61–70 of 427 posts
"All I knew about Moldova were the eleven names of men printed on the inside back page of my news paper. None of them sounded to me like they were any good at tennis."
I was in Belarus recently and it did feel like I was the only non-Slavic person, and tourist, on the bus there (yes, bus, because no European country except for Turkey is flying to Belarus). Everyone else seemed like locals going back home for a visit (including my wife!). But once you get to Minsk, it's actually pretty modern and nice, extremely clean... and clearly a vibrating city with lots of things to do, buy an…
Belarus does seem like a wonderful country at its core, but after the election fraud all progress just froze and the country is (once again) seen as Russia's de-facto vassal state. This sucks for the people of Belarus who got caught up in this, but for the average tourist going there is not something to consider.
The travel advice for Dutch tourists, for example, is literally don't; this country is not safe for holidays. And that's ignoring the additional warnings for LGTB+ folk.
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I am not sure what you are talking about. Could you please elaborate? EDIT: Found https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukraine#Etymology_and_orthogra... now. Thanks for the correction!
The Ukraine is a translation of Imperial Russia's name for the country. Whereas Ukraine is the self-selected name for the Sovereign Nation.
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Sorry, how does that refute anything? The point is that in English, adding the definite article makes it sound like a region rather than a country: "the mountains", "the veldt", "the border land". Removing the article is appropriate for a country, unless grammatically necessary like " The United States of America", but not "The America" or "The Germany".
Misread the paragraph first, then edited the edit. Sorry!
I was in Belarus recently and it did feel like I was the only non-Slavic person, and tourist, on the bus there (yes, bus, because no European country except for Turkey is flying to Belarus). Everyone else seemed like locals going back home for a visit (including my wife!). But once you get to Minsk, it's actually pretty modern and nice, extremely clean... and clearly a vibrating city with lots of things to do, buy an…
Well yeah, Belarus is essentially off-limits to a large part of the world due to Russia's war with Ukraine. Belarus does seem like a wonderful country at its core, but after the election fraud all progress just froze and the country is (once again) seen as Russia's de-facto vassal state. This sucks for the people of Belarus who got caught up in this, but for the average tourist going there is not something to conside…
I wonder what will happen to them if Ukraine loses to Russia. I have heard Moldova already has issues with Russian separatists. EDIT: Changed an offensive use of a definitive article. ;)
You're thinking of Transnistria: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transnistria The history of that area is complex. Moldova itself was part of the Ottoman Empire, then it was ceded to the Russian Empire, united with Romania, then the whole are became part of the USSR... and after the dissolution of the USSR, Transnistria became an unregognized, but de facto autonomous "country". Moldovians see the area as still part of…
However, it remains to be seen if the war in Ukraine can be frozen. If a certain large supporter of Ukraine stops the support, Ukrainians might simply lose it all. But will Russia stop there?
Another place I'd like to go is Kyrgyzstan. And Turkmenistan. Why? Because no one goes there. What other reason do you need?
Kyrgyzstan is a good place to take in a game of kok buru, which I found endlessly entertaining - much more fun than football.
shut up and take my money
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They have hit apartments and hospitals before so its not only military/government/infra targets any longer. I'm surprised they haven't been sold an iron dome or a similar system by now to be honest.
Hamas managed to overwhelm iron dome just with their jury-rigged home built rockets: https://scitechdaily.com/iron-domes-vulnerability-how-hamas-... It wouldn't stand a hope against Russian missiles.
I was in Belarus recently and it did feel like I was the only non-Slavic person, and tourist, on the bus there (yes, bus, because no European country except for Turkey is flying to Belarus). Everyone else seemed like locals going back home for a visit (including my wife!). But once you get to Minsk, it's actually pretty modern and nice, extremely clean... and clearly a vibrating city with lots of things to do, buy an…