You might not remember this-it's been so long! RL has a way of sweeping you along with it.
We have a few questions ready. Some were contributed from my oldest son and some were ones I thought we needed. You can answer here or copy and paste and send directly to my email.
Where do you live? City/State/country?
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects?
Is this rural or urban? Rough size?
What do you like most/least about where you live?
Most historically significant points about your town/country?
Climate?
Type of government? Name of current leader?
What are the major industries?
Major religion?
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College?
Most popular sport?
Most popular trend at the moment?
Most popular food?
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live?
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!)
If you feel like I didn't include something, please feel free to add it. Any links to pictures would be great. I'd love for them to have a picture of every place mentioned to add to their collage.
ooo OOooo answer here! That way some of us can use it for FF research as well . Dunno if you want info about the Ozarks but let me know if you do . Carol
Some of these q's are really hard! The diversity in my country complicates matters significantly - people's experiences there are incredibly different. This will require thought and, embarrassingly, research on my part, but I'll give it my best go. I'm answering as a South African about SA, not someone who lives in the UK, which I presume is what you want. Maybe if I'm really short of anything else to do I could do a comparison between the two...
Wait and see.
When Life Gives You Green Velvet Curtains, Make a Green Velvet Dress.
Okay, I should be working on schoolwork or packing for the likely trip to the hospital - or at the very least brainstorming Missy's brand new NANO with her - but I did this instead .
Where do you live? City/State/country? Republic, Missouri – just outside Springfield
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects? English
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? We live in a fairly rural area [there's a farm not 300 yards from us and another smaller one that our subdivision has grown around]. Republic has about 12,000 people but Springfield where we work and go to church, etc. is about 150,000.
What do you like most/least about where you live? Most: Our street in particular – it's safe for the kids to play on and we have .5 acre so room to run here too. Our area – it's smallish, community oriented, not big city… Least: Lack of good public transportation, but that's a side effect of living in a small community...
Most historically significant points about your town/country? There was a Civil War battle less than a mile from where I live [Wilson's Creek]. My alma mater [Drury University] still has berms soldiers hid behind during the Battle of Springfield.
Climate? Overall, pretty moderate. It doesn't get TOO hot in the summer [mostly upper 90s is the high with a few 100 days but not very many]. Winter is also fairly mild. Snow doesn't stick around too long. Today it's going to be 70* which is unusual for November. We also live in Tornado Alley. Every 2-3 years, Republic or Battlefield [about 3 miles away with 600-1000 people, half the town goes to school in Republic, half in Springfield] get hit by a tornado. Wilson's Creek Battlefield got hit a few years ago and it tore up the church with all the really old Bibles in it . Some were found miles away...
Type of government? Name of current leader? I'm going to go with local/state since I'm sure you know who the president is . Our governor is Matt Blunt – his dad, Roy Blunt, is our local US Representative. From the Republic website [ http://www.republicmo.com/local/index.php ]: The City of Republic is a first class chartered city under Missouri law with a Mayor-City Council form of government. The City Council consists of ten members, two Councilmen from each of five wards. The Mayor and Councilmen serve two year terms, with five Councilmen being elected each year. The City Administrator is the chief administrative officer of the City and is responsible to the Mayor and Council for the administration of all city affairs placed in the City Administrator's charge under the City Charter. The mayor is Jim Collins. The City Councilmen are: Ron Oswalt, Wes Carfourek, Gerry Pool, Garry E. Wilson, Steve Ward, Brian Buckner, Jim Huntsinger, Shane Grooms, Dennis Robbins and Keith Roberts. I'm ashamed to say I have no idea what Ward we're in…
What are the major industries? Here in Republic I'd have to say the farming industry is probably the biggest. There's no plants or anything but a few service type places [a few restaurants, stores, auto repair shops, stuff like that]. Springfield does have a few manufacturing plants, but I'd say it's also mostly service industry.
Major religion? Assemblies of God and Baptists have their world headquarters in Springfield. The vast majority of people in the region at least claim to be some Protestant denomination.
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? I think most people graduate high school. There are... 3 universities in Springfield [one major state uni, one Assemblies of God, one small liberal arts where I and Bob Barker both graduated from], at least 2 Bible colleges, one major community college [where DH and I both went and now teach]. There's also at least two more semi-major colleges within 30 minutes or so.
Most popular sport? Baseball – the St. Louis Cardinals and Kansas City Royals have many loyal fans, but probably more STL fans. We also have the AA team for the STL Cardinals locally. Kansas City Chiefs football is also very popular.
Most popular trend at the moment? Um… not a clue.
Most popular food? Springfield Chinese. This is not to be confused with actual Chinese. It's slightly different [don't ask me how, I don't eat Oriental food as a rule] but I do know that in Chicago, cashew chicken is known as Springfield Cashew Chicken because it was invented here *shrug*. We also have more restaurants per capita than anywhere else in the country [or at least we did 10 years ago].
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? Most people want to go to Bass Pro Shops when they're here – a hunting and fishing store. Not quite as big a deal as it used to be since they've opened franchises around the country, but still a pretty big deal. As for me... I don't know. I live here .
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!) I know there is something about a woman wandering around a bridge... but that's the extent of my knowledge about it... I didn't grow up here so I didn't learn all those things as kids...
Where do you live? A city close to Cologne, North-Rhine- Westfalia ( I belief that's the official English name), Germany or as I would say: Köln, Nordrheinwestfalen, Deutschland.
If you want to know how to pronounce Köln right and since their is no such letter as ö in English, please check this link: Pronounciation of Köln
Prominent language spoken? German Other languages/dialects? There are many dialects in Germany, the local dialect would be Kölsch or something pretty similiar to that one.
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? Cologne is pretty urban and has about a million inhabitants. If you chose the right direction you can go from one city to another without seeing rural environment. I live at the more rural side of Cologne, but that doesn't mean much. This western part of Germany is densely settled and there is no place you could actually call rural. At least not compared to the USA. After all Germany is pretty small.
What do you like most/least about where you live? The history is something I both like and dislike. I don't think I need to say something about Germany's role in history. But I love how much history is visible throughout Cologne. The Romans, the Middleage, whatever you like. The oldest parts of the church I was christianed in were build in 800 AD.
Most historically significant points about your town/country? The most famous place in Cologne is certainly the cathedrale or as we call it the "Kölner Dom".
But there are also parts of roman buildings and many other interesting things.
Climate? Hard to tell. You could say it's pretty wet, at least where I live. But I guess that's not what you want to know. In most parts of my country we have pretty mild winters- seldom below 0°C, hardly ever snow. The summers are warm, about 30°C. We don't usually deal with tornados, though lately we had a few. In the eastern and southern parts of the country the winters are less mild and the climate is more like continental.
Type of government? Name of current leader?
Federal Republic. We have a chancellor, her name is Angela Merkel - she is the head of government at the moment. People can only elect the parliament for the whole federation - called Bundestag, and the parliaments of the federal state they live in. The Bundestag elects the chancellor. There is also a formal head of state, a president. His name is Horst Köhler.
What are the major industries? Well, the most famous are automobiles I belief. VW, BMW, Mercedes... Other than this - Pharmaceutics (Bayer), steel
Major religion? Christian, one half catholic, the other half protestant. After all, it's our fault they're seperated
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? School's a strange thing around here. You go to primary school at the age of 7 until you're ten. After this you need to choose. If you're not that well at school you can go to the "Hauptschule". Better pupils can go to "Realschule". They both are from fith grade to tenth. The graduation basically is the same, but people who come from "Realschule" can get more different types of jobs. The third possibility is "Gymnasium". It used to be from fith grade to 13th, but lately that changed and now it's 12th grade. The graduation from "Gymnasium" enables you to go to University. We call that graduation "Abitur".
As far as I know about 50% of the German students finish school with an Abitur. But the major problem around here is that children with better financial, educational background have better chances to get a good education. Mostly children of immigrants have problems at school. Since Germany has a relatively high rate of unemployed people, children with low educational level easily end up unemployed. That's a great topic of the politicians these days.
Most popular sport? Without a doubt - football, or as some call it: soccer. There is little else people here pay any attention to.
Most popular trend at the moment?I can't think of anything right now.
Most popular food?Definitely not sourkraut I guess that "Currywurst" is very popular at least when it comes to fastfood. I'm not sure certain fastfood restaurants really stand a chance. Other than that... I guess most German meals consist of potatos, vegetables and meat.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? I'm pretty interested in history, so... Cologne became a city in 51 AD. I still think that's almost unbelievable. Before that it was a little village, called Oppidum Ubiorum. When Agrippina became the wife of a Roman emperor (I think it was Claudius. And they were Nero's parents) the village had to become a city, because someone that famous couldn't be born in a village. The new name of Cologne was - Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium. That's why Cologne is called Cologne.
Oh and there is also something I find pretty funny. Throughout the whole Middleage nobody thought about street numbers. It wasn't before Napoleon occupied the city (and the French almost went crazy because they didn't find anything in the city) that the houses got numbers. Maybe you know the most famous: 4711. Eau de Cologne
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!)The most famous legend is about the "Heinzelmännchen" They are some kind of dwarfs who used to come each night to do all the work the people hadn't finished. They made bread, they sewed coats - and the people of Cologne had a nice and lazy life. But the tailor's wife was curious and she wanted to know who did all the work. One night she put peas all over the stairs and waited for the "Heinzelmännchen" to come. When they came they stumbled over the peas and fell down the staircase. They fled and were never seen again ever since that night. Thus we need to do our work all on our own.
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects?
Most Swedes speak Swedish, of course, but Swedish is not "officially" the language of Sweden. A few languages are granted special protection because they have long been spoken by well-established minorities in Sweden. Two such languages are Finnish and Romani.
Most Swedes are able to speak English.
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Is this rural or urban? Rough size?
Malmö is the third largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm (our capital) and Gothenburg (Göteborg). Population 280,000. (The total population of Sweden is about 9 million. The total land area of Sweden is 449,964 km² (173,720 square miles), which makes it slightly bigger than California.)
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What do you like most/least about where you live?
Pildammsparken, The Willow Pond Park, is situated in Malmö right next to where I live, and it's really nice.
There are other nice parks, too. And we have a quite beautiful main library, which won first prize in an architeture competion some years ago.
We have a nice main theater house from 1944, Malmö Stadsteater. Famous film director Ingmar Bergman, who died a few months ago, directed the first play ever at Malmö Stadsteater, A Midsummer Night's Dream. I had found a nice picture of it, but suddenly the link shut down!
Both the library and the theater are close to where I live. There are sports stadiums nearby, too.
Downtown, people gather at Lilla Torg (Little Square), where there are all sorts of restaurants, cafés and bars.
In August the Malmö Festival is held, when Stortorget (The Big Square) looks like this:
A popular new landmark in Malmö is our new skyscraper, Turning Torso.
Turning Torso is situated in Västra hamnen (West harbour), the newest district in Malmö where everybody in Malmö comes to swim in the summer.
We actually have a quite nice sandy beach in Malmö too, Ribersborg, but these days people prefer to lie down on the clean wooden construction that you can see in the picture above. And there are such nice cafes right nearby in Västra hamnen, too.)
And let me mention one of my own favorites in Malmö, too. It's Katrinetorps Gård, a lovely old mansion from the year 1800, situated in the southernmost part of Malmö. The place is still quite rural, although the trains bound for Copenhagen pass nearby, and a lot of new shopping centers and the like have sprung up not far from the railway. Katrinetorps Gård has got a lovely restaurant, and I quite often cycle there on a Saturday or a Sunday to eat a delicious weekend meal!
Most historically significant points about your town/country?
This is Malmöhus slott, an important castle or fort from the 16th century.
We also have a church from the 13th century, Sankt Petri kyrka (Saint Peter's Church).
Recently, Öresundsbron, the Strait of Öresund fixed link, was built between Malmö and Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark. It may not be historically significant, but it sure is important for us here in southern Sweden! It's very easy to travel to Copenhagen from Malmö these days, and Copenhagen is a large and important European capital. Trains cross the bridge every twenty minutes, and it takes only about forty minutes to go from Malmö to Copenhagen.
This is Nyhavn (New Harbour) in Copenhagen. Pretty, isn't it?
Malmö is also very close to Lund, the second most important university town in Sweden. Lund is pretty, intellectual and charming, and it is ancient and youthful at the same time.
The University of Lund. There has been a university here since, I think, the 15th century. This is the main building, which is of course much more recent. Here the all-male Student Choir, founded some 150 years ago or so, gather each year on the first of May to sing beautiful songs in honour of spring and the month of May.
The county that Malmö is situated in, Skåne (Scania), is really beautiful and varied. I can recommend Ales Stenar (the Stones of Ale). It's a monument somewhat reminiscent of Stonehenge in England. Admittedly Stonehenge is a lot more impressive as a monument, but take it from me - the landscape surrounding Ales Stenar is breathtaking, because the coastline is very steep. You can walk right up to the edge of it, and you feel as if you are almost flying over the Baltic Sea.
The Swedish poet Anders Österling wrote a poem about Ales stenar. I'll make a rough translation of parts of it:
Where land hovers between sea and sky Ale built a giant ship of stones.
....
