1/5/25 - All Things Change 🪙

🏁 Solve –> All Things Change by Kareem Ayas

7A | Protagonist of Arabian folk tales

ALI BABA

One Thousand and One Nights (alternately known as Arabian Nights in some English translations) is a collection of Middle Eastern and Indian folk tales framed as a series of stories told by Scheherazade to delay her impending execution at the hands of King Shahryar, an aggrieved cuckold intent on marrying and killing a new woman every day.

Ironically, two of the work's most well-known pieces – "Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves" and "Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp" – are not in the original text. Rather, they were added in the early 1700s by French translator Antoine Galland from versions set down by Syrian storyteller Ḥannā Diyāb.

22A | Many a Quentin Tarantino film role

CAMEO

Like Alfred Hitchcock and M. Night Shyamalan, American film director and screenwriter Quentin Tarantino has a penchant for inserting himself into his movies. To date his roles include:

• Reservoir Dogs - Mr. Brown
• Pulp Fiction - Jimmie Dimmick
• Jackie Brown - voice of Jackie's answering machine
• Kill Bill: Volume 1 & 2 - Crazy 88 member
• Death Proof - bartender
• Inglourious Basterds - voice of British soldier in Nation's Pride (fake Nazi propaganda movie)
• Django Unchained - Ku Klux Klan member & Australian miner (two different roles)
• The Hateful Eight - narrator
• Once Upon a Time in Hollywood - announcer of Bounty Law (fictional Western show)

39A | Made less effective, in gamer slang

NERFED

Nerfing refers to deliberate actions taken by video game developers to weaken a character, weapon, or other attribute in order to ensure fair game play (in contrast to "buffing" – which involves strengthening those same components.)

This process is often accomplished through the release of updates (or "patches"), which are implemented once the game's creators have had a chance to see how real-world players interact with – and exploit – various aspects of the artificial environment.

The origin of the term dates back to the late '90s when Electronic Arts released a role-playing game called Ultima Online. Users soon realized that swords had a much greater impact than other weapons, which led to an unfair advantage. As a result, future versions of the title featured less powerful blades, leading players to remark that it was as if they were battling with NERF™ swords.

54A | Landmark featured in "Roman Holiday"

TREVI FOUNTAIN

The 1953 romantic comedy Roman Holiday stars Audrey Hepburn, Gregory Peck, and a slew of famous Roman landmarks (the movie was filmed on location) – including the 85-foot-tall Trevi Fountain

Sitting at the intersection of three (tre) roads (vie), the Baroque-style fountain was completed in 1762 on the site of the original Aqua Virgo aqueduct, the only one of Ancient Rome's 11 water supply channels still in use today.

👉 BONUS BIT: Legend holds that anyone who tosses a coin into the fountain will someday return to Italy's capital. (The money thrown into the water – amounting to nearly 2 million euros in 2023 – is collected twice a week and donated to Caritas, a Catholic charity.)

92A | European capital said to be the site of the first decorated Christmas tree

RIGA

C'mon! How am I supposed to earn a living when the trivia's already in the clue?!

106A | Musician once nicknamed "The Beale Street Blues Boy"

BB KING

While working at Memphis-based radio station WDIA, legendary singer/guitarist Riley King was awarded the nickname "Beale Street Blues Boy" (subsequently shortened to "Blues Boy and then simply "B.B") – a reference to the city's iconic blues club-lined thoroughfare.

According to King, he was hired on the spot after being asked to write a jingle for station sponsor Peptikon - a "blood-building" tonic that dubiously claimed to treat a variety of ailments. The tune he came up with went a little something like this:

"Peptikon sure is good; Peptikon sure is good; Peptikon sure is good; You can get it anywhere in your neighborhood.”

👉 BONUS BIT: When it came on the air in 1947, WDIA played a mix of country-western and pop music. It wasn't until the following year that its owners found success upon changing its programming to exclusively cater to the region's large Black audience, the first station in the United States to do so.

1D | Like most Iraqis

SHIA

When Islam's founder, the prophet Muhammad, died in 632 without leaving a male heir, his followers split into two factions over the question of who should become their religious leader.

Shi‘a (or Shi‘ite) Muslims believed that only direct descendants of Muhammad could assume this role, while Sunni Muslims felt that the first caliph (literally, "successor") could be elected from any worthy adherent to the faith.

Of the approximately 2 billion Muslims in the world today, around 85-90% are Sunnis. However, members of the smaller Shi'a branch constitute a majority in four countries: Iran, Iraq, Bahrain, and Azerbaijan.

28D | Last word of the New Testament

AMEN

The second half of the Christian Bible, otherwise known as the New Testament, concludes with the Book of Revelation – a highly symbolic text written near the end of the first century by a prophet calling himself "John."

After first describing the tribulations believers will endure while awaiting Jesus's return, the apocalyptic work foretells the restoration of God's paradise and ends with a benediction:

“The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.”

[Rev. 22:21, King James Version]

52D | North Carolina campus town

ELON

Elon University is a private institution that was established as "Elon College" in 1889 by the United Church of Christ. (The school shed its religious affiliation in 2001, the same year it amended its name.)

The school's founders chose the name "Elon" (from the Hebrew word for "oak") as a reference to a grove of oak trees that had to cleared to make room for the hallowed halls of higher learning.

[I can't help but be reminded here of an old Demetri Martin joke: “A treehouse is really insensitive. That’s like killing something and then making one of its friends hold it.”]

64D | Coffee named for the district it's grown in

KONA

As with Champagne wine and Roquefort cheese, for a coffee to bear the name "Kona" it must have come from a specific locale: the Kona district of Hawaiʻi (the largest of the eight main islands that comprise the state of Hawaii).

Kona, meaning "leeward" or "downwind," refers to the dry side of the island where the sunny weather and nutrient-rich volcanic soil provide ideal conditions for coffee cultivation.

Funny enough, coffee plants are not native to Hawaii, but were originally brought to the islands from Brazil in the 1820s.

👉 BONUS BIT: Kona is also the site of the Ironman Triathlon World Championship races.

75D | Gordimer who wrote "The Conservationist"

NADINE

Nadine Gordimer (1923-2014) was a South African novelist who received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1991, becoming the first of her country's citizens to be honored in that field.

Born to a Latvian father and married to a German husband, both of whom had emigrated from their native countries to escape persecution, Gordimer became a vocal anti-apartheid activist who befriended Nelson Mandela and provided feedback on his "I Am Prepared to Die" speech (a three-hour monologue Mandela delivered in front of the judge who was presiding over his trial for acts of sabotage against the South African government).

109D | Sch. with the Daily Bruin newspaper

UCLA

Founded on the UCLA campus in 1919, the same year as the university, The Daily Bruin is Los Angeles's third-largest newspaper by circulation (following the Los Angeles Times and the Los Angeles Daily News).

Notable individuals who spent time in the Daily Bruin newsroom include:

• Ralph Bunche (diplomat, first Black Nobel Peace Prize winner)
• Carol Burnett (actress, comedian, The Carol Burnett Show)
• Cari Champion (ESPN's SportsCenter, First Take)
• Harry Shearer (actor, Spinal Tap, The Simpsons)
• Marty Sklar (pioneering Disney theme park "imagineer")