnings into the makeover, the crew raised another $300 making the budget for that makeover $1,800.
 * Some members of the on camera cast have swapped their typical roles, Farmer himself served as designer in one episode (designer John Bruce served as host in the interim), carpenter/seamstress Leslie Segrete and carpenter Andrew Dan-Jumbo have also taken turns as designer on different episodes (designer Mark Montano filled in as seamstress for Leslie, while designer John Bruce filled in as carpenter for Dan-Jumbo).

Cast
A list of the crew is as follows:

Hosts

 * Evan Farmer (season 2 - 4)
 * Teresa Strasser (season 1, episodes 11-60)
 * Anna Bocci (season 1, episodes 1-10)

Designers

 * John Bruce (decorator) (season 1 - 4)
 * Chayse Dacoda (season 1 - 4)
 * Nadia Geller (season 2 - 4)
 * Lauren Lake (season 1)
 * Mark Montano (season 2 - 4)
 * Christy Schlesinger (season 1)
 * Stephen Saint-Onge (seasons 1 - 2)

Landscape designers

 * Peter BonSey (season 1)
 * Mayita Dinos (season 1)

Carpenters

 * Ali Barone (season 2 - 3)
 * Jason Cameron (season 2 - 4)
 * Andrew Dan-Jumbo (season 1 - 4)
 * Troy Dunn (season 1)
 * Jennifer Ann Halpern (season 1)
 * Adrienne Haitz (season 1)
 * Jaqui Jameson (season 1)
 * Leslie Segrete (season 1 - 4)

Host

 * Ananda Lewis

Designers
For the revival, designers from TLC's Trading Spaces and various HGTV and DIY Network shows will work as teams of two. The teams are as follows:

TLC

 * Carter Oosterhouse and Sabrina Soto
 * Doug Wilson and Kahi Lee
 * Frank Bielec and Vern Yip
 * Hildi Santo-Tomas and Ty Pennington

HGTV/DIY Network

 * Bristol and Aubrey Marunde (Flip or Flop Vegas)
 * David Visentin and Hilary Farr (Love It or List It)
 * Karen E. Laine and Mina Starsiak (Good Bones)
 * Nicole Curtis (Rehab Addict) and Rob “Vanilla Ice” Van Winkle (The Vanilla Ice Project)

Carpenters

 * Eric Griffin
 * Jordan Thompson

title: While You Were Out


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Marine reptile

[[Image:Modern-marine-reptiles-001.jpg|thumb|Reptiles that live in the sea:

 * Saltwater crocodile (top left)

 * Sea turtle (top right)

 * Marine iguana (bottom left)

 * Sea snake (bottom right)]]

Marine reptiles are reptiles which have become secondarily adapted for an aquatic or semiaquatic life in a marine environment. Only about 100 of the 12,000 extant reptile species and subspecies are classed as marine reptiles, including marine iguanas, sea snakes, sea turtles, and saltwater crocodiles.

The earliest marine reptile was Mesosaurus (not to be confused with Mosasaurus), which arose in the Permian period of the Paleozoic era. During the Mesozoic era, many groups of reptiles became adapted to life in the seas, including such familiar clades as the ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs (these two orders were once thought united in the group "Enaliosauria", a classification now cladistically obsolete), mosasaurs, nothosaurs, placodonts, sea turtles, thalattosaurs and thalattosuchians. Most marine reptile groups became extinct at the end of the Cretaceous period, but some still existed during the Cenozoic, most importantly the sea turtles. Other Cenozoic marine reptiles included the bothremydids, palaeophiid snakes, a few choristoderes such as Simoedosaurus and dyrosaurid crocodylomorphs. Various types of marine gavialid crocodilians remained widespread as recently as the Late Miocene.

Some marine reptiles, such as ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, metriorhynchid thalattosuchians, and mosasaurs became so well adapted to a marine lifestyle that they were incapable of venturing onto land and gave birth in the water. Others, such as sea turtles and saltwater crocodiles, return to shore to lay their eggs. Some marine reptiles also occasionally rest and bask on land.

Extant (living) varieties

 * Sea turtles: there are seven extant species of sea turtles, which live mostly along the tropical and subtropical coastlines, though some do migrate long distances and have been known to travel as far north as Scandinavia. Sea turtles are largely solitary animals, though some do form large, though often loosely connected groups during nesting season. Although only seven turtle species are truly marine, many more dwell in brackish waters.
 * Sea snakes: the most abundant of the marine reptiles, there are over 60 different species of sea snakes. They inhabit the tropical and subtropical waters of the Indian and Pacific oceans, though very limited reports of sightings suggest they may be extending into the Atlantic Ocean. Sea snakes are venomous and their bites have been known to be fatal, though generally they only bite when provoked and often inject only a very small, non-fatal quantity of venom. Sea snakes are distinguished from terrestrial snakes by a vertically flattened tail.
 * Marine iguana: marine iguanas live only on the Galápagos Islands and are not fully adapted to marine life. Although they feed exclusively on marine plants and spend a good deal of their time in the water, they do nest on land and need to bask in the sun to reach their ideal body temperature; they are thus also subject to terrestrial predators.
 * Saltwater and American crocodiles: none of the extant species of crocodiles are truly marine; however, the saltwater crocodile (Crocodylus porosus) does display adaptations to saltwater inhabitation and dwells in the brackish waters of Southeast Asia and Australia. Saltwater crocodiles dispose of excess salt in their bodies through specialized salt glands. These are the largest species of crocodile, also making them the largest reptiles. They can grow up to six meters in length. American crocodiles (Crocodylus acutus) similarly prefer brackish over freshwater habitats.

Extinct groups

 * Ichthyosaurs were marine reptiles with a dolphin-like body shape that flourished during the Mesozoic era.
 * Sauropterygians were a diverse group of aquatic reptiles adapted for flipper-based aquatic locomotion. This group included the plesiosaurs, nothosaurs, and placodonts.
 * Mosasaurs were a group of large, aquatic squamates (relatives of modern-day lizards and snakes) which became the dominant marine predators towards the end of the Cretaceous period.
 * Thalattosaurs were a group of aquatic or semiaquatic marine reptiles of uncertain placement within the diapsid clade. One subgroup, the thalattosauroids, are known for their unusual downturned snouts and crushing dentition.
 * Mesosaurs were quite possibly the first fully aquatic reptilian animals and the only group known from the Paleozoic, though they are technically not true reptiles in the sense of not being part of the diapsid group. Taxonomic placement either puts these Permian animals resembling long-snouted lizards with newt-like tails either as members of Parareptilia or as a type of Synapsid.
 * Thalattosuchians were marine crocodylomorphs that flourished during the Jurassic era.

Conservation
Most species of marine reptiles are considered endangered to some degree. All but one species of sea turtles are endangered due to destruction of nesting habitats on coastal lands, exploitation, and marine fishing; many species of sea snakes are threatened or endangered due to commercial exploitation (sale of skins) and pollution especially in Asia; marine iguanas are threatened due to their very limited habitation range. Saltwater crocodiles are at low risk for extinction.

title: Marine reptile


text:
Jim Verraros

James Conrad Verraros (born February 8, 1983) is an American singer, songwriter, and actor, who placed ninth on the first season of American Idol. Raised by deaf parents, he is fluent in American Sign Language and gained notoriety on American Idol for signing the lyrics to his audition song. After competing on the series, he released three pop rock, dance albums with music producer and songwriter Gabe Lopez. Verraros was also featured on the 2002 compilation album American Idol: Greatest Moments, covering "Easy" by the Commodores – this album reached number four on the Billboard 200 chart.

