Mexico Part 1

Today I will be focusing purely on the provinces of Mexico, not Mexico as a whole, each individual province.

PROVINCE OF MEXICO
First up is the province of Mexico, which is in fact a province. It is home to the capital of Mexico, Mexico City! Now today's post will be very different from usual, with the fact that cuisine is already world known and cuisine in Mexico really doesn't vary from province to province, cuisine will be replaced by History and Animals, so let's go! P.S. The history part has nothing to do with the score, just a filler. ;)
HISTORY
So there are actually two Mexico Cities, the old one is what is now today known as Tenochtitlan which was founded by the Aztecs. It was on an island in the center of the inland lake system of Mexico Valley. It was claimed to be the perfect land by the Aztecs and was a beautiful place. They knew this where their home would be when they saw (Get this) a hawk standing on a cactus with a snake in it's mouth which just so happened to be the symbol of hope by the Aztec people. So they made the perfect capital for the most perfect country, AND THEN SPAIN CAME IN AND RUINED EVERYTHING. So Spain colonized Mexico and called it 'New Spain' and the Spaniards established a capital in the middle of this land only known as, YOU GUESSED IT, Mexico City. Then the independence came in and then that dictator came in and modernized the country but ruined everything then there was another dictator and then Mexico became what we today know as Mexico then there was the 34th president of Mexico who was in office for like 45 minutes. That's a true story, look at this, Pedro Lascurain: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedro_Lascur%C3%A1in
You thought I was lying, didn't you?

ANIMALS
Okay so I cannot talk about Mexico City WITHOUT talking about the most adorable thing that lives in fresh water aside from beavers, platypus, and bass. Am I the only one finds bass cute? They look like little Opera Singers when they swim near the surface and they want the food that we're carrying, ahem, sorry about that. The most adorable thing in fresh water is the Axolotl.





 

Isn't that just adorable?

 

These cute amphibious creatures live in only one place in the world and that's Mexico City. Sadly these poor guys are critically endangered and need help to sustain a big population. But enough sadness, let's talk about awesomeness. Did you know that the Axolotl is like the Wolverine? If a limb, say leg, were to be cut off the Axolotl, it would take just a couple of weeks to have a fully functional leg again. Best part, this can be done as many times as you like and it will never stop. This surprised scientists and the cell in it's body that allows it to do so. Okay, now try and guess another aquatic animal that lives in Mexico City. If you said any type of fish you are wrong, the answer I was looking for was the West Indian Manatee and just like the Axolotl, they are endangered.

 

ATTRACTIONS

So I'm going to make this one short. First of all is the Great Temple of Tenochtitlan which is a very nice place if you're interested in the Aztec past of Mexico, next is the Angel of Independence which is a statue made by Mexicans celebrating their fresh-out-the-oven independence, and finally for that one luchador in your life is the Arena Mexico!!! Which is a professional wrestling arena.

 

Mexico Province gets a...

98.2

 

 

Israel, South Africa, and Azerbaijan Part 2

Now before I begin this post, I just want to appreciate Azerbaijan. Thank you Azerbaijan for being the most developed Muslim community in the world, thank you for being the first country to make an off shore oil drill ever, thank you for building the city of Baku seriously thank you so much for Baku, thank you for being the home of the world's largest KFC in the world, thank you for being the first Muslim-majority democratic secular country ever and the first Muslim-majority to have theaters, operas, and modern day universities, thank you for building the flame towers, thank you for making flipping monuments dedicated to your love of tea, thank you for Gobustan; home of the most mud volcanoes in the world, thank you for being the first Muslim-nation to allow women to wear whatever they want, not forcing women to wear hijabs or burkas, and allow religious freedom, thank you for being the only Muslim that gets along with Israel, supports Israel, and accepted Jewish immigrants during the holocaust, and thank you for being the Canada of the middle east. As in you're friends with everybody. Okay on with the post!

AZEERBAIJAN

CUISINE
A nice Azerbaijani dish that is considered to be fancy is the Dushbara, which is  small dumplings stuffed with minced lamb and herbs and is also served in broth. A very interesting dish is a type of soup in Azerbaijani, the Dovga. Dovga is a yogurt based soup with sorrel, spinach, rice, dried peas, and small meatballs made from ground mutton; the temperature it is served in depends from season to season. To end cuisine, I'll end it with a beverage, tea. Black Tea is the most drunken thing in Azerbaijan and is also Azerbaijan's National Drink and as I mentioned before they built monuments throughout Azerbaijan in love of their tea which is adorable. My favorite thing is there are Ayran stands along roads which are stands where you can buy tea on the side of a road.

ATTRACTIONSLet's start off with Baku, Azerbaijan's capital. Baku is amazing, it's a shore side city and on the ocean you can see a huge and complex network of oil drills connected by wire bridges which is surprisingly cool to look at. Baku is also the home of the previously mentioned flame towers which were completed in 2011, they are tall buildings which put up an amazing light show at nightsthanks to illuminated windows and LEDs. There is also the previously mentioned world's largest KFC or Gobustan or the tea monuments. There's just too much to do in Azerbaijan, it's amazing!

CULTURE
The people of Azerbaijan speak Azerbaijani, that's it. No exceptions. Azerbaijan has an incredibly low crime rate too!

Azerbaijan gets a...
97.5

Israel, South Africa, and Azerbaijan Part 1

So I apologize for not being able to post much. The main reason is because school but since it's summer now, I've got all the time I need to make a lot of posts again! So I'm now going to focus on Africa, Middle East, and South East Asia for a while, no reason at all. Plus to make posts longer I'll do 3 countries a post and I promise to make 1 post once every 2 days. So let's go!

