#top 10 coolest countries to be from

[fussypaws]

Attack on @angel-k900!!

[prongsfish]

*blinks* headcanons *blinks*

okay. i am almost a month late to this ask hi @ethanmilo ... sorry about that... and i will be using it to give the barty hcs you asked for over a month before this but the ask expired... sorry about that again... my bad time is scary

but yes barty headcanons. these may end up leaning into bartylus territory because i am So obsessed with them right now but i have no idea what i'm going to write yet so we'll see HAHA

(jumping back here after writing this, most of these are lighthearted but some do get a bit more serious/dark, nothing out of character for what you see scrolling on maraurders tumblr but i just don't want people to be shocked by the tone shift)

he doesn't take day-to-day school life seriously and fucks around in most of the classes he doesn't skip altogether BUT his competitiveness is not to be underestimated. he's barely in class and he never pays attention but he gets away with it because he's so smart that when he started school he was already suuper advanced. he just kept working on his own and so was always way ahead of whatever he was supposed to be learning, so he's super annoying and disruptive during classes but when it comes time to it he's still at the top of all his classes. he and reg are always warring for the number one spot and they're a nightmare to be around during exams because they are SO competitive

he'd give himself those shitty stick and poke tattoos at like age fourteen, if you've seen the videos of kids on tiktok with the ugliest shoddiest tattoos you've ever seen you know what i mean... i just found this image on pinterest and this is Exactly the sort of shit he'd have. i think he'd have always been constantly drawing on his work and skin with a quill/pen and he does not fear permanence. the moment he found a way to give himself tattoos he was doing it.

the absolute biggest shit stirrer you've ever met, everything he does is always in the hopes of pissing someone off. he will lie, he will argue, he will push and shove his way into a confrontation and when someone eventually breaks his nose he just starts laughing

he knows Everyone. he has connections to everyone in whatever city he's in, he constantly "knows a guy" and every time it's the most absurd story that his friends have never heard a single word of but it's 100% true. his lore is infinite. and people expect it to be limited to just where he lives but no, he could go to a whole new country and still be being stopped every 5 minutes by some old friend who's thrilled to see him

related to the above, he is that Coolest Fucking uncle. he's awful with kids but god damn it if he doesn't have the most legendary stories to tell luna as often as she could ever want!!

he knows a shit ton of languages. he started learning them because he was bored and it eventually it just became a Thing and he's fluent in like 4 or 5 but can hold a decent conversation in upwards of 10 others too

he looks like he smells bad. he wouldn't smell bad when he was younger, still too used to certain privileges of his class, but the further he strayed from his father and family, especially into young adulthood, i think he would start to—unless regulus was in his life, in which case he'd better smell like fucking roses if he ever wanted to be seen anywhere even Near him in public

i heavily associate him with nu metal and post industrial music but i also think that when he was younger he would've been suuper into all those whiny indie rock bands that normal people call midwest emo, music nerds crucify you for calling midwest emo, and i have no clue what to call. he'd totally have his own band inspired by them too, and he totally has the voice for it—the voice that's objectively terrible but works perfectly for that style of music

he doesn't talk about how he feels like ever but those close to him have worked out ways to get him what he needs when he needs it. he refuses to ask for help but his friends know him well enough that they don't need him to ask, they can pick up his question in far fewer words, and even though it's still hard for him to even imply that he needs help it's a lot easier when he can talk around the issue rather than having to actually using his words. his friends know that it'd be better if he Did use his words but they also know that if they tried to stop letting him get away with not asking properly he'd just stop trying to ask at all

his favourite film genres are horror and action, the gorier the better. he loooooves all the saw films

he's super messy, his room is a fucking NIGHTMARE. shit EVERYWHERE. clothes strewn all around, dishes stacked in several tall piles, three different rubbish bins that are each around 70% full from the times he's been forced to "clean up" and eventually gotten bored/distracted. regulus despises it and refuses to go anywhere near his room meanwhile evan is so excited because every time he goes into barty's room he discovers a new species of mould. sometimes when he's really lucky barty will kick over a pile of clothes to find something and like eight cockroaches scurry out (evan immediately rushes to grab as many of them as possible before they disappear and then takes them home)