While participating in the 2002 American Idols LIVE! tour, Verraros came out as gay. He was the first American Idol finalist to come out, and he remained the series' only publicly gay finalist for over three years. Several organizations subsequently honored Verraros as an influential figure within the gay community (such as Out magazine, which named him to its "Most Intriguing People" list twice, first in 2002 and again in 2006). Throughout his music career, Verraros performed at numerous pride events. He also toured at gay clubs.

Verraros released his official debut album, Rollercoaster, through independent label Koch Records in 2005. It was accompanied by two singles and received generally positive reviews. Some of the songs from Rollercoaster had previously been featured on a demo album, Unsaid and Understood, which Verraros had self-released through mp3.com around 2003. The lead single from Rollercoaster, "You Turn It On", peaked at number twenty-one on the Billboard Dance Club Play Chart.

In addition to music, Verraros pursued an acting career. He had a starring role in the first two installments of the gay comedy film franchise Eating Out, and he had a cameo in Another Gay Movie. He also stayed involved with American Idol-related projects for several years. In 2003, he joined with various finalists from the first two seasons of the series for a promotional tour of select shopping malls throughout the United States, and later, he co-hosted a video recap series of American Idol ' s seventh season for AfterElton.com.

In 2007, Verraros released a non-album single about his then-to-be husband, Bill Brennan; the song, "You Make It Better", was featured in the second Eating Out film. Verraros and Brennan married in 2009. The same year as his wedding, Verraros self-released three new singles, although the accompanying second album, Do Not Disturb, was not released until 2011. Following Do Not Disturb, Verraros announced his intention to retire from music. He subsequently served as executive vice president of Brennan's organization, Bridal Expo Chicago and Bridal Expo Milwaukee. Verraros and Brennan have since separated.

Early life
Verraros was born on February 8, 1983, in Mount Prospect, Illinois. He grew up in nearby Crystal Lake. His father, Nicholas, and mother, Debbie, both lost their hearing after contracting German measles as infants. Verraros was raised to be fluent in American Sign Language. The responsibility of interpreting for his parents as a child led him to relate with people older than himself, more than he did with others his own age. Reflecting on his childhood, Verraros once said, "I had to do things like hold phone conversations and discuss things with doctors and even real estate agents. I had to become well-versed not only with sign language but with people skills as well...I didn't have time for bullshit."

Around the age of twelve or thirteen, Verraros realized that he is gay. Although he did not come out publicly until after adolescence, his sexual orientation was apparent to his classmates, who bullied him during middle school. In response, Verraros developed a more masculine appearance. In a 2003 interview, he said of the time, "I changed my image. I wore a lot of baggy jeans, I gained weight, and it was fine for a while." He also sought help from the school psychologist during those years. High school marked a more significant improvement for him – he became active in theater and went on to attend Monmouth College on a theater scholarship.

Upon later transferring to Columbia College, Verraros struggled to find acting opportunities. Insecure about the weight that he had put on, he began doing intensive workouts and became a vegetarian. Over the course of two and a half months, he lost around eighty pounds. Some people thought that he had developed an eating disorder, and Verraros later acknowledged that he most likely did.

Verraros was open about his sexual orientation with classmates at both colleges. Looking back in 2004, he said that people who had been mean to him in high school were "rooting" for him at Monmouth and that he came out to his mother and sister during this time. In another interview, he called the environment at Columbia "beyond gay-friendly".

American Idol
During his time at Columbia College, Verraros followed a friend's suggestion to try out for American Idol and attended the auditions in Chicago – even though his primary interest was acting. Verraros later said that he had only tried out "for fun" and without any expectations. In 2006, he reminisced, "I wasn't really looking for a record deal. I was looking for the experience, and everything just kind of... happened." The auditions were held only a few blocks away from his college dorm.

Attempting to stand out, Verraros chose to sing "When I Fall in Love" by Nat King Cole at his audition, rather than a pop song. He was nineteen at the time. While singing, he also signed the lyrics to his song. American Idol heavily focused on his parents' disabilities, and several publications speculated that Verraros may have been helped in the competition by sympathy votes.

Despite receiving positive remarks from the judges at his audition, Verraros began receiving largely negative feedback by the Top 30 semi-finals. Placed into Group 1 for that round he chose to reprise "When I Fall in Love". Simon Cowell and Paula Abdul both called this the best performance that Verraros had given on the series up to that point, but Cowell also called Verraros "ordinary" in comparison to that night's preceding performer, Tamyra Gray, and declared, "I think if you win this competition, we would have failed." Jessica Shaw of Entertainment Weekly called this the harshest critique that Cowell had given to any contestant on the series up to that point. First season co-host Brian Dunkleman recalled in a 2014 podcast overhearing the judges say that they were going to "nail Jim" on the night of the semi-finals. After the performance, Dunkleman offered Verraros reassurance, but during a commercial break, the series' executive producer, Nigel Lythgoe, purportedly took Dunkleman backstage and raged against him for not further demoralizing Verraros. Dunkleman recounted this as a partial explanation for why he quit the series after its first season.

Phil Rosenthal of the Chicago Sun-Times speculated that the severity of Cowell's comments during the semi-finals may have increased audience support for Verraros, who was voted through to the top ten. Originally, Verraros was going to be cut anyway. In his 2011 tell-all book, American Idol: The Untold Story, Richard Rushfield revealed that a "judge's cut" was going to be introduced as a twist to the semi-finals. After the Group 1 results episode went off air, Cowell went to the three contestants who had been voted through to the finals and told Verraros that the judges were overruling his advancement to the next round. Rushfield wrote that "A stunned Verraros and his fellow contestants burst into tears" upon hearing the announcement. Before the twist could be aired, Lythgoe reversed the decision, arguing that the audience's preference should be respected. In 2020, Lythoe and Verraros spoke together on a podcast and shared their own memories of the "judge's cut", clarifying that it actually occurred on the performance night rather than the results night.

His place in the top ten secure, Verraros planned to sing "Get Ready" by The Temptations for the first round of finals. The week's theme was Motown. Verraros won a coin toss against Kelly Clarkson, who also wanted to sing "Get Ready", but he switched course upon considering how much of the song is in falsetto. With a limited selection of Motown songs available for him to choose from, Verraros settled on "Easy" by The Commodores, even though he was unfamiliar with it. The judges were critical of the performance. Two contestants were voted off that week, and Verraros was the second eliminated, following EJay Day.

Public response
When Verraros advanced into the top ten for American Idol ' s first season, Shaw (of Entertainment Weekly) wrote of the contestant, "I can't decide whether I love him or loathe him." She likened Verraros to a forgettable boy-band member, but also wrote that she had appreciated Verraros' decision to use sign language during his audition. After Verraros was voted off the series, Shaw wrote of him, "I genuinely felt bad for the guy...Of course, I could have told you all that he wasn't advancing on to the next round. You can't follow up stellar singers like Tamyra and Justin [Guarini] with a tepid rendition of 'Easy.'" Jim Derogatis of the Chicago Sun-Times was more favorable. After watching all of the top ten finalists perform on their nationwide tour, he suggested that Verraros should have placed seventh and commended him for "doing as well as anyone could" with poor singing-material (referring to "Easy"). Another positive review of Verraros came from Rick Shefchik of the Saint Paul Pioneer Press, who wrote that Verraros sang a "tender version" of "When I Fall in Love" during the competition. Most critics, however, voiced negative opinions. Amy Amatangelo of the Boston Herald wrote that Verraros "lacked stage presence" and Eric Deggans of St. Petersburg Times called Verraros "obviously overmatched" among the other first season finalists. In his review of American Idol: Greatest Moments, Chuck Campbell of The Herald News was critical of Verraros' track on the album, writing "Verraros takes it too easy on his slack interpretation of Lionel Richie's Easy."