ISRAEL
Planning on going to Israel? That's ok, but if you are, might want to cross Libya and Saudi Arabia off that list as well. The reasoning is because if you have any Israeli stamps on your passport then you aren't restricted on rights, you aren't supervised, but they don't let you even go in there. So either go to those countries before Israel or just not go there at all. (PS The second option is a better choice because women don't get many rights in either country in the first place and if caught owning of drugs or questionable items is punishable by death.)

CUISINE
So Israel has a very unique cuisine in comparison of it's neighbors like Jordan mainly because almost every single person in Israel is Jewish. (duh) So Israeli cuisine is mainly kosher foods (foods that the Tanakh, which is the Jewish bible, allows a Jew to eat). Taking that in mind that means you may not consume pork or shellfish, also meat and dairy products may not be combined, meat must also be (hilariously) ritually slaughtered and salted to remove all traces of blood, finally some people may not eat any form of poultry or meat.

But enough about food restrictions, let's talk about what you CAN eat. One immediate example that comes to my mind is the ever so famous American-Israeli dish; Bagels and cream cheese with a side of lox. (cured salmon) Most Israelis say this is an Israeli dish with some American influence, specifically the bagel with cream cheese. The lox is a very famous kosher food in Israel, for some reason, and some Americans say that lox is "Like regular salmon, but more like bacon; nice and crispy and dry". A famous kosher snack is fig which is the most mentioned food in the Jewish bible. If you want to know what fig is like listen to this Wikipedia description:
They are lusciously sweet with a texture that combines the chewiness of their flesh, the smoothness of their skin, and the crunchiness of their seeds.
In my opinion, that sounds like a mix of strawberries, pomegranates, and apples. Oh my god I want a fig now. Okay so the next food for Israel is Yaprak, which is stuffed vine leaves. Also I just wanted to do this food because Yaprak is also a feminine Turkish name that means 'leaf'. So the last food is actually a list of the foods eaten on the holiday of Rosh Hashana, (Jewish New Year) and those foods are...

• Apples and Honey - To celebrate the soon to be 'sweet' year
• Pomegranates - For many blessings this year. (Each seed means another blessing)
• Fish Head - For a successful year in which we are the "head," not the "tail."
• Honey Cake
• Tzimmes (Hot Vegetable Cubes served alongside honey)
• Teiglach (Twisted Pastries boiled in a honeyed syrup)
• Challah (Special Braided Bread)

ATTRACTIONS
First of all is the adorable Mini Israel which is a park that contains hundreds of miniature replicas of buildings and landmarks in Israel. Also each figure is surprisingly realistic and accurate and photos of it look like regular cities in Israel until you see the photos of some 5'4" dude towering over a tall building. Secondly is the Tikotin Museum of Japanese Art which is a very rare building mainly because of the fact that it is the only Japanese Art Museum in the entire Middle East. Finally is the number one most popular thing to do in Israel, see the old city of Jerusalem. One person says ,"The Old City is a melange of culture, religion, tradition. Expect to barter and do not walk away unless you get to at least half of the asking price!" Need I say more?

CULTURE
(People from now on is culture) The culture of Israel is predominately Jewish but culture is also largely influenced by the UK and the US. But Arabic culture still plays a tiny role in Israel: language. Israel's 3 official languages are currently English, Arabic, and Hebrew which is the Jewish language, also practically every Jewish citizen knows a bit of English. Crime is also not a problem at all so you don't have to worry about your phone being stolen or something like that.

Israel gets a...
90

SOUTH AFRICA
South Africa is interesting country mainly because it is the world hub of cultural diversity. (Aside from the DRC) Which means that cultural influence could be part Mexican, part Greek, heck even part Turkish! So yeah...

CUISINE
A popular drink amongst the citizens is Amasi, which is just sour milk. Okay, so Bunny Chow is also a popular food, it is curry stuffed into a hollowed out loaf of bread, yuck. Um okay how about Chakalaka? It is... Spicy Vegetable Relish. Um, Mafi? DANGIT!! Just more sour milk. How about, you know what forget it everything here is horrible. The only food here I'd eat is sausage. THAT'S IT!!! NOTHING HERE TASTES GOOD!!!!!

ATTRACTIONS
To start off is Gold Reef City, which is a big amusement park in Johannesburg, South Africa that was built on top of an old gold mine. The park is themed around the gold rush that occurred in 1887 in Witwatersrand, South Africa. Next is the Moses Mabhida Stadium which is a multi-use stadium in Durban, South Africa. It was a host stadium of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. The stadium is named after Moses Mabhida who was a General Secretary of the South African Communist Party... Okay, then. Finally (And probably the best of all these) is the Highgate Ostrich Show Farm. Yes you read that correctly and no I did not misspell anything, it's exactly what it is; an ostrich farm. THEY EVEN ALLOW YOU TO RIDE THE OSTRICHES!!!

CULTURE
I'm going to sum up the culture of South Africa with a quote from their website:
"We have groups with different languages, religions, race, customs and traditions e.g. Zulu, Ndebele, Khoisan, Hindu, Muslim and Afrikaner people. All of these people are united by being South African and all of their ways of life form part of our country's identity and culture."
Also, the number of official languages there are is unreal, and they are:

• English
• Afrikaans
• Zulu
• Xhosa
• Southern Sotho
• Tswana
• Northern Sotho
• Tsonga
• Venda
• Swati
• Ndebele

South Africa gets a...
84.3


Azerbaijan is a county that not many people remember that it exists, but I cannot do it in this part so I'll see you soon!