Its stem are stones its sails are clouds It sails the stream of time unfettered.
....
Around the ship and grave the water glitters old as time and wide as the open sea. ....
Each new spring brings flowers around ancient stones the lark sings, and the summers of Skåne tumble in the wind.
Okay, let's leave Ales stenar! There are also lovely beech forests in Skåne. Many of them are unbelievably full of white wood anemones in the spring.
So what do I like the least about where I live? Uh... how about January and February in Malmö?
It's as depressing as it looks. Gaaahhhh!!!!
Well, I've posted very many pictures already. i will be back later with a bit more information about Malmö.
I'm writing this about my home town and country, even though I now live in England.
Where do you live? City/State/country? Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape Province, Republic of South Africa.
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects? Majority of the population in this area speaks Xhosa 57%. Also English 12% and Afrikaans 30%. We have 11 official languages in SA - those three (which incidentally make up our national anthem), plus IsiNdebele, IsiZulu, Northern Sotho, Sesotho, Setswana, SiSwati, Tshivenda, Xitsonga. I speak Eng and Afr (and a very little bit of Xhosa).
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? Fifth largest city in SA, and third largest port - approximately 1,500,000 people live in the greater PE area - known as Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality, which is the 2nd largest metropolitan area in the country area-wise - and just over 1 million in the city itself. The national population is about 48mil. I grew up about 20 min from town, in a rural suburb - big plots, but not farm land. Interesting bit of trivia: PE is sister city to Jacksonville, Florida and Palm Desert, California.
What do you like most/least about where you live? Likes: Lovely mild climate. We are rated as having the 4th best weather conditions in the world! Also, beautiful beaches. Having wildlife on your doorstep. There's a lion park just down the road from where my parents live - have had the privilege of handling lion cubs.
PS. That is not me! but that is the lion park. Note the lovely sunshine and Indian ocean in the background, Ann.
PE is known as the Windy City (and the Friendly City - locals prefer that one!), which is one downside to living on the coast. Also, it's a nice size city, but not too big - in fact small enough so you always find someone who knows someone you do! Dislikes: After having lived in the uk for the last few years, going home everything's a little bit third world to me - the appearance of the place, the services you have available to you, the occassional donkey cart in the street. Lol. You just don't have everything you take for granted here, eg I can't walk into a library and get free internet access. I'd have to go to an internet cafe, pay and then be frustrated by slow connections. Or, I can't walk into a shop and buy the dvd I want cos it's too obscure for them to stock it - things like that are v expensive relative to what people earn. Just little things like that. As far as the country is concerned, crime is a huge problem. People have razor wire on top of their walls, security systems, car alarms, etc. There's a different feeling when I go to SA. I wouldn't go for walk somewhere deserted by myself because I wouldn't feel safe, whereas in the uk I'm forever wandering around the countryside by myself with not a care in the world. It's not all bad though really, you just have to be sensible.
Most historically significant points about your town/country? The first european to come to the area was Bartolomeu Diaz in 1488. The town itself was founded in 1820 when around 4000 british settled there. It's named for the late wife of the acting governor of the Cape Colony at the time, Sir Rufane Donkin. Pictured below is the monument erected to her.
As for the country, the discovery of gold and diamonds. Apartheid (legalised system of racial segregation).
Climate? Mixed, but generally temperate. It's a world in one country as far as geography is concerned. We have montains, desert, savannah, woodland, and more. A lot of the country is very hot , the east coast is warm and humid, the south and west coasts are more temperate. My home town is on the south east coast, so the temperature ranges from low teens in winter to high 20's/low 30's in summer. That celsius btw. (50's - 90'sF I think.) Most of the rain falls in winter/early spring, and the wind blows a lot in Oct. (and nov through sept Lol!)
Type of government? Name of current leader? Govt is democratically elected every 5 years by national election. Each of the 9 provinces has a local government, separately elected, so not all represent the national ruling party. The country's leader is Thabo Mbeki, ruling party is the ANC - African National Congress.
What are the major industries? The major industry in PE is the motor vehicle industry. In SA, mining - we are the worlds leading producer of gold and platinum; diamonds; coal; agriculture; tourism
Major religion? Christian
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? Among the white population I would say most kids finish high school and a large percentage go on to university or other forms of tertiary education. The non-white population is not so lucky. Children of different races were educated separately during Apartheid. I went to a white's only school until I was 14 - integration took place in 1991. But poverty is a huge factor in education, as in most areas of life. The 'haves' will be well educated, the 'have nots' just don't get that opportunity. I've found some stats that say a little over 60% of high school students graduate - some provinces students perform significantly better than others though. The Eastern Cape has pretty poor pass rates.
Most popular sport? Soccer, cricket and rugby.
Most popular trend at the moment? I have no idea.
Most popular food? Again, because there are so many different cultural groups in South Africa, everyone has there own types of food. eg. There is a large Indian community in SA; the Afrikaner diet is more 'meat and potatoes'; the poor black population has maize meal as a staple in their diet. The wealthy might eat something else. The answer is, I don't really know. I grew up in an english household eating what I would describe as traditional western type food. Probably much the same as what you all eat. We have KFC, MacDonalds, etc which might surprise you. It always surprises me to know things like that, which is ridiculous since I've lived there, but when I think of Africa the pictures you see on the news of starving children and animals wandering down dirt streets is what comes to mind. Sure that's a part of it, but the cities are pretty first world.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? Probably the cultural and ethnic diversity of my country, and the changes that have taken place politically and socially in the last 20 years or so. (unfortunately those are also a great source of frustration for a lot of people, but we're getting there slowly.)
We have one of the only three horse memorials worldwide, erected in recognition of the animals that died during the Anglo-Boer War(1899 - 1902).
Hosting the soccer world cup in 2010. Winning the Rugby world cup last month. Springbok captain John Smit, pictured with Mr Pres, Thabo Mbeki.
Couldn't resist adding that!
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!) The tokoloshe is all I can think of - it's a little evil spirit of sorts that will get you at night if you're not careful, so people who believe in this sleep with their beds on bricks so it can't reach them and they'll be safe! Not really an urban legend, but thought he might like it. There are some alarming ideas about HIV and Aids, it's causes and how to cure it, which are prepetuated by the govt so they don't need to provide medication on a large scale. But I'm not going to go there.
If you feel like I didn't include something, please feel free to add it. Any links to pictures would be great. I'd love for them to have a picture of every place mentioned to add to their collage.
I've had enough for the moment, but I'll probably come back and edit this later. I've learned a few things filling this in too, so thanks. And if you want me to elaborate on anything SQD, just ask.
When Life Gives You Green Velvet Curtains, Make a Green Velvet Dress.
Okay, this is my second post about Malmö and Sweden, and I will not include so many pictures here, I think!
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Climate?
Sweden is really a very northerly country, but the climate is relatively mild. Canada and Russia, which are situated at the same latitudes, are so much colder. The Gulf Stream keeps us warm, I suppose.
This is the average temperature in Malmö in degrees Celcius - you will have to convert it into Fahrenheit yourselves, I'm afraid (but remember that water freezes at zero degrees Celsius and boils at a hundred degrees Celsius):
January: average daytime temperature, +2, average nighttime temperature, -3. February: +2, -3. March: +5, -1. April: +10, +2. May: +16, +7. June: +20, +11. July: +21, +13. August: +21, +12. September: +17, +10. October: +12, +7. November: +7, +3. December: +4, -1. We get an average of 604 millimeters of precipitation each year.
Most of the rest of Sweden is colder than Malmö, particularly in the winter. 15% of Sweden is north of the Arctic Circle, where the sun never sets during parts of the summer, and never rises during mid-winter.
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Type of government? Name of current leader?
Sweden is a constitutional monarchy, but the king is a mere figurehead.
The king and queen of Sweden on the right, and their three children on the left:
The government, always dominated by the largest political party, has the executive power. The Parliament, where each party is represented according to how many votes they got in the latest election, has the legislative power. Elections are held in Sweden every four years.
Since 1930, the left-wing Social Democratic Party has usually been the largest party by far, and they have usually dominated the government. However, in the latest election of 2006, an alliance of four right-wing political parties won, and they now form the government. So far the Swedes have been relatively unhappy with their new government. According to the latest polls, a left-wing alliance would get 55% of the votes if there was an election today, and the right-wing alliance would get only 40%.
The Prime Minister of Sweden is just the leader of the dominant party. The current Prime Minister of Sweden is Fredrik Reinfeldt.
Of course, Fredrik Reinfeldt is the (right-wing) Prime Minister of Sweden. Sweden is also divided into municipalities, and they have their own "governments", although they are not as independent of the government of Sweden as the individial states are independent of the federal government of the United States. Nevertheless, the municipality of Malmö is governed by a left-wing, Social Democratic "city council". There is an election for the city council every four years, at the same time as there is an election for the government of Sweden.
This is the top man in Malmö, Ilmar Reepalu. You can hear from his name that he, like many other people in Malmö, has immigrant roots. His parents are from Estonia.
Malmö is a fairly expansive town right now, and many new things are being built. I'd like to show you this picture, too. Ilmar Reepalu on the left has grabbed the shovel to start off yet another building project, a city tunnel. But the reason that I wanted to show this image is that the woman in the picture, one of the bosses for the city tunnel project, is an astronomy friend of mine, Pia Kinhult.
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What are the major industries?
I'd better quote Wikipedia here:
Sweden is an export oriented market economy featuring a modern distribution system, excellent internal and external communications, and a skilled labour force. Timber, hydropower, and iron ore constitute the resource base of an economy heavily oriented toward foreign trade. Sweden's engineering sector accounts for 50% of output and exports. Telecommunications, the automotive industry and the pharmaceutical industries are also of great importance. Agriculture accounts for 2% of GDP and employment.
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Major religion?
It is obviously Christianity, but Sweden is not a very religious country at all. We have had a Prime Minister - not the current one, admittedly - who was an avowed atheist. Such things are not important to most Swedes, who think that a person's religious faith is his or her own business. Credibility and personal morality are not seen as having much to do with a person's religious faith.
There was recently an article in Dagens Nyheter, Sweden's most influential daily newspaper, which claimed that Swedes are the second most secularized people in the world. Only the Japanese are more secularized. These figures are from Wikipedia:
According to the most recent Eurobarometer Poll 2005,[70] 23% of Swedish citizens responded that "they believe there is a god", whereas 53% answered that "they believe there is some sort of spirit or life force" and 23% that "they do not believe there is any sort of spirit, god, or life force".
There is only one openly religious political party, kristdemokraterna (the Christian Democrats). In the latest election, the Christian Democrats got 6.59% of the votes. In the latest polls they have been down to about 4%.
Most Swedes regard churches as some sort of museums - beautiful to look at, but sort of boring too, and irritating to visit if there is a person inside lecturing you about God. The average Swede goes to church mostly or only to attend events like weddings, christenings and funerals. Marriage is really optional in Sweden, and we have a word, "sambo" - "live-together" - which is used about couples who openly live together without getting married. Huge numbers of Swedes are sambos, and that is never an impediment to life in Sweden unless, perhaps, you want to be a bishop or a diplomat in a country where non-married partnerships would be most severely frowned upon. But if you do get married in Sweden - and very many do, of course - then the huge majority want to get married in church, because that is much prettier than getting married in the court house.
A just-married Swedish couple. The little boys are probably their sons. People who get married in church when they already have children often baptize their kids at the same time, because it's popular to baptize one's children in Sweden.
The people who are most religious in Sweden today tend to be immigrants, many of whom are Muslims (and in many cases refugees from Iraq).
I should probably mention that Sweden really receives huge numbers of refugees these days. People who arrive here from countries which are at war, or where there is a civil war going on, are almost always permitted to stay, and within a couple of years they are almost routinely granted Swedish citizenship, too. The net result is that Sweden alone accepts almost three times as many refugees from Iraq as the rest of the European Union put together. Very many of those refugees gravitate to Malmö once they have come to Sweden, and they often end up in a part of Malmö called Rosengård. Here is an image of immigrant children in Rosengård celebrating Swedish midsummer:
Aren't ethnic Swedes opposed to the idea that Sweden should receive so many immigrants? Actually, few are concerned. There is a nationalist party, Sverigedemokraterna (The Swedish Democrats) which is against immigration, but they have never received enough votes to be represented in the Swedish Parliament. You need 4% of the votes to be represented, but the Swedish Democrats usually gets only 2% or at most 3%.
Speaking about immigrants, I should perhaps mention Möllevångstorget, the Mill Meadow Square, which is a very well-known part of Malmö. In the daytime the square is full of people selling fruit and flowers and the like. There are also many restaurants, bars and night clubs around Möllevångstorget, and many people love it. Möllevången is described as ethnically mixed, happy and laid-back. But this is also a crime-ridden part of Malmö, and personally I never go there after dark.
Well, well. I just picked up a copy of Sweden's snottiest (and certainly Stockholm-based) daily, Dagens Nyheter, and they exhorted people to go to Malmö just so they could sample all the culinary delights in all the exotic food shops around Möllevångstorget! Okay, just so you know!
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Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College?
Most people certainly graduate high school. As for how common it is to graduate college, I can't really say. Certainly many people go to college, but I think - I'm not sure, mind you - that fewer than half of all Swedes do. Going to college is free, however. It costs nothing, except that you will have to buy your own (often expensive) books.