2002–2003: American Idol tour and related projects
About a month after being voted out of the top ten on American Idol's first season, Verraros joined thirteen other former contestants from the series to perform at various events in Northwest Indiana. He participated in a group medley during American Idol ' s first season finale and a few weeks later, he reunited with all of the series' top thirty contestants for the American Idol in Las Vegas TV special. Verraros then participated through October and November in the 2002 American Idols LIVE! tour, along with his fellow top ten finalists. For each stop of the tour, he reprised his performance of "Easy" from the series.

Prior to competing on American Idol, Verraros had been open about his sexual orientation through an online journal. The Advocate, an American LGBT-interest magazine, discovered this journal while Verraros was on the series and contacted Fox with an interview request for the contestant. One day later, the journal was deleted. Verraros later explained to The Advocate that his journal had been removed because Fox did not want it to give him an unfair advantage in the competition. Verraros was open about his sexuality with the other American Idol finalists, whom he described as being very supportive.

Verraros came out publicly during the American Idol tour. He also came out to his father at this time. In November 2002, Verraros was named as one of "2002's Most Intriguing People" by Out, another LGBT-interest magazine. Around that time, Verraros said, "I just thought it was time to come out. I really hate the segregation and only being able to hold hands in gay bars. We have to start breaking down the barriers. I want to be a gay advocate and let teens know that being gay is just a small part of who you are. And if people don't like it, it's their problem, not yours." Verraros gave an extensive interview to The Advocate in January 2003, which was described as his official "coming out", and in May, he participated in Boston's Youth Pride march.

The American Idol: Greatest Moments album, released October 1, 2002, features a recorded version of Verraros singing "Easy". The album reached No. 4 on the Billboard 200 chart. Asked during his run on American Idol what he might call his debut album, Verraros suggested "So You Say". Verraros moved to Los Angeles after the American Idol tour and was turned down by several agencies. While in LA, he lived for two years with Natalie Burge and Christopher Aaron, both of whom were in the Top 30 with him on American Idol ' s first season. Throughout the Spring of 2003, Verraros participated in Coca-Cola's Behind the Scenes With American Idol promotional tour, in which he and a selection of other finalists from the first two seasons of the series performed across the country in shopping malls owned by the Simon Property Group.

2003–2005: Unsaid and Understood, Eating Out, and Rollercoaster
Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter and music producer Gabe Lopez reached out to Verraros, after hearing American Idol: Greatest Moments. The two began a collaboration based out of Lopez's home studio. Unsigned to a record label, Verraros self-released his debut album, Unsaid and Understood, in 2003. While recording the album, he worked at a tanning salon and at a phone bank. Unsaid and Understood was included on a list of six indie albums by gay and lesbian artists recommended by Adam B. Vary of The Advocate. Vary wrote that Verraros "sings with true passion and bracing maturity" on the album and singled out the track "So Deep", for being "so dirty even Xtina would blush." Another track on the album, "I Want You", was included on Bi the People, a 2003 compilation album of "bisexual artists and friends", which was released to raise money for the Bisexual Foundation. Multiple tracks from Unsaid and Understood topped the Rock and Pop charts on mp3.com, and the album won the 2004 Out Music Award for Outstanding New Recording – Debut Male. A tour of gay clubs was undertaken to promote the album.

Around the same time that Verraros was recording Unsaid and Understood, Q. Allan Brocka, an American Idol fan, cast Verraros as Kyle in his 2004 gay-themed comedy Eating Out. The film was produced on a budget of less than $1 million by Ariztical Entertainment. Filming lasted ten days. Although intended as a straight-to-DVD release, it secured limited theatrical distribution in 2005, after performing well in film festivals. Two songs from Unsaid and Understood, "I Want You" and "Welcome to Hollywood", are included in Eating Out, as is a third song performed by Verraros, called "Visions of You". Writing again for The Advocate, Vary (along with Dennis Hensley) placed Eating Out among a group of films released in the mid-2000s that he and Hensley felt constituted a "New New Queer Cinema", after the initial "New Queer Cinema" movement faded in the 1990s. Vary also argued that, as a college sex comedy, Eating Out is notable for being an early example of a gay genre film. Eating Out received mostly negative reviews, although Verraros was praised for his performance by Dana Stevens in a review for The New York Times, who wrote that Verraros "has a scrappy energy that sets him apart from the bland and vulgar proceedings" of the film.

Rollercoaster
According to ChicagoPride.com, Verraros pitched Unsaid and Understood to "every major label in the U.S. two or three times" without success. Verraros then pursued a record deal in the United Kingdom, hoping that British labels would be more willing to work with an openly gay artist, although nothing materialized from this. New York-based indie label Koch Records began communicating with Verraros over the summer of 2004 about the possibility of featuring him on a compilation album of songs by American Idol finalists. Verraros sent Koch Records a demo tape and was signed to the label within a week. Unsaid and Understood was then revamped and released through Koch Records as Rollercoaster on April 26, 2005. This was marketed as Verraros' official debut. The album recycles several songs from Unsaid and Understood, in addition to featuring new material.

Several publications noted that Verraros went through a significant image change between his time on American Idol and the release of Rollercoaster. Verraros explained that he had "come into [himself]" during that time, having improved his figure and become more involved within the LGBT community. The Advocate wrote that on American Idol, Verraros had been "a slightly geeky kid with a stiff stance...[and] a preppy look [that] included dark- rimmed glasses, spiky hair and a stone-washed jeans jacket" – in contrast, The Advocate wrote, Verraros possessed "bad-boy good looks" and "long rock-star hair" when Rollercoaster was released. The Houston Chronicle added that the "shaggy dark cut, eye makeup and slick threads" that Verraros had adopted at the time gave him sex appeal. Verraros himself assessed his look on American Idol as having been "[very] Midwestern" – he said that he was wanting to distance himself from associations with the series and that he was excited "to see how people would react to such a crazy change".

A release party for Rollercoaster was held on April 27, 2005, at the Roxy Theatre in Hollywood. The date was chosen to follow Eating Out ' s Spring premiere in US theaters.

"You Turn It On" was released as Rollercoaster ' s first single. The song debuted at number forty-eight on the Billboard Dance Club Play Chart, where it spent eleven weeks, peaking in early June at number twenty-one.

"You're Getting Crazy (Estas Enloqueciendo)" was released in October as the album's second single. Billboard wrote that it "treads in similar territory [as "You Turn It On"] stirring the beats into a simmering frenzy." The song received multiple remixes by Mike Cruz and L.E.X, which Edgemedianetwork.com called "as slick, upbeat and professional as anything else currently climbing the charts." Billboard suggested that the song could become a hit, if Verraros released an accompanying music video, although no music videos were ever released for any of the songs on Rollercoaster.