by the time he was a preteen he'd given up on the idea that his father would ever be proud of him, had flipped to doing everything in his power to anger him further, entirely stopped caring about the consequences because if his father would hate him no matter what he did why not make it reflect badly back on him, since he cared so much about his public image as a politician. he never intended to leave though, because he couldn't bear the thought of leaving his mother with him. that was until he pushed too far with his dad, got too sucked into the lifestyles of others who'd given up just like him, fell too deeply into the depression and the anger and the violence, until he crossed a line and his mother was looking at him like she was disappointed, too. he realised that he was trying so hard to stay for his mother but staying was making him a worse person and it wasn't worth it anymore if she could no longer see what he was doing as a sacrifice, and only as surface level "badness". he hated leaving his mother more than he hated his dad but in the end staying was only making things worse for the both of them

he uses humour and stupidity as a defence mechanism, and while he does find it fun to do ridiculous and reckless things he also does it because it gives him a role to fill. he can't stand being genuine because he's terrified of rejection, so he'd rather lean into all the superficial judgements made about him. if when someone shuffles away from him in public transport he bares his teeth at them and when someone expects him to be stupid he purposefully misunderstands a simple concept, then nobody actually knows him and nobody can hurt him in a way that matters. the person they insult isn't actually him so they can't possibly get to him

he is VERY judgemental and he and regulus can spend hours talking shit about anyone from lifelong classmates to complete strangers. it surprises everyone that he actually gets along with remus really well, but it's because remus has a more judge-y side that he hides when with anyone but regulus and, apparently, barty

he and dorcas are the gay man and lesbian best friends duo and people have probably mistaken them as a couple before, which they'd both be mortified by. "have they seen us?!?!"

okay i'm forcing myself to end it there because i have an essay draft to finish and a substantial amount of french homework to do in the next like 4-5 hours (nobody is allowed to say shit about my sleep schedule i don't want to hear it HAHAHA) and i've already been writing this for WELL over an hour so i really should stop giving myself ways to procrastinate, i hope these were enough to make up even slightly for the very long wait <//3 ah barty crouch jr, the one and only love of my life... i would be utterly terrified of you in real life but i would also be very attracted to you from a safe distance which is basically the highest form of compliment i can possibly give a person

[alnilaem]

thank you @ohbo-ohno for the tag <3 !!!! I’m throwing my no-pressure tags to @shotmrmiller, @yeyinde and @bitten-fruit and anyone else who wants to join!

1. How many works do you have on Ao3?

14, including an anonymous one and uploads from my old ao3 account

2. What's your total Ao3 word count?

24,237 😞 (on my current account)

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Call of Duty. I want to write for RDR2 eventually but I’m scared because I won’t give it justice, lol. Arcane is also on my list, maybe LotR, and maybe Bo will twist my rubber arm into writing TLoU too

4. Top three (because I don’t have enough fics) by kudos.

bury me beneath the basswood tree, never meet your heroes, [anonymous fic]

5. Do you respond to comments?

if one really gets to me, yeah! otherwise, no. but I appreciate them all nonetheless ❤️

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

ermmmm? it may be a tossup between bear country or never meet your heroes, because of the whole Johnny-being-left-limp-after-being-absolutely-mauled, lmao

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

it isn’t exactly happy, but bury me beneath the basswood tree. FMC is happy, albeit under Simon’s supernatural forces lmao

8. Do you get hate on fics?

nope

9. Do you write smut?

it’s all i write…….

10. Craziest crossover.

hate crossovers, sorry. I checked the LotR tag the other day and was SHOCKED at the amount of NARUTO crossovers. like, what?