It is certainly true that very many immigrant children and teenagers have very big problems at school, because their knowledge of Swedish is so rudimentary.
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Most popular sport?
Definitely soccer! And the second most popular sport is ice hockey.
Swedish soccer fans. They dress in blue and yellow because those are the colors of our flag. The girl on the banner would be Pippi Longstocking, the strongest girl in the world. Pippi is a fictional character created by Astrid Lindgren, Sweden's most popular children's book writer ever.
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Most popular trend at the moment?
I've been giving the trend thing some thought, and I think I can say something about some very important trends in Sweden.
Certainly since the 1950s, Sweden has been a welfare society. We expect the government to give us free health care, free education (including college), very generous child care, parental leave etcetera, sick leave and unemployment support. In return, we pay the highest taxes in the industrialized world. I was once asked about our taxes by an American woman, who was shocked and upset to hear how high or taxes are:
American woman: How can you stand it?
Me: Ummmm... because we think it's worth it?
We generally do think it's worth it, but then we also expect the government to be there for us in our hour of need.
One thing we expect from the government is paid vacations. Swedes are entitled to five weeks of paid vacation every year. After the Swedish economy was generally down in the 1980s, Swedes feel richer now, and an incredibly popular trend is to travel abroad. So many Swedes do it, and for so many reasons. The twenty-year-old son of a colleague of mine recently took a one-year break from college to go to Beijing and study Chinese. The daughter of another colleague is doing voluntary work in Ghana. The 24-year-old son of one of my best friends is currently living and working in Nicaragua. And I know a lot of other young Swedes who have travelled extensively in Asia and South America.
Huge numbers of Swedes travel abroad on vacation. They go to Mallorca, the Canary Islands, Greece and Turkey, and one of the best-loved destinations is Thailand.
On December 26, 2004, a huge tsunami hit Thailand, and almost 600 vacationing Swedes were killed. And no wonder, because almost 50,000 Swedes were in Thailand when the tsunami hit! 50,000 out of a total population of 9 million! Isn't that amazing? No other European countries had even nearly as many tourists in Thailand at the time, and no other European country had nearly as many casualities.
Seriously, how could so many Swedes be in Thailand on that day, December 26, 2004? The answer is that Sweden practically shuts down twice a year. It happens during the last week of December, between December 24 and January 1, and also during the entire month of July. That is when practically every Swede is on vacation! And so many Swedes go abroad when they are free.
By the way, please come to Sweden in July, because those who work with tourism will make your stay really nice for you. But don't come here for Christmas! That's when Swedes either go abroad or shut themselves up in their homes with their families. In 1993 my father died a few weeks before Christmas, and my neighbour Christer had also lost his father that year. Moreover, he had no other relatives left. Christer and I decided that we would go out and eat together on Christmas Eve in Malmö. Would you believe that it was impossible? Nothing was open! We decided to go to Copenhagen instead. It was hard enough to find anything that was open in Copenhagen either, but we managed to find one restaurant that would serve us. However, we were warned that they would close already at 3 p.m. This was before there was a bridge between Malmö and Copenhagen, so we had to take the hydrofoil instead. As we got on board, we realized that we were the only ethnic Scandinavian passengers there! All the other passengers were immigrants, almost certainly Muslims, who don't celebrate Christmas but used the vacation to go to Copenhagen to, probably, visit relatives there.
Okay, so Christer and I went to the restaurant and had some rather nice fish. At three o'clock we left, as the restaurant was closing. But can you imagine what Copenhagen looked like when we got outside? Remember that Copenhagen is a large and important European capital with a very nice downtown center. I'm not kidding you when I say that the place was deserted! Seriously! Christer and I walked down the large pedestrian street with all its nice shops, and there was not a single person anywhere! At three o'clock in the afternoon! It was as if a bomb had hit and vaporized all the people but left all the buildings perfectly intact. It was absolutely surreal, believe me. So take my advice, don't come to Malmö or Copenhagen for Christmas unless you have family here!
Let's return to the tsunami of 2004. I said before that we currently have a right-wing government, which won the election of 2006. An important reason for why they won (and for why the Social Democrats lost) is that people were furious because the Swedish government had failed to save the 600 Swedes from the tsunami! Why didn't the Swedish government swoop down from the sky with helicopters to evacuate its citizens and bring them to hospitals in Sweden? So what if Thailand is tens of thousands of miles away from Sweden, and what if there was total chaos in Thailand after the tsunami? We pay taxes so that the government can save us, don't we?
So now we have a new government, and people are so disillusioned because this new government is apparently even less interested in taking care of us than the previous government was....
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Most popular food?
It could well be pizza! Hamburgers are popular too, and kebab, and Thai food. Many people love well-filled baguettes, and many others love pasta and meat sauce.
A very traditional Swedish dish is Swedish meatballs with potatoes, sauce and lingonberry jam:
Want to try Swedish meatballs? Is there an Ikea department store close to where you live? Ikea is one of the huge industrial successes of Sweden, and its founder, Ingvar Kamprad, is one of the ten richest persons in the world.
If you want to try Swedish meatballs and have an Ikea store close to where you live, go to the restaurant there! They will serve you Swedish meatballs!
An peculiarly Swedish "dish" - actually, rather something that is eaten on top of slices of bread - is Kalles Kaviar. That's cod roe with vegetable oil, sugar and salt. You squeeze it out of a tube. I love it!!
Another extremely Swedish thing is salty licorice! It's licorice candy, but it is salty as well as sweet. We and the Danes are the only ones who like it! Sometimes I bring some salty licorice with me when I go abroad. They say you shouldn't eat too much of it - it can raise your blood pressure....
There is one more thing that I just have to show you. Swedish men live an average of 76.8 years, which makes them the second-hardiest men in the world, after the men in Japan and Iceland, who are the Methuselahs of the world with an average life expectancy of 77.1 years. (Source: Globalis - an interactive world map ) I can't tell you why men in Japan and Iceland live so long, but I can tell you the secret behind Swedish men's longevity. It's "snus". Snus is wet tobacco, and the guys put it between their upper lip and their gum, as far up as it will go (although sometimes it will slip down), and then they sort of suck at it. Snus, in other words, is smokeless tobacco. Tobacco smoke is really extremely dangerous, and it contains, I think, hundreds of carcinogenic substances. Smokeless tobacco, or snus, is really much, much less dangerous. Relatively few Swedish men smoke, but many Swedish men use snus. (And just so you know, many Swedish men don't use tobacco at all!) But because Swedish men smoke less than men from other countries, they also live longer. Swedish women, however, tend to avoid snus, so if they use tobacco they will be smokers instead. So far Swedish women live longer than Swedish men - Swedish women live an average of 81.8 years, which means we tie third place in the world along with Switzerland. But we are behind Spain, Martinique and France, which tie second place in female life expectancy at 82 years. The longest-living women by far are found in Japan, where females live to an average of 83.8 years. But the life expectance gap between Swedish men and women seems to be closing. There may come a time when Swedish men, the "snusers", will outlive Swedish women, the smokers! Okay, take a look if you dare:
(These days snus also comes packaged in little bags looking like tea bags, and then it's not half as disgusting. Quite a few women use the tea bag snus.)
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What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live?
Don't know if it is exciting, but to me it is important that Sweden may be the best country to live in if you are looking for rights for women. For example, health care is free, and many teenage girls go to youth clinics where they can talk to gyneacologists as well as to welfare officers and get all kinds of advice. At the clinics, the girls can get help with birth control, testing for venereal diseases, and also help with abortions. Young girls who get pregnant and want to keep their babies are offered a lot of support. (Giving up one's baby for adoption is practically unheard of).
Pregnant women are given a lot of medical checkups, and child mortality as well as maternal mortality are among the absolutely lowest in the world. After giving birth, a woman gets 420 days of partly paid child leave, and her employer is forbidden to fire her for staying home with her child. Also, the child's father is entitled to 60 "parent leave" days of his own, which can't be taken over by the mother.
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Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!)
The only thing I can think of is that since pizza is so popular in Sweden, there have been stories circulating that some pizzerias are not to be trusted - because if they run out of meat they may catch a rat and fill your pizza with rat-atouille.... Wait, I remember something else. Do you remember Malmöhus slott which you could see in a picture in my previous post? It is surrounded by a moat, and people say that tropical turtles swim around in the moat. People who have turtles as pets are said to dump them in the moat when they get tired of them.
Oh, by the way! I just have to show you this picture. A few years ago a documentary was made about Malmö, based on ordinary people's private footage and films, Mitt hjärtas Malmö (Malmö of my heart). Volume #1 had this cover:
Guess what? The baby girl in the picture is my own best friend, Annika Ekman! She is held by her mother, Carin, now deceased. The picture is from 1957. Cool, eh?
In the background you can see the Central train station, from where I commute every day. But the tram cars are a thing of the past.
Where do you live? City/State/country? Welcome to Seattle, Washington!
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Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects? English, but we have a large non-English-speaking Asian population, as well.
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? Urban. Rough estimate of population: 572,600 as of 2004, and it has grown.
What do you like most/least about where you live? I love the fact that it's such a cultural melting pot. And I hate the traffic.
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Most historically significant points about your town/country? Seattle is surrounded by water on three sides. It was home to the 1962 World's Fair. Grey's Anatomy is set there.
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Climate? RAIN, RAIN, RAIN. We actually have all four seasons, but it rains a lot.
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Type of government? Name of current leader? The mayor of Seattle is Greg Nickels. The governor of Washington is Christine Gregoire, who won in the closest gubernatorial race in state history, by less than 100 votes, in 2004. The state is led by Democrats. Seattle as a city is generally very liberal. The conservatives are in the suburbs.
What are the major industries? Boeing, Microsoft, Starbucks, Amazon, Expedia. Lots of tech, we're getting into a lot of biotech, as well. We have the biggest children's hospital in the Northwest, and one of the leading cancer-research institutes in the world. We also have the Port of Seattle, which is one of the largest ports in the country for freight.
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Major religion? Seattle continues to grow as a city without deep religious roots. However, I would say the majority of those who are religious are Christian.
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? We have one very large college here (the University of Washington), as well as two private colleges (Seattle Pacific University and Seattle University), and a lot of community colleges. The Seattle School District is in somewhat of a state of disarray, and the number of kids who graduate and go onto college seems to be falling. However, the graduation rates are a lot higher in the suburbs; one of the best-ranked high schools in the country is about 10 miles away across the lake.
Most popular sport? Football. We have the Seattle Seahawks and then the University of Washington Huskies. The city is still on a high from the Seahawks going to the Superbowl in 2006.
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Most popular trend at the moment? Being pissed off at our NBA team, the Seattle Sonics, for being sold to a group from Oklahoma City, which plans to break the lease with the team's arena and move the team to Oklahoma.
Most popular food? Coffee! We're Starbucks USA! (That pic is the very first one, by Pike Place Market.) We also are known for our salmon and the city has really become entrenched in the organics movement.
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What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? The fabulous newspapers. No, really, it's that Washington has a little of everything. We have mountains and plains and a rainforest and urban areas and the ocean ... it's a real variety.
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Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!) We have had some famous killers come from here. Yeah, I know that sounds great.
Clark: "You don't even know the meaning of the word 'humility,' do you?"
Where do you live? City/State/country? London, England
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects? English.
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? Urban, several million.
What do you like most/least about where you live? Likes - easy access to big city resources, shops, communications, etc. Dislikes - traffic, occasional crowding in e.g. street markets and tourist areas, seriously overloaded public transport.
Most historically significant points about your town/country? Capital of Britan, about as historic as it gets.
Climate? Very variable. Currently cold and damp.
Type of government? Representative democracy.
Name of current leader? Gordon Brown
What are the major industries? Financial services, tourism, some manufacturing but a lot less important than it was except in some specialized areas e.g. aerospace, armaments, chemicals, pharmaceuticals.
Major religion? Probably christianity, but not by much - Islam and the Indian religions are catching up, with Judaism trailing some way behind.
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? Yes College? No
Most popular sport? Football (soccer, not American football)
Most popular trend at the moment? No idea
Most popular food? Indian food, possibly pizza.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? It's a real city, sometimes the pace of change is a little daunting, but I'd hate to live in the country.
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!)
Hundreds - from all the old stories about the Tower of London up to Jack the Ripper, Sprin-Heeled Jack, and beyond. The school where I work just had to dig up an entire graveyard and 1500+ bodies to make room for an underground gymn, give that a few years and someone is sure to decide it's haunted!
Marcus L. Rowland Forgotten Futures, The Scientific Romance Role Playing Game
Where do you live? City/State/country? Sydney, New South Wales Australia
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects? English
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? Urban according to Wikipedia the rough size of Sydney is 12, 144.6 square kilometres
What do you like most/least about where you live? I love being within easy reach of Sydney Harbour and the beaches. There's nothing I love more than going to the Harbour or to the beach on a nice sunny day. I also love that we are the only city in the world (at least currently to my knowledge) that has a (or rather two) Lindt cafe. Mmmm... Swiss Chocolate. There's not much that I don't like about being here I guess I have to say public transport would be my main gripe, but I rarely use it anymore.
