Category Social Sciences

Which is the world’s first ice hotel?

Icehotel, the world’s first ice hotel, has been melting and being rebuilt since 1990, and is one of the Seven Wonders of Sweden. Located in Jukkasjarvi village, the 64,600 sq foot hotel is rebuilt each year with snow and ice from the Torne River. The hotel exists from December until mid-April when it melts and returns to the river. It has around 100 rooms designed by artists from all over the world who vie annually for the opportunity to design one of the rooms. The hotel features chandeliers, furnishings, running fountains and statuary, all crafted of ice and snow. It hosts an ice chape, an ice restaurant, and a bar with glasses made of ice! The entire structure remains below freezing, around -5 degree C.

Given that climate control is one of the biggest challenges, steel pipes are drilled into the permafrost (at 16 feet below ground) to keep the building at 23 degrees (Fahrenheit)—the ideal temperature for the preservation of the hotel plus its ice and snow sculptures, according to Bergqvist. “That way, the building works like a thermos where it doesn’t let the cold air out nor the heat in,” he said. What’s more, approximately 7,320 square feet of solar-powered refrigerating plants will be used to keep the hotel cool during the summer months too.

 

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Kashmir saffron gets Geographical Indication tag

Kashmiri saffron has a Geographical Indication tag marking its ingenuity and making it illegal for anyone outside the valley to sell a similar product under the “Kashmiri saffron” name. Jammu & Kashmir is the only state in India that produces saffron, also known as ‘red gold’. Pampore is known as the ‘saffron bowl’; the town’s saffron is considered to be of superior quality because of the high concentration of crocin (8.72%) – which gives the saffron its darker colour and medicinal value – as compared to the Iranian variety (6.82%).

The saffron available in Kashmir is of three types — ‘Lachha Saffron’, with stigmas just separated from the flowers and dried without further processing; ‘Mongra Saffron’, in which stigmas are detached from the flower, dried in the sun and processed traditionally; and ‘Guchhi Saffron’, which is the same as Lachha, except that the latter’s dried stigmas are packed loosely in air-tight containers while the former has stigmas joined together in a bundle tied with a cloth thread.

Saffron cultivation is believed to have been introduced in Kashmir by Central Asian immigrants around 1st Century BCE. In ancient Sanskrit literature, saffron is referred to as ‘bahukam’.

 

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Which village is known as ‘Aloe Vera village in Ranchi?

Dewri village in Ranchi is known as ‘Aloe Vera village’ after the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and Birsa Agricultural University (BAU) motivated villagers to take up aloe vera plantation to boost their income. Aloe vera takes 18 months to grow fully and the first lot of leaves were sold profitably as aloe vera is in high demand for its medicinal and cosmetic properties. The villagers saw their income increase from Rs 3,000 per month from paddy cultivation to s 5,000-6,000 per month.

Villagers are happy with the increase in their income.

“Earlier, we used to earn around Rs 3,000 per month from paddy cultivation if we were able to get work for all the 30 days. However, this year, apart from working in paddy fields, we were able to boost our income by selling aloe vera leaves. Our income has increased between Rs 5,000 and 6,000 per month,” said Manju Kachyap, mukhiya of the Dewri village and a woman farmer.

Manju said out of the 90 families belonging to the Oraon tribe residing in their village, nearly 40 families had taken part in planting aloe vera.

 

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What language does not have numbers?

The Piraha tribe in the Amazon region of Brazil does not have words for specific numbers nor do they count. The Piraha language contains just three words for quantities: Hoi for “small size or amount”, hoi for “somewhat larger amount”, and baagiso for “many”. Linguists refer to languages that do not have number-specific words as anumeric.

There’s still much to learn about this niche language. Although the 2016 MIT study was the most extensive to date on Piraha, analyzing 1,100 translated sentences, deeper research is required to say with certainty that recursion doesn’t exist.

The strongest statement researchers could make: “It’s plausible.”

Although Daniel Everett has studied Piraha longer than any other known researcher, his findings are often called into question. He has suggested the tribe does not have words to describe colors, for example, and that idea has also been challenged. Other researchers have started to study Piraha, but there’s little agreement thus far on much of anything.

Despite the uncertainty, Piraha serves as a fascinating reminder that perhaps we haven’t unraveled the mystery that is human language. With such a small Piraha population remaining, linguists and translators face a race against time to learn everything they can about one of the world’s most isolated languages before it disappears entirely.

 

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What are the facts of the Statue of Liberty in the United States?

Standing in the middle of the sea, the Statue of Liberty is a 93 metre – tall copper statue; think of it as equivalent to the height of a 22-storey building. The statue is a national treasure of the United States visited by millions every year.

A gift from France

To commemorate the centennial of the United States’ independence and honour France’s relationship with the U.S., French jurist Edouard de Laboulaye, in 1865, proposed the idea of presenting a gift from the people of France to the people of the U.S. Laboulaye was touched by the recent abolition of slavery in the U.S., which furthered the ideals of freedom and democracy in which he greatly believed.

Sculptor Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi, who resonated with Laboulaye, conceptualised a colossal structure that is formally known as Liberty Enlightening the World.