Shortly after releasing Rollercoaster, Verraros moved back to Crystal Lake, where he lived with his family for a time. Over the summer of 2005, he performed at the wrap party for American Idol ' s fourth season, served as a judge during the finals of "Windy City Gay Idol" (held by the Windy City Times at the Circuit Nightclub in Chicago), attended a pride ceremony held by the New York City Council, and also served as a judge at the World of Chocolate, a charity event for the AIDS Foundation of Chicago. He participated in several local events around Chicago during this time and performed in multiple pride events, including the LA Pride  and Chicago Pride parades. He also performed, along with American Idol second season third place finalist Kimberley Locke, at the Kansas City Gay Pride Festival in June and at the New York City Gay Life Expo in November. A club tour was considered to promote Rollercoaster.

2006–2007: Eating Out 2: Sloppy Seconds and unrealized film projects
Twice in the mid-2000s, Verraros was called a "gay icon" by the Chicago Sun-Times, first in 2004, and again in 2006. The New York Post noted in 2006 that Verraros had "gained a cult following" due to his role in Eating Out. In 2009, PopCrush claimed that "almost immediately" after appearing on American Idol, Verraros had become "a huge symbol within the LGBT community", and that same year, the Washington Examiner wrote that Verraros "has been a fixture in the gay world...practically becoming a gay sex-symbol through the years." Verraros remained the only American Idol finalist to be publicly out until 2006, when his fellow first season finalist R.J. Helton came out. Helton had confided in Verraros about his sexual orientation on the night of the first-season finale, shortly before the group went on tour and before Helton had come out to any of the other first season finalists.

Verraros returned to the role of Kyle in Eating Out 2: Sloppy Seconds, which filmed during the Summer of 2006 and screened in several film festivals, before receiving a theatrical release on November 22. Brocka returned as co-writer, but passed directorial duties over to the first film's Film editor, Phillip J. Bartell. The film features a song written by Verraros and Lopez, called "You Make It Better", which was released as a single on July 17, 2007. Like its predecessor, Eating Out 2: Sloppy Seconds received mostly negative reviews. It was described as a cinematic landmark however, by multiple publications, for being the first sequel to a gay film.

In June 2006, the Windy City Times included Verraros in its "30 Under 30" list of young figures who had made positive contributions to the LGBTQ community. Throughout that year, Verraros continued performing at local events around Chicago; he was also featured on American Idol Rewind, filmed a guest appearance for the pilot of a cooking show called The Astrological Kitchen, and released a duet called "Sweat" with indie artist Jamie O'Brien. Once again, Verraros was named to Out magazine's "Most Intriguing People" list for that year.

In November 2006, it was reported that Verraros was living in East Dundee, Illinois, with his long-time boyfriend. It was also reported at this time that Verraros' second album would be released in 2007. In a December 2006 interview with gay-interest website Atlantaboy.com, Verraros said that Rollercoaster had been "pretty much all over the place" and that his next album would be "more focused", while in April 2007, the Daily Herald wrote that a follow-up to Rollercoaster was scheduled to be released that May. Verraros had also told Atlantaboy.com that he was "heading more toward the film thing" and that if he ever released a music video, he would hope to co-direct it. Around this time, he mentioned that he had been cast in three films; one was described as a dark LA-based romance, in which he would play a cocaine addict who falls in love with a struggling actor, another, referred to by the title Copacabana: Of Love and Shadows, was described as a Rio de Janeiro-based musical, in which Verraros would play both male and female roles;   and the third, referred to by the title Pizza on Sunset, was described as a gay LA-based romantic comedy. By July 2007, Verraros still had not released his second album. It was announced over the summer that he was "writing and recording [the album] in Malibu, California" with producers Gary Miller and John Porter. On a July podcast for the Windy City Times, Verraros said that he was aiming for a January 2008 release.

2007–present: Return to American Idol-related projects, marriage, and Do Not Disturb
The 2007 book Chicken Soup for the American Idol Soul by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, and Deborah Poneman, features a chapter about Verraros, which Poneman called her favorite story in the book. During a press interview, Poneman said, "I thought it was so amazing that a kid got to number eight or nine on 'American Idol' with parents who are deaf...His story makes me cry, when he realized that even though the whole country was cheering for him because they loved his voice, the two people that he loved the most would never be able to hear him sing." Verraros appeared at multiple book signings in Illinois during January 2008 with Poseman and American Idol sixth season finalist Gina Glocksen.

Throughout the first half of 2008, Verraros recapped the seventh season of American Idol for ChicagoPride.com   and co-hosted video recaps of that season with Penny Frulla for AfterElton.com. He was also featured on Usmagazine.com as a guest recapper for that season's Top 12 episode. In January 2008, the Chicago Free Press named Verraros "Best LGBT Musician of 2007" in its "Pressie Awards". In a subsequent Myspace post expressing his gratitude for the award, Verraros announced that his second album, which still had not been released, would be called Do Not Disturb (AfterElton.com had previously reported that the album would be called Chapter Two). Verraros accepted the Pressie award in March, around which time he said that Do Not Disturb would be "coming out in the next couple of months."

Verraros cameoed as a priest in Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild!, which was released in the Summer of 2008. That same year, the electronica album Ear Therapy was released by DJ Russ Harris, which features Verraros on the track "Another Lifetime",  and the following year, Verraros released three new singles on iTunes – "Touch (Don't U Want 2)" on January 20;  "Electric Love" on May 26; and "Do Not Disturb" on November 9. All three songs were written and produced by Gabe Lopez, whose official website announced that the accompanying album's release date had been pushed back to late 2010. Samuel Lora of the Washington Examiner gave "Touch (Don't U Want 2)" a negative review, calling it "simple and vapid". He also wrote that the song "is overdone with heavy beats and crowding vocals". "Electric Love" fared somewhat better with Lora, who called it "pretty decent" but also felt that it was mimicking the sound of other, more successful artists. Lora likened the song to a "less powerful" version of "Larger Than Life" by the Backstreet Boys or something by "Nick Carter if he were making Justin Timberlake music". Lora had kinder words for "You Make It Better", which had been released as a single two years earlier.

In November 2009, Verraros served as a judge for Rialto Idol, a singing competition held by the Rialto Square Theatre for the ComEd Festival of Trees. Entertainment Weekly reported in March 2010 that Verraros was looking for "an indie label to release [Do Not Disturb]." Several years earlier, in 2006, Verraros had mentioned the possibility of his second album being released through Sony BMG's then-newly formed gay-focused label, "Music With a Twist". Ultimately, Do Not Disturb was released on October 18, 2011, through Red Queen Music – Sound Axis. Ten tracks are included on the album, out of dozens that were written and recorded throughout the development process. Verraros told Entertainment Weekly in 2010 that Do Not Disturb would likely be his final album, saying "I think I'd like to just pull away [from singing] and focus [more on acting]."

Marriage
On September 6, 2009, Verraros married Bill Brennan in their shared home state of Illinois. The couple first met through MySpace in 2005, at which point they decided to meet in person, after realizing that they only lived about twenty minutes away from each other. A few months later, they moved in together. Brennan proposed to Verraros two-and-a-half years after they began dating. Although Illinois did not legally recognize gay marriage in 2009, Verraros said that he and Brennan "wanted the day to be a reflection of [their] love and commitment to each other as well as a statement to other gay couples in Illinois". Each of the groom's fathers served as their best men in the wedding. The song "You Make It Better" from the film Eating Out 2: Sloppy Seconds was written by Verraros about Brennan and was included in the music set list for their wedding. The marriage was later legalized in Iowa.

