Let my people go. - Google Maps style. :)

Let my people go. - Google Maps style. :)

Recently during routine archaeological computer excavation not far from Eilat in Negev desert was found historical item, which proves existence of the Jewish Exodus from Egypt.   Here is a image of antic Google Satellite Map of Exodus led by Moses.

ABBAland (part2).

If you liked my ABBAland post, here is a trite for you, two more views of Europe from the eastern part of the continent - Russia and Poland, and as a bonus you can get an American view of its Southern Neighbours (South America).

Enjoy!!!

Double click on a map to see the details.

Russian View of Europe.



Polish View of Europe.

American View of South America

Greenland - the land up North.

On September 14 we were flying back from Europe by Crossing Atlantic, I have done it several times for last 10 years. And most of the times pilot will let you know then you are flying over Greenland. So I can say, I sow Greenland from high above ( 33 thousand feet or 10.000 meters to be exact) This time I had a camera with me and to make it memorable I got couple of pictures of the land probably most of us never going to visit. Here is a most southern tip of the biggest island in a world located north of N60 parallel.

Enjoy!

ABBAland and IKIAville is a same country, isn't it?

A stereotype or "stereotypes" is a commonly held public belief about specific social groups or types of individuals. Stereotypes are standardized and simplified conceptions of groups based on some prior assumptions.




The term stereotype (στερεότυπος) derives from the Greek words στερεός (stereos), "firm, solid" and τύπος (typos), "impression", hence "solid impression".



Recently I found several maps which represent these "solid impressions" toward the countries and areas in Europe in a minds of Americans, British, French, Germans and Italians. Take under consideration, assuming that the post and maps are scientifically correct is a stereotyping some sort.



American View of Europe.

 French View of Europe.

 German View of Europe.

 Italian View of Europe.

 British View of Europe.

The World 's Population by Lat and Lon

Harvard grad student Bill Rankin devised these fascinating maps, which show the sum of all population living at each degree of latitude or longitude circa 2000. As you can see above, there’s quite a northerly bias: According to Rankin, roughly 88 percent of the world’s population lives in the Northern Hemisphere, with about half north of 27 degrees north.


Rankin: “Taking the northern and southern hemispheres together, on average the world’s population lives 24 degrees from the equator.”

International Number One, because every country is a best at something.

International Number One, because every country is a best at something. Check out this map. It is dose not claimed to be scientific however it is fun to spent couple minutes to study it. Very informative.

Enjoy!!!

Europe’s Alcohol Belts.

Remember around year and a half ago, I presented my readers map of Europe representing popularity staffed cabbage vs. staffed peppers.

http://katzmanyata.blogspot.com/2008/08/stuffed-cabbage-vs-stuffed-peppers.html

However recently I stumbled on similar thematic Europe maps , only now lets talk about drinking habits of ‘Old’ continent.






This map shows Europe dominated by three so-called ‘alcohol belts’, the northernmost one for distilled spirits, a middle one for beer and the southernmost one for wine. Each one’s existence and extension is determined by a mix of culture and agriculture.
The Wine Belt covers the southern parts of Europe, where wine has historically been an important industry and an everyday commodity: the whole of Portugal, Spain, Italy, Montenegro, Greece, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Moldova and Georgia; all but the northwestern zone of France; and significant parts of Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia, Serbia, and Romania.
Either through effects of climate change or renewed viticultural enthusiasm, grapes and wine-making have in recent years been introduced in areas to the north of the traditional Wine Belt, in southern Britain and the Low Countries, creating an overlap between Wine and Beer Belts. That overlap is often ancient rather than recent; the introduction not rarely is a reintroduction. And indeed, southwestern Germany, for example, has an ancient and unbroken tradition of wine-making.
The Beer Belt comprises areas where beer has been the alcoholic beverage of choice since times immemorial: Ireland and the UK, the Low Countries, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Bosnia and Albania; most of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia, Serbia and Romania; and significant, western parts of Poland. Beer production requires the cultivation of cereals, so this is a climatic-agricultural precondition for the Beer Belt.
An interesting co-explanation for the prevalence of beer in southern parts of this belt is the relatively weak cultural influence of the Roman Empire on these places. The Wine Belt indeed conforms to a large extent with the territory formerly occupied by Rome, with notable exceptions in areas with large Slavic or Germanic migration (the Balkans, southwestern Germany, northern France respectively), where beer predominates (although often overlapping with wine).