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

none that I know of

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

doubt it

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

i tried it and it FAILED because she ended up being a whole weirdo. i do, however, looooooove the idea. would love to see it through one day (with someone normal, preferably)

14. All time favorite ship?

Eren/Armin

15. What's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

price/ex escort reader, where he keeps coming back for more but refuses to treat her like anything more than a vessel for his urges

16. What are your writing strengths?

um. similes…? maybe detail?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

dialogue, flow, speed, um let’s see–

18. Thoughts on dialogue in another language?

i don’t read enough fics with this specific thing, so I don’t have any thoughts about it really. if the author finds a way to translate it not directly but through introspection? coolest thing EVER.

19. First fandom you wrote in?

marvel comics!

20. Favorite fic you've ever written?

heughhhh idk ;; i always have post-fic clarity where I think I absolutely killed a fic when I may have, at the most, smothered it a bit

[leoinjapan]

A week in Colombia

Day 1

i arrived at El Dorado Airport at 4am, having slept not that great on a six-hour overnight flight from Toronto. my friend had booked me a taxi straight from the airport to her apartment; taxis here are really cheap, around 4 pounds to get across the entire city. Uber is also widely used here, although you should sit in the front seat as they are not actually allowed in Bogotá. apartments in Bogotá are really well protected, with different security measures to keep you safe. first i napped for a few hours and then had a delicious vegan bowl made by my friend's lovely mom. then my friend showed me around her neighbourhood, Chapinero, a historically queer district in north Bogotá. i learned how Colombia is a really queer and trans-friendly country, where gay marriage is legal and trans people have complete right of self-determination to change their documents, even with non-binary options, as well as gender-affirming healthcare!

for lunch my friend treated me to patacones, a mashed plantain baked to a crisp and topped with delicious toppings. she also showed me some awesome bookstores, such as Nada and Tornamesa. i tried delicious local chocolate from Fruto de Cacao. the weather was amazing at around 23 degrees celcius, not too sunny but pleasantly warm with no wind. luckily i did not suffer immediately from the altitude sickness that many tourists get when they arrive, as Bogotá is the highest capital city above sea level in the world.

we went back to watch a documentary about Lemebel, a queer icon in latin america (my friend was scandalized i had not heard of him). then i napped a bit more, which was a mistake; i woke up feeling so sick that i couldn't eat!

then we went to Theatron, latin america's biggest queer club. the streets that were empty before came alive with music and thousands of people. we had hotdogs from Nomáda Bogotá which were lovely, but sadly i was too sick to eat. Theatron has over 15 rooms with different types of music and live shows, and a capacity of over 6000. entry is less than £10 on saturdays (cheaper on other days) and includes a drink (gatorade for me)! my friend tells me more and more straight people come to the club now, but it was still very queer-friendly and one of the coolest club experiences i have ever had.

Day 2

for lunch my friend took me to a delicious vegan restaurant that does all traditional Colombian food, called Maria Candela. i tried ajiaco, a Bogotán dish of a herbal soup made with different kinds of local potatoes and chicken. it was so yummy, cheap and super filling!

i then went on a general tour of Bogotá hosted by Beyond Colombia. the guide was super enthusiastic and taught me so many things i didn't know about Colombia. we walked around important sights in its history, tasted the local traditional alcohol called chicha (fermented corn and sugar), and walked around the iconic La Candelária district. it was so colourful, full of street art and intricate crafts.

we then went to see Past Lives (again) at the cinema. the cinema quality was amazing, and the popcorn tasted really good! during Oscars season, you can get a pass to all the Oscars movies in february.

Day 3

in the morning i took an Uber to the bottom of the Monserrate, a mountain in Bogotá. it costs about £6 for a return journey on the cable car up the mountain to its peak, where you will find a church, a tourist market, and some restaurants. you can hike up the mountain yourself, but it takes around 2 hours. on the holy week, people walk up barefoot or on their knees on a sacrificial pilgrimage up the mountain to the church. in the church is the Black Madonna, based on the same iconic statue on the Montserrat mountain in Catalonia.