Brennan is the president of Bridal Expo Chicago and Bridal Expo Milwaukee. In 2006, Verraros signed an endorsement deal to serve as spokesman for the business; he eventually became executive vice president. Kelly Clarkson and Verraros maintained a friendship after competing on American Idol together, and Verraros helped design the headpiece that Clarkson wore for her 2013 wedding.

By 2019, Verraros and Brennan had separated. Verraros is currently engaged. On November 20, 2021, Verraros married Sean Michael Buck.

Filmography

 * American Idol Season 1 (2002) – Himself
 * Eating Out (2004) – Kyle
 * Eating Out 2: Sloppy Seconds (2006) – Kyle
 * Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild! (2008) – Priest

title: Jim Verraros


text:
VSC

VSC may refer to:

Organizations

 * Venezuela Solidarity Campaign, a British political group
 * Vermont State Colleges, the U.S. state of Vermont's system of public colleges
 * Victory Services Club, a London private members' club for those in active military service, veterans, and their immediate family members.
 * Vietnam Solidarity Campaign, a Vietnam War-era activist group
 * Volunteer Special Constabulary, a component of the Singapore Police Force
 * Video Standards Council, of the United Kingdom responsible for promoting standards in the video industry
 * Volunteer Service Corp, at Wake Forest University

Places

 * Valley Stream Central High School, in Valley Stream, NY, US
 * Vermont Studio Center, a fine arts and writing residency program located at Johnson in the US state of Vermont
 * Vinings, Smyrna, Cumberland, an area in metropolitan Atlanta, US; See Vinings, Georgia

Science and technology

 * Variable structure control, a type of discontinuous nonlinear control
 * Vertical service code, a special telephone number that usually begins with the * (star) key
 * Vehicle Stability Control (VSC), Toyota's tradename for electronic stability control
 * Video spectral comparator, a specialized lighting instrument used to analyze passports and drivers licenses, as part of questioned document examination
 * Volatile sulfur compounds, in organic chemistry
 * Voltage source converter, a type of power electronics device, see high-voltage direct current

Computing

 * Volume Shadow Copy Service, a mechanism of the NTFS file system
 * Virtualization Service Client, software used to run Microsoft App-V virtualization software
 * .vsc, a file extension used by the Versus programming language and the Viscosity image and animation editing utility
 * Visual Studio Code, a source code editor for Windows, Linux and macOS, developed by Microsoft

Other uses

 * Aerovías Especiales de Carga (ICAO airline designator), a Colombian airline operator
 * Debreceni VSC, a Hungarian football club
 * Vancouver Sleep Clinic, an Australian band
 * Vehicle service contract, used for automotive repair, for example see Carchex

 * Vertebral subluxation complex, in chiropractic
 * Vessel Safety Checks, of recreational boaters; See Missions of the United States Coast Guard
 * Virtual Safety Car

title: VSC


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Mountain Jews

Mountain Jews or Caucasus Jews, also known as Juhuro, Juvuro, Juhuri, Juwuri, Juhurim, Kavkazi Jews or Gorsky Jews (יְהוּדֵי־קַוְקָז or  ; Горские евреи, Dağ Yəhudiləri), are Jews of the eastern and northern Caucasus, mainly Azerbaijan, and various republics in the Russian Federation: Chechnya, Ingushetia, Dagestan, Karachay-Cherkessia, and Kabardino-Balkaria. The Mountain Jews comprise Persian-speaking Jewry along with the Jews of Iran, Afghanistan, and Central Asia. The Mountain Jews are the descendants of Persian Jews from Iran, and fall within the Mizrachi category of Jews. Mountain Jews took shape as a community after Qajar Iran ceded the areas in which they lived to the Russian Empire as part of the Treaty of Gulistan of 1813.

The forerunners of the Mountain Jewish community have inhabited Ancient Persia since the 5th century BCE. The language spoken by Mountain Jews, called Judeo-Tat, is an ancient Southwest Iranian language which integrates many elements of Ancient Hebrew.

It is believed that Mountain Jews in Persia, as early as the 8th century BCE, continued to migrate east; settling in mountainous areas of the Caucasus. Mountain Jews survived numerous historical vicissitudes by settling in extremely remote and mountainous areas. They were known to be accomplished warriors and horseback riders.

Mountain Jews are distinct from Georgian Jews of the Caucasus Mountains. The two groups are culturally differentiated: they speak different languages and have many differences in customs and culture.

Early history
Mountain Jews, or Jews of the Caucasus, have inhabited the Caucasus since the fifth century CE. Being the descendants of the Persian Jews of Iran, their migration from Persia proper to the Caucasus took place in the Sasanian era (224–651). It is believed that they arrived in Persia from ancient Israel as early as the 8th century BCE. Other sources attest that Mountain Jews were present in the region of Azerbaijan at least since 457 BCE. However, Mountain Jews only took shape as a community after Qajar Iran ceded the areas in which they lived to the Russian Empire per the Treaty of Gulistan of 1813.

Mountain Jews have an oral tradition, passed down from generation to generation, that they are descended from the Ten Lost Tribes exiled by the king of Assyria (Ashur), who ruled over northern Iraq from Mosul (across the Tigris River from the ancient city of Nineveh). The reference most likely is to Shalmaneser, the King of Assyria mentioned in II Kings 18:9–12. According to local Jewish tradition, some 19,000 Jews departed Jerusalem (used here as a generic term for the Land of Israel) and passed through Syria, Babylonia, and Persia and then, heading north, entered into Media.

Mountain Jews maintained a strong military tradition. For this reason, some historians believe they may be descended from Jewish military colonists, settled by Parthian and Sassanid rulers in the Caucasus as frontier guards against nomadic incursions from the Pontic steppe.

A 2002 study by geneticist Dror Rosengarten found that the paternal haplotypes of Mountain Jews "were shared with other Jewish communities and were consistent with a Mediterranean origin." In addition, Y-DNA testing of Mountain Jews has shown they have Y-DNA haplotypes related to those of other Jewish communities. The Semitic origin of Mountain Jews is also evident in their culture and language.

1600s–1800s: "The Jewish Valley"
By the early 17th century, Mountain Jews formed many small settlements throughout the mountain valleys of Dagestan. One valley, located 10 km south of Derbent, close to the shore of the Caspian Sea, was predominantly populated by Mountain Jews. Their Muslim neighbors called this area "Jewish Valley". The Jewish Valley grew to be a semi-independent Jewish state, with its spiritual and political center located in its largest settlement of Aba-Sava (1630–1800). The valley prospered until the end of the 18th century, when its settlements were brutally destroyed in the war between Sheikh-Ali-Khan, who swore loyalty to the Russian Empire, and Surkhai-Khan, the ruler of Kumukh. Many Mountain Jews were slaughtered, with survivors escaping to Derbent where they received the protection of Fatali Khan, the ruler of Quba Khanate. In Chechnya, Mountain Jews partially assimilated into Chechen society by forming a Jewish teip, the Zhugtii. In Chechen society, ethnic minorities residing in areas demographically dominated by Chechens have the option of forming a teip in order to properly participate in the developments of Chechen society such as making alliances and gaining representation in the Mekhk Khell, a supreme ethnonational council that is occasionally compared to a parliament. Teips of minority-origin have also been made by ethnic Poles, Germans, Georgians, Armenians, Kumyks, Russians, Kalmyks, Circassians, Andis, Avars, Dargins, Laks, Persians, Arabs, Ukrainians and Nogais, with the German teip having been formed as recently as the 1940s when Germans in Siberian exile living among Chechens assimilated.

