We eat raw olive oil with bread for breakfast. Trust me, it’s actually more disgusting than everyone thinks.
Imagine a country physically located in Africa that has more influence from the Arab world and the European [sub]continent than local influence. Your average citizen can speak like, 3 languages, and there’s certainly some that can speak more than that. We even participated in the Eurovision Song Contest at one point (biggest regret imo).
Have you ever heard of Pokimane? What about Loreen? Chances are they have ethnic roots from this country. Oh, and Faouzia too.
There’s so many mosques here. I’m not against practicing religion, but I have to say that there’s probably too many mosques, when a couple hundred is more than enough for everyone. Try appropriately 40 thousand. And the state actually wants to build more.
Some Israeli company uses our argan oil for their skincare products. To this day, this remains my worst nightmare.
Hospitality.
You guys really need to try our couscous. It’s delicious.
Hey, I see you mentioned the USA in your post. Well guess what. It’s not France that first recognized them, it’s us.
Do you season or do anything special to the couscous?. Over here it’s just served plain and I always wondered if other countries seasoned or prepared theirs differently.
If you’re feeling fancy then saffron is a good one. Tumeric and cumin are more common, as well as harissa. Sometimes aniseed, cinnamon, nutmeg or mace for something sweeter/peppery, though I personally don’t like those as much.
Not only did we only participate once for a single year, it ended up being a poor result, receiving only 7 points from Italy and getting 18th/19. The Moroccan broadcaster chose not to return. It’s actually even more of a problem now because of… things that happen that offend the Moroccan state, such as LGBT rights. Also, Israel participating would result in massive boycotts if Morocco participates alongside them.
There’s more churches than businesses in my county here, I completely understand that setinen-
Yeah, counties are small. Morocco is bigger than most European countries.
u wot mate
Yep. It’s actually true.
Anyway that’s all the additional stuff I have to say.
The night before December 6th, children leaves their shoes on front of the chimney, along with a glass of milk and a carrot for Saint-Nicholas and his donkey (other countries say it’s a horse, but it’s a donkey for us).
Saint-Nicholas leaves a bunch (like, a lot) of candy and toys during the night for children to find when they wake up.
Traditional treats include speculoos, chocolate coins, nuts, clementines and “guimauve” (like marshmallows but a little less soft, in the shape of clogs or religious figures, sometimes chocolate-covered).
Also, on Easter, children will find eggs in their backyard. They are dropped by “the bells”. The story is that the bells of Rome fly across Europe and drop eggs along the way (see this postcard). So when the children are done finding all the eggs, they shout “THANK YOU BELLS”.
Well we do have the ‘index’ mechanism: all paychecks and wellfare adjust magically and automatically when stuff in shops gets more expensive. There’s worse places to live, I guess.
Here in Mexico and some parts of LATAM we celebrate Día de los Reyes Magos which is a recalling of the Three Kings visiting baby Jesus, bearing gifts on Jan 6th.
Kids are also supposed to leave their shoes under the Xmas tree and in then when they wake up in the morning, there are some candies and sometimes gifts inside them.
We also cut a big, circular bread called “Rosca de Reyes” that has some small plastic baby Jesus inside, if you are cutting your slice and you get a baby Jesus, you have to buy the tamales for the Feb 2nd celebration, Día de la Candelaria.
While the plastic baby Jesus is supposed to be held with respect because catholicism and stuff, a lot of kids normally throw it away, play with it or sometimes burn it, sometimes you are cutting your slice and you “accidentally” cut thru it too.
Moms and grandmas have a chancla nearby for enforcing peace.
The current Marshal of the Sejm is a showman. He was a host of the Polish version of Got Talent. He often says funny retorts and is less uptight than other Marshals. Some even call the live stream “Sejmflix” now.
But also members of the previous ruling party, PiS, are like… super stupid. I don’t know if populist parties are like that everywhere, but PiS politicians often say things so ridiculous, that they are just funny. Well, they weren’t so funny, when they had a majority.
