Interesting Maps

My first thought was how strange it is that "Water & Other Countries" are actually labelled in the map legend.

Then I realised what a terrible map it is; Various shades of blue for land areas, Provincial boundaries disguised by the same lines used for boundaries of smaller areas, Atlantic coastline of the USA omitted but still showing lakeshore edges in the USA.

It's facinating to read such a cutesy and fun-looking tourism map of Germany with all these happy people doing stuff...

...and then you see the flags.

What is kind of chilling is that a map like this looks so similar to fun maps I've seen as a kid of various innocent fun places. You can see the fun-loving mindset of the artist...

...and then you see the flags.

Per the 2021 census, in the Greater Perth region 4.8% of households have no motor vehicle, while 19.2% have three or more. (The report I've seen doesn't give figures for four or more.)

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How to get as many letters into Mexico as possible!

Irish became a written language, and adopted the Roman alphabet, earlier than most European languages. At the time the letter W did not exist, and J and V were not considered distinct letters - up to that point (and well beyond) they were variants of I and U. The Romans did use Y and Z but did not consider them to be Roman letters — rather, they were borrowed from the Greek alphabet. The Romans used K, but only rarely.

So, the limited range of the Irish alphabet reflects the limited range of the Latin alphabet at the time.

It;s a mistake to think that the English (and indeed Irish) names of foreign places (at least within Europe) are "translations" of the modern name used by the inhabitants. Rather, the name of a place in different languages will often have evolved out of a common root. "Lisbon" isn't a translation of "Lisboa"; they both evolved out of "Olissippo", which is what the Romans called it.

I went to a gaelscoil and I still remember a lot of the interesting spelling to remove v and w from the students' names.

I have never quite understood this need to change students' names to Irish. If you were taken to live in France or Spain would your name be literally translated to French or Spanish by the school? Your name is your name. If you are called John then that is your name, not Sean or Jean or Johann. They may be versions in other languages, but they are not your name. If your parents wished you to be called Sean they would have named you Sean. If you choose to go by the name your parents gave you then that is your name. You could say 'I was named John but I go by Sean' then that is your prerogative, not something someone else should decide.

You may choose to change your name to something more pronounceable by local tongues but that is your decision. You may be given a nickname by others if they find your name too difficult, but that is a casual arrangement that you may or may not go along with. Your name is your most basic personal possession.

Post by Peter Donaghy on Twitter. Affordability of housing, he reckons Cork and Limerick are good with decent job prospects but houses at not outrageous prices. Derry if you want a bargain.

There's black, navy, dark blue, blue, light blue, yellow, and red. The black and navy are very similar.