(this is also when i found out i got into the university of tokyo starting in april!)

it was super foggy on the 3000 metre high mountain and we could barely see the city. it started to pour with rain and my umbrella was not enough. unfortunately i got cold and wet without a coat, and was also exposed to high levels of UV up on the mountain, which led me to develop a fever later that evening...

i tried a bit of coca tea on the mountain. in Colombia and other countries in the Andes mountain range, people have been consuming coca leaves for centuries. coca tea contains a small amount of cocaine with mild stimulant effects, much like caffeine in coffee, and is completely harmless. Colombians use it to cure altitude sickness, nausea, and other stomach upsets.

i took my friends i made on the tour to Maria Candela again and i tried frijolada, which is a wholesome bean soup that i really loved. after that, i went to the Botero Museum/MAMU which has some really unique art from international artists, paintings by the iconic Colombian painter Botero, and a current exhibition highlighting indigenous culture and art (all in Spanish). it's free to visit so i definitely recommend going!

when my friend heard i felt sick, she took me to get aguapanela. panela is unrefined sugar, which you put in hot water for a nice soothing beverage. the Bogotá tradition is to put pieces of cheese in it, let them melt and then eat them! since i'm vegan i had it with bread. it was very delicious

Day 4

i had a restless night with my fever and decided to stay at home for the day. my tour guide even cancelled, so it felt like a sign not to go anywhere.

my friend's mom was an absolute angel and made me delicious vegan food and hot drinks and before long i felt a lot better

Day 5

in the morning i went on a war and peace-themed walking tour, also operated by Beyond Colombia. our guide was super knowledgeable, condensing centuries' worth of history into three hours. i learned so much about Colombia's recent history and controversies and i highly recommend this tour.

after that, i went to the Gold Museum (or Museo del Oro), which houses pre-Hispanic golden artefacts. in the indigenous culture, gold represented the sun and did not have monetary value; it was used in crafting and often offered back to nature. El Dorado is not a place, but an ancient ritual in which gold is thrown into the water, particularly a large lake near Bogotá; the Spanish dug up a lot of it and melted it into gold bars, but this museum still holds a large collection of 35,000, which is still only about 1% of the original artifacts that have been sacrificed in the ritual over the millennia.

at the end of the day my friend invited me to a collage-making workshop, which was really fun and therapeutic!

Day 6

at 8am in the morning, i took an Uber to the Paloquemao fruit market, where i was to have an AirBnB Experiences tour with my friend's brother, Victor. i was stunned by the amount of fruit i had never seen before. i tried different avocados, guavas, berries, cactus fruit, melons, and more. my favourite was the guanabana, or custard apple, which tastes exactly like custard!

the market is also full of beautiful flowers, vegetables, souvenirs and all sorts. i recommend visiting, though take an Uber as apparently it is not in the safest of neighborhoods.

in the evening i went to the National Museum, which houses an impressive amount of information about Colombian history. there are currently a few exhibitions about indigenous cultural revival. i was most excited to see a small exhibition about Las Traviesas, a collective of displaced indigenous trans women in Colombia, which was a beautiful and inspiring display of art.

towards the end of my visit, i developed a migraine. i got a tasty dinner at Wok and then went home to recover. thank you again to my friend and her mom for taking care of me!

on the day there was a big protest in the city centre in support of the current president. it's better to try and avoid the city centre when there are big protests.

Day 7

me and my friend went on a day trip to Villa de Leyva, a town north of Bogotá in the beautiful Boyacá region, famous for its emeralds. the bus trip took between 4 and 5 hours each way.

the town is absolutely gorgeous, full of cobbled streets and old colonial architecture. it was more touristy than Bogotá, with lots of tourist shops and some tasty food options. i got gelato made with tamarind and tajín (chilli flakes). for lunch, we went to La Maria Bistro which had an incredible brocolli dish that was the best thing i've eaten in a long while.

we went to Casa Terracota, the world's largest ceramic structure. it took 15 years for the architect to bake the house, during which it fell down three times. the construction was incredible and it was a very unique experience. usually the tour is only in spanish, but the guide did a great job translating it to english for me. the crazy thing was that he did his study abroad in Paignton, which is the town next to my hometown!

