Topics of the World
Does climate influence culture in Azerbaijan?
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: Street scene in Ottawa, Canada
This week’s street scene picture postcard has been sent in by or contributor, Ana, who spotted these vendors in Ottawa.
See more picture Postcards:
Street Scene in Peru
Funny Photo from the Channel Islands, UK
Flowers from Costa Rica
The Royal Wedding and Britain’s north-south divide
Last Friday the UK celebrated the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton, otherwise known as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. The day was designated as a special public holiday so most people had the day off work.
The happy couple
Folar: a Portuguese Easter Tradition
Easter in Portugal is a very special occasion for godparents and their godchildren.
The tradition says the goddaughter or the godson should visit their godparents and ask for the Folar.
The Folar da Páscoa is a kind of bread or cake, salty or sweet, depending on the region of the country. If it is from the North (the most popular is the Folar de Chaves,) it is salty. If it is from the South (Algarve,) it is sweet.
The Folar da Páscoa is a symbol of brotherhood, friendship and reconciliation, and when covered with eggs, as in the South, it is also a symbol of fertility, rebirth and resurrection.
Picture Postcards: Street scene Cusco, Peru
This month we are looking at street scenes around the world here on Picture Postcards. Today’s photo was taken by our contributor Jason, who snapped it in Cusco Peru. He says it is an “Inca lady walking by 500-year old stone walls, carrying produce to market”.
If you’d like to contribute a street scene from your city, all you have to do is label your photo clearly as OK for us to use, tell us what they are about and put them in our Flickr group.
Have a look at some of our other recent photos from:
Thailand
The Channel Islands
New Zealand
The great big Coorgi wedding
The Indian wedding is a splash of colour, a blur of reds, yellows, greens and dazzling gold. It is the finest advertisement of Indian hospitality with guests numbering in the hundreds, sometimes entire villages. This detail I am careful not to miss in any conversations about marriage here in London, for the sheer amusement of seeing jaws drop once the comprehension of the scale of the wedding hits the listener. The pageantry of the processions stays in the mind long after the wedding is over – the Mehendi, The Food, The Drink, the Dancing and then the innumerable rituals steeped in traditions and kept alive through the ages, handed down from one generation to the next.
Weddings vary in form and structure depending on the state the bride and groom are from. And so the ‘Indian wedding experience’ is as diverse as they come.
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