The Vodka Belt occupies what’s left of Europe, to the east and north: Scandinavia (except Denmark), Russia, the Baltics, Belarus, Ukraine and central and eastern Poland. There is a climatological imperative to the Vodka Belt: freezing temperatures make grape cultivation impossible (except in southernmost Russia and some areas of Ukraine). So there’s almost no overlap possible between the Vodka and Wine Belts. For cultural reasons, however, the Vodka Belt has been losing ground to the Beer Belt. Scandinavians tend to drink more beer than before (although possibly this doesn’t mean they drink less wodka). Maybe this is due to the perception of beer correlating more with ‘core European’ behaviour (as it is the preferred alcoholic beverage of Britain, Germany and other influential and centrally positioned countries). That might explain the emergence in Poland, some years ago, of a Beer-Lovers’ Party (which actually won seats in the Polish Parliament in the early 1990s). Beer has since surpassed wodka as the most consumed type of alcohol in Poland.

Дорогие Москвичи и гости столицы.

For all Moscowites (present and former) all over the world and guests of the capital. Small excourse in a Moscow History of XX century, small animation of Moscow expansion and its territorial subdivision during that time. Here you can find Pervomaysky ( Первомайский Район ) and Sakolnechesky ( Сокольнический Район ) districts were I was born and spend most of my Youth.

Double-Click on the picture to see animation.

And the prize goes to... Israel.

This is a time of the year, than Nobel prices are giving out by Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. I am happy to announce that this year academy price would go to Israel. Today Ada Yonath received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, together with Venkatraman Ramakrishnan and Thomas A. Steitz, for her studies on the structure and function of the ribosome.

I would like to post a map of distribution of Nobel price winners through out the world. Looks like Boston, San Francisco, Washington and London left others far behind. Israel look like an island in the middle east/ Asia area. Chicago is doing well to, probably due to School of Economics in University of Chicago.

Enjoy the map!!!! Have not posted them in a while.

Mameloshen (Part 2)

Recently I found really cool map of Yiddish dialects in Europe in end of 19 and beginning of 20 century. That actually pushed me to write a small article about origination of Yiddish dialects as well as a current use of the language in today’s warls.

Yiddish has many dialects, which are usually subdivided into western and eastern dialects. The last one is divided into three main dialects: Northern (so-called. Belarusian-Lithuanian dialect:
Baltic States,
Belarus,
north-eastern regions of Poland,
west of Smolensk Oblast of Russia and
part of the Chernigov region of Ukraine),
South-East ( so-called. dialect of Ukrainian:
Ukraine,
Moldavia,
the eastern region of Romania,
first of all - Moldova and Bucovina,
the southern part of the Brest Region of Belarus and
the Lublin Region of Poland),
Central (or south-west, so-called. Polish dialects:
central and western Poland,
Transylvania,
the Carpathian areas of Ukraine).
There are also transitional dialects on a border of dialect regions. In the early twentieth century the united common Yiddish “klal shprakh” was developed, which gained acceptance mainly in the universities of Eastern and Central Europe. In North America, among Hasidim immerged common dialect based on the "Hungarian" Yiddish, widely used earlier in Transylvania. In the USSR, the grammatical basis of the literary standard served as a Ukrainian dialect, whereas the phonetics based on the northern dialect. Yiddish Theater, in accordance with the tradition of its origin from Abraham Goldfaden (Jewish poet, playwright. stage director and actor in the languages Yiddish and Hebrew, author of some 40 plays. Goldfaden is considered the father of the Jewish modern theatre. ), played in averaged Ukrainian dialect (sometimes, referred to as the Volyn).

Western Yiddish, which by some researchers is seen as a separate language, spoken by the Jews in the western regions of Germany, Switzerland and Holland, is now almost dead due to the massive assimilation of West European Jews prior of World War II.


By beginning of XXI century Yiddish speaking world consist of 3 million people of whom 600,000 to 700,000 people considered it as their first language. Here is a short list of countries with a most Yiddish First language speakers.