Day 8

on the last day, my friend and i went into the city to buy souvenirs for my family. there are tons of tourist shops and stalls in La Candelária, and we did our best research to find out which crafts were authentic. for lunch we want to Maria Candela again as the whole city was having a vegan burger festival with several restaurants participating.

in the afternoon we went to see Perfect Days, a really beautiful japanese movie. the cinema in Bogotá was really nice, with great quality screens and tasty snacks.

in the evening we went to my friend's favourite taco place, Insurgentes. the vibe was great and the tacos were delicious (mostly meat but some vegan).

for our final stop, we went to Chiquita. much smaller than Theatron but with a majority queer crowd, the music was on point and the atmosphere was great. there were even a couple of drag performances which apparently happen every night. i really loved this bar, which had a mixture of 90s/2000s pop and latin pop. i could have stayed there much longer but i had to get home to sleep before my flight at 9am.

i am the first to admit i knew nothing about Colombia (or even South America in general) before coming to Bogotá. i was eager to learn, and yet i learned far more than i ever imagined. Colombia exceeded my expectations 100 times over.

the internet is full of scary stories about Colombia, yet i felt safer here than i ever have in the US, for example. the city is so vibrant, colourful, and creative, full of life and soul. it is also the most queer-friendly capital i have been to, with the most amazing clubs you could imagine.

i learned so much about the history of the country, the language, the food, the art, and the gorgeous nature that's around every corner.

but what makes Colombia so, so great is the people. everybody here was so friendly and made such an effort to make me feel welcome, even though i know barely any Spanish. the city feels so alive with passion, hope, and resistance. i am so, so grateful to my friend Estefanía for taking care of me while i was there, looking after me and showing me the real Bogotá, making sure i knew where to go and what to do. she really is the best of us, and i will never forget her kindness 💕

i am so grateful to her incredible mother as well for nursing me back to health when i was sick!

i would come back to Colombia in a heartbeat, but until then, i have to get on the language apps!

[notesonartistry]

Taylor Swift's road to fame

Behind the scenes of the teen sensation's career, from guitar lessons to sold-out shows

By Chris Willman

Updated February 05, 2008 at 05:00 AM EST

”I love turning on pop radio and hearing my song,” allows Taylor Swift, the 18-year-old country music sensation. ”But,” she adds, mindful of her base, ”I don’t look at it as crossover as much as spillover.”

Her cup definitely runneth over. In 2007, Swift’s debut album was one of the top 10 all-genre SoundScan sellers. And all those sales came in while a lot of non-country-lovers had yet to hear of her…or, if they had, were still asking, ”Taylor Swift? Who’s he?” She’s harder to escape now: Besides several smash hits at country radio, she’s moved into the upper levels of the Top 40 format with a remix of her heartbreak ballad ”Teardrops on My Guitar.” (In recent years, only Carrie Underwood, with ”Before He Cheats,” has successfully managed that leap.) MTV is even playing it. And since the album has such legs, it’s a good bet to cross the triple-platinum mark, almost unheard of in this era of plunging record sales. She’s got to be the most popular high school senior in America right now. So: teardrops, schmeardrops… Did being 18 ever suck any less?

But she wasn’t always the belle of the ball, personally or professionally; those rejection anthems she’s so adept at writing weren’t penned purely as fiction. We profiled the rising siren in this week’s issue of EW. But for this exclusive EW.com bonus feature, we also talked with some of the people who were with her on the way up, including her mother, manager, and label president, to find out some of the strategizing that went into achieving one of the last year’s few true musical success stories.