Not at all. Just after 8 years of Right wing party (PiS) lost the elections in october to Left wing coalition. Right now everyone wants to see the fulfillment of promises and reapair of all the things that they broke.
We take folk dancing very seriously. There are A LOT of folk dance ensembles and they vary from random hobbyist groups to company-sponsored groups of 80+ dancers. There are lots of competitions, drama and every 5 years - a huge concert where most ensembles participate and perform in a stadium. One dance can contain up to 1000 dancers at the same time.
During this year’s final dance the spectators mentioned that they could feel the ground shaking.
I’m not even into dancing but goodness me, that sounds like a lotta fun to watch. I’ll have to see one of y’all’s competitions if I ever find my way around the Baltics!
My wife’s late grandfather was from Latvia, displaced during the Second World War, I always enjoy reading things about the country and relaying them on to her.
Passion for dance is a really cool thing to have in my book, preserves something that words doesn’t.
It’s large prominence in my media, news, just in the general online zeitgeist. I wanna learn neat stuff from elsewhere for a change, just see what kinds of interesting stuff ya got all over the world.
There are broadly 150 indigenous language groups but only about 14 are still in common use.
If you’ve worked for a single company/system for 7 years you get a bonus 6 weeks ‘long-service’ leave.
We have a native cherry that grows inside out called a cherry ballart.
Our cuisine is really varied depending on your geography with a lot of soth East Asian influences. Most people will make stir-fry reasonably often and we have our own variations of sushi and dim sum which would offend most Japanese or Chinese people.
Aight, my geography isn’t heaps great, but I do vaguely remember a Southeast Asian nation with tons of indigenous languages. Shot in the dark, one of the archipelago nations?
The cherry ballart sounds neat! So I take it ya crack 'em open to get the fleshy juicy goodness inside?
Aw derp, not even close xD Much love to yer folks and country from here in the States! Always had love for Aussie slang and y’all’s shortening of half the English language.
Most slavic languages probably don’t have spelling contests - what you say has mostly exact textual representation, except some letters that can sound alike when spoken.
The more I learn about other languages the more I realize that most languages do that. English probably also did that before it became mixed with french
Very interesting! I vaguely recall having once seen an infographic explaining how to read cryllic in very little time ages ago, and if it’s that rigid with pronunciations and such I can see it being that easy to pick up.
As opposed to English, where you might cough and hiccough while the borough’s favorite dough-maker ploughs through the field.
you are writing about a place where every second person is prone to skin cancer and you don’t even notice it… It’s just like a cold (illness ) for you. And the fact that you live so far from the rest of the world that if you have the opportunity, you certainly try to escape from the country (despite the high level of prosperity of the country). And you can’t swimming in ocean… water is cold, evenin summer…
Guy Fawkes is a real big deal. Fireworks will be going all week.
Try a major UK city. It’s dark early, often foggy, people are fighting each other with rockets on the streets. People are holding hands and burning effigies of the latest prime minister.
American here, we’d never pick on the Aussies, they’re our little brother that just keeps picking up our bad habits, which I guess makes NZ the little brother that we forget even exists most of the time, till you do something cute.
Don’t pick on them though, because we’re the Pacific redneck brothers. Only we can pick on Australians.
I’ve always loved seeing these sorts of brotherly rivalries between nations.
You always know when Tonga or Samoa is playing a sports match, because you’ll see the flags and hear the cars tooting everywhere.
Ahh, that big a sports rivalry, then?
It’s difficult to find some nationality that isn’t represented by a restaurant somewhere.
Got a favorite nationality’s food?
New Zealand is a beautiful country and it’d be a dream to get a chance to visit y’all some time :D
We also have no romantic relationships with them either.
Well yeah, bit rude for the sheep to cheat on their Welsh spouses, innit? Nawh I kid, love ya Wales! A Welsh accent’s honestly my favorite from the Isles.
