From somewhere random

I don't know why, but last night I randomly decided to read up on what's going on in Burkina Faso right now.

Yeah - their parliament was torched, protesters outed the president of many decades, new "democratic" election being held, oil companies already trying to sneak in like slimeballs... seesh. Pretty much every neighboring country has been on the news recently and for reasons far less dramatic than this. Burkina Faso is actually really fascinating right now.

So everyone, I have a current affairs challenge for you all. Find a country you know hardly anything about, and find out what's going on there right now in the news. Report back to this thread your findings.

Need inspiration? Here's a list of obscure countries: http://www.ranker.com/list/most-and-_34_obscure-and-_34_-countries/the-monto-gawe/

admin: I follow the current events of nearly any country. I could probably give you a load of information on every country except those little island countries with 10,000-100,000 people.

admin: This was all over the news awhile ago. The rioting lasted about two weeks before the government decided to make concessions.

Blackflag: Well, the president stepping down was pretty huge. Though the current front runner is the dodgiest guy I've ever seen. But I'm sure it hasn't been all over the news here.

admin: Huh, well I'm more fanatic on this stuff than most people. I crave current events, and I assume people are using the same media sources I am.

Blackflag: So I'm sure you know all about what's going on in New Zealand right now... ?

admin: New Zealand is hardly ever in international news.

Blackflag: There's a lot of countries that are hardly ever in international news. I'm sure if you looked into a country you don't know much about you'd find something interesting. Hence why this thread exists

Blackflag: I follow the current events of nearly any country. I could probably give you a load of information on every country except those little island countries with 10,000-100,000 people.

You can't make a statement like this and then qualify it by saying you only follow countries that are in the news. That was Admin's whole point. Stuff is happening in EVERY country, and only some of it makes the International news!
It's also hard to take your knowledge of international affairs seriously when you say things like Rugby is only played in a handful of schools...

Ok so I just spent a little time reading up on the news in Belize.

Turns out most of the breaking news stories for the last month are people getting killed. Mostly men and mostly being shot in the street.
On an unrelated note, there are also a lot of articles concerned that the future of cruise ships visiting Belize is looking like it's on a downward trend.

There's a nice little piece about the gender gap, turns out Belize was recently ranked a disappointing 100 out of 142 countries.
And here's an interesting article about a "Superbond" plan to institute some financial reform: http://www.reporter.bz/features/superbond-ll-the-price-of-a-belizean-haircut-belize-needs-to-be-more-innovative/

Finally, it turns out that the Belize Sugar Industry is looking to deal directly with the Sugar Cane farmers and cut out the Sugarcane Farmers Assn. Big news and they're currently meeting in Mexico to discuss it. You can get live updates from the meeting.

nzlockie: All of a sudden Belize seems a lot more interesting.

I think I'll probably do this again for some other random country tonight.

admin: Yeah it was pretty fun. Nice idea.

Been reading up on São Tomé and Principe.

Apparently UNICEF thinks their social progress is awesome, their oil revenues are good, pepper exports are good, malaria is pretty much gone, ebola is not proving a deterrent to tourism... so things are pretty good in general.

They have a new government that's just getting in. The former leader, Gabriel Costa, looks a lot like Obama and (I'm not kidding) had the slogan "God protect us!", while the new president elect (Patrice Trovoada) has been the leader on two separate non-consecutive previous occasions. He's centrist, compared to the old guy who was in a government that was a little further left.

Not a bad comeback from that coup they had a decade ago. Must be some sort of record for an African nation.

admin: Do all black people look alike over their in the land of white meat?

Blackflag: *there
You guys remind me of the Russians

Blackflag: Sure, I can find two pics of Obama that make him look like 2 different people too. For the record: NZ is most definitely not a land of "white meat", and I consider that offensive even if it was true. And moreover, no, black people look totally different from each other in ways other than their skin color. It has nothing to do with it.

admin:


If there are black people in New Zealand, they're an anomaly.

I'll grant you that there hair looks alike. Besides that every feature is disproportionate.

Blackflag: Their*
Again.

New Zealand is not at all "white meat". Your arrogance and ignorance are showing equally here.

Blackflag: Yeah, this idea that NZ is a white country is not exactly something that's actually borne out by reality. This is doubly true if you include "brown" people like Obama as "black".

I still think their eyes look the same, as does their nose structure and mouth. They differ in details like Obama's slightly more pronounced chin, slightly narrower face, and slightly lighter skin. Still a great degree of similarity to me.