A symbol of liberty and freedom

Several elements of the statue symbolise liberty and freedom. The statue is named after the Roman Goddess Libertas who personifies freedom. The tablet she carries is inscribed with July 4. 1776 in Roman numerals, the day America became a free country. The torch carried by the statue is considered a symbol of enlightenment and lights the way to freedom. As a symbolism of abolition of slavery, Bartholdi has placed a broken shackle at the statue’s foot.

The Eiffel connection

Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, the man who built the Eiffel tower in Paris, France, was closely involved in the building of the statue. He was engaged by Bartholdi to address structural issues associated with designing the statue. Eiffel designed the massive iron pylon and the secondary skeletal framework that allows the statue’s copper skin to move independently yet stand upright.

Of seas and continents

The seven spikes radiating from the statue’s crown are meant to be a halo, also known as an aureole. The spikes represent the seven seas and the seven continents of the world and emphasise the statue’s message of inclusiveness and freedom.

Modelled on a real person

The face of the Statue of Liberty is said to have been modelled on Bartholdi’s mother, Charlotte. This was first discovered in 1876, when Bartholdi invited French Senator Jules Bozerian to his box at the opera, where his mother was also present and Bozerian noticed the similarity instantly.

 

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What is a coup?

On February 1, 2021, people of Myanmar woke up to the news that the country’s military has seized power from the elected government in a coup. The country’s President Win Myint, State Counsellor and de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi, and numerous members of her party National League for Democracy (NLD) were detained. In a television address, the army announced that power had been handed over to the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, Min Aung Hlaing, and that it was declaring a national state of emergency for one year. People also fear that there could be wider clampdown under the military rule. Let’s take a look at what led to a coup Myanmar in this Five Ws and One H..

A coup (pronounced koo) is when power is illegally and unconstitutionally seized from the government of country, by a political faction or the military. Violence is part of many coups. In other words, a coup is the forcible overthrow of ruler or government. The word coup is short for the French term “coup detat,” which translates as “stroke of state.”

Coup is often the result of displeasure with how the country is run by the elected government or ruler. A military coup, as in the case of Myanmar, is when the military takes control of governance by staging a coup.

What are the different types of coup?

The world has witnessed different kinds of coup and political scientists categorise them into various types. Some of them are military coup, civil society coup, parliamentary coup, presidential coup, breakthrough coup, silent coup, democratic coup and the guardian coup.

Why did the military stage a coup in Myanmar?

A crisis has been brewing in Myanmar since the November 2020 parliamentary election, in which Suu Kyi’s NLD party won in a landslide against the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development party. The latter won just 33 out of 476 seat. But the military refused to accept the results, claiming widespread irregularities in the election and demanded a new military-supervised election. However, the election commission refused, saying there was no evidence to support its claims of fraudulence.

Citing a provision in the Constitution it had drafted (in 2008), the military warned that it could launch a coup if it felt a threat to the nation’s sovereignty.

And on February 1, which was supposed to be the first day of a new session of parliament since the November election, the military staged a coup.

What is the background?

Myanmar gained independence from Britain in 1948 and Sao Shwe Thaik became its first president and U Nu became its first prime minister. In 1962, the Tatmadaw, as the country’s military is formally known, staged a coup and took over power. Since then, Myanmar has switched between military rule and civilian leadership.

Myanmar was ruled by the armed forces from 1962 to 2011, when pressure from the international community forced the military to cede power and a new government ushered in a return to civilian rule. But the Constitution the military had drafted ahead of this cessation gave it at least 25% of the seats in the Legislature. According to the Constitution, any amendment is possible only if over 75% of lawmakers vote for it. So, in effect, the military holds the power to veto any attempt by the government that could be seen as a threat to its authority.

In 2015, Suu Kyi’s NLD won a sweeping victory in the general elections. However, the military retained significant power under the Constitution that also barred her from the presidency, as her two sons are citizens and ran the government as a de facto leader (a leader in fact, whether or not constitutionally binding).

The election in November 2020 was only Myanmar’s second-ever election since the end of the military rule in 2011. Post election, Suu Kyi proposed to make amendments to Myanmar’s Constitution and Strip the military of many of its authorities. This move received major support from people, but ruffled the feathers of the military.

How has the international community reacted?

World leaders condemn the coup and detainment of Suu Kyi. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said it was a “serious blow to democratic reforms”, while the U.S. President Joe Biden has threatened to reinstate sanctions. Meanwhile, people of Myanmar resorted to non-violent means to register their protest against the coup.

What are some of the coups in the recent times?

Many coups (pronounced kooz) have been staged in the past. Here, we are listing some of the recent ones.

1999 Pakistan coup: The the military leader Parvez Musharraf overthrew the Pakistani government under Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on October 12, 1999. It was a bloodless coup as Musharraf declared an emergency and took control of the entire country.

2013 Egyptian Coup: On July 3, 2013, Egyptian army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi led a coalition to remove the President of Egypt, Mohamed Morsi, from power and suspended the Egyptian constitution.

2016 Turkish failed coup attempt: On July 15, 2016, the Turkish military attempted a coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, but could not succeed in overthrowing the government. Hundreds were killed in the violence that ensued and thousands were detained subsequently.

2019 Sudanese coup: On April 11, 2019, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, after nearly 30 years in office, was overthrown by the Sudanese army after popular protest demanded his departure.

 

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