Mountain Jews have also settled in the territory of modern Azerbaijan. The main Mountain Jewish settlement in Azerbaijan was and remains Qırmızı Qəsəbə, also called Jerusalem of the Caucasus. In Russian, Qırmızı Qəsəbə was once called Еврейская Слобода (translit. '), "Jewish Village"; but during Soviet times it was renamed Красная Слобода (translit. '), "Red Village".

In the 18th–19th centuries, Mountain Jews resettled from the highland to the coastal lowlands but carried the name "Mountain Jews" with them. In the villages (aouls), the Mountain Jews had settled in separate sections. In the lowland towns, they also lived in concentrated neighborhoods, but their dwellings did not differ from those of their neighbors. Mountain Jews retained the dress of the highlanders. They have continued to follow Jewish dietary laws and affirm their faith in family life.

In 1902, The New York Times reported that clans of Jewish origin, who maintain many of the customs and the principal forms of religious worship of their ancestors, were discovered in the remote regions of the Eastern Caucasus.

Soviet times, Holocaust and modern history

By 1926, more than 85% of Mountain Jews in Dagestan were already classed as urban. Mountain Jews were mainly concentrated in the cities of Makhachkala, Buynaksk, Derbent, Nalchik and Grozny in North Caucasus; and Quba and Baku in Azerbaijan.

In the Second World War, some Mountain Jews settlements in North Caucasus, including parts of their area in Kabardino-Balkaria were occupied by the German Wehrmacht at the end of 1942. During this period, they killed several hundreds of Mountain Jews until the Germans retreated early 1943. On 19 August 1942, Germans killed 472 Mountain Jews near the village of Bogdanovka, and on September 20 the Germans killed 378 Jews in the village of Menzhinskoe. A total of some 1000–1500 Mountain Jews were murdered during the Holocaust by bullets. Many Mountain Jews survived, however, because German troops did not reach all their areas; in addition, attempts succeeded to convince local German authorities that this group were "religious" but not "racial" Jews.

The Soviet Army's advances in the area brought the Nalchik community under its protection. The Mountain Jewish community of Nalchik was the largest Mountain Jewish community occupied by Nazis, and the vast majority of the population has survived. With the help of their Kabardian neighbors, Mountain Jews of Nalchik convinced the local German authorities that they were Tats, the native people similar to other Caucasus Mountain peoples, not related to the ethnic Jews, who merely adopted Judaism. The annihilation of the Mountain Jews was suspended, contingent on racial investigation. Although the Nazis watched the village carefully, Rabbi Nachamil ben Hizkiyahu hid Sefer Torahs by burying them in a fake burial ceremony. The city was liberated a few months later.

In 1944, the NKVD deported the entire Chechen populace that surrounded the Mountain Jews in Chechnya, and moved other ethnic groups into their homes; Mountain Jews mostly refused to take the homes of deported Chechens while there are some reports of deported Chechens entrusting their homes to Jews in order to keep them safe.

Given the marked changes in the 1990s following the dissolution of the Soviet Union and rise of nationalism in the region, many Mountain Jews permanently left their hometowns in the Caucasus and relocated to Moscow or abroad. During the First Chechen War, many Mountain Jews left due to the Russian invasion and indiscriminate bombardment of civilian population by the Russian military. Despite historically close relations between Jews and Chechens, many also suffered high rate of kidnappings and violence at the hands of armed ethnic Chechen gangs who ransomed their freedom to "Israel and the international Jewish community". Many Mountain Jews emigrated to Israel or the United States.

Today, Qırmızı Qəsəbə in Azerbaijan remains the biggest settlement of Mountain Jews in the world, with the current population over 3,000.

Economy
While elsewhere in the Russian Empire, Jews were prohibited from owning land (excluding the Jews of Siberia and Central Asia), at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, Mountain Jews owned land and were farmers and gardeners, growing mainly grain. Their oldest occupation was rice-growing, but they also raised silkworms and cultivated tobacco and vineyards. Mountain Jews and their Christian Armenian neighbors were the main producers of wine, as Muslims were prohibited by their religion from producing or consuming alcohol. Judaism limited some types of meat consumption. Unlike their neighbors, the Jews raised few domestic animals, although tanning was their third most important economic activity after farming and gardening. At the end of the 19th century, 6% of Jews were engaged in this trade. Handicrafts and commerce were mostly practiced by Jews in towns.

The Soviet authorities bound the Mountain Jews to collective farms, but allowed them to continue their traditional cultivation of grapes, tobacco, and vegetables; and making wine. In practical terms, the Jews are no longer isolated from other ethnic groups.

With increasing urbanization and sovietization in progress, by the 1930s, a layer of intelligentsia began to form. By the late 1960s, academic professionals, such as pharmacists, medical doctors, and engineers, were common in the community. Mountain Jews worked in more professional positions than did Georgian Jews, though less than the Soviet Ashkenazi community, who were based in larger cities of Russia. A sizable number of Mountain Jews worked in the entertainment industry in Dagestan. The republic's dancing ensemble "Lezginka" was led by Tankho Israilov, a Mountain Jew, from 1958 to 1979.

Religion

Mountain Jews are not Sephardim (from the Iberian Peninsula) nor Ashkenazim (from Central Europe) but rather of Persian Jewish origin, and most of them follow Edot HaMizrach customs. Mountain Jews tenaciously held to their religion throughout the centuries, developing their own unique traditions and religious practices. Mountain Jewish traditions are infused with teachings of Kabbalah and Jewish mysticism. Mountain Jews have also developed and retained unique customs different from other Jews, such as govgil, an end-of-Passover picnic celebration involving the whole community.

Mountain Jews have traditionally maintained a two-tiered rabbinate, distinguishing between a rabbi and a dayan. "Rabbi" was a title given to religious leaders performing the functions of liturgical preachers (maggids) and cantors (hazzans) in synagogues ("nimaz"), teachers in Jewish schools (cheders), and shochets. The dayan was a chief rabbi of a town, presiding over beit dins and representing the highest religious authority for the town and nearby smaller settlements. Dayans were elected democratically by community leaders.

The religious survival of the community was not without difficulties. In the prosperous days of the Jewish valley (roughly 1600-1800 CE), the spiritual center of Mountain Jews centered on the settlement of Aba-Sava. Many works of religious significance were written in Aba-Sava. Here, Elisha ben Schmuel Ha-Katan wrote several of his piyyuts. Theologian Gershon Lala ben Moshke Nakdi, who lived in Aba-Sava in 18th century, wrote a commentary on the Mishneh Torah of Maimonides. Rabbi Mattathia ben Shmuel ha-Kohen wrote his kabbalistic essay "Kol Hamevaser" in Aba-Sava. With the brutal destruction of Aba-Sava in roughly 1800 CE, however, the religious center of Mountain Jews moved to Derbent.