Most historically significant points about your town/country? Circular Quay is where the first settler's arrived in Sydney, Parramatta is one of the first inland suburbs or Sydney, Kurnell/Botany Bay where Captain James Cook first discovered Australia and I guess you could add Homebush Bay because that's where the 2000 Olympic Stadium is situated.
Climate? Mild to moderate in summer and winter we enjoy a rather temperate climate that on occasion will tip either way. It usually depends whether the Blue Mountains get snow for it to be really cold
Type of government? Name of current leader? If by that you mean the party in power in NSW then it's the Labor Party and the Premier is Morris Iemma (pronounced 'Yemma'). National leader is John Howard who is part of the Liberal Party, but Australia is sson to have an election so that could change.
What are the major industries? Sydney is mostly the corporate centre of Australia. In Australia wheat, wool, banannas, mangoes and mining are considered our primary industries.
Major religion? Christianity mainly Catholicism and Anglican. Sydney is where the Catholic and Anglican Archbishop reside
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? Technical colleges and many will graduate high school either finishing in year 10 to do a trade or go onto year 12 to hopefully attend university. Sydney University my alma mater is Australia's oldest university.
Most popular sport? Cricket, Rugby League/Union, Swimming, Australian football
Most popular trend at the moment? Have no clue
Most popular food? There's so much cultural diversity in Sydney so it depends where you go. Thai, Chinese, Japanese and Vietnamese are popular Asian foods. At the footy or sports in general nothing does better than a meat pie, the good old barbeque never hesitates to bring people together.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? No question either being by the Harbour.
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? Not that I know of. I have heard of a few ghost stories, but I don't remember them.
The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched they must be felt with the heart
I was going to answer some of those questions but Crazy_Babe beat me to it.
But, while I'm here I just want to ask how we could not know each other IRL. I mean, I currently work in Sydney, where I could go to Circual Quay every day for lunch if I wanted to. And I went to Sydney University for three and a half years.
I was home eating chocolate—cottage cheese. Chocolate flavoured cottage cheese. It's a new flav— I was doing my laundry. —Lois Lane
I live in Jacksonville, Florida (USA), in the northeast corner of the state. The state of Georgia is immediately north and the Atlantic Ocean is immediately east.
This is the heart of our downtown. (Pic by me! I'm kind of proud of it because I took it at 7 am on a Sunday at a dead stop on the ramp to the bridge. I never could have taken it at any other time due to traffic.)
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects?
English with a large minority speaking Spanish.
Is this rural or urban? Rough size?
Jacksonville is a city, but we don't have a city center like New York or London. (Our downtown absolutely dies after 5pm). We are more like the textbook definition of suburban sprawl. The metropolian Jacksonville area has about a million residents. And here's an interesting fact: we are the largest city, area-wise, in the continental United States - about 870 square miles.
What do you like most/least about where you live?
Most: The weather (see "Climate"). I also like Florida's landscape - it's really beautiful here, a lot more than just beaches. We don't have a huge influx of tourists like the southern parts of the state. And I like that this part of the state is still very much "the South"; if you go 90 minutes or two hours south of here, you start getting into snowbird/tourists areas, and it is very different.
Least: We're too big to be a town and not important or with-it enough to be a city. So we have all the downfalls of a city like horrible traffic and long distances but few of the benefits like good shopping, culture and easy access to things like natural foods. There's not much of a community feeling. And I don't like that Jax is a Republican, big business type of town. Developers are ruining our landscape putting up more and more cardboard houses, and the city council just keeps issuing those permits.
Most historically significant points about your town/country?
St. Augustine, a half hour to the south (and considered part of the metro Jax area) is the "oldest continuously occupied European-established city, and the oldest port, in the continental United States." (copied that from Wikipedia!) The coast is scattered with old Spanish and French forts - history buffs can have a field day here!
Jacksonville was the Hollywood of the 1910s and 20s, before the movie industry moved out to California. In 1916 there were 30 movie studios here.
Climate?
(I think my answer is more "weather" than "climate" but I'm not sure, I can never remember the difference!)
We have two seaons - "Summer" (late May through mid-to-late September) and "Not Summer":
Summer can be beastly: humid, temps in the high 90s, and it rains (and I mean serious rain) every day at three in the afternoon like clockwork. We also have a bit of a hurricane problem. We haven't had a direct hit since Dora in 1964, but if a storm hits down south and travels up the state, we can still have a nasty experience. That happened twice in 2004, a truly awful year for us.
Not Summer is wonderful. Today is a textbook example - sunny, clear, light breeze, mid-70s. (Makes me wonder why I'm inside on the computer instead of outside!) We have a few cold weeks in December and January, but it rarely goes below freezing even at night. I own a light leather jacket, but I don't own gloves, mittens, scarves, golashes, earmuffs, any of that. It did snow Christmas of 1989, and long-time Jax residents still talk about it. It's a "where were you when Kennedy was shot" type of touchstone.
Type of government? Name of current leader?
Our city and county are consolidated (which is why we are so big) so we only have one government. It is run by the mayor (John Peyton) and the city council.
What are the major industries?
For several decades we were a Navy town. We still have two bases, Jax NAS and Mayport, and they are still a major presence, but the city has grown so much that the overall effect has diminished. For a long time we were known as a banking and insurance center, but I can't think of industry in particular that dominates these days.
Major religion?
Christian. We do have a small Jewish population, but you don't meet Muslims or Hindus.
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College?
About one in four students graduate from high school. The public schools are struggling, especially in certain neighborhoods, and more middle class families are sending their kids to private schools unless they can get them into the magnet schools - like Stanton or Paxon, which are both in the top twenty public high schools in the United States.
I'm not sure how many go on to college, but many that do stay in town and go to Florida Community College at Jax and then on to University of North Florida. But a fair number go to Florida State in Tallahassee (3 hours west) or University of Florida in Gainesville (90 minutes south).
Most popular sport?
Football. We have an NFL team, the Jaguars, but really it's college football that everybody follows. You are either a Gator (U of FL) or a Seminole (FL State), period.
Most popular trend at the moment?
Not sure there is one!
Most popular food?
Junk. I don't know, pizza? We don't do fine dining here. Most of my friends look at me cross-eyed because I eat sushi.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live?
There's really nothing exciting about living here, unless you count the hurricanes. The most interesting thing, in my opinion, is the landscape, the sheer, breathtaking beauty of the beaches at sunrise and the old roads lined with huge live oaks. But lots of people don't think there is anything interesting at all, which is why we don't get tourists!
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!)
Where do you live? City/State/country? The City of Dodgers! That's right don't care for the American League Angeles. (Los Angeles)
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects? English with Spanish probably a close second.
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? Gargantuan!
What do you like most/least about where you live?LA is quite diverse and because it's cities are spread out, some can have a different feel than others. Also, it's been home most all my life. I do not care for how huge this place is and how crowded it is. Also, too many folks seem so bent on attaining fame or fortune that they forgoe basic kindness.
Most historically significant points about your town/country? I think LA is the second biggest city in the world?
Climate? It has finally gotten cooler. Okay I'll answer. Summer and some Fall/Early Spring rain.
Type of government? Name of current leader? * sigh * the governor of CA is Arnold S and the current Mayor of LA is Antonio Villaraigosa.
What are the major industries? Entertainment
Major religion? Christianity and Judiasm.
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? Most people do tend to graduate both high school and college. However, I am shamed to say this city of mine has many an area in which residents are probably lucky to eat let alone go to school.
Most popular sport? Baseball and Basketball.
Most popular trend at the moment? I have no clue.
Most popular food? Proabbly fast food.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? Disneyland?
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!) Here's one of sorts. In nearby Beverly Hills there is an ancient house that some call "Witch's Landing." http://www.seeing-stars.com/Landmarks/WitchesHouse.shtml
I was going to answer some of those questions but Crazy_Babe beat me to it.
But, while I'm here I just want to ask how we could not know each other IRL. I mean, I currently work in Sydney, where I could go to Circual Quay every day for lunch if I wanted to. And I went to Sydney University for three and a half years.
Funny how that is I really don't know. When did you graduate? I started in 2002 so if you finished before me chances are we wouldn't have met.
The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched they must be felt with the heart
These answers are fantastic! I love the pictures. We'll have an entire scrapbook by the time you guys are finished. And I'll take answers as long as you'll post them.
Thanks again. FOLCs are the best people on the net!
Hey, Woody, who says that Australia is down under?
(Can you find Scandinavia in the picture? It's on the far right, below the middle, and it looks vaguely like something that you can only mention in the nfic folder.... )
Hey, Crazy_Babe, do Australians really call the rest of the world "Up Over"?
Sorry didn't reply earlier, but the answer would be to the best of my knowledge no. If I refer to anything above the equator I refer to the country I'm talking about.
The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched they must be felt with the heart
I'm using no sources other than Wikipedia, but I boast a good knowledge of Greek and Athenian history. Hopefully I still remember what I learned in school, heh!
Where do you live? City/State/country? Athens, Greece.
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects? Greek (modern).
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? Urban area, the size of which depends on what you decide to count as Athens. The 2001 census gave a population of 745,514 for the Municipality of Athens and approximately 3.8 million for the metropolitan area, although if you count citizens registered in other areas that live in Athenian suburbs, plus immigrants, the population is estimated around 5 million. That's about half the total population of Greece, interestingly enough.
What do you like most/least about where you live? Well, I like the fact that it's a huge city, with variety in places and people - from purely urban areas with big buildings to open areas with small houses and parks. There's something here to satisfy every want and need. Also, the city is built in a basin, surrounded from three sides from mountains and from the south bordering to the sea, so there's easy access to many different landscapes The biggest downsides are the pollution and the overabundance of cars. The greenery/cement ratio is much smaller than it should be, in some areas making for an ugly atmosphere. Also, sometimes you get the feeling that there's no respect for the city - graffitis, garbage thrown on the road and parks...
Most historically significant points about your town/country? The city of Athens has a long history that goes back to ancient times. The 5th century B.C. was when it peaked, economically, politically and culturally, becoming the most powerful Greek city of all. It has also been the capital of Greece since 1834. The history of Greece goes even further back, with the first evidence of civilization appearing around 6000 BC in Peloponnese, Crete and the Cyclades islands. Greece, which was actually organized in a number of cities, was overtaken by the Romans in 146 B.C., when they won the battle of Lefkopetra. Since then, the area of Greece was under Roman reign. The Eastern Roman Empire later evolved into Byzantium, a state with a character rather close to the modern Greek one, since Greek language and Orthodox Christianism were prevalent. It was then overtaken by the Turks, officially in 1453 A.D. with the Fall of Constantinople. Eventually, Greece became an independent country in 1828, after a revolutionary war that started in 1821. Today's boundaries were set in 1947.
Climate? The mediterranean climate is characterized by hot, dry summers and mild winters, and it's pretty much what you'll find in Athens. During the past decades, we had a series of winters when, especially the northern suburbs, would systematically get temperatures around -5 to 0 degrees Celsius and an abundance of snow, a sight rather unusual in older times. Last winter, however, was warmer than that and quite dry. Summers keep getting hotter every year, hitting temperatures of over 40 degrees Celsius in the early afternoon many times over the course of the summer months. The mediterranean climate is generally characteristic of Greece, with the average temperatures being lower in the mountainous or more northern areas.
Type of government? Name of current leader? The government is Parliamentary republic. The person with the most responsibilities in this type of government is the Prime Minister (currently Kostas Karamanlis of the Nea Demokratia party). The Parliament is comprised of 300 members and the president is Dimitrios Sioufas. Finally, the President of Democracy is Karolos Papoulias.
What are the major industries? Greece doesn't have heavy industry such as cars or electric appliances. I believe that the biggest part of the Greek industry is devoted to food and tobacco processing.
Major religion? Christian Orthodox.
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? Most people graduate at least junior high school, since it's obligatory. There's a big number of people graduating high school and a relatively big number graduating universities or technical schools. A law first employed in 2006 introduced extra requirements for people who wanted to enter universities and technical schools, because the big number of admissions was judged as responsible for the decline in the quality of studies and the overabundance of educated but unemployed young people.
Most popular sport? Soccer, with basketball coming second.
Most popular trend at the moment? Uh, nothing springs to mind. I'll get back to you about that.
Most popular food? Everyone likes souvlaki ! It's basically made by some kind of meat (usually pork or chicken) and vegetables (such as tomato, onion, fries) rolled in a fried, bread-like leaf called pita.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? Everyone seems to think it's the history of the place, but I will have to reiterate how refreshing it is to live in a place where everything is accessible someplace
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? Well, there's plenty of mythological tales, in case those count. Here's the story of how Athens got its name:
Poseidon (God of the sea) and Athena (Goddess of wisdom) were fighting over who would be the protector of a new city, then called Kekropia after its king Kekropas, who was half human and half snake. They agreed that each of them would offer a gift to the city and that Kekropas would choose based on the gifts. Poseidon offered a fountain with salt water, whereas Athena offered an olive tree. Kekropas judged that the olive tree was more useful, because of its edible fruit. So, he chose Athena as the protector of the city, and also named the city after her. The symbol of the city became the owl, the favourite animal of goddess Athena and symbol of wisdom. As for Poseidon, he cursed the city never to have enough water - and it's true that Athens has never been rich in water.
