People: 2013

1. Adolf Hitler: suffered over 50 murder conspiracies including a porn-mad plan

Leader of the Nazis, Hitler was responsible for the killing of approximately six million Jews (overwhelmingly Ashkenazim), as well as two million ethnic Poles and four million others who were deemed "unworthy of life" (including the disabled and mentally ill, Soviet POWs, homosexuals, Freemasons, Jehovah's Witnesses, among others) as part of a program of deliberate extermination. It's no surprise then that he appears as number one in our list, having suffered over fifty intents of murder. The first of them was in 1921 when shots got fired at him after a speech. In Warsaw 1939, October 5, the Polish army wanted to blow up Hitler's car, when it crossed the (now called) Square Charles de Gaulle. A human error prevented the bomb from exploding. There was another crazy plan of some American soldiers to throw down a lot of pornographic material on Hitler's mountain to make the puritan Hitler go mad. The colonel the soldiers discussed the plan with, said that they were maniacs with an insane plan.

None of the plans succeeded and it's believed that Hitler finally died after committing suicide along with his wife, Eva Braun, by gunshot and cyanide poisoning.

2. Grigory Rasputin: was poisoned, shot four times, and beaten until he finally died from drowning

Rasputin has been tied in the immortality of history to the ill-fated Romanov family. Some may even say that he was the cause of their destruction. Whatever you may think about him: powerful mystic or drunken fruitcake, he wormed his way into the heart of the imperial family and he just didn't want to go. The legends surrounding the death of Rasputin are perhaps even more mysterious and bizarre than his life. The first attempt on Rasputin's life failed; on June 29, 1914, after either just receiving a telegram or exiting church, he was attacked suddenly by Khionia Guseva, a former prostitute. The woman thrust a knife into Rasputin's abdomen, and his entrails hung out of what seemed like a mortal wound. Convinced of her success, Guseva supposedly screamed, "I have killed the antichrist!". After intensive surgery, however, Rasputin recovered. It was said of his survival that "the soul of this cursed muzhik was sewn on his body".

On December 16, 1916, having decided that Rasputin's influence over the Tsaritsa had made him a far-too-dangerous threat to the empire, a group of nobles, led by Prince Felix Yusupov and the Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich and politician Vladimir Purishkevich, apparently lured Rasputin to the Yusupovs' Moika Palace basement, where they served him cakes and red wine laced with a massive amount of cyanide. According to legend, Rasputin was unaffected, although Maklakov had supplied enough poison to kill five men. Determined to finish the job, Yusupov became anxious about the possibility that Rasputin might live until the morning, leaving the conspirators no time to conceal his body. Yusupov ran upstairs to consult the others and then came back down to shoot Rasputin through the back with a revolver. Rasputin fell, and the company left the palace for a while. Yusupov went to check up on the body. Suddenly, Rasputin opened his eyes and lunged at him. When he grabbed Prince Yusupov he ominously whispered in Yusupov's ear "you bad boy" and attempted to escape. Yusopov and his co-conspirators chased Rasputin out into the yard, shooting him two more times and beating him with a rubber club. To ensure he didn't rouse again, the men tied Rasputin in a blanket and dumped his body into the Neva River. His body was found with his right arm outstretched, presumably to make the sign of the cross, indicating that he was still alive when he hit the water and managed to partially free himself. An autopsy established that the cause of death was drowning. His arms were found in an upright position, as if he had tried to claw his way out from under the ice (the Neva Riva freezes between November 25 and December 5, and the ice is gone only by mid-April). It was found that he had indeed been poisoned, and that the poison alone should have been enough to kill him.

3. Fidel Castro: survived 638 assassination attempts and counting

The infamous Cuba's Dictator is probably the hardest man to kill on planet, or at least the one of the most number of attempts. Fabian Escalante, who was long tasked with protecting the life of Castro, estimated the number of assassination schemes or attempts by the CIA to be 638. Some such attempts allegedly included an exploding cigar, a fungal-infected scuba-diving suit, and a mafia-style shooting. Some of these plots are depicted in a documentary entitled 638 Ways to Kill Castro. One of these attempts was by his ex-lover Marita Lorenz, whom he met in 1959. She allegedly agreed to aid the CIA and attempted to smuggle a jar of cold cream containing poison pills into his room. When Castro realized, he reportedly gave her a gun and told her to kill him but her nerve failed. Castro once said, in regards to the numerous attempts on his life he believes have been made, "If surviving assassination attempts were an Olympic event, I would win the gold medal." One such assassination attempt before the Bay of Pigs invasion involved Johnny Roselli and Al Capone's successor in the Chicago Outfit, Salvatore Giancana and his right-hand man Santos Trafficante.

