This week’s photo was contributed by Anna on Pocketcultures who has been photographing a town called St. Jacobs which has a Mennonite history. Thanks Anna!
Read more:
Picture Postcards: Canadians celebrating Canada Day
It’s Not Summer ‘Till You Camp
How to Make Things Happen in Canada
Thanksgiving. The major Fall holiday in North America. Instantly, you may picture a feast of food, pilgrims in black hats, and, in recent years, a start to the Christmas shopping mania. Nope. Sorry, that’s our neighbours to south: that’s American Thanksgiving. I’m here to talk about Canadian Thanksgiving. To be honest, I barely even know what a pilgrim is.
Canadian Thanksgiving, firstly, happens over a month earlier, in October. It is held the second Monday in October each year, so the exact date changes. This Thanksgiving will be held on October 10, 2011. Why the date difference between America and Canada? Well, Thanksgiving has very pagan roots. The founders of Canada were settlers who lived off of the land. The fall is the time for harvest. The farms are ripe with food and everything must be picked before the first frost comes and ruins the crops. This time of year would be celebrated with a huge feast of all the freshly picked food. Thus, the holiday is timed around the harvest itself, and being north of America, Canada has shorter summer seasons and experiences its harvest earlier in the year.
Thanks to Xiaozhuli for sharing this photo of Canadians celebrating Canada Day in Ottowa.
Next week we have a new photo theme – graffiti and street art. If you have a photo to share please add it to our photo group on Flickr. We’ll post our favourites here on Picture Postcards.
Canada is the second largest country in the world, but there’s a relatively small population. What does this mean? A whole lot of empty space to go camping! Many of us do not consider it summer until we have been surrounded by trees, we smell like smoke, and we have eaten a s’more -or two.
The vast space, wilderness, and endless forests are definitely taken for granted here in Western Canada. I would recommend trying a night camping on a different continent, so one can come home and truly know what it means to be Canadian. (more…)
This month’s collaborative post was inspired by a conversation between some of our contributors about languages and how much they ‘borrow’ words from one another. Malay has words from English, Turkish has words from French, English has words from Hindi, Spanish has words from Arabic. Not to mention the massive way in which European languages have influenced each other.
So here’s a look at the history and foreign influences of some of the languages spoken by PocketCultures contributors around the world.
It’s a long article, so if you’re interested in a particular country use these links: India, UK, France, Canada, Turkey, Spain, Argentina, Costa Rica, Portugal, Malaysia.
Languages in India are as varied and complex as the country itself. The 2001 census estimated that there were 29 languages spoken by more than a million native speakers, 122 by more than 10,000!
We have 22 ‘official’ regional languages spoken across the country, but no ‘national language’. Hindi is often mistakenly referred to as the ‘national language’, but the constitution lists it as our ‘principal official language’. Where does Hindi come from? Well, it’s a language which evolved from a dialect spoken in northern India during the Mughal period, was influenced by Persian, and is closest to Urdu – the language today identified with Islam!
Test your cultural expertise with our weekly quiz question. This week’s question is from Azerbaijan.
Azeris in the north differ from those in the south of Azerbaijan largely because of climactic conditions.
True or False?
Picture Postcards: Colours of Argentina
The Netherlands – a country of many names
Bucharest Seen From the Arch of Triumph
From our contributors: week of May 13
Familiarizing the World with Assam.
From our contributors: week of April 23
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