NEXT PAGE: From karaoke to Nashville

The chipmunk years. ”When I was 10, or younger than that, even, I would watch these biographies on Faith Hill or the Dixie Chicks or Shania Twain or LeAnn Rimes, and the thing I kept hearing was that they had to go to Nashville,” Swift remembers. She talked her parents into letting her fly out for a visit. ”I took my demo CDs of karaoke songs, where I sound like a chipmunk — it’s pretty awesome — and my mom waited in the car with my little brother while I knocked on doors up and down Music Row. I would say, ‘Hi, I’m Taylor. I’m 11; I want a record deal. Call me.”’ They didn’t. (But you have to wonder how many of the folks who answered those doors suddenly flashed back to that moment when they saw a grown-up Swift screaming over her Best New Artist nod at the Grammy nominations press conference.)

Rather than discouraging her, that rejection was like rocket fuel. It dawned on her that karaoke-style singing wasn’t going to cut it at any age; she needed to become a full-fledged guitar-picking singer/songwriter. ”She came back from that trip to Nashville and realized she needed to be different, and part of that would be to learn the guitar,” says her mother, Andrea Swift. Earlier, she had tried picking up an acoustic guitar and had no interest in it, but things had changed. ”Now, at 12, she saw a 12-string guitar and thought it was the coolest thing. And of course we immediately said, ‘Oh no, absolutely not, your fingers are too small — not till you’re much older will you be able to play the 12-string guitar.’ Well, that was all it took. Don’t ever say never or can’t do to Taylor. She started playing it four hours a day — six on the weekends. She would get calluses on her fingers and they would crack and bleed, and we would tape them up and she’d just keep on playing. That’s all she played, till a couple of years later, which was the first time she ever picked up a six-string guitar. And when she did, it was like, wow, this is really easy!”

She started writing, too. Two of the songs she’d recorded (”The Outside,” on her debut album, and ”Christmas Must Mean Something More,” from a Target-exclusive Christmas EP she released) were written when she was 12. When she went back to Nashville with her own songs in tow, people took notice: At 13, she signed a development deal with RCA Records, working with that label’s Joe Galante and Renee Bell, a couple of legendary figures in town. But when the deal came up for renewal after a year, she opted out, because she felt she’d have to record outside material if she got to the point of cutting her debut — and at 14, she was already married to the idea of only recording material she had a hand in writing. Not coincidentally, at 14, she became the youngest person ever signed to the major songwriting company in Nashville, Sony/ATV Publishing.

NEXT PAGE: Taking chances

Nashville acceptance, hometown alienation. Swift started to feel cut off from some of her friends, since she was writing songs while they were either playing soccer or partying. ”A lot of people ask me, how did you have the courage to walk up to record labels when you were 12 or 13 and jump right into the music industry? It’s because I knew I could never feel the kind of rejection that I felt in middle school. Because in the music industry, if they’re gonna say no to you, at least they’re gonna be polite about it.” (Being unusually tall for her age, or any age — she’s now 5’11”, without her cowboy boot heels — may have made her more of a junior high outcast.)

Now that she had publishing and recording deals in hand, she convinced her parents, when she was in the eighth grade, that it was time to move where the action is. ”I was from a small town, and nobody really expects you to leave, especially before you graduate. That doesn’t happen. I actually went back a couple months ago and played a sold-out show in my hometown, and it was amazing; ever since all this stuff started happening, the people in Pennsylvania have been the most supportive people I’ve ever known. But I wouldn’t change a thing about growing up and not exactly fitting in. If I had been popular, I probably wouldn’t have wanted to leave.”

The Swifts never pushed their daughter toward a music career, and the family uprooted itself from the Christmas-tree farm where they lived only after it was clear that her stockbroker dad could do his job just as effectively down South. ”I never wanted to make that move about her ‘making it,”’ says her mom, Andrea. ”Because what a horrible thing if it hadn’t happened, for her to carry that kind of guilt or pressure around. And we moved far enough outside Nashville [to nearby Hendersonville] to where she didn’t have to be going to school with producers’ kids and label presidents’ kids and be reminded constantly that she was struggling to make it. We’ve always told her that this is not about putting food on our table or making our dreams come true. There would always be an escape hatch into normal life if she decided this wasn’t something she had to pursue. And of course that’s like saying to her, ‘If you want to stop breathing, that’s cool.”’