Retired at the age of 83, with poor health, it's hardly probable that Fidel will suffer the 639th attempt.

4. Hussein of Jordan: survived 12 attempts of assassination and was saved once by a medal in his uniform

Hussein bin Talal was the King of Jordan from the abdication of his father, King Talal, in 1952, until his death, in 1999. During his life, he suffered at least 12 attempts of assassination, mostly during the 1950s and 1960s and once wrote 'that sometimes I have felt like the central character in a detective novel'. The first attempt occurred in 1951. He was with his grandfather, the King Abdullah. A Palestinian extremist opened fire on Abdullah and his grandson on July 20 of that year as the pair walked into the mosque for Friday prayers. Abdullah was killed, but the 15-year-old Hussein pursued the gunman. The assailant turned his weapon on the young prince, who was saved when the bullet was deflected by a medal on his uniform given to him by his grandfather. In 1970, King Hussein survived an assassination attempt after gunmen opened fire on his motorcade as it was driving near his summer palace. The king was said to be unharmed but it is understood his driver was wounded in the attack, which took place in the town of Sweileh, 12 miles (19km) northeast of the capital, Amman. The king jumped out of his car and fired back at the attackers.

He died of cancer in 1999 at the age of 63.

5. Zog of Albania: suffered 55 killing attempts and once survived after shooting his potential assassins

Zog I, Skanderbeg III was the king of the Albanians from 1928 to 1939. During his reign, he is reputed to have survived over 55 assassination attempts. One of these occurred in 1931 while Zog was visiting a Vienna opera house for a performance of Pagliacci. The attackers struck whilst Zog was getting into his car, and he survived by firing back with a pistol that he always carried with him.

6. Yasser Arafat: escaped from several bombing attacks and a plane crash

Mohammed Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa Al-Husseini, more commonly known as Yasser Arafat was a Palestinian leader. During his life survived several assassination attempts. In 1985 he narrowly survived an Israeli assassination attempt when Israeli Air Force F-15s bombed his headquarters there as part of Operation Wooden Leg, leaving 73 people dead. Arafat had gone out jogging that morning. He also survived a car write-off and a plane crash in a sandstorm in the Libyan desert on April 7, 1992. Two pilots and an engineer were killed; Arafat was bruised and shaken. He died November 11, 2004, at age 75 in a hospital in Paris.

The cause of death was never announced, and remains a mystery. Conspiratorial suggestions that Israel was somehow involved were quickly rejected by Palestinian authorities. Rumors have circulated for decades that Arafat was gay, and much of the speculation about his death, and the associated secrecy of the circumstances, have led to suggestions that he may have died of Aids.

7. Alexander II of Russia: after several attempts, got killed with a plan that included 3 backup bombers

Also known as Alexander the Liberator, he was the Emperor, or Czar, of the Russian Empire from 3 March 1855 until his assassination in 1881. In 1866, there was an attempt on the tsar's life in St. Petersburg by Dmitry Karakozov. To commemorate his narrow escape from death (which he himself referred to only as "the event of 4 April 1866"), a number of churches and chapels were built in many Russian cities. Thirteen years later, on the morning of 20 April 1879, Alexander II was briskly walking towards the Square of the Guards Staff and faced Alexander Soloviev, a 33-year-old former student. Having seen a menacing revolver in his hands, the Tsar fled. Soloviev fired five times but missed, and was sentenced to death and hanged on 28 May. In December 1879, the Narodnaya Volya , a radical revolutionary group which hoped to ignite a social revolution, organized an explosion on the railway from Livadia to Moscow, but they missed the tsar's train. On the evening of 5 February 1880 Stephan Khalturin, also from Narodnaya Volya, set off a charge under the dining room of the Winter Palace. Eleven people were killed and 30 wounded but the tsar was unharmed because he was late for dinner.