All the South African folks I’ve met working in tourism had been absolutely lovely! Just a joy to talk with. Last time we had a South African gal I managed to blindside her with an unexpected Tot Ziens as she went to leave the gift shop, and we wound up just chatting for a good while. Coincidentally that was the day me and a coworker were talking coins, and it just so happened I had my Rand coin with me that day. Seeing one of those this far away from her home was uncanny for her.
That’s what it is. I’ve always been able to tell a distinct difference between the British English accent, and the South African English accent, even though they’re almost identical. You speak English with a happy accent.
Genuine question here from a place of interest, what do you count as a British Accent? Is there like an actor or someone with an example?
I’m Scottish and for such a wee country (meaning both Scotland and also the UK) we have such a wide variety of accents I am always interested when someone says ‘British Accent’ as the difference between south Wales to Newcastle to Essex to Aberdeen are chalk and cheese to me.
Oh, well we don’t get to compare those accents much. Trevor Noah when he first started playing in the US had a very clear South African English accent as opposed to now when he sounds a lot more American. John Oliver is who I think of for a classic “British” accent, but having never visited the islands, I wouldn’t know the difference between a Yorkshire accent and a London accent, and as I understand it, London even has multiple accents
But there’s a distinct tonal shift between Brits and South Africans. The SA English speakers are more high pitched and variable in their tonality making them sound “happy.” The British English accent is more monotone to my ear, which sounds “mildly depressed, just waiting for the rain to stop for two days in the summer.” Which is extremely English.
Half of the people with swiss citizenship have a foreign background at some level.
The majority of immigration went from permanent to temporary. People come for a small amount of time.
Despite being one of the most neoliberal country, people of the city of Berne voted to allocate money to the self-managed cultural center. This can be explained by the city-countryside political divide.
Switzerland doesn’t have direct democracy but a semi-direct democracy.
Appenzell Innerrhoden and Glarus still have a Landsgemeinde where people vote cantonal level legislations using show of hands vote.
Corruption at the local level is high.
There are more unwritten rules than laws.
People keep their friends during the entire life. As a side effect, people can be seen as unfriendly. It can take up to 10 years to make a local friends.
You can reach 95% of the country by public transportation.
The Habsburg dinasty originated from the small town of Habsburg in the Canton of Aargau.
Don’t forget that making a spliff out of your train ticket, ink and all, is a thing lol
Edit: There are also pockets where the police won’t go because they recognize they’re full of crime and drugs, but as long as it stays within those couple of streets, they’re happy to let things stay as they are so it doesn’t spill out.
Oh and over a quarter of the population consists of immigrants.
And there’s free water everywhere… hiking, in towns… just bring a water bottle and find a fountain that’s always running. The water is ice cold year round too.
It’s also the home of H.R. Geiger (Alien design fame) in Gruyère. You can go to the town of Gruyère, which is gorgeous, and see the museum, go to the Alien-inspired café, see how they make the Gruyère cheese that you probably know, and even visit the Cailler chocolate factory, which has a Willy Wonka-type tour with infinite chocolate tasting at the end… mmmmmmm…
Rather amazingly, set into its outside wall on the street is a pissoir. The “Herren WC” sign is a little misleading, as there is neither WATER nor a CLOSET."
It’s probably reasonably well-known, but nearly (or around) 90% of Aussies live within 50km of the coast, despite us having a landmass similar in size to the USA.
Can’t blame ya with how brutal the Outback is. Yer skin cancer rates are already sky high, I can’t imagine how bad it’d be if y’all lived in the parts of the country where they haven’t invented clouds yet.
Glad to be of service :D Cheers mate! May your tinnies be crisp and refreshing, your sausage rolls delicious, and make sure to grab some extra Tim Tams for the road home.
A scholar of the lads down low, or just a fan of that one bogan who yells at plastic, throws chairs at cars he calls nuggets, and hollers at his snake while drumming xD
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