Where do you live? City/State/country? Riverside, California, USA. To be more specific, I live in the Orangecrest area of Riverside, which is the southeast corner of the city, just a few miles away from the border between Riverside and Moreno Valley (which used to be part of Riverside years ago) and the March Air Reserve base. My area is one of the newer parts of the city. It used to be nothing but acres and acres of orange groves until around about 10 years ago when farmers decided it was more profitable to sell their land to developers looking to build middle class tract homes and McMansions. A big thank you to Wikipedia's entry on my city http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riverside%2C_California for vast amounts of information.
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects? Most people speak English, but there is a large Spanish-speaking population as well.
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? I live in the suburbs. Wikipedia says the area is 78.4 square miles. Riverside is part of the Inland Empire, which is part of Southern California. Many people would say that we're just the place that people move to when they can't afford to live in Los Angeles or Orange County.
What do you like most/least about where you live? I love the affordable housing. I live in a 5 bedroom, 2 3/4 bath home with 3755 square feet, which I bought brand new in 2001 for a fraction of what it would have cost had it been located in San Diego, Orange or LA counties. I love that within a two-hour drive I can be swimming in the ocean, skiing in the mountains, relaxing at a desert spa, visiting a foreign country, attending a tv taping, or shopping 'til I drop - the possibilities are truly endless. I hate the traffic - that two hour time frame can expand exponentially during peak rush hours or if there's a major freeway accident. Our annual Santa Ana winds and wildfires are scary. I'm not concerned about earthquakes, though Southern California is overdue for a major one.
Climate? We're actually in the low desert, so summer can get hot (can reach over 100 F) and in the winter, nights can get cold (but only rarely does it ever get cold enough to even frost, much less snow). Usually, we're in the 70s or 80s. The Inland Empire is well known for its smog - pollution that blows in from Los Angeles and settles into our valleys.
Type of government? Name of current leader? We are a representative democracy, despite the abysmal voter turn-out rates. Our mayor's name is apparently Ronald Loveridge http://www.riversideca.gov .
What are the major industries? Hmmm…I'm not sure. Like many suburban cities in the Inland Empire, a large number of people commute to Orange County or Los Angeles for their jobs. I wouldn't be surprised if more people were employed in education or service industries than any other fields due to sheer numbers.
Major religion? Judeo-Christian…Catholic, Protestant (of many varieties), Jewish, non-denominational
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? I don't know the statistics, but I would venture to say that many people graduate from high school and a good number go on to higher education. Riverside is home to a large number of K-12 schools http://www.rusd.k12.ca.us/ , Riverside Community College www.rcc.edu , the University of California, Riverside www.ucr.edu , and California Baptist University http://www.calbaptist.edu . We also are home to the California School for the Deaf http://csdr-cde.ca.gov , which teaches students from 7th-12th grade.
Most popular sport? Most sports fans here support an Orange County, Los Angeles, or San Diego team because we don't have anything of our own to speak of. Kids enjoy baseball, basketball, football, and soccer - our AYSO (youth soccer) league has a huge set of fields for the games http://www.ayso47.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=24&Itemid=37 .
Most popular trend at the moment? Complaining about traffic (always a popular topic of conversation)
Most popular food? You can just about eat any kind of food from anywhere on the planet if you look in the right place. But honestly, any place you can drive through is probably the most popular.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? I think our city's commitment to alternative energy is exciting http://www.riversideca.gov/utilities/comm-gp.asp . Riverside Public Utilities is a recognized leader within the state for its Green Power program.
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!) If you want ghost stories, there's a web site that lists a bunch of them http://theshadowlands.net/places/california1.htm . Scroll down to the Riverside listings to check out what may be lurking around my corner.
You can find my stories as Groobie on the nfic archives and Susan Young on the gfic archives. In other words, you know me as Groobie.
Ann, as mentioned before I will give you answers for Australia AND for Sri Lanka. Here are the Australian ones:
Where do you live? City/State/country?
I currently live in the 'West End' a historic district of the City of Fremantle which is part of the Greater Metropolitan Area of Perth which is the state capital city of Western Australia which is a state in Australia.
Usually my address goes like this, Fremantle, W.A. 6160 Australia without a mention of Perth.
The Dutch used to get shipwrecked along the coast because they used to sail straight across the Indian Ocean from South Africa on their way to Indonesia but if they forgot to turn left too late, they ran straight into the coral reefs along Western Australia's shoreline. The French were thinking of settling it so the British put up a military outpost at Albany in the southern part of the state to discourage them in 1827. However the very first settlement of the state happened in 1829 in Fremantle. Fremantle was named after one of the captains of the first ships that brought the settlers from England over. England had just finished fighting a long war and had downsized it's military so there were people out of jobs who were soliders, weapon manufacturers etc as well as people who were flocking into England's cities because it was the time of the first wave of the Industrial Revolution and England's urban areas were overcrowded and there were no jobs and no housing. So they sent them off to found a new colony in W.A. and they landed in Fremantle with the mistaken impression that it was fertile land. Fremantle and the area around it is limestone - the fertile area is far further inland. However they set up a makeshift port of sorts here and they kept it despite all the changes over the years and even made some drastic changes in the 1880's to the mouth of the Swan River where Fremantle is located to make sure it became a better deep water port so that the ships could come all the way upriver to unload.
We call it 'Freo' now. We even have the 'Freo Doctor' which is our name for the afternoon sea breeze that wafts in and turns our umbrellas inside out. We had the Freo Festival yesterday that's been celebrated since 1905 and this year's theme was 'Wind' so we celebrated the Fremantle Doctor.
In the 1850s due to politics and a severe overcrowding of prisons in England we started getting convicts who built a lot buildings and roads and infrastructure that the colony needed. Up till now all settlers who had come were free settlers who made the choice to. Convicts stopped being shipped out in the 1860s.
In the 1880s gold was discovered further inland - way further and there was a huge gold rush. The third gold rush if you will - the first to California, the second to NSW on the east coast of Australia and now the third to WA on the west coast of Australia. The population of the colony increased dramatically and Freo developed because all those who had to come into the colony for whatever reason had to come through Fremantle since it was the port. All the gold had to be shipped out as well. So Freo developed and Perth which is further upriver and was established at the same time as Freo was designated the adminstrative capital while Freo was to be the official port. But they had to deepen the port, and build a railway to the mines. This is still the case.
In 1901 we had federation - we stopped being a British colony and we joined in with the other states to become a state of Australia.
The third gold rush never stopped. Gold is still one of WA's biggest exports. In fact the rest of Australia benefits from WA because WA is the source of most of the country's exports and the backbone in that sense of it's economy. WA exports sheep, cattle, sandalwood oil, timber, timber for paper, gold, iron ore, bauxite for aluminium, pearls, fish, wheat, diamonds, and a certain amount of silver.
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects?[B]
English - WA's English can be directly linked back to 1830s London slang which you won't find anywhere else in the world. The native Aboriginals in WA (and it's a huge place - the size of 16 Frances - whole Western half of Australia) are from the Nyoonyar/Nyungar (you can spell it a dozen different ways) and they have different dialects according to the tribes. In fact, counting all the Aboriginal languages and all the immigrant languages, Australia beats India for the most number of languages - 160 odd.
[B]Is this rural or urban? Rough size?
Perth and the surrounding metro area is urban - so where I am is urban. Everything else is rural. Very rural but easy to get to, easy to stay in and absolutely wonderful. My boyfriend is a farm boy who grew up in sheep country in the mid south west in a place called Yealering next to a town called Narrogin but his family moved to the lower South West region to a place called Mt. Barker where they now have a beef cattle farm.
What do you like most/least about where you live?
What I like least is the weather because I grew up in the tropics. It is good weather compared to other places I have been in but I still yearn for hot humid days. We have winter during April - July and summer is coming up right now from November till about January. But here we prefer winter because the winter brings the rain which we need desperately for farming. In the summer, we get desert summer - no humidity, dry air, hot days and you bake not sweat. In the winter we don't get snow (though on the east coast Melbourne will because it's just further south and in a better position to do so and they do have ski resorts on the east coast) but we get rain and huge gales. Sometimes in summer we get hurricanes (tornadoes/tropical cyclones) and sometimes they cause damage and sometimes they bring much needed rain.
The weather moves across the globe from west to east so whatever we get in Perth first, the East Coast gets it about two to three days later. My mother asks me all the time what the weather is like so she can be prepared.
Most historically significant points about your town/country?
I could give you a lecture on this and I have already given you some answers. There are lots of points - are there any that you are particularly interested in? Any specific subjects of history?
Climate?
Weather - see above. Climate is technically a southern mediterranean climate. We do a good wine trade ;-) And we have a lot of Italian and Greek immigrants and Parisian style cafe culture has caught on a lot here in Fremantle.
Type of government? Name of current leader?
Technically it's a democratic system. Officially it's the Commonwealth of Australia. That means we are independent but because we don't have an official head of state we recognize that the Queen of England as one - ie we originated as country from a British colony.
Current leader is John Howard of the Liberal Party - he is our Prime Minister.
Australia has states and territories. Federal refers to all of Australia and at the Federal level we have two houses - Senate and the Lower House. At the moment, the Liberal party has a majority vote and therefore the majority of seats in both houses. This is called proportional representation. Because John Howard is the leader of the Liberal Party, he gets to be Prime Minister and he has members of his party who get appointed as Treasurer, Minister for Foreign Affairs etc. The Liberal Party is now called the Govt cos they won.
The second runner up was the Labour Party in the last election so they get to be The Opposition and they get to yell in Parliament at the Liberal Party aka the Govt.
Federal level politics is responsible for higher education, military, foreign affairs, taxes and economy, and anything that functions at a national level. They debate bills that have to be passed through the senate and then through the lower house before they become part of the law.
Then they have the exact same system at the state level - ie each state has a Premier and a Senate and a lower house of its own. This enables you to dabble in politics without having to wander off to Canberra (Australia's national capital) all the time. These are filled with different people voted for at a different election. The current Premier of WA is the leader of the State Labour Party in WA and he is Alan Carpenter. At the state level in WA currently, Govt is Labour and the opposition is Liberal, and at the state level whoever is govt is responsible for primary and secondary education, fisheries, imports, exports, state economy, state infrastructure, tourism, state health, police, housing, etc.
So we have one election where you vote for who has power overall at the national level - you get two papers at this election where you rate 1-10 all the people from all the parties who can get a seat in the national/federal senate - this ensures that who you want to open debate on certain issues at a federal level might get into the senate where everything has to be discussed first nationally before anything gets done. The second paper asks you to choose either your party preference (Labour/Liberal/Greens/Australian Christian Democrats etc) or to rate 1-45 the people you want to be in the lower house which is the next stage of debate for anything at federal/national level if the senate decides to pass it.
Depending on which party gets the most votes this way, they will choose a new opposition, govt and prime minister.
We will be having this kind of election this Saturday 24th of November so it's a big deal at the moment.
Then they have a similar kind of election about two years from now (every four years or so but not at the same time as the federal one) for each state and you only vote for your state representatives. and you vote for those you want to who will debate the issues you want them to - and then you have a premier who takes everything into consideration and goes off to canberra to lobby the prime minister on your behalf.
For example, the Prime Minister wanted to put nuclear waste in WA and our premier said no because nobody in WA wanted a dump site within our borders. So that's how it is supposed to work, and sometimes it actually does.
What are the major industries?
The mines employ a lot of people and are actually doing a damn good job of a) bringing money into the country and b) doing it with minimum effort to the environment - we make them plant trees and develop new technology etc - they aren't allowed to mine if it's an environmental risk or a cultural heritage area or a sacred place for aboriginals and they have to do all sorts of tests before they get to go ahead.
Major religion? Secularism??? It's hard to tell, probably Catholicism though they have been losing numbers lately. In the 70's Freo was the centre for a huge Hari Krishna movement and they are still around. They even get their own float in the parade. Protestants, presbyterians, buddhists, hindus - all sorts really. Fremantle has: a) a fairy shop, b) a shop that sells new age stuff where you can get psychic readings. It's a multicultural town where everything is accepted. We even have a regular psychic fair at the town hall. Yoga classes are everywhere. As are sex shops - I have two on my block.
Freo is a town where everything rebellious and eccentric can find a home - where all is accepted and then even years later, still celebrated.
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College?
Fremantle's West End has been conserved historically because the University of Notre Dame Australia was set up here. This is where I study and I get to do it some of the old warehouses and buildings from the 1800's. I even live in one.
Most people graduate high school yes, and after that it's not considered a horrible thing if you get a trade via an apprentice or choose not to go to college. Plumbers and electricians make more money in a year than a lawyer will. So you can go to college or get an apprenticeship. The options are there.
Sadly for most Aboriginals, the clash of cultures and other issues to do with perceptions and past history means that not many of them stay in school or can stay in school. Some do yes. And the number is slowly increasing but it needs to increase some more and one of the issues at the moment is how to include them more fully in society and still ensure their culture is preserved. It's an issue that crops with more recent immigrant cultures too.
