Fun fact Friday: Checkpoint 5 - Malawi

Malawi will be the penultimate country that we’ll be travelling through on the Put Foot rally. No doubt there are many great (and better) reasons to visit Malawi but mostly we’re super-excited because:

1.  Who wouldn’t want to visit the place known as the ‘Warm heart of Africa’?

2.  It looks like the kind of place where one might suntan on the beach whilst being served cocktails

Not bad Malawi.

and  3. The Checkpoint party is full-moon themed and is going to be epic

Full moon and full set of toes.

The country was established in 1891 as the British protectorate of Nyasaland and in 1964 became the independent nation of Malawi. The capital is Lilongwe which has an estimated population of 821000.

Much of the country is plateau - the Great Rift Valley runs from north to south and in the mountainous sections surrounding the valley, plateaus rise from 900 to 1 300m above sea level.

Now for fun facts!

• Lake Malawi is sometimes known as the Calendar Lake as it is around 365 miles (587 km) long and 52 miles (84 km) wide. It is the third largest lake in Africa and the eighth largest lake in the world.
• The only Carlsberg factory found outside Denmark is found in Blantyre, and they do free tours on a Wednesday afternoon. Alas we will miss this, but now you know - should you ever find yourself in Blantyre on a Wednesday afternoon.
• Who does the lake belong too? Tanzania claims that the border runs through the middle of the lake, based on the border set out between the German and British territories prior to 1914. Meanwhile Malawi claims the whole of the surface of the lake (excluding the Mozambican part). The dispute stems from when the British captured Tanganyika (now Tanzania) and placed all of the water under the jurisdiction of Nyasaland (now Malawi).
• The lake is of big interest to scientists as it is the site of some 'exciting' evolutionary happenings amongst some fish. These fish (Cichlids) evolved rapidly into a large number of closely related but diverse species. Lake Malawi is home to several hundred endemic species of Cichlids - and they are fairly good-looking as fish go.

Not for eating

As ever thanks to wiki and CIA factbook (here).

Fun fact friday: Check point 4 - Zimbabwe

Our fourth fantastic check point will be Kariba in Zim. Zim has had a lot of bad press in recent years but is definitely on the up and up!

• Zimbabwe became an independent state on 18 April 1980.
• Prior to independence the country was known as Rhodesia or Southern Rhodesia.
• The name Zimbabwe is derived from "Dzimba dza mabwe", which means "great houses of stone" in the Shona language. It is based on the stone structures of Great Zimbabwe or Dzimbahwe, which were included in the World Heritage List in 1986.
• The capital city of Zimbabwe is Harare.

We like Zim a lot not only because it is Laura's homeland but also because of it's rasta coloured flag. The green represents agriculture, yellow mineral wealth, red the blood that was shed in the fight for independence, and black stands for the native people. The yellow Zimbabwe bird represents the long history of the country and is superimposed on a red five-pointed star, which symbolizes peace.

And now for a fun fact about our Check point location!

• Lake Kariba was formed by the damming of the Zambezi river and is one of the largest man-made lakes in the world. 
• The formation of the dam led to the flooding of the Zambezi Valley which left many animals stranded on small islands.  From 1958 to 1964 a large-scale wildlife rescue operation - Operation Noah - was led by Rupert Fothergill during which over 6000 animals (elephant, rhino, lion, leopard, zebra, small birds and even snakes) were rescued and relocated to the mainland.

Again thanks CIA World factbook

Fun Fact Not-quite Friday: Check point 3 - Zambia

This is a little late but, as they say, better late than never. Besides I'd say we're probably going to have to get used to late arrivals having looked at the route and the number of hours we'll spend in the car...not including border crossings...

The third checkpoint is in lovely Zambia, formerly Northern Rodhesia, which has been independent since 1964. Although it was only 1991 which saw the end of one-party rule and 1996 and 2001 elections were riddled with all sorts of problems. 2006 saw Levy Mwanawasa re-elected (after challenges back in 2001) in elections that were deemed free and fair. Mwanawasa died in 2008 and was replaced by his vice-president. The current president is Michael Sata who was elected in 2011.