Prominent rabbis of Mountain Jews in the nineteenth century included: Rabbi Gershom son of Rabbi Reuven of Qırmızı Qəsəbə, Shalom ben Melek of Temir-Khan-Shura (today known as Buynaksk), Chief Rabbi of Dagestan Jacob ben Isaac, and Rabbi Hizkiyahu ben Avraam of Nalchik, whose son, Rabbi Nahamiil ben Hizkiyahu, later played a crucial role in saving Nalchik's Jewish community from the Nazis. In the early decades of the Soviet Union, the government took steps to suppress religion. Thus, in the 1930s, the Soviet Union closed synagogues belonging to Mountain Jews. The same procedures were implemented among other ethnicities and religions. Soviet authorities propagated the myth that Mountain Jews were not part of the world's Jewish people at all, but rather members of the Tat community that settled in the region. Soviet antisemitic rhetoric was intensified during Khrushchev's rule. Some of the synagogues were later reopened in the 1940s. The closing of the synagogues in the 1930s was part of a communist ideology that resisted religion of any kind.

At the beginning of the 1950s, there were synagogues in all major Mountain Jewish communities. By 1966, reportedly six synagogues remained; some were confiscated by the Soviet authorities. While Mountain Jews observed the rituals of circumcision, marriage and burial, as well as Jewish holidays, other precepts of Jewish faith were observed less carefully. Yet, the community's ethnic identity remained unshaken despite the Soviet efforts. Cases of intermarriage with Muslims in Azerbaijan or Dagestan were rare as both groups practice endogamy. After the fall of the Soviet Union, Mountain Jews experienced a significant religious revival, with increasing religious observance by members of the younger generation.

Educational institutions, language, literature
Mountain Jews speak Judeo-Tat, also called Juhuri, a form of Persian; it belongs to the southwestern group of the Iranian division of the Indo-European languages. Judeo-Tat has Semitic (Hebrew/Aramaic/Arabic) elements on all linguistic levels. Among other Semitic elements, Judeo-Tat has the Hebrew sound "ayin" (ע), whereas no neighboring languages have it. Until the early Soviet period, the language was written with semi-cursive Hebrew alphabet. Later, Judeo-Tat books, newspapers, textbooks, and other materials were printed with a Latin alphabet and finally in Cyrillic, which is still most common today. The first Judeo-Tat-language newspaper, Zakhmetkesh (Working People), was published in 1928 and operated until the second half of the twentieth century. Originally, only boys were educated through synagogue schools. Starting from the 1860s, many well-off families switched to home-schooling, hiring private tutors, who taught their sons not only Hebrew, but also Russian. In the early 20th century, with advance of sovietization, Judeo-Tat became the language of instruction at newly founded elementary schools attended by both Mountain Jewish boys and girls. This policy continued until the beginning of World War II, when schools switched to Russian as the central government emphasized acquisition of Russian as the official language of the Soviet Union.

Mountain Jewish community has had notable figures in public health, education, culture, and art.

In the 21st century, the Russian government started encouraging the revival of cultural life of minorities. In Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria, Judeo-Tat and Hebrew courses have been introduced in traditionally Mountain Jewish schools. In Dagestan, there is support for the revival of the Judeo-Tat-language theater and the publication of newspapers in that language.

Military tradition

"And we, the Tats We, Samson warriors, Bar Kochba's heirs... we went into battles and bitterly, heroically struggled for our freedom -"The Song of the Mountain Jews"

Mountain Jews have a military tradition and have been historically viewed as fierce warriors. Some historians suggest that the group traces its beginnings to Persian-Jewish soldiers who were stationed in the Caucasus by the Sasanian kings in the fifth or sixth century to protect the area from the onslaughts of the Huns and other nomadic invaders from the east. Men were typically heavily armed and some slept without removing their weapons.

Dress

Over time the Mountain Jews adopted the dress of their Muslim neighbors. Men typically wore chokhas and covered their head with papakhas, many variations of which could symbolize the men's social status. Wealthier men's dress was adorned with many pieces of jewelry, including silver and gold-decorated weaponry, pins, chains, belts, or kisets (small purse used to hold tobacco or coins). Women's dress was typically of simpler design in dark tones, made from silk, brocade, velvet, satin and later wool. They decorated the fabric with beads, gold pins or buttons, and silver gold-plated belts. Outside the house, both single and married women covered their hair with headscarves.

Cuisine
Mountain Jewish cuisine absorbed typical dishes from various peoples of the Caucasus, Azerbaijani and Persian cuisine, adjusting some recipes to conform to the laws of kashrut, with a great emphasis on using rice (osh) to accompany many of their dishes. Typical Mountain Jewish dishes include:
 * Chudu – A type of meat pie.
 * Shashlik – skewered meat chunks, such as lamb chops or chicken wings.
 * Dolma – vegetables such as grape leaves, onions, peppers, tomatoes and eggplants that are stuffed with minced meat, then boiled.
 * Kurze or Dushpare – Dumplings that are boiled and then fried in oil on both sides until golden brown and crispy.
 * Yarpagi – Cabbage leaves stuffed with meat and cooked with quince, lamb riblets and a sauce made of dried sour plums (alcha).
 * Gitob
 * Ingar – Square shaped dumpling soup with Meat (Chicken/Beef/Lamb), sometimes with tamarind paste added to the soup.
 * Ingarpoli – Dumplings served with tomato paste flavored minced meat on top.
 * Dem Turshi – Rice soup flavoured with garlic, dried mint and dried cherry plums.
 * Tara – Mallow stew with pieces of meat, dried cherry plum, garlic, dill and clintaro. In Baku sometimes its made vegan with chestnuts instead of meat.
 * Nermov or Gendumadush – Chicken or other meat stew with wheat and beans, traditionally cooked overnight from Friday to Saturday.
 * Dapchunda Osh – Rice pilaf with lamb chunks, qazmaq and dried fruits such as raisin, apricots and golden plums.
 * Osh Lobeyi – Rice pilaf with cowpeas and smoked fish.
 * Osh Kyudu – Pumpkin Rice pilaf with carrots, pumpkin, qazmaq and dried fruits, traditionally served for Hannukah.
 * Osh Mast – White rice with Mast, a variety of yogurt, on top.
 * Shomo-Kofte bebeyi – Meatballs made from minced meat and onions cooked alongside potatoes, sometimes served on rice (osh).
 * Buglame – (curry like stew of fish or chicken eaten with rice (osh).
 * Eshkene – Persian soup, made of Lamb, potatoes, onions, eggs, dried cherry plums, cinnamon and herbs such as cilantro, green onions, parsley and spinach, prepared for Passover.
 * Yakhni Nisonui – The Derbendi variation of eshkene consist on lamb, potatoes, onions, eggs, dried cherry plums, cinnamon but without herbs, made on the first day of Passover.
 * Yakhni Nakhuti – A soup made of lamb, chickpeas, potatoes and dried plums cooked in a tomato paste based soup. served with rice.
 * Hoshalevo – (honey-based treats made with sunflower seeds or walnuts) typically prepared for Purim.
 * Bischi – Fried dough topped with hot honey syrup, typically prepared for Purim.
 * Hallegh – made with mixture of apples, walnuts, honey, raisins, cinnamon and wine, a ritual dish prepared for Passover.
 * Pakhlava
 * Fadi-shiri – A milk cake made of flour, eggs, butter, milk, sugar, turmeric, raisins, walnuts, sesame seeds and poppy seeds, served during Shavuot.
 * Pertesh – A dish consist of a Lavash bread that is soaked in honey based syrup and filled with a milk porridge inside, served for Shavuot.
 * Khashil – Sweet porridge made of flour, butter, honey, cinnamon and turmeric with a crunchy crust.
 * Lovush Roghani
 * Khashlama – Boiled chunks of meat, usually beef, veal, or lamb, as well as vegetables such as bell peppers, potatoes, tomatoes and onions, in hot water.
 * Khoyagusht – Meat pie made of eggs, turmeric, slow cooked meat (usually sheep or goat) and its broth, often considered to be the "national dish" of the Mountain Jews.
 * Khoyaghusht Kyargi – Khoyagusht with chicken instead of red meat.
 * Khoyahusht Bodimjon – Khoyagusht with eggplants instead of meat, without turmeric.
 * Nukhorush – Beef or Lamb cooked with quince, raisins, dried golden prunes, dried apricots, chestnuts and flavoured with turmeric, sometimes served alongside rice (osh).
 * Nukhorush marjumeki – Lentil stew with potatoes, zucchini, onions, and carrots flavoured with cilantro, dill, cumin and turmeric.
 * Gayle or Khayle – A dish made of herbs, onion and eggs.
 * Dugovo – A soup made by cooking yogurt, with a little bit of rice, a variety of fresh herbs such as dill, mint, and coriander.
 * Aragh – a strong alcoholic drink made of distilled fermented mulberry juice. It can be made from both black and white mulberries.
 * Asido
 * Harissa – A dish of Mountain Jews from the northern regions in Dagestan made of Meat, Potatoes and dried cherry plums cooked in tomato sauce, traditionally used in weddings.