Sometimes learning is just learning - and you will know that you are intelligent without needing a piece of paper to prove it - but unfortunately the world now needs that piece of paper before you can go ahead. Plus we all have our own different ways of learning things - hence why you home school your children.
It's a very hard thing to discuss and talk about. I am not sure I can fully explain it here.
Most popular sport?
Cricket!!! Sri Lanka and India both have teams too and they are currently playing against the Australian national team as part of their tour over the summer. The biggest matches in cricket are: a) The World Cup Series which has all the cricketing nations involved. Sri Lanka won it in 1996 but Australia has won it quite a few times :p . If Sri Lanka is playing Australia, I usually support SL but though my favourite team used to be Australia - I now rather support individual players than a whole team. Besides Australia is fighting dirty at the moment which I don't approve of. Because cricket is a gentleman's game. The world Cup happens once every four years.
My favourite player is either Adam Gilchrist who is wicketkeeper for Australia or the only player to wear glasses while he plays - our very own cricketing Clark Kent - Daniel Vettori from New Zealand. Will post pictures later so you all can perve.
Daniel Vettori aka Cricket's Clark Kent from New Zealand:
Adam Gilchrist:
b) To tide us over between World Cups we have the Ashes series. Way back when, only England and Australia used to play cricket so they played a series between them. Then Australia won it once and they took the wooden wickets that they used during the game and burnt them and sent the ashes back to England in the trophy. This was their way of saying "Don't treat us horribly because you think we are from a colony and therefore have to bow to you or can't play!" sort of thing. Ever since then it's been called the Ashes and they play every year and alternate between playing in England or Australia. And they get terribly angsty and territorial over it. Very patriotic. And we all get to watch (esp if you're from another cricketing nation) - because it's like a watching a comedy drama.
Australian rules football is played as well and they have matches leading up to two big cups each year. They call them Derbys. They have state teams as well - in WA we have two major state teams called The Fremantle Dockers (ie dock workers or port workers) and The West Coast Eagles who are in constant competition with each other. We also have football teams for districts ie South Freo vs East Freo etc. Football on Saturday is a huge thing - because we can only play cricket in the summer but rugby or football can be played all year around.
Most popular trend at the moment?
The most popular trend far as I can gather is to try to be glamourous - homewares are all black and white and are copies of 1920/30s furniture and design (and erring badly). Sort of 1930s Paris French elegant boudoir feel. The clothes are trying to evoke that era as well but a lot of designers can't seem to visualise what people wore in the 1920s -30s very well. They have the hairstyles down well though. This is seen randomly in Freo but is more obvious elsewhere in Perth. Freo is such a melting pot anyway. This is slowly giving way to either the 60s/70s bold print pattern look for beachwear or to ethnic exotic (or what they think passes for it) travel wear - caftans and the like. I myself wear either 40s inspired stuff or classic combinations or mod dresses with stockings ... and that's when I can be bothered. The rest of the time I am in jeans. ;-)
Most popular food?
Since we don't have a white Christmas in Australia - everyone does a barbecue Christmas lunch and you must have a) pork/lamb and b) grilled prawns.
Other than that Freo has Indian, Chinese (very popular), Sushi (Japanese), Mexican, Italian, seafood of all sorts, French bistro, Kebabs, etc.
Very Australian would be a meat pie with tomato sauce. And a bottle of Coke. Very aboriginal would be kangaroo steak with bush pepper sauce. And there is place in the southwest of WA called Pemberton - they have these freshwater crayfish called marron or bugs and these grilled with butter are wonderful.
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live?
As mentioned before, the ability to be eccentric. Freo is like a country town - everyone knows everyone else. There is a sense of community. Last night they had a Bhangra (Hindi pop) street party and most of the people dancing like mad in the street were Caucasian not Asian. They just accept you here and they love what you do even if they don't understand it completely. How many people last night would have understood what any of the words meant given it was all in Hindi? But they danced anyway. And it makes you - a foriegner feel that much more accepted as part of the community. I have been here four years and so many people I can't even name know who I am. It's just amazing.
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!)
Ha ha. Yes there are. For instance when the settlers came over in 1829 they were told they would get land and they thought it would be land with manor houses and the like built already so they brought horse drawn carriages and pianos with them on the ships. We have proof that they were on the ship but urban legend says that there is at least one piano buried on the beach somewhere because as soon as they landed they found that there was land but they had to build their own houses and farm it and that the pianos were of no use in their immediate future so they left them on the beach.
As part of the archaeology dig that I do, we found a piano key to unlock the cover of the piano before lifting it up to play it but we haven't found the piano itself yet.
I will be back to put more pictures in. For now here's your info on Australia. Stay tuned for pictures and info on Sri Lanka.
Cheers, The Little Tornado.
The Little Tornado is ....
.... Marisa Wikramanayake Freelance Writer & Editor, Board Member of SoEWA and Writing WA http://www.marisa.com.au
I love that information, Tornado, especially the Clark Kent cricketeer and the mental picture of all those Caucasians dancing wildly to Hindu pop!!! Itwas fascinating to read about the "never-ending gold rush", too, and those buried pianos on the beach.
But do you think you could re-size that very big picture of the Western Austalia map? The size of it makes the entire thread too wide, so that you have to scroll back and forth to read the text. If you can't re-size it, maybe you can just put in a link to it (frustrating, I know, but....)
Looking forward to the information about Sri Lanka!
Where do you live? City/State/country? I live in Peru as you know . Peru is divided in 25 regions called departments and subdivided into 180 provinces. So: Country-Peru Deparment-Lima Province-Lima
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects?
Main language: Spanish. Quechua is another language spoken by a great part of our population, next comes the Aymara.
Is this rural or urban? Rough size? We have urban and rural places. Lima is urban and the capitals of most of the departments located on the coast. The deparments in the middle and south-east are rural while the deparments north-east are forest. web pagehttp://www.infoperu.com/pics/cities/miraflores.jpg
What do you like most/least about where you live? Most: Peru: It’s food. We have all kinds of tipical food, each department has it’s own diversity of plates, our food in general is just delicious. Main plates, desserts …mmmm!
I’ll mention some just from Lima: Ceviche Aji de gallina - Chicken in strips withn a sauce fo bread, milk and green pepper. Causa rellena - Smashed potato with meat inside.
Anticuchos
Desserts: Mazamorra
Picarones
Suspiro a la limeña
Turron de Doña Pepa: It’s tipical in October, related to a religious festivity in Lima: El Señor de los Milagros (it means Lord of the Miracles). It’s said that a woman called Josefa Marmanillo (she was called Doña Pepa) was sick so she asked to the Señor de los Milagros to be healed, after that the miracle was granted and the next Ocotber she stand at the street with her turron and offered it to Señor the los Milagros and from that time on you can’t enjoy this festivity without having turron, in fact it’s not October if you don’t have turron .
The Señor de los Milagro, is Jesus Christ with black skin, a lot of people in Lima believes on its miracles, it’s said that in the time where the Indians and black people were slaves around 1650 a black man painted it on a wall so they could venerate the god the Spanish imposed on them but they could also relate to, there was an earthquake in 1655, the houses and all the constructions fell or got broken but the wall were the Christ was painted remained unharmed, that’s why he’s called Lord of the Miracles. In October he’s carried through the streets from it’s church to the Catedral of Lima and back in a 3 days travel and thousand of people followed him all the way the three days either thanking him or asking him for a miracle. Whether you believe or not the image it’s beautifully adorned, when you are there with all the people feels great.
The image of the "Señor de los Milagros"
You must not leave Lima without trying ceviche, anticuchos and suspiro a la limeña!
EDIT: Sorry for the big pics I'll try to make them smaller later.
Pisco and Ceviche ->100% PERUVIAN. Never doubt that.
The sights, I’ve always lived in the city, but there are so many beautiful natural places in our country, nature has been so generous with us, just traveling from one place to another it’s worth it for the sights you’ll see in your way.
It’s history, Lima and every part of our country it’s so rich in history and you can still see buildings that are proved older cultures had lived here. We still have towns who keeps traditions that have thousands of years, specially in the forrest, you go visit them and the way they live now it’s how their ancestors lived. The knowledge they have of the nature, the respect they have for it and how they could live with it without harming it, it’s truly inspiring.
Least:Poverty, there's still people who are very poor.
Most historically significant points about your town/country? It’s history, Lima and every part of our country it’s so rich in history and you can still see buildings that are proved older cultures had lived here. We still have towns who keeps traditions that have thousands of years, specially in the forrest, you go visit them and the way they live now it’s how their ancestors lived. The knowledge they have of the nature, the respect they have for it and how they could live with it without harming it, it’s truly inspiring.
You can still see the trend of architecture and art of the Virreynal time (Virrey was the as a governor who had to answer to the king, in this case the king of Spain – we were a Spanish colony until 1821- so this Virrey was the major authority in the absence of the king). At the time they build big houses with very carefully made balconies, the churches are greatly adorned.
The historic center of Lima is also called ‘Cercado’ ‘Surrounded’, because at one time a wall was build around the city keep it safe from attacks from the corsairs and pirates, there’s still part of that wall behind the San Francisco’s Church. The wall at the bottom is it.
Climate? It’s not completely tropical because of the Andes ( a mountain system, most of it crosses our country) that give us all kinds of climates. For more explanation see : http://www.incalink.com/landscape.htm
Type of government? Name of current leader? Democratic Republic. The president is Alan Garcia Perez.
What are the major industries? Mining, Tourism and Agriculture.
Major religion? Most of the country is catholic
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? Most people finish high school, for people to go to college they either have to come to Lima where there are the better Universities or to the other cities on the coast side which also have universities, and because some young men/women can’t come here or have money to afford the travel and the living alone, they just can’t go to the university.
Most popular sport? Soccer, definitely. Next comes volleyball. We are such a soccer driven country that for example this past sunday our team was playing versus Brazil’s team and they were playing at our stadium, at the time of the game the streets were silenced , people were either at the stadium or their houses watching the game. If you go to the supermarket the morning of some day’s soccer game (especially when it’s Peru vs some other country and they’re playing to get into the world cup)you can see people buying snacks, food and drinks because family and friends would gather in the afternoon to watch the game.
Most popular food? In Lima, ‘cebiche’ and ‘pollo a la brasa’
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? In my opinion , it’s history again, it’s customs.
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? All that comes to my mind and my family’s (I’ve tried to think about others but just don’t know). There’s ‘La casa Matusita’ ‘Matusita’s House’
There’s all kind of stories about it. One says there lived a Japanese man you killed himself after killing his wife and kids because he saw his wife with another man. The other says the servants of the master’s house killed him and some friends that were invited some day because they were abused by him, after that they killed themselves.
It’s said also that those stories were invented because a very long time ago across the street was located the embassy of the US and they help spread the stories so no one would spy on them :S.
Whether any of those stories it’s true or not, no one lives there and no one wants to spend a night in there.
That’s it, look normal huh? Well it’s not!
Carolyn (Who hopes you have enjoyed reading it as much as she has enjoyed writing it)
Pisco and Ceviche ->100% PERUVIAN. Never doubt that.
It was sooo difficult to stick with my city and not babble about the province.
Where do you live? City/State/country?
We have provinces instead. Winnipeg/Manitoba/Canada
Winnipeg is the capital city of Manitoba.
If you are from here you pronounce it Winna peg. If you are new here, or like my Mum who grew up in England, pronounces it Winn i peg as in Winnie the Pooh. And yes, Winnie the Pooh is named after Winnipeg. If French is your mother tongue, it seems to be pronounced with an ‘I’. Well, that is generally how it goes.
Picture looking to the Winnipeg Centre:
Prominent language spoken? Other languages/dialects?
The main language here is English. We have two official languages though - French and English.
At one point we were able to boast that we had at least one person from every country on Earth. Even from some warn torn countries where people were not allowed to leave. (These people had fled to Winnipeg and where doing a talk tour at the time.)
With these people came various languages. Every year we celebrate Folklorama where various venues across the city are opened where a groups particular culture is featured. E.g. Metis, Jamaican, there are two for the Philippines and Ireland, Spain…
We have many cultures in Winnipeg thus different languages. The ones I hear the most are Ukrainian and Tagalog b/c of the region of the city I grew up in. Busing it to school everyday I encountered Cree and Ojibway and other Native languages that I might not have been able to identify, and Ukrainian. As the years go by the Ukrainian element is decreasing and you encounter more languages from Asia and in the past few years, Africa.
Winnipeg has the highest number of First Nations people (either per capita or just as a general amount) than any other major city in North America. Again, we are categorizing Winnipeg as a major city here (capitals). Even though it isn’t a large percentage of the total languages spoken, it is a characteristic of Winnipeg.
Statistically after English, German is the most popular at roughly 4%, then Tagalog and Ukrainian and so on. The major languages, of course, have alerted drastically over the past 100 years. At one point in our provinces history, we had more French speaking people than English.
Is this rural or urban? Rough size?
The city is urban, but it is like a urban dot on the rural prairie landscape.
There are many small communities/hamlets/towns located around Winnipeg and over the past twenty years some of them, along the Red River, have connected in a way that you can't go a mile without seeing a house, but NOTHING like what you see in the US or Toronto. That's just too much. I’d cry if it ever became like that.
Winnipeg has roughly 650,000 people. We are a sprawling city unfortunately. We are faced with deteriorating infrastructure. E.G. bad roads.
The closest urban centres to Winnipeg is Brandon (city that just celebrated 125 years. Pop under 6000). Now if you want to talk major cities, to the south Minneapolis to the east Toronto and surrounding cities, to the west (if you skip the province of Saskatchewan….ahhh too many jokes there) then there would be Calgary and Edmonton. All those cities are larger than Winnipeg. Calgary and Edmonton used to be smaller, but during the past 40 years they have grown into large metropolises and left Winnipeg it their dust.
Even though we are a ‘small’ city, we cover more land area than Calgary that has roughly double our population size. This clearly illustrates our horrible sprawling. Hmmm…I should check on the currently validity of that statement.
Our city is too big and has too many attractions and can’t be supported by our small and cheap population. I guess I should say too many places need funding to revitalize themselves. Here are some major ones that are in the news a lot.
Typically ‘old’ Winnipeg or Downtown The Forks - Actually a good tourist spot. Downtown/Portage Avenue - needs more help Exchange District - the ‘hot spot’ at the moment. Main Street - Has needed help for the longest time Osborne Village - This place doesn’t need help b/c it supports itself well. It is a great example of a popular, artistic area.
I say we have too many attractions, but they are not exciting enough to hold onto our younger demographic. I agree Winnipeg can be boring. Ahhh, I’d love to experience a city like Hollywood, Vancouver or Seattle. Then I’d come running home.
My husband described our city’s situation perfectly…unfortunately I cannot remember it.
What do you like most/least about where you live?
HATE: I used to love living here b/c it was a quite city with little violence or trouble. Many people said this was a great city to raise a family, but boring if you are a young adult ready for sophistication and socializing. However, my patience is being tested b/c within the past year because gun violence has increased. Growing up we never heard about guns unless someone had a sawed off hunting shot gun. Now there seems to be an issue every weekend, but at least the majority of it doesn‘t affect innocent bystanders.
People are horrible drivers here!
I love the open spaces and being able to get away from everyone. However, in the past six years there are more cars crawling around within the city so you have to go to one of the city park or provincial or national parks outside of the city.
I greatly dislike our city because it can be ugly. The roads are full of potholes and the curbs are always chipped. The weather is rough on infrastructure.
HATE: - Panhandlers and welfare bums. Gangs. - Loss of Canadian identity to the increased American influence. - This city is afraid of change and need to do more to retain it’s heritage. For example, It took forever to knock down the old Eaton’s building and build the MTS centre. I was sooo sad to see that building go. My granddad used to work there and I spent a lot of time there, but once Eaton’s closed up shop NO one wanted that building for a reasonable purpose. It was too old and too expensive. Our former mayor (first gay mayor in Canada!) flew through Winnipeg long enough to see what we have not done since he left. http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/subscriber/columnists/top3/story/4072273p-4673810c.html - The fact that we lost our NHL team, The Jets. Though we don’t deserve one. People are to cheap to support one (ticket sales) if one came back. -crime - lack of available safe bike paths. I wish I could ride my bike to work. - horrible drivers. We are notorious for being amongst some of the worst drivers in Canada. Extremely impolite despite the quote on our license plates. http://www.canplates.com/manitoba.html - Winnipeg can be boring, but it’s a bit embarrassing when people say it. People from bigger cities often do. “Winnipeg is boring unless you are a boring person. Not much to do at all. I live here and would not recommend that you waste your money here.”
LOVE: Well, I’ll try to be more positive and list some ‘loves’ only.
Our parks: - Assiniboine Forest: It is unusual to find a forest within a city, but Winnipeg has one, complete with a heard of white -tailed deer. http://www.winnipeg.ca/publicworks/naturalist/ns/AF/index.asp Last I heard, it is the largest urban forest in North America.
- Assiniboine Park: A chunk of land just north (actually across the street) of the Assiniboine Forest. Here we have the Pavilion, Conservatory (features plants and an indoor tropical house and a shop) Fireworks twice a year, various parties like the Teddy Bear’s Picnic and different runs for charity.
- Assiniboine Zoo: It is not the prettiest zoo and I feel, like many people, it needs a huge update. However, it is the cheapest zoo around to get into. It used to be free when I was a kid. The Zoo is on the west hand side of the Assiniboine Park and we have the oldest polar bear in captivity in the world. Her name is Debbie! She turned 40 on Dec 6 2007. We also have a white black bear and a white bison. They are not albinos, they just happen to have white fur. In some cultures for Native peoples/First Nations, the white bison is revered and has special meaning. Many people came to visit the bison for this reason. His name is Blizzard. The bear was rescued when it’s mum was hit by a car. They became a bit of an attraction outside of the city and she unfortunately was a casualty of the increased human presence. The zoo adopted him.
- Last I heard we have more trees in the city than any other city in N.A (per some measurement...I can't remember what). We have MANY elm trees, but we are loosing many to Dutch Elm disease. I'm sooo sad about that. We need to get more people involved with banding of the trees to help avoid spread of the disease by a certain type of insect.
- We don't number our street here. They all have names. That frustrates many visitors.
- Little Mountain Park: It a short drive just north of the city. I could ride my bike there when I was a kid b/c I lived on the edge of the city. The picture of the tree is very memorable for me. Everyone looks out for this tree when they look for the road to the park. There is no mountain in this park. I can’t remember why it is called that.
- I love all the old buildings in Winnipeg, but unfortunately many of them are obsolete and abandoned. They were built because of the train boom at the beginning of the 1900s. Unfortunately some of them have to go:
- The view: I loved to be able to look out of my old apt on the 18th floor in Osborne Village. To the right was the Leg and to the left was the sunset. Sorry the pic is dark: [img]http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p212/superroo_is_here/106_0644.jpg?t=1194729424[/img] I love big open spaces. We have clear skies and can see the stars also we are lucky enough to be north enough to watch the northern lights. I know this is nothing special to our city, but it’s something I love.
- Manitoba Museum: I love this place b/c it features a detailed history of the land and peoples of Manitoba. This has always been a favourite of mine:
- I don’t have to spend hours in my car to get to work! It takes me about 15 minutes to drive on average.
- I love many residential areas of Winnipeg like Wosely (character homes) and the North End neighbourhood because of its cultural significance. It has traditionally been home to new immigrants. At one time in the 1920s, nearly 14,000 Jews resided there. It is Canada's largest urban concentration of Aboriginals as well as Filipinos currently and the largest Ukrainian center outside of Ukraine itself!
Most historically significant points about your town/country?
- The main point of the below story is this that at the end of it all the predecessor of the NDP was created and is one of the three major political parties in Canada.
Here is a direct quote and not created by me... "Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 As a result of appalling labour conditions following World War I, 35,000 Winnipeggers walked off the job in May 1919, in what came to be known as the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919. The government broke the strike through arrests, deportation and violence. The strike ended June 21, 1919, when the Riot Act was read and a group of Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) officers charged a group of strikers; two strikers were killed and at least thirty others were injured, resulting in the day being known as Bloody Saturday. The lasting effect was a polarized population. One of the leaders of the strike, J.S. Woodsworth, went on to found Canada's first major socialist party, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF), which would later become the New Democratic Party [NDP]."
URL=http://www.cbc.ca/documentaries/bloodysaturday/gallery.html?dataPath=/photogallery/documentaries/gallery_518/xml/gallery_518.xml]Photo gallery[/URL] of famous pictures (at least here) from this riot. Some of them are beautiful and capture Winnipeg during the height of it's growth and fight with the separation of the rich and poor.
I guess many of these pictures can be considered boring BUT!!!! Number 14 is the most famous one. That is on Main Street. In the back right is a picture of our old gingerbread city hall. It was torn down in the 1960s b/c it was falling apart (poor Red River valley clay foundation) and was a fire hazard.
- We had one of the largest train yards in the world.
- North Main Street was once known as one of the most dangerous streets in Canada. Not fun. I went through on the bus almost daily. I didn’t know what a big deal it was at one time.
- Famous people from Winnipeg that I have a story about or check out famous Winnipegers and Manitobans: http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Village/1479/famous.html The Guess Who - My mum and a guy I used to work with went to school with them. I later went to the same school. The ‘guy’ was very bitter about their success. Neil Young - My mum grew up in the same neighbourhood with him. I live in the same neighbourhood as where a few great speed skaters practiced and went on to do great at the Olympics: Susan Auch. It a lot of fun to watch the kids learning. Sir William Stephenson, WWII spy; the real Intrepid, portrayed by actor David Niven in "A Man Called Intrepid", was born in Winnipeg. Influenced the character 007.
- Winnipeg is located in a flood plain thus we like to flood! We are situation in a area called the Red River Valley. We are to the north and Grand Forks, North Dakota is in it as well. Of course it isn’t crazy big like the Mississippi, but the Red River flood plain is large for us. In 1950 70,000 people had to be evacuated b/c of the flooding. Many parts of the city were destroyed along with four bridges. The previous huge flood was in 1861was even bigger but Winnipeg was not the city it was then. This house is near the Red River: Due to the devastation of the 1950 flood, The Floodway AKA Duff\'s Ditch was built. It saved us in the 1997 flood. Many thought the idea of this floodway was crazy, but in the end it was the greatest thing ever. 1997 was bigger than 1950 and was called the Flood of the Century . The majority of the city would have been under water. Many still experience basement flooding and many houses outside of the city were lost. It was devastating and a stressful time for many in the Red River Valley that spring.
- Valour Road is in the West End . It was formerly called Pine Street, but was renamed in 1925 to Valour Road in recognition of the courage of three young men who all lived on the 700 block of the street and served in the First World War. Corporal Leo Clarke, Sergeant-Major Frederick William Hall, Lieutenant Robert Shankland all received the Victoria Cross for acts of bravery during the war.
Climate? Yes, Antarctica has experienced the coldest temperature on record, -91C, but us Winnipeggers can get it cold here. LOL
Like many people we seem to have lengthily conversations about weather and laugh at other major cities (*cough* Toronto) with their inability to handle a few inches of snow...gee I'm not pointing fingers at Toronto. "With our cold winters, hot summers and everything in-between it is not surprising that the weather is a national preoccupation of Canadians."
In Canada, Winnipeg has the sunniest winters with the most hours of sunshine during December, January and February. I guess I should be happy that the honour of being the city with the coldest winters in Canada goes to Yellowknife and not us! We do experience cold winters because we are more or less situated in the centre of the North American continent.
As mentioned above, we are far from any mountains and any large body of water than can have a substantial long term affect on our climate and daily weather. We have large temperature differences from the winter to summer and that can wreak havoc on our streets. During the spring, when we experience this stress, the daily temperatures have been known to go into the late teens and then dip to a good -10 at night. We are a pot hole city!! City council is always trying to find money to fix the streets.
WINTER: From a personal point of view, we can almost guarantee we get snow on Halloween. It might not stay, but the snow fairy will pay a visit. Children must learn to have a costume that can be adjusted to fit a snow suit if needed! We can have blizzards which normally come from a weather system that will identified as a Colorado Low. When those come in the winter, we can cheer b/c we hope we shall have a snow day! Yippee! As a child we had a few big memorable blizzards. I was a child in 1986 when we had a big one and we could walk onto our roofs (roo-ves not rufs) due to the amount of snow. There was a big one in the 1950s when my Mum came to Canada. I have never experienced one that big before. We had one in 1997 (around there) where it shut down the city for a few days. Unfortunately everything started moving along the day of my exam. I was hoping for a few more studying days. My husband (who I didn’t know at the time) was waiting at the airport for his family to return from Florida. The car got stuck and he had to push and run to catch up to it and jump in so he could drive the car. He picked everyone up about 10 minutes before the airport was closed. Due to the large snow fall and a wet fall, this led to the devastating flood in the spring of 1997. Growing up the kids used to walk to school and class would only be kept in a recess if the wind chill became to hazardous. Now it seems like every drives their child to school. The kids seem to be more fat, lazy, afraid and wimpy now. I’m only 30. Shouldn’t I be bitter at a later age?
In February we have the Festival Du Voyageur. Unfortunately a festival that relies on ice and snow always seem to co-insides with a warm snap. Hehe. Here are some nice snap shots of the festival. Two winters ago it wasn’t warm like it usually is for that week! The temp was trapped in the -30s (not including the wind chill). The year I actually went as an adult I couldn’t bring my camera b/c it was too cold. http://www.manitobaphotos.com/festival.htm
We always get snow on Xmas. We have only one on record where there was no snow. I recall a few years ago where we didn’t get snow until a few days before Xmas…that was weird. It didn’t feel like Xmas until it snowed.
Here’s a quote! From December through January the maximum daily temperature exceeds 0 °C (32 °F), on average, for only 10 days and the minimum daily temperature falls below -20 °C (-4 °F) on 49 days. Cold weather and snow will occasionally extend into April, although in general the winter weather begins to moderate in late February or early March. The coldest temperature ever recorded at Winnipeg was -47.8 °C (-54.0 °F), on December 24, 1879. The coldest temperature during the last 25 years was -41.7 °C (-43.1 °F) on February 5, 2007 [2] The coldest wind chill reading ever recorded was -57.1 °C (-70.8 °F) on February 1, 1996. According to Environment Canada, Winnipeg is the coldest city in the world with a population of over 600,000.[3]
SUMMER: Our summers are warm/hot and humid and we have many thunderstorms. We had the stronger Canadian tornado on record last summer. They are not frequent like they are in the southern US, but are not immune to them. The average maximum temperature for June, July, and August is 24.7 °C (76.5 °F). I used to be able to handle the heat and sun w/o any problem. But after spending my 20s indoors and gaining a little weight it can be uncomfortable. Luckily for us we have some beaches along Lake Manitoba north of the city to enjoy. It’s only about a 40 minute drive!
Here’s a quote: On average, the maximum daily temperature exceeds 30 °C (86 °F) on 11 days out of 92 for these three months and the minimum daily temperature falls to or below 2 °C (36 °F) on only one out of the 92 days. Depending on the year, warm weather can continue beyond Thanksgiving in October, or come to an abrupt end soon after Labour Day. The city often receives an Indian Summer, when summer weather returns briefly after the first frosts, in mid to late October, or even early November. The highest temperature ever recorded in Winnipeg (since commencement of record-keeping in 1873) was 42.2 °C (108 °F) on July 11, 1936. The hottest temperature recorded in the past 25 years was 38.8 °C (101.8 °F) on September 2, 1983. The highest humidex reading was 48 on July 25, 2007.
THE SHORT SEASONS - FALL & SPRING: I hate the spring, but I love fall. Unfortunately our fall is short lived. This year it seemed like it rained more in the fall, and it was LOVELY. I love that type of weather. Fall weather lasted from the beginning of September to about November 20th.
Here’s another quote in case you prefer details! Spring and fall tend to be rather contracted seasons, each averaging little over six weeks. In general the weather during these seasons is highly variable, and rapidly changing. For example, temperatures in Winnipeg in May have ranged from -11.7 °C (10.9 °F) to 37.8 °C (100 °F), and in October from -20.6 °C (-5.1 °F) to 30.5 °C (86.9 °F).
Like I mentioned earlier we have a lot of sunshine here. More than Toronto or Vancouver. July is our hottest month. We are the ‘sunshine capital of Canada’ . We are also known as the ‘windy city’ and often our winds can average 16km/hr and we have had strong winds up to 129km/hr. I remember that period. Windows smashed and trees came down. It was very weird. A storm you expect downed trees. We get about two really bad wind storms a year, but this particular event was just characterized by a few windy days with one dozy of a day. Just a cloudy sky with winds that decided to go a bit crazy!
Type of government? Name of current leader?
Federal Parliamentary Democracy and Constitutional Monarchy. Canada is a federation, which means powers are shared between federal and provincial governments. The head of our government is the Prime Minister. The Queen of England is represented in Canada by the Governor General, currently Adrienne Clarkson. Currently the Conservative movement is in power and their leader is Stephen Harper.
We uphold the “Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms” where the USA has “Bill of Rights”…I think that’s what they told us in school. I can’t remember the main comparisons they would bring up. Link http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/charter/
What are the major industries? - Winnipeg boomed during 1890 to 1920 because of trains for the transportation of goods for sale and international trade. Winnipeg was referred to as the "Chicago of the north" and has the largest train yard in North America. Also, it was called the "gate way to the west". However, when the Panama Canal opened in 1914 Winnipeg's importance diminished. Winnipeg had many banks and storage facilities in Downtown or more specifically what is now known as the Exchange District . It's name implies its history. I love that part of town it is beautiful . Many of these banks have been lost to time or have been converted to salons, condos and schools. - Winnipeg used to have a large textile industry, but due to competition from China in the last 10 years, the industry is disappearing. Western Glove Works, who do not make gloves, used to make jeans for The Gap and posh high end jeans for major designers. Posh Spice and some major singer have done deals with them in the past few years. My husband used to work there and despite it being stressful, he got awesome jeans out of it!! Nygard fashions HQ is here. I don’t like the clothing, but the owner of this company is so rich he owns a island in the Caribbean. - Winnipeg is home to head office of one of the largest insurance companies in the world - Great-West Life. Winnipeg unfortunately lost many head offices to Calgary, Edmonton and Toronto. Toronto has a negative mentality (traditionally anyways) towards those in the west. Winnipeg often has to fight against that. Something many of us are proud of. Some would argue this, but this is the general consensus I find with older and younger people (and the media) over the past 15 years I have been curious about the subject. - Alberta has their oil, Toronto has their commerce, Manitoba is one of those province that isn't poor, but not rich either and it would be great if we could 'afford' more. We do have many renewable resources. Despite the concerns over environmental degradation, we are major producers of hydro from hydro electric dams. We export this electricity to other area of Canada and to the US. We also have a lot of fresh water and this may become like gold in the future as we see our environment degrade around us. - Movie industry - When the Canadian dollar was lower than the US dollar, it made sense to do filming in Canada. Winnipeg was chosen often because of our large areas of historical building, like the Exchange District. Here is a list of TV and films done in Winnipeg (or parts of): The list....sorry Wikipedia again. Some more famous movies that have had portions/all shot in and around Winnipeg: - Capote - Christmas Rush (well famous for us!!!) - Shall We Dance (I saw filming!) - The Constant Gardener - Category 7: The End of the World (2005) - Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004) (I never did get to watch those! )
- “Winnipeg is also home to the National Microbiology Laboratory, Canada's front line in its response to SARS and one of only 15 Biosafety level 4 microbiology laboratories in the world.” We seem to have a lot of buildings related to health in Winnipeg and that seems to be increasing. I actually live close to the lab. EEK! JJ…about the EEK part.
Major religion? I had to look this one up b/c I honestly don’t’ know. I just know the major one is some sort of Christianity.
Diversity of education? Do most people graduate high school? College? I’m not sure, but I think they do.
We are luck that we have many post secondary opportunities: educational facilities and the following are The major ones: - University of Manitoba - University of Winnipeg (used to be the original U of M...but they moved and U of W soon became a University on their own). - Red River College
To me, Winnipeg used to more of a working person's city. Doesn't like change and just goes along quietly and not that exciting and young people move away. That seems to have been the attitude since WW2 and is still trying to go away. We are fighting the brain drain. Many people are educated here and then leave either to Toronto (city), Alberta (Prov) or BC (Prov) oh and of course USA.
Most popular sport? Man that’s a hard one. We love our hockey, but we greatly support our CFL team (football). Curling is very popular here. We can sell out our MTS centre just full of people wanting to watch curling.
Most popular trend at the moment? I’m not sure. I’m not trendy.
Most popular food? We have more McDonald’s per capita than anywhere else. At least that is what we were told in an introduction meeting when I started in the 1990s. Who knows what it is now…I hope it isn’t true. We love cheap so I guess whatever’s cheap. Hot dogs…from the carts on Broadway in the summer. We seem to have an over abundance of Chinese food restaurants. I don’t go. My favourite places are Montana’s (chain restaurant), Elephant & Castle (fake English pub), The Onion (local), The Nook (local), Wendy’s (of course a chain), McDonald’s (enuf said) and just north of the city The Half Moon (local).
What do you feel is the most interesting/exciting thing about where you live? Ugh….ummmm…………..I love the old history of Upper and Lower Fort Garry. Osborne Village’s energy. One on the right was burnt down. One summer we made international news where we had so many arson fires. I loved that old building L
Are there any urban legends associated with your town/state/country? (My son's enquiring mind wants to know!)
There is a house, one of the few left, in amongst the old commerce buildings in the Exchange District. It is said to be haunted and if you go in there you will be …..
There are many stories about ghosts in the old Fort Garry Hotel. The one I heard the most is of a lady that haunts certain sections of the hotel. She’s in a ball gown. Also there’s something about a fake or “phantom’ diner and a “mysterious ghost light” that can be experienced in the hallways. Room 202 is also supposed to be haunted. Even a Canadian Member of Parliament, Brenda Chamberlain, was so convinced of a presence in her room that she fled from her room in the middle of the night. Cleaning ladies have claimed their items have been thrown around the room by an unknown entity. I found this quote that is better than what I an describe: Manitoba - Winnipeg - Fort Garry Hotel - Brenda Chamberlain (Liberal MP for Guelph-Wellington) traveled to Winnipeg for a Liberal caucus retreat and requested (for a little Halloween fun) to stay into a room that the hotel staff believes is haunted by either a young woman or man. Perhaps both? Sometime during the night, Chamberlain- who is a non-spiritual believer- was awoken by a disturbance consistent with someone getting into bed beside her. Keep in mind that her husband was not with her in Winnipeg. Chamberlain ignored it thinking she was half asleep and dreaming when this disturbance occurred and went back to sleep. About half an hour later, she felt her "invisible bedmate" start to move around again as if trying to get comfortable. Also, Maids have reported seeing blood trickle down the walls of room 202, where a woman hung herself in the closet after learning her husband just died in a car accident. She has been seen crying in the corner after she'd ask a worker to give her a cup of water in the bar/lounge.
I am most familiar with this story. It was told to me while I was in University: Manitoba - Winnipeg - The Walker Theatre - Eerie experiences have taken place here. Mysterious applauding in tiers of seats, which are unoccupied at the end of a performance sometimes, is heard. Steel doors close on their own they weigh at least a couple hundred pounds, and when a reporter did research in the theatre with a well known psychic in the night they set up a tape recorder for a few hours only to find they couldn't hear anything...until they played the tape back to hear loud banging sounds and hammering, footsteps across the floor to and from the tape recorder then more towards the tape recorder sounding like somebody was whispering "please" into it....this tape would play sometimes but other times appear blank...dressing room doors that were supposed to be closed would be opened the next time the guard would make his rounds. The wedge of wood he had used to prop open the doors would appear to be kicked out...the guards dogs would mysteriously bark at the air and be by his side all night, Which was unusual because they were very outgoing dogs. The suspected presence is said to be maybe acting team Laurence Irving and Mabel Hackney who died in 1914 less than a week after performing at The Walker.
There’s a building that used to be a restaurant in the Exchange District area and the third floor is said to be haunted. Loud bangs and ghostly blobs of light have been seen through the window if you walk by.
One of the oldest structures in Winnipeg that is still standing is a house - 99 Ecluid and is just known as the Euclid House. One of the last surviving links to Winnipeg colonial past. It was occupied by the Barber family who where one of the families that helped shaped a portion of Winnipeg. The house is a rare example of Red River frame construction employed by the early settlers. Unfortunately it is boarded up at the moment as no one wants to claim financial responsibility to ensure it isn’t lost to time. It is surrounded by a high chain link fence to hopefully avoid acts of vandalism in the rough neighbourhood. So just looking at it seems freaky in itself on a dark moonless night. It is said that a family once lived in it and one of them murdered all of them and killed themselves, no one knows how the story went..
At the old jail downtown there is supposed to be a lady begging for help.
You can always sum Wpg as the below - A song - http://www.songmeanings.net/lyric.php?lid=3530822107858489206 Late afternoon, another day is nearly done. A darker gray is breaking through a lighter one. A thousand sharpened elbows in the underground. That hollow hurried sound of feet on polished floor, and in the Dollar Store the clerk is closing up, and counting Loonies, trying not to say, "I hate Winnipeg." The driver checks the mirror, seven minutes late. The crowded riders' restlessness enunciates that the Guess Who suck, the Jets were lousy anyway. The same route every day. And in the turning lane, someone's stalled again. He's talking to himself, and hears the price of gas repeat his phrase: "I hate Winnipeg." And up above us all, leaning into sky, our Golden Business Boy will watch the North End die, and sing "I love this town," then let his arcing wrecking ball proclaim, "I hate Winnipeg."
I've converted to lurk-ism... hopefully only temporary.
My oldest son (13) and his sister are forever picking at one another. (She's 17 and both have a birthday in a few days!) Anyway, in his Christmas letter (part of school work this week), he asked for his sister to move to Peru. When I say the picture above that Carolyn posted of Peru, I almost laughed out loud. It was just too cute!
I thought I'd add a few photos from my collection oneis of the Queen Mary II when she visited here, but it's such a pretty picture (in my humble opinion considering I took it ).
The other two one is part of main wharf of Sydney in Circular Quay and the other is of possibly our most famous landmarks the Opera House and our harbour bridge.
The Queen Mary II
Circular Quay Wharf (and n the background the train station)
and The Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge (or Coat Hanger as we affectionately call it)
I'll add more as I take them though.
The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched they must be felt with the heart
. Dunno if you want info about the Ozarks but let me know if you do 
. Some were found miles away...
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No, really, it's that Washington has a little of everything. We have mountains and plains and a rainforest and urban areas and the ocean ... it's a real variety.
I really don't know. When did you graduate? I started in 2002 so if you finished before me chances are we wouldn't have met.
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Itwas fascinating to read about the "never-ending gold rush", too, and those buried pianos on the beach.![[Linked Image]](http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/americas/9810/08/berenson.peru.01/peru.lima.lg.jpg)
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Fireworks twice a year, various parties like the Teddy Bear’s Picnic and different runs for charity.![[Linked Image]](http://www.zoosociety.com/images/061203021a_000.jpg)
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