After getting out of her RCA deal, Swift found a believer in Scott Borchetta, who was then a big cheese at the Universal label group. ”I thought, ‘Oh, awesome, I’m gonna get to deal with Universal!’ I get this call a couple of weeks later, after I do this showcase and Scott’s on board and everything’s rocking. He goes, ‘I have good news and bad news. The good news is I want to sign you, and the bad news is I’m not gonna be with Universal Records anymore.’ Because he was leaving to start up this whole new record label.” She took a chance and went with what would become a new powerhouse indie label, Big Machine, figuring that at least she’d get more individual attention there. ”They only had 10 employees at the record label to start out with, so when they were releasing my first single, my mom and I came in to help stuff the CD singles into envelopes to send to radio. We sat out on the floor and did it because there wasn’t furniture at the label yet.”

NEXT PAGE: The viral marketing plan

The MySpace triumph. Swift’s album wasn’t Big Machine’s first release, or even its first relative success. Another early signing, Texas rocker Jack Ingram, had a song go to No. 1 on the country chart — but he still didn’t sell boatloads of albums. That would be up to Swift, and her success would help little Big Machine go on to become Garth Brooks’ new label, not to mention giving Borchetta the heft to sign Jewel (one of Swift’s childhood influences) to a country deal.

”The story that everyone is gonna tell with Taylor is her use of technology and viral marketing techniques — MySpace and texting — that are non-traditional for the country format,” says RJ Curtis, country editor for the weekly trade magazine Radio & Records. ”This kind of flies in the face of how to market a new artist from Nashville. It’s partly her being in that life group and using the things teens use to communicate and spread music around, but her label had a lot of savvy in that area too.”

But Swift’s manager, Rick Barker, gives the singer and her family most of the credit for working the Web. ”The parents already had her MySpace and her website up and running,” he says. ”The mom and dad both have great marketing minds. I don’t want to say fake it until you make it, but when you looked at her stuff, it was very professional even before she got her deal. And we put her music up there on MySpace before it was out, to help decide what was gonna be on the record. ‘Our Song’ made it to the record because of MySpace.” That song has been her biggest radio hit to date — written about her first real romance, premiered at her ninth-grade talent show, and nearly lost to the cutting room floor. ”If you notice the running order on the record, ‘Our Song’ is No. 11,” the manager points out. ”It was the last song added to the album, and a lot of that had to do with buzz that was being created on MySpace.”

Once the album was actually finished and ready for promotion, MySpace came in even handier. ”People laughed at me,” says Big Machine founder-president Borchetta. ”They said, ‘You’re starting a new record label and you signed a 15-year-old female country singer — good for you! You have a teenager — there’s a lot of those on country radio. You have a new female artist — there’s a lot of those on country radio.’ They were looking at me like I had two strikes. But I knew we didn’t want to count on country radio out of the box. So we went heavy on TV, putting the video out before the single, and doing a special with [cable channel] GAC, and we went heavy on her MySpace and online stuff. By the time we got to country radio, we said: We have you surrounded and you don’t even know it.”

It still wasn’t an easy sell. ”Her records are not records that researched fantastically,” says R&R‘s Curtis — and he ought to know, because when Swift’s single ”Tim McGraw” was first coming out in late 2006, he was then the program director of L.A.’s KZLA, and one of the guys balking at putting her on the air. ”But the radio guys hung in there because anybody who’s programming a station wants to get some younger listeners. Country does a good job of naturally getting 35-plus listeners, so getting someone who fits the image of the 18-to-34-year-old, that’s an asset. There’s a need for [youthfulness] in the format. When Gretchