Countries of the World

[CaaC (John)+]

There are a lot of countries that I have not seen but this place is one I would love to visit just to see the Northern Lights, I have seen them in Scotland years ago but nothing like this, stunning and it makes me shiver just looking at this photo.

Nordic Islands are seen in their 'surreal light'

Stefan Forster has made more than 80 trips to Greenland, Iceland, Norway and the Faroe Islands, capturing some of the beauty of the Nordic landscapes.

FULL REPORT AND MORE PHOTOS

 

[nudge]

7 hours ago, CaaC (John) said:

There are a lot of countries that I have not seen but this place is one I would love to visit just to see the Northern Lights, I have seen them in Scotland years ago but nothing like this, stunning and it makes me shiver just looking at this photo.

Nordic Islands are seen in their 'surreal light'

Stefan Forster has made more than 80 trips to Greenland, Iceland, Norway and the Faroe Islands, capturing some of the beauty of the Nordic landscapes.

FULL REPORT AND MORE PHOTOS

 

I think that is one of those cases where seeing it in reality is completely different from what they look like in the photos. I'm sure it's still a nice experience, but you'd be disappointed if you expected colours like that; they are extremely exaggerated in the pictures...

[CaaC (John)+]

13 hours ago, nudge said:

I think that is one of those cases where seeing it in reality is completely different from what they look like in the photos. I'm sure it's still a nice experience, but you'd be disappointed if you expected colours like that; they are extremely exaggerated in the pictures...

Aye, I know that but I would still like to travel there and witness their northern lights, I bet they are far better than the ones I saw in Scotland. 

[CaaC (John)+]

A selection of powerful news photographs taken around the world this week as people react to the spread of the coronavirus.

MORE PHOTOS

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-52501210

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Majestic mountains around the world

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I love this one amongst the lot.  

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Australia's highest peak is located in Kosciuszko National Park in New South Wales. It was named after Polish patriot and statesman Tadeusz Kościuszko.

[CaaC (John)+]

@nudge  @Bluewolf @Mel81x and any other of the Star Wars Clan  

 

'Darth Vader' enforces lockdown in Philippine village

MANILA (Reuters) - Dressed as "Star Wars" characters, local officials in the Philippines are out and about to enforce strict quarantine measures while also handing out relief packages.

With Darth Vader and Stormtrooper outfits made from rubber mats and old plastic, the youth leaders catch the attention of villagers on the outskirts of Manila, who are then reminded to stay indoors.

"We tell off residents who still go outdoors without the proper quarantine passes needed and also those who do not wear face masks. We make sure the government guidelines are properly followed," Muriel Baldago, an elected official dressed in a Stormtrooper costume, told Reuters.

His get-up is greeted with smiles and offers villagers a little distraction from the outbreak, he added.

On May 4, also known as "Star Wars" Day and celebrated worldwide by fans of the franchise, government workers in costume also rode small wooden boats to distribute relief packs containing rice and canned goods in a nearby coastal neighbourhood.

The Philippines, whose capital and main cities are under strict quarantine protocols until mid-May, has recorded 9,485 confirmed coronavirus cases, 623 deaths and 1,315 recoveries as of Monday, government figures showed.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/offbeat/darth-vader-enforces-lockdown-in-philippine-village/ar-BB13F7lA#image=2

 

 

[nudge]

Good guy Vader. 

[CaaC (John)+]

Supermoon lights up night skies around the world

Skywatchers around the world have enjoyed stunning views of this month's Supermoon when the Moon appears larger and brighter.

The phenomenon happens when the celestial satellite reaches its closest point to Earth - known as a perigee - and is on the opposite side of Earth to the sun.

This month's supermoon - the third and final one of the year - is known as the Flower Moon because of its occurrence in Spring

MORE PHOTOS

[CaaC (John)+]

Canada: DNA discovery lends weight to the First Nations ancestral story

When a woman named Shanawdithit succumbed to tuberculosis in Newfoundland nearly 200 years ago, it was widely believed that her death marked a tragic end to her people’s existence.

For centuries, the Beothuk had thrived along the rocky shores of the island, taking on a near-mythical status as descendants of the first people encountered by Norse explorers in what is now Canada. But their population was devastated by decades of starvation and diseases, and when she died in 1829, Shanawdithit was believed to be the last of her line.

New research from Memorial University, however, has found Beothuk DNA probably still exists in people alive today – a discovery that would rewrite the history of the Newfoundland’s early inhabitants, even as it confirms the accuracy of local First Nations oral tradition.

“We’ve got good evidence that we have genetic continuity from the Beothic into modern persons,” said biologist Dr Steve Carr.

But while the finding would trigger a rethink for historians, the notion is not surprising to local Indigenous groups.

Mi’kmaq oral history has long asserted a shared ancestry with the original inhabitants of Newfoundland, and local First Nations have worked closely with Carr to help lend genetic evidence to their own traditions.

“There were always connections or friendly relations going back more than 200 years ago and when you mingle that way, periodically, things would happen,” said Chief Mi’sel Joe of the Miawpukek Mi’kamawey Mawi’omi, a Mi’kmaq First Nation in Newfoundland.

© Provided by The Guardian A miniature portrait titled ‘A female Red Indian of Newfoundland’ which is believed to be a portrait of Shanawdithit, though may possibly be a copy of a portrait of Demasduit. Photograph: The Picture Art Collection/Alamy Stock Photo

Historians believe the Beothuk are descended from a group that braved the ocean to cross from Labrador to Newfoundland thousands of years ago and whose distinct culture emerged around 1500 CE. At one point, as many as 2,000 Beothuk lived in communities scattered around Newfoundland.

For generations, they largely resisted and avoided relations with European settlers; the few interactions between the two were defined by violent encounters.

Early European settlements on the coast cut off Beothuk access to critical salmon and seals – forcing them to move further inland where they sustained themselves on caribou before finally succumbing to starvation and disease.

But Carr’s research suggests it was only a “cultural extinction”; their genetic legacy lives on.

In his study, Carr used DNA samples from Shanawdithit’s aunt and uncle – Demasduit and Nonosbawsut – whose skulls were taken to the Royal Museum in Scotland in 1828. After a long campaign by Chief Joe’s community, the remains were repatriated to Newfoundland in March.

After running samples through a genetics database, Carr was able to find his “smoking gun” – a man in Tennessee who was genetically similar to Nonosbawsut but had no known Indigenous ancestry.

With is only a small amount of data to work with, Carr hopes more samples will further demonstrate a connection.

“It’s easy to obtain the DNA sequence from somebody and you can count the number of similarities. That’s a very easy thing to do. But to reconstruct the patterns of a relationship is a very challenging problem,” said Carr, adding that further research into the known movement and connections between the Beothuk and Mi’maq was still required.

The findings also illustrate the way in which genetic uniqueness – in this case, the distinct sequence of Beothuk mitochondrial genomes – can persist intact for generations. While humans share an immense amount of DNA that traces back millennia, said Carr, the intent of his research lay in teasing out the subtle and distinguishing differences between known groups.

For years, academia has ignored the oral histories of Indigenous peoples, said Chief Joe.

“Academics are hard people to convince. They often have this mindset that ‘this the way it was’ – no matter what information we give them to the contrary,” he said.

He described a frustrating experience in a land claims court, where the adjudicator suggested the Mi’kmaq first arrived in Newfoundland in the 1700s.

“But we have an oral history of British sailors meeting our people and asking for directions. We drew them a map on birch bark. If this is the first time we had ever been on the land, how could we draw a map?” said Joe.

“It’s convenient for the government, for everyone, to ignore people who had no written history”

The community is excited to keep working with Carr on further testing, said Joe, to further strengthen the evidence of shared ancestry.

“This is a big thing for us,” he said. “But it all comes from something we already knew.”

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/offbeat/canada-dna-discovery-lends-weight-to-first-nations-ancestral-story/ar-BB13ROos

 

 

[CaaC (John)+]

Athens hotel ordered to demolish top floors blocking Acropolis view

A battle over the right to enjoy uninterrupted views of the Acropolis has resulted in a five-star hotel being ordered to demolish its top two floors, in a landmark ruling hailed by residents of Athens.

Owned by Coco-Mat, the Greece-based mattress maker, the hotel — whose “breathtaking terrace” had been its selling point — opened its doors barely a year ago. Citizens enraged about the ten-storey establishment blocking their own views of the citadel took the case to the highest court in the land.

“It was a very brave decision,” said Athens mayor Kostas Bakoyannis of the ruling by Greece’s Central Archaeological Council (KAS), the country’s top advisory body on the preservation of ancient antiquities. “The Acropolis is our heart and our soul, an essential part of our cultural heritage. It’s very important that everyone can enjoy it.”

Campaigners are on a roll. This decision follows more than a year of protests against “mammoth” high rises being erected in neighbourhoods at the sharp end of tourism beneath the fifth century BC site.

FULL REPORT

 

[CaaC (John)+]

NE Scotland, Orkney & Shetland

Ancient Tap O' Noth hillfort in Aberdeenshire one of 'largest ever'

A hillfort in Aberdeenshire is one of the largest ancient settlements ever discovered in Scotland, researchers have said.

University of Aberdeen archaeologists say 4,000 people may have lived in more than 800 huts perched high on the Tap O' Noth near Rhynie.

Many had thought it dated from the Bronze or Iron Age.

The team said carbon dating suggested it was likely to be Pictish, dating back as far as the third century AD.

They believe at its height it may have rivalled the largest known post-Roman settlements in Europe.

Archaeologists from the university have conducted extensive fieldwork in the surrounding area since 2011.

Prof Gordon Noble, who led the research, described the discovery that activity at the site extended into the Pictish period as the most surprising of his career.

"I was absolutely stunned when I read the results," he said.

'Truly mind-blowing'

"We took samples from the site really just to begin placing the important discoveries we have made at Rhynie over the last few years in a broader geographical context. The results of the dating were simply incredible.

"The Tap O' Noth discovery shakes the narrative of this whole time period. If each of the huts we identified had four or five people living in them then that means there was a population of upwards of 4,000 people living on the hill.

"It is truly mind-blowing and demonstrates just how much we still have to learn about settlement around the time that the early kingdoms of Pictland were being consolidated."

Aberdeenshire Council leader Jim Gifford said: "This find of historic importance will be of huge significance.

"I am hopeful that once restrictions start to be lifted, and of course when it is safe to do so, visitors from far and wide will flock to Aberdeenshire to explore this find."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-52660032

 

[CaaC (John)+]

26 majestic forests around the world

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South Scotland

Celebrating Scotland and Italy's links in lockdown

A celebration of the long-established links between Scotland and Italy is being held online.

Images from across the country and throughout the decades are being shared as part of the project.

Historic Environment Scotland (HES) said the scheme started out as school engagement work.

Traces of Italian Scots heritage in their archives inspired a combined creative learning project in early 2020 called Removed.

FULL REPORT & MORE PHOTOS

 

[CaaC (John)+]

New App Takes You Inside the Edinburgh of the 16th Century

SMART HISTORY COURTESY UNIVERSITY OF ST ANDREWS

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The English towers and landmarks that inspired Tolkien's hobbit sagas

© Photograph: keenbean/Alamy Garth believes Faringdon Folly inspired Saruman’s dark tower in the Lord of the Rings.

Readers of The Lord of the Rings must surely imagine lifting their eyes in terror before Saruman’s dark tower, known as Orthanc. Over the years, many admirers of the Middle-earth sagas have guessed at the inspiration for this and other striking features of the landscape created by JRR Tolkien.

Now an extensive new study of the author’s work is to reveal the likely sources of key scenes. The idea for Saruman’s nightmarish tower, argues leading Tolkien expert John Garth, was prompted by Faringdon Folly in Berkshire.

“I have concentrated on the places that inspired Tolkien and though that may seem a trivial subject, I hope I have brought some rigour to it,” said Garth this weekend. “I have a fascination for the workings of the creative process and in finding those moments of creative epiphany for a genius like Tolkien.”

A close study of the author’s life, his travels and his teaching papers have

led Garth to a fresh understanding of an allegory that Tolkien regularly called upon while giving lectures in Old English poetry at Oxford in the 1930s.

Comparing mysteries of bygone poetry to an ancient tower, the don would talk of the impossibility of understanding exactly why something was once built. “I have found an interesting connection in his work with the folly in Berkshire, a nonsensical tower that caused a big planning row,” Garth explains. While researching his book he realised the controversy raging outside the university city over the building would have been familiar to Tolkien.

Tolkien began to work this story into his developing Middle-earth fiction, finally planting rival edifices on the Tower Hills on the west of his imaginary “Shire” and also drawing on memories of other real towers that stand in the Cotswolds and above Bath. “Faringdon Folly isn’t a complete physical model for Orthanc,” said Garth. “It’s the controversy surrounding its building that filtered into Tolkien’s writings and can be traced all the way to echoes in the scene where Gandalf is held captive in Saruman’s tower.”

Garth’s book, The Worlds of JRR Tolkien, is published next month by Frances Lincoln and is to be translated into nine languages. It will argue that many assumptions previously made about the origins of scenes from the sagas are wrong.

“We have a good idea of when Tolkien was writing each bit, but he kept his cards pretty close to his chest when it comes to his creative process. I think it has been misleading just to visit places he went to and draw simple conclusions,” said Garth. He is unconvinced by a prior claim that The Two Towers in the title of the second book of Lord of the Rings were influenced by buildings in Birmingham, including Perrotts Folly in Edgbaston.

© Provided by The Guardian Maiden Castle earthworks in Dorset may have inspired the Barrow-downs. Photograph: Arcaid Images/Alamy

One of Garth’s key discoveries concerns an ancient battlescape that reappears across Tolkien’s writing. It has its basis in the large earthworks at Maiden Castle in Dorset, he now believes, and is best known to readers in the shape of the contours of the atmospheric Barrow-downs in Lord of the Rings.

“It is a former place of a battle with tombs, dating from a ‘deep time’; the place where the Barrow-wights captures the hobbits when they need to be released from his power,” said Garth. “Tolkien does the scene beautifully. It is one of his real talents as a writer.”

In the year before Tolkien wrote this passage, major excavations in Maiden Castle had been chronicled in a newspaper column of archaeological highlights written by his friend REM Wheeler. “Wheeler, who invented ‘stratigraphy’, the study of archaeological layers, was a great populariser,” said Garth. “The excavations in Dorset were given an awful lot of space and I am pretty confident that Tolkien read it, especially as he knew Wheeler. At the time, though, Tolkien still didn’t have a clue where he was going with his story. He… liked the setting of a place of former battles.”

The significance of Warwick and Warwick Castle in the genesis of the Middle-earth books has also become clearer to Garth. Tolkien travelled there on romantic breaks with Edith Bratt, his future wife, and his love of the trees of the area and of a particular hill can be closely linked now to the Elven forests that his fans later came to love.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/offbeat/the-english-towers-and-landmarks-that-inspired-tolkiens-hobbit-sagas/ar-BB14v6ty

[CaaC (John)+]

12 colourful spring scenes from around the world

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[Carnivore Chris]

@nudge

[CaaC (John)+]

Tunisia's sea turtles are beating the odds as they inch towards survival

Years of marine conservation efforts throughout the Mediterranean are beginning to pay dividends in Tunisia, with activists expecting a further increase in the number of sea turtles visiting the country’s beaches to build their nests this year.

It’s an unlikely, albeit fragile, victory. Many of the factors that pushed sea turtles on to the world’s endangered list are still present and continue to threaten the survival of the species. However, activists monitoring sea-turtle nests on Kuriat Island, a vital nesting ground, have reported an increase in nests from 11, when they first started monitoring in 1997, to more than 40 annually.

“Sea turtles are what we call a keystone species,” says Jamel Jrijer, a marine project manager at the WWF’s offices in Tunis. “That’s to say, they play a critical role in making the marine environment what it is.”

Of the three species of sea turtle – green, leatherback, and loggerhead – that are encountered in Tunisian waters, it is only the loggerhead that nests here. It lays its eggs at just a tiny number of sites, with Kuriat Island near Monastir, a popular destination for day-trippers, being the most important.

Heavy fishing – which often sees turtles trapped in lines and nets – plus the waste pumped from Gabes’s industrial heartland (estimated at about 13,000 tonnes of phosphate daily), had combined with plastics and other debris to push the Mediterranean’s loggerhead turtle population to the brink.

Undercutting it all are the twin threats of global heating and a cultural tradition that prizes turtle’s meat as a source of traditional medicine over their contribution to the health of the sea.

However, NGOs, along with the Tunisian government, have pushed back, protecting the nesting grounds on Kuriat since 1997 and establishing the Sea Turtle Rescue Centre at the National Institute of Marine Sciences and Technologies in Monastir in 2004.

Marine biologist Imed Jribi, speaking from his home in the coastal town of Chebba, is delighted to discuss his work on Kuriat. “When I first started work here in 1997 there were only 11 nests,” he says. “Now we are seeing between 40 and 45 nests every year.”

However, tourism still presents major problems. “We have too many people visiting Kuriat,” Jribi says. “We need smaller groups, which will allow us to manage them and protect the turtles’ nesting areas,” he says. Other problems can arise, he explains, for example with the hatchlings at Chebba, whose instinct to navigate to the sea by the moon is subverted by the cafes and roadside lights, which draw the baby turtles towards the lethal streets.

Loggerhead turtles return to Tunisia’s beaches sporadically, sometimes leaving two to three years between visits. Once on the beach, the female turtle will build three or four nests, into each of which – if left undisturbed – she will lay 80 to 120 eggs. However, despite their numbers, the odds of the young turtle’s survival are already slim. Small, vulnerable and with shells barely formed, only a tiny fraction of those born on the sands of Tunisia will ever reach sexual maturity.

If the resurgence in Tunisia’s nesting grounds is a success story, it is a qualified one. Turtles trapped in fishing nets and lines are still clandestinely sold for meat at some fish markets along Tunisia’s coast. While most agree that this illegal practise is diminishing, it is impossible to say by how much. However, the increasing numbers of turtles being taken to the Sea Turtle Rescue Centre by fishermen and the general public gives some cause for hope.

50% of the turtles we see have plastic within their system

“Most of the turtles we see have been injured through contact with fishing gear,” chief biologist Olfa Chaieb says. “The trawlers [which rake the sea floor] do particular damage, destroying the Posidonia seagrass, which is an important source of food for sea turtles, as well as providing a habitat for other forms of marine life. Because of the turtle’s dependence on air, they can drown once they become entangled in nets underwater.”

Further cause for concern is discarded plastic; sea turtles often mistake floating plastic bags for jellyfish, a staple of their diet. “About 50% of the turtles we see have plastic within their system. That’s not including the microplastics that we can’t detect,” says Chaieb.

Given the obstacles, including rising sea temperatures affecting turtles’ gender (more females are born the warmer it is), the increase in turtles is all the more remarkable.

As Tunisia gradually emerges from lockdown, local tourists are returning to empty beaches, just as the turtles are revisiting their birthplaces. Both have faced hard times. Both are looking forward to a more hopeful future.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/offbeat/tunisias-sea-turtles-are-beating-the-odds-as-they-inch-towards-survival/ar-BB14SSAZ

[CaaC (John)+]

This European Old Town is Fake—but Full of Secrets

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It’s a credit to craftsmanship that one could spend some time in Warsaw’s Old Town before noticing a very salient fact about it—most of it’s not very old at all. Weathering is mild, features are sometimes a little too regular, masonry is in surprisingly strong shape. Contrast with Praga across the Vistula,  a 19th-century neighbourhood that is full of crumbling buildings, and you’ll soon apprehend that something is up. 

FULL REPORT

[Michael]

On 06/06/2020 at 11:20, CaaC (John) said:

This European Old Town is Fake—but Full of Secrets

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It’s a credit to craftsmanship that one could spend some time in Warsaw’s Old Town before noticing a very salient fact about it—most of it’s not very old at all. Weathering is mild, features are sometimes a little too regular, masonry is in surprisingly strong shape. Contrast with Praga across the Vistula,  a 19th-century neighbourhood that is full of crumbling buildings, and you’ll soon apprehend that something is up. 

FULL REPORT

Yes, indeed mate. Warsaw was almost entirely destroyed during the bombing of Warsaw during WW2. The city had to be almost completely reconstructed. Minsk was another city that was obliterated during the war. Krakow and Lviv on the other hand are two cities that went largely unscathed during that period. The old parts of their cities are still there to be seen, even though many of the buildings are crumbling due to age. But these cities do feel much more authentic.

[CaaC (John)+]

Rivers where you can still find gold

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There's still gold in these hills

The gold rushes of the 19th century have long since ended, but there are still plenty of places you can hunt for the precious metal using a shovel, pan, metal detector and more. In fact, recreational gold mining is a pastime these days for many people, and for good reason: the largest nugget ever found in California was discovered by an amateur. Here are some key locations worldwide that you can still prospect for the yellow metal – you never know, you may get lucky and strike it rich. 

[CaaC (John)+]

Incredible stories of lost treasure and where you could find it 

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[CaaC (John)+]

Two hours off the coast of Colombia is a small island home to over 1,200 people. As the entirety of Santa Cruz del Islote only spans the length of two soccer fields, residents live in close quarters, making the island four times as dense as the borough of Manhattan. Despite the circumstances, the community makes the most of their limited surface area, packing in a school, two shops and one restaurant. Only 150 years ago, the island was uninhabited; today, generations of families are proud to call Santa Cruz del Islote home.

 

[CaaC (John)+]

This 50,000-year-old lake just turned pink

Experts believe the change of colour at Lonar Lake, located 311 miles east of Mumbai, India, is likely due to either increased salinity in the water, the presence of algae or a combination of both.

CNN

 

[CaaC (John)+]

In Bordeaux, France, a Former Nazi Submarine Base Has Been Transformed Into a Digital Art Gallery

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When it opened on June 10, 2020, the Bassins de Lumières in France became the largest digital art gallery in the world. But history buffs may be more interested in the site's background than the art it contains: Before it became an art gallery, the concrete space held a fleet of Nazi submarines during World War II, Smithsonian reports.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Bassins de Lumières's spring 2020 opening date was delayed to June. Now guests can visit and see the works of painters Gustav Klimt, Paul Klee, and Egon Schiele digitally projected over the concrete structures. U-boat pens, reaching up to 300 feet long and 36 feet high, are now canvases for colourful portraits, landscapes, and abstract scenes. The water filling the space's four basins reflects the artwork from below, while visitors look down from walkways woven throughout the 130,000-square-foot space.

The base looked very different in the 1940s. Nazi Germany constructed it off the coast of Bordeaux as a place to keep its submarines safe from enemy attacks during repairs. The site was abandoned in 1944, but because it's so enormous, the city of Bordeaux decided it would be cheaper to keep it than to tear it down.

Several decades later, the defunct bunker has been given new life. Culturespaces, the organization behind the project, spent more than $15 million transforming the base into a multimedia art gallery. After showcasing the current roster of painters for the rest of the year, the space will feature new artists in 2021.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/offbeat/in-bordeaux-france-a-former-nazi-submarine-base-has-been-transformed-into-a-digital-art-gallery/ar-BB15qHJa#image=BB15qHJa_1|1