Music
The music of Mountain Jews is mostly based in the standard liturgy, for prayer and the celebration of holidays. Celebratory music played during weddings and similar events is typically upbeat with various instruments to add layers to the sound.

Notable Mountain Jews

 * Omer Adam, Israeli singer
 * Udi Adam, Israeli general
 * Yekutiel Adam (1927–1982), Former Deputy Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces
 * Albert Agarunov (1969–1992), Azerbaijani soldier
 * Yakov Agarunov (1907–1992), Soviet poet and playwright
 * Astrix, producer of Trance music
 * Daniil Atnilov (1913–1968), Soviet poet
 * Gyulboor Davydova (1892–1983), Soviet winegrower
 * Hizgil Avshalumov (1913–2001), novelist, poet and playwright
 * Mishi Bakhshiev (1910–1972), Soviet writer and poet
 * Manuvakh Dadashev (1913–1943), Soviet poet
 * Mikhail Gavrilov (1926–2014), Soviet writer and poet
 * Sarit Hadad, Israeli singer
 * Zarakh Iliev (1966-) Russian businessman
 * Gavril Abramovich Ilizarov (1921–1992), Soviet physician (Mountain Jewish father, Ashkenazi Jewish mother)
 * Telman Ismailov, businessman
 * Tankho Israelov (1917–1981), dancer, choreographer
 * Sergey Izgiyayev (1922–1972), author, translator, and songwriter
 * Tamara Musakhanov (1924–2014), Soviet sculptor and ceramist
 * Vladmir Yakubov, USSR Mathematician
 * Mushail Mushailov (1941–2007), Soviet/Russian artist and teacher
 * God Nisanov, Russian businessman
 * German Zakharyayev (born 1971) – businessman, Vice-President of the Russian Jewish Congress
 * Gennady Simeonovich Osipov (1948–2020), Russian scientist and professor
 * Iosif Prigozhin, Russian music producer
 * Lior Refaelov, Israeli football player
 * Zoya Semenduyeva (1929–2020), Soviet and Israeli poet
 * Robert Tiviaev, Israeli politician, former member of the Knesset
 * Israel Tsvaygenbaum, Russian-American artist (Ashkenazi Jewish father, Mountain Jewish mother)
 * Yaffa Yarkoni (1925–2012), Israeli singer, winner of the Israel Prize in 1998 for Hebrew song
 * Anatoly Yagudaev (1935–2014), sculptor
 * Zhasmin (née Sara Manakimova), Russian pop-singer (2005)
 * Yekutiel Ravayev (1881-1916), Mountain Jewish man that immigrated to Eretz Israel during the Ottoman era.

title: Mountain Jews


text:
Rolled homogeneous armour

Rolled homogeneous armour (RHA) is a type of vehicle armour made of a single steel composition hot-rolled to improve its material characteristics, as opposed to layered or cemented armour. Its first common application was in tanks. After World War II, it began to fall out of use on main battle tanks and other armoured fighting vehicles intended to see front-line combat as new anti-tank weapon technologies were developed which were capable of relatively easily penetrating rolled homogeneous armour plating even of significant thickness.

Today, the term is primarily used as a unit of measurement of the protection offered by armour on a vehicle (often composed of materials that may not actually contain steel, or even contain any metals) in equivalent millimetres of RHA, referring to the thickness of RHA that would provide the same protection. Typically, modern composite armour can provide the same amount of protection with much thinner and lighter construction than its protective equivalence in RHA. Likewise, the term is also used as a unit of measurement of penetration capability of armour-piercing weaponry, in terms of the millimetres of RHA that the weapon system can reliably penetrate.

Composition
Armoured steel must be hard, yet resistant to shock, in order to resist high velocity metal projectiles. Steel with these characteristics is produced by processing cast steel billets of appropriate size and then rolling them into plates of required thickness. Hot rolling homogenizes the grain structure of the steel, changing the crystalline structure of the steel and normalizing it.

RHA is homogeneous because its structure and composition are uniform throughout its thickness. The opposite of homogeneous steel plate is cemented or face-hardened steel plate, where the face of the steel is composed differently from the substrate. The face of the steel, which starts as an RHA plate, is hardened by a heat-treatment process.

History
From the invention of tanks through to the Second World War, tank armour increased in thickness to resist the increasing size and power of anti-tank guns. A tank with sufficient armour could resist the largest anti-tank guns then in use.

RHA was commonly used during this period (combined with other plate alloys and cast steel armour), and the power of anti-tank guns was measured by the thickness of RHA they could penetrate. This standard test has remained in use despite the modern usage of many other types of armour, some of which do not include steel or any other metals.

RHA was in common use as primary armour until after World War II, during which a new generation of anti-tank rounds using shaped charges came into use instead of heavy high-velocity projectiles.

Current use
Since World War II, because of a reduction in effectiveness against new weapons (mainly shaped charges and improved kinetic energy penetrators), RHA has largely been superseded by composite armour, which incorporates air spaces and materials such as ceramics or plastics in addition to steel, and explosive reactive armour.

For the testing and calibration of anti-tank guns, the term rolled homogeneous armour equivalency (RHAe) is used when giving an estimate of either the penetrative capability of a projectile or the protective capability of a type of armour which may or may not be steel. Because of variations in armour shape, quality, material, and case-by-case performance, the usefulness of RHAe in comparing different armour is only approximate.

Currently, most armoured vehicles have their basic structures formed from RHA to lend general strength and toughness.

Specifications
For current United States Army use, RHA is produced to military standard MIL-DTL-12560 by several manufacturers. Another standard is MIL-DTL-46177; however, this standard has been inactivated, and all new designs use MIL-DTL-12560. MIL-DTL-46177 RHA is nearly identical to AR500 in terms of tensile and yield strength. The typical Brinell Hardness range of MIL-A 12560 is 302-400, making it weaker than AR500 which is in the 477-534 range.

title: Rolled homogeneous armour