Israel: 215,000, or 3% of the total Jewish population (1995)
USA: 178,945, or 2.8% of the total Jewish population (2000)
Russia: 29,998, or 13% of the total Jewish population (2002)
Moldova: 17,000, or 26% of the total Jewish population (1989)
Ukraine: 3,213, or 3.1% of the total Jewish population (2001)
Belarus: 1,979, or 7.1% of the total Jewish population (1999)
Canada: 19,295, or 5.5% of the total Jewish population (2001)
Romania: 951, or 16.4% of the total Jewish population
Latvia: 825, or 7.9% of the total Jewish population
Lithuania: 570, or 14.2% of the total Jewish population
Estonia: 124, or 5.8% of the total Jewish population

Jorney throug the center of the Earth.

Have you ever thought, if you start digging where you are and dig through the center of the earth where you going to ended up geographically, what will wait for you on the other side of the globe. Of course it is a hypothetical question, however answer displayed on the map in that blog.

Jews love Idaho.

Imagine you are looking for a Jewish company or gathering for a Shabat or have an urge for Geffilte fish, Matzo, Borsch or other assortment of Jewish delicacies in a middle of potato country – Idaho, somewhere around Pocatello, ID. You are in luck – Pocatello has grate variety of Jewish and kosher products in their local supermarkets and specialized stores. Percent of Jewish population in town is steadily growing from 2 to 3 percent in a last decade, and the biggest in Idaho by passing even Boise. Who new, that Idaho could have a vibrant Jewish life with synagogues, religious schools and ethnic restaurants. That why I decide to post the map of Jews by county in US, so potential Jewish tourist somewhere in a middle of the US should not fill lonely. Jews are everywhere even in Idaho.

Jewish map by county in US.

How we see the world on a map.

Depending were in a world you are, you have a different perception of viewing and describing the world on a map. Every one want to put the place, were they are in a upper center portion of the map, making the area were they live as a main real-estate of the map.

Europeans have Europe in a center, which would probably make it most correct representation of the world, because borders of the map will go around 180th meridian, which is international date line, so you will see not only map of the world but complete map of the day from 0 to 24 day hours.

Americans usually put America in a center, which will split Asia on a two opposite sides of the map. Splitting Russia and China and placing them on a edges of the map, I don’t think it make them both happy.

The weirdest map of all comes from Australia, by looking in it, first thing which come to the mind, are Australians familiar with common cartography laws, why do they place map up side down. The map would truly describe them as people from down under.

Stuffed Cabbage vs. Stuffed Peppers

In the pre-Columbian ( before America become known to Europeans) Europe, people could not rely on potato as a main food staple, simply because it was not known to Europeans. So they had something else as a main source of getting energy for their wellbeing (I am talking about food here.). Cabbage and Sweet peppers, depending on a country and culture, were and still are one of the main food staples on European continent. Many dishes are made out of them, but I would like to take a note on two of them which are similar in preparation except the main ingredient in them Cabbage and Sweet Pepper. Let’s talk Stuffed Cabbage vs. Stuffed Pepper.

Stuffed Cabbage.

The filling is traditionally based a ground meet, often beef, lamb or pork and is seasoned with garlic, onion and spices. Grains such as rice and barley, eggs, mushrooms and vegetables are often included in the filling as well. Pickled cabbage leaves are often used for wrapping. The stuffed cabbage are usually baked in a sauce made from cream, tomatoes and spices.

Stuffed Peppers

Usually prepared with bell peppers (or a similar species) stuffed with ground meat, often beef, lamb or pork , rice, onion and other vegetables and spices. The stuffed peppers are usually baked in a sauce made from cream, tomatoes and spices.

Sounds similar, but not quite, here the 48th parallel phenomenon takes effect. People north of that line prefer Stuffed Cabbage to Stuffed Pepper, and people south of that line vise versa. The farther from that parallel you go, liking to particular kind of food getting stronger. Nice example is a map presented in a blog. Countries like Hungary, Ukraine, France enjoy both dishes equally, however Germany, Austria and Poland are more cabbage people, and Romania, Moldova, Italy and Spain are pepper ones.

Beijing Olimpics

Today is opening ceremony for Beijing Olympics. The day it is starts is significant for Chinese because of repetition of number eight (08-08-2008). The word for "eight" in Mandarin sounds similar to the word which means "prosper" or "wealth". In regional dialects the words for "eight" and "fortune" are also similar, eg Cantonese "baat" and "faat". Couple of cool Olympic maps in honer of the day. The image below is a Soviet post envelope dedicated to Moscow Olimpics back in 1980. Moscow was my home town during that time.