Big thing in Zambia is copper mining which was privatised in the 90s which saved the government from losses incurred from running the mines as well as improving their output which has meant real GDP growth in 2005-11 of more than 6% per year. Copper prices remain high keeping Zambia fairly safe but as they rely almost entirely on copper a slump in prices would be bad news. Unfortunately even with impressive GDP growth, the high birth rate, relatively high HIV/AIDS burden, and market distorting agricultural policies haven't decreased the high poverty rates.

Total Area: 752,618 sq km (that's slightly larger than Texas) - 39th in the world - made of 743,398 sq km land and water: 9,220 sq km.

Population: 14,309,466 (July 2012 est.) - 69th in the world
Birth rate: 43.51 births/1,000 population - 4th in the world 
Life expectancy at birth: 52.57 years 207th in the world

Favourite line from the CIA world factbook about Zambia - contained in transnational issues, the illicit drugs section - "major consumer of cannabis"

And now, Five Fun Facts:
1) Zambia’s name comes from the Zambezi River.  Zambezi is from a local word yambezhi “heart of all”
2) Livingstone, which is the 3rd checkpoint used to be the capital. No it's Lusaka.
3) Zambia and Zimbabwe share Victoria Falls which is one of the seven wonders of the world.
4) Not so fun - has been known to suffer from acid rain due to the extensive mining.
5) Transition to independence was peaceful - it was the 60s after all!

Fun Fact Friday: Namibia

Country two of our adventures is Namibia where we get to stay in ETOSHA a national park which, when first established in 1907, was the largest game park in the world. Due to political changes however it's now slightly less than a quarter it's original size but still awesome.

Before we get there though a basic background in Namibia in general. Thanks again CIA World Factbook.

President = President Hifikepunye Pohamba
Government Type = Republic, with 13 regions.

Total Area = 824,292 sq km, making it 34th in the world; it's sightly more than half the size of Alaska. It borders Angola 1,376 km, Botswana 1,360 km, South Africa 967 km and Zambia 233 km and has 1,572 km of coastline.Only 0.99% of the land is arable and 14% is protected (almost the entire Namib desert coastal strip). Interestingly, Namibia was the first country in the world to incorporate the protection of the environment into its constitution.

Population = 2,165,828 (July 2012 est.), 143 in the world.
Population growth rate = 0.817%, 133 in the world.
Only 38% of the population lives in urban areas, although there also only seems to be one major city, Windhoek. After that is Swakopmund with some of the best-preserved colonial buildings in Africa. The two thirds of the population that live in the rural areas rely on subsistance farming to survive while 61% of people work in services. Interestingly mining accounts for 8% of GDP, but provides more than 50% of foreign exchange earnings. Namibia has diamonds but is also the fourth largest producer of uranium.
Life expectancy = 52 which is 210 in the world

In 2007 they had 4700 Angolan refugees.

And now for fun facts!

1. By the early 2000s, Namibia had Africa’s fourth highest proportion of women in its National Parliament, behind Mozambique, South Africa and Rwanda. 25% of the seats in the National Assembly were occupied by women (compared with 14% in the United States).
2. The tallest Miss Universe (from 1952 to 2009) is Namibia’s Michelle McLean, who is 1m 83. McLean is Africa’s second MU since 1952.
3. Continuing the theme - in 1995 Namibia hosted Miss Universe - the first time in Miss Universe history that the competition was hosted in Africa.
4. Dragon's Breath Lake, in the Otavi Mountains in north east Namibia, is the world's largest underground lake. Its surface area is about two hectares.
5. Namibia is home to the Hoba Meteorite, the world's largest complete meteorite. It weighs over 50 tons. It fell to earth about eighty thousand years ago, and is on display near Grootfontein. The meteorite was discovered in 1920, and is estimated to be about three hundred million years old. I hope we get to drive past it!

