Interesting stuff about different countries.

• Average inhabitant of Switzerland eats more than 10 kg of chocolate a year.
• Name 'Kalash' appeared in some African countries in honor of Kalashnikov rifle.
•  There is area named Hell in Norway.
• 'Spain' is translated as 'The land of rabbits'.
• It is prohibited to sell dolls with inhuman faces in France.
• National Orchestra of Monaco consists of more people than its army.
• Flag of Alaska was invented by 13-year-old boy.
• Guinness World Records is the most popular book among library thieves.
• Some public toilets in Singapore have karaoke.

Did you know...?

A census in 1920 revealed that fewer than one Eskimo in 46 has ever seen an igloo.
Anyone in England who reaches the age of 105 will receive a telegram from the Queen or King on every birthday.
The average US marriage lasts about 9.4 years.
In the USA Christmas did not become a national holiday until 1890.
In Taiwan a third of all funeral processions feature a stripper!

Please choose a country and find out some interesting trivia about their customs and traditions.

Short Story links

The Carpet Fitter, a gruesome short story!
http://web2.uvcs.uvic.ca/elc/studyzone/410/reading/fitter.htm

American Pepper, hope you have a strong stomach!!
http://web2.uvcs.uvic.ca/elc/studyzone/410/reading/pepper.htm

Homework for Friday 20th!

Hi guys!

Read the three texts below and comment on which ever seems the most interesting to you. You could speculate about what will happen next in the text... and on Friday we will find out which text is most popular...

The Carpet Fitter

  Eddie was a carpet fitter, and he hated it. For ten years he had spent his days sitting, squatting, kneeling or crawling on floors, in houses, offices, shops, factories and restaurants. Ten years of his life, cutting and fitting carpets for other people to walk on, without even seeing them. When his work was done, no-one ever appreciated it. No- one ever said "Oh, that's a beautiful job, the carpet fits so neatly." They just walked all over it. Eddie was sick of it.

     He was especially sick of it on this hot, humid day in August, as he worked to put the finishing touches to today's job. He was just cutting and fixing the last edge on a huge red carpet which he ...

The Hitchhiker

  As Andrea turned off the motorway onto the road to Brockbourne, the small village in which she lived, it was four o'clock in the afternoon, but already the sun was falling behind the hills. At this time in December, it would be completely dark by five o'clock. Andrea shivered. The interior of the car was not cold, but the trees bending in the harsh wind and the patches of yesterday's snow still heaped in the fields made her feel chilly inside. It was another ten miles to the cottage where she lived with her husband Michael, and the dim light and wintry weather made her feel a little lonely. She would have liked to listen to the radio, but it had been stolen from her car when it was parked outside her office in London about two weeks ago, and she had not got around to replacing it yet.

     She was just coming out of the little village of Mickley when she saw the old lady, standing by the road, with a crude hand-written sign saying "Brockbourne" in her hand. Andrea was surprised. She ...

The American Pepper

    "Mummy! Mummy!" shouted little Murna racing from the front door through to the kitchen. "There's a parcel. The postman's brought a parcel!"

      Her mother, Savni, looked at her in surprise. She had no idea who could have sent them a parcel. Maybe it was a mistake. She hurried to the door to find out. Sure enough, the postman was there, holding a parcel about the size of a

small brick.

      "From America, madam," he said. "See! American stamps."

      It was true. In the top right-hand corner of the brown paper parcel were three strange-looking stamps, showing a man's head. The package was addressed to Savni, in big, clear black letters.

      "Well, I suppose it must be from Great-Aunt Pasni," said Savni to herself, as the postman went on his way down the street, whistling. "Although it must be twenty years since we heard anything from her. I thought she would have been dead by now."

   

Napoleon Crossing the Saint-Bernard.

One of my favourite artists is Jacques-Louis David. His paintings are realistic and historical, and the majority of his drawings shows Napoleone I, whom I consider to be one of the most interesting outstanding personalities.

Jacques-Louis David (30 August 1748 – 29 December 1825) was a highly influential French painter in the Neoclassical style, considered to be the preeminent painter of the era. In the 1780s his cerebral brand of history painting marked a change in taste away from Rococo frivolity toward a classical austerity and severity, heightened feeling chiming with the moral climate of the final years of the ancien régime.

David had been an admirer of Napoleon from their first meeting, struck by the General Bonaparte's classical features. As the First Consul Napoleon commissioned David to commemorate his daring crossing of the Alps. The crossing of the St. Bernard Pass had allowed the French to surprise the Austrian army and win victory at the Battle of Marengo on 14 June 1800. Although Napoleon had crossed the Alps on a mule, he requested that he be portrayed "calm upon a fiery steed". David complied with "Napoleon Crossing the Saint-Bernard". After the proclamation of the Empire in 1804, David became the official court painter of the regime.

Peter Paul Rubens

My name is Peter Paul Rubens and I am a Flemish Baroque painter.

I was born in 28 June 1577 in Siegen, Westphalia, to Jan Rubens and Maria Pypelincks. My father, a Calvinist, and mother fled Antwerp for Cologne in 1568, after increased religious turmoil and persecution of Protestants during the rule of the Spanish Netherlands by the Duke of Alba. Jan Rubens became the legal advisor (and lover) to Anna of Saxony, the second wife of William I of Orange, and settled at her court in Siegen in 1570. In 1589, two years after my father's death, I moved with his mother to Antwerp, where I was raised as a Chatolic. Religion figured prominently in much of my work and later I became one of the leading voices of the Catholic Counter-Reformation style of painting.



In Antwerp, I received a humanist education, studying Latin and classical literature. By fourteen I began his artistic apprenticeship. Much of my earliest training involved copying earlier artists' works. I completed my education in 1598, at which time I entered the Guild of St. Luke as an independent master.

 In 1600, I travelled to Italy and stopped first in Venice, where he saw paintings by Titan, Veronese, and Tintoretto, before settling in Mantua. With financial support from the Duke, I travelled to Rome by way of Florence in 1601. There, I studied classical Greek and Roman art and copied works of the Italian masters.


I travelled to Spain on a diplomatic mission in 1603 and returned to Italy in 1604.



Upon hearing of my mother's illness in 1608, I planned my departure from Italy for Antwerp. However, she died before I made it home. 

A priceless paiting.

Dali and Picasso are my favourite artists. Now I want to show you the most exeptional picture I 've ever seen. Unfortunately, I've missed my chance to see it in museum in Czech Republic. Here it is:

It is called 'Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening' and was paited in 1944. In this painting Dali represented his sleeping wife Gala (who was Russian, by the way). Everything we can see is her dream before waking-up. She is hovering over the sea of  unconscious. Dali painted it under the impact of  Z.Freud's theory of long close sleep, which causes fantastic actions at the end of it, if smth disturbs the person. Here we can see that the bit of the bee transformed into a gun.

I realy like this painting because of its colours, singularity and symbolism for me.

Hi! My name is Katrina!

I'm Hurricane Katrina. I was born in the Bahamas in  August 23, 2005. Then I moved to Florida and became  a moderate Category 1 hurricane, causing some deaths and flooding.  Then I was upgraded to a Category 3 in Louisiana. The most successful job I've done in Mississippi beachfront towns where 90% were flooded in hours. Nowadays displaced residents are still living in temporary accommodation. Today I'm known as the most damaging hurricane in the USA as a result of all my exertions.

The morning in a pine forest

“The morning in a pine forest” is a painting by Russian artists Ivan Shishkin and Konstantin Savitsky (Savitsky has painted the bears).

“The morning in a pine forest” turned very popular, being reproduced on various items, including the chocolates by Babayevskiy. According to the statistics, the painting is the second most popular in Russia behind “Bogatyrs” by Viktor Vasnetsov.

Personally, I adore this painting the most, because it somehow suits my inner world. This picture makes me feel relaxed and finally I realize how virgin and pure Russian nature is.

It is believed that Shishkin painted the pine trees in Estonia, where he often liked to rest in summers.

Greetings from Sarah

My name is Sarah Thompson, and I am the Countess of Rumford.

I was born in 1774 in New Hampshire. My mother was a rich heiress and my father was a physicist and inventor. In the American revolutionary war my father took the side of the British, and when they lost, he moved to London. There he was knighted for his services to the Empire. My mother and I remained in New Hampshire, however.

When my mother died, I moved to be with my father in London, and at the age of 23 I became the first American to receive the title of Countess.

I never married. Instead I spent most of my life helping needy children, and adopted a daughter of my own. I set up two asylums to help the public, and in 1984, 130 years after my death, the Rumford Society was established in my honour.

You can visit my grave in Concord, New Hampshire.

Three Royal Margarita's

My name is Margarita Theresa of Spain, and I am the Holy Roman Empress, German Queen, Archduchess consort of Austria, Queen consort of Hungary and Bohemia.

I was born on 12 July 1651 in Spain, Madrid. I am the daughter of King Philip IV of Spain and his second wife Mariana of Austria, and I am the elder sister of Charles II the Bewitched, the last of the Spanish Habsburgs.

I left my native Spain at the age of 15 and traveled to Austria. There I married my uncle Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor. Our wedding took place in the city of Vienna, on 12 December 1666. Despite the difference in our ages, some 11 years, we were very happy together, as we shared a number of interests, especially theatre and music.

My only surviving child was Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria, future Electress of Bavaria.

I died at the young age of 21. You can visit my grave in the Imperial Crypt, in Vienna.

_________________

My name is Princess Margaret Rose Windsor, Countess of Snowdon, and I am the younger sister of Elizabeth II and the younger daughter of King George VI and his wife Queen Elizabeth. I was born on 21 August 1930 in Scotland.

After the WWII I fell in love with Group Captain Peter Townsend, my father’s equerry. Many in the government felt that Townsend was an unsuitable husband for the Queen's sister, and the Church of England refused to countenance the marriage. Under pressure, I accepted the proposal of the photographer Antony Armstrong-Jones, who was created Earl of Snowdon by Elizabeth II. The marriage, despite an auspicious start, soon became unhappy; we divorced in 1978.

I was often viewed as a controversial member of the royal family. My divorce earned to me negative publicity. My health gradually deteriorated for the final two decades of my life; a heavy smoker all my adult life, I had a lung operation in 1985, a bout of pneumonia in 1993, and at least three strokes between 1998 and 2001. I died at King Edward VII Hospital, London, on 9 February 2002. You can visit my grave in the George VI Memorial Chapel at St. George's Chapel, Windsor Castle.

______________________________________________________________

My name is Margrethe Alexandrine Þórhildur Ingrid, and I am the Queen regnant of the Kingdom of Denmark. In 1972 I became the first female monarch of Denmark since Margrete I, ruler of the Scandinavian countries in 1388-1412 during the Kalmar Union.

I was born at Amalienborg Palace, to Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Ingrid, on 16 April 1940.

I studied prehistoric archaeology at Girton College, Cambridge during 1960–61, political science at Aarhus University between 1961–1962, at the Sorbonne in 1963, and at the London School of Economics in 1965, and is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London.

On 10 June 1967 I married a French diplomat, Count Henri de Laborde de Monpezat, at the Naval Church of Copenhagen. He received the style and title of "His Royal Highness Prince Henrik of Denmark" because of his new position as the spouse of the Heiress Presumptive to the Danish throne.

I am fluent in my native tongue, Danish, the native tongue of my husband, French, as well as English, Swedish and German.

My father King Frederik IX died on 14 January 1972. On the occasion of my accession to the throne, I became the first female Danish Sovereign under the new Act of Succession.

My official motto is: God's help, the love of The People, Denmark's strength.

I am an accomplished artist and costume designer.