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Category: Countries
St Fyodor Ushakov
Outside the church of St Dionysius, a bust of Fyodor Ushakov, Russian naval commander. The Russian inscription indicates the statue was a Russian idea, but it isn’t absurd to see him here: Ushakov won the sea battle that wrested control the Ionian Islands away from Napoleonic France for seven years, of autonomy under joint Russian […]
What’s the most unforgettable food that you have eaten in a foreign country?
I’ve had the opportunity to travel a bit in my time; and because Australians are food snobs, I’ve used the opportunity to sample what the locals eat. I’ll put down two memorable meals. The first was in Amsterdam. On my last day there, I opened up my Lonely Planet guide book, flicked past the hoity-toity […]
Why are the Black people in America called African-Americans but we don’t have French-Americans or any other nationality Americans?
https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=Polish+-+American&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2CPolish%20–%20American%3B%2Cc0 Am astonished that the obvious answer hasn’t been uttered yet. There was a longstanding practice in America of referring to white ethnic minorities as hyphenated Americans. (Something Teddy Roosevelt famously decried.) There were, and are, French–Americans, Italian–Americans, German–Americans, etc etc. Blacks changed their description from racial terms to a hyphenated American term in the […]
In England, we have a curious habit of cheering when someone (especially staff) drops a load of glasses or plates. Is this the norm in other countries?
In Australia, in pubs, we yell “Taxi!” The premise is that the glass or plate was dropped by someone drunk, who therefore will be needing a taxi, as they are in no state to drive themselves home. Answered 2017-04-17 [Originally posted on http://quora.com/In-England-we-have-a-curious-habit-of-cheering-when-someone-especially-staff-drops-a-load-of-glasses-or-plates-Is-this-the-norm-in-other-countries/answer/Nick-Nicholas-5]
What makes you wish you understood Russian?
Odd you’d ask me, Habib le toubib! Russian actually is a language I wish I understood. There’s a little bit of Byzantine literature published in Russia, and it’d be useful to access the literature. There’s a bit more Russian writing on Balkan linguistics: ditto. Much more so: Mariupolitan Greek, spoken in the Ukraine, is substantially […]
Have you ever lied about your nationality while traveling abroad?
Nope. Australians enjoy a good reputation in the parts of the world I have been to (Europe, North America), and I have not been to the parts of the world where they might not (India, Papua New Guinea?). I have been to New Zealand, but any animus there is jocular and reciprocated. The Austria/Australia confusion […]
Who, in your opinion, is the most dangerous person alive?
Ah, Mez. I was going to dodge this, but I won’t. What’s the danger I care about most? Not the planet blowing up, and not what happens to America in isolation from the rest of the planet. (I mean, of course I care, but not most. And boy, will there be a bunch of isolation […]
Why is Iran one of the most hated countries?
I love questions about Iran, Anon. I actually know very little about Iran, and much of what I do know is through people right here on Quora. But I know enough about the neighborhood, as their neighbours’ neighbour, that I can make intelligent guesses. They may be very far from correct guesses, of course. But […]
Why are some Americans so bad at geography?
Originally Answered: Why are Americans so bad at Geography? I responded to Nick Nicholas’ answer to What do you think when you hear the words, “United States”? with a map, to undo such questions. I got the ball rolling, with all the questions listed in the answer wiki under How many Central and South American […]
Could someone produce a rank for Cyprus based on size among European islands?
Let’s take List of islands by area – Wikipedia, and edit in the European islands. Plus or Minus. Great Britain. 209k [math]km^2[/math] Iceland 101k [math]km^2[/math] Ireland 84k [math]km^2[/math] Severny Island (Novaya Zemlya) 47k [math]km^2[/math] Spitsbergen 39k [math]km^2[/math] Yuzhny Island (Novaya Zemlya) 33k [math]km^2[/math] Sicily 26k [math]km^2[/math] Sardinia 24k [math]km^2[/math] Nordaustlandet 14k [math]km^2[/math] Cyprus 9k [math]km^2[/math] […]