Fun facts from here http://safariwise.com.na/archives/fun-facts-about-namibia and http://www.funtrivia.com/en/subtopics/Namibia---a-fascinating-country-176637.html. 

Fun Fact Friday: Checkpoint 1 - South Africa

Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start. With time ticking away a-pace we better get our heads around where exactly it is we're going to. With two South Africans and a Zimbabwean (who has lived in South Africa) starting with South Africa may well be a tiny cheat but it is the starting point of the rally so there isn't really any other way to begin.

Yes it's the SA Flag

General Facts - as taken from the CIA World Factbook and some of my very own personal general knowledge (I know, you all want me on your next pub quiz team...)
President = Jacob Zuma
Governement Type = Republic, with administrative capital in Pretoria and 9 provinces.
National Symbol = Springbok

Total Area = 1,219,090 sq km - making it the 25th largest country in the world and it's slightly less than twice the size of Texas. It has 2,798 km of coastline and borders Botswana 1,840 km, Lesotho 909 km, Mozambique 491 km, Namibia 967 km, Swaziland 430 km, Zimbabwe 225 km. We will get to see 4 of these in our rally. Bazinga.

Population = 48,810,427 (July 2012 est.) - making it the 26th most populated country in the world.
Median Age = 25
Life expectancy at birth = 49
Interestingly the birth rate is negative at = -0.412% (2012 est.), making it 217th in the world.

We start the rally in Johannesburg which has the largest city population in SA of 3.607 million although interesting in 2010 it was estimated that 62% of the population lived in an urban area. This explains why the majority of the 17.67 million economically active people in the country work in services - 65% in fact. And at 173rd in the world unemplyoment is at 23.9%.

Now for fun facts! 1st contact news has some awesome unusual facts so here are a few of my favourites:
1. South Africa is now the only country in the world to have hosted the Soccer, Cricket and Rugby World Cup
2.What about beer? South African brewery SABMiller ranks – by volume – as the largest brewing company in the world. SABMiller supplies up to 50% of China’s beer.
3. South Africa is the only country in the entire world that has voluntarily abandoned its nuclear weapons programme.
4. There are more than 2000 shipwrecks off the South African coast, most dating back at least 500 years.
5. The Cape Floral Kingdom is one of the world’s six floral kingdoms – and the only one which is wholly contained within a single country.

Fun Fact Friday – Malawi's Flag

Malawi is definitely the country I’m most looking forward to visiting whilst we are putting foot – I’ve always wanted to go and it looks simply amazing. And just when you think things can’t get any more awesome now we also get to have an (almost) full moon party whilst we are there!! Lumo on!

I always thought that this was the Malawian flag:

But it turns out that in 2010 it changed to this one (amidst much public outcry):

Not a huge change, but apparently at independence in 1964 when the flag was introduced the rising sun represented the dawn of freedom and hope for Africa – then in 2010 they decided to remove the red rising sun and replace it with a full white sun in the centre to symbolise Malawi's economic progress. What would we do without Wikipedia. 

Fun Fact Friday - Empty Namibia

Namibia has the lowest population density in Africa with only 2.6 people per square kilometre. This is the second lowest population density in the world after Mongolia, which we’ll be going through if we ever get to the Mongol rally - one day girls!

So basically Namibia is not a place we want to break down in – it could be a while before we come across another human being. But damn it is beautiful - can't wait!

Fun Fact Friday: Rhino Horn

Given that rhinos are the animals we're raising charity funds for I decided I should learn more about them and discovered that:

"Rhino horn is not a true horn, it is made of thickly matted hair that grows from the skull without skeletal support" (see link below).

Am I the only person that didn't know that? And how interesting (and awesome is that).

I also read that the only predator of rhinos are humans. Isn't that depressing.

Sorry it's not a more cheerful Fun Fact Friday.

More on rhinos here.