Finally, On 13 March 1881, Alexander felt victim to an assassination plot. As he was known to do every Sunday for many years, the tsar went to the Manezh to review the Life Guards. He traveled both to and from the Manezh in a closed carriage accompanied by six Cossacks with a seventh sitting on the coachman's left. The tsar's carriage was followed by two sleighs carrying, among others, the chief of police and the chief of the tsar's guards. The street was flanked by narrow sidewalks for the public. Another member of the Narodnaya Volya movement, Nikolai Rysakov, was carrying a small white package wrapped in a handkerchief. "After a moment's hesitation I threw the bomb. I sent it under the horses' hooves in the supposition that it would blow up under the carriage...The explosion knocked me into the fence."

The explosion, while killing one of the Cossacks and seriously wounding the driver and people on the sidewalk, had only damaged the bulletproof carriage, a gift from Napoleon III of France. The tsar emerged shaken but unhurt. Rysakov was captured almost immediately. Police Chief Dvorzhitsky heard Rysakov shout out to someone else in the gathering crowd. The surrounding guards and the Cossacks urged the tsar to leave the area at once rather than being shown at the site of the explosion. A second young member of the Narodnaya Volya, Ignacy Hryniewiecki, standing by the canal fence, raised both arms and threw another bomb at the tsar's feet. Later it was learned there was a third bomber in the crowd that would have been used if the other two bombers failed.

8. Gabriel Garcia Moreno: had his hand cut off with a machete, was shot 5 times but still managed to shout "God does not die"

Gabriel García Moreno (1821-1875) was the President of Ecuador in 1861. He was reelected three times. In 1875, when he got elected for the third time, it was considered to be his death warrant. He wrote immediately to Pope Pius IX asking for his blessing before inauguration day on August 30, and told him that he knew about conspiracies to assassinate him.

García Moreno's prediction was correct; on August 6, 1875, President Moreno went to the Cathedral in Quito to adore the Blessed Sacrament as he did often. Leaving the Cathedral, his assassins sprang into action. Faustino Rayo, the leader of the band, suddenly attacked the President with a machete while his comrades opened fire with revolvers. But he didn't die right away. Fallen from the porch and lying stretched out on the ground, his head bleeding, his left arm severed and right hand cut off by blows of a machete, the illustrious victim recognized his assailants. Some accounts say he gasped his last words, others that he was able to cry them out defiantly. All agree on the words themselves:"Dios no muere!" "God does not die!" Still conscious, he was brought back into the Cathedral and was laid before the altar of Our Lady of Sorrows. There he received the Last Rites and finally expired. Pope Pius IX, declared that Gabriel Garcia Moreno "died a victim of the Faith and Christian Charity for his beloved country."

At around 10 AM, festivities begin with the first event of the Tomatina. It is the "palo jamón", similar to the greasy pole. The goal is to climb a greased pole with a ham on top. As this happens, the crowd work into a frenzy of singing and dancing while being showered in water from hoses. Once someone is able to drop the ham off the pole, the start signal for the tomato fight is given by firing the water shot in the air and trucks make their entry. The signal for the onset is at about 11 when a loud shot rings out, and the chaos begins. Several trucks throw tomatoes in abundance in the Plaza del Pueblo. The tomatoes come from Extremadura, where they are less expensive and are grown specifically for the holidays, being of inferior taste. For the participants the use of goggles and gloves are recommended. The tomatoes must be crushed before being thrown so as to reduce the risk of injury. The estimated number of tomatoes used are around 150,000 i.e. over 40 metric tons. After exactly one hour, the fight ends with the firing of the second shot, announcing the end. The whole town square is colored red and rivers of tomato juice flow freely. Fire Trucks hose down the streets and participants use hoses that locals provide to remove the tomato paste from their bodies. Some participants go to the pool of “los peñones” to wash. After the cleaning, the village cobblestone streets are pristine due to the acidity of the tomato disinfecting and thoroughly cleaning the surfaces. IN JUNE 2013 - The Town Hall of Buñol finally decided on limiting the fight to 20,000 revellers, broken down as follows, 5,000 for locals of the town of Buñol and 15,000 for foreigners. Entry will be taxed at 10€ per person. Booking must be made online at their site and you must print a "budget airline" style ticket and take it to Buñol with your passport on the morning to exchange for a wristband. There are some organised trips to La Tomatina which include the entry to the fight (with wristband before arrival) and more.

Rules of the festival

The city council follows a short list of instructions for the safety of the participants and the festival:

The tomatoes have to be squashed before throwing to avoid injuries.
No other projectiles except tomatoes are allowed.
Participants have to give way to the truck and lorries.
The festival doesn't allow ripping off T-shirts.
After the second shot indicative of ending the tomato hurl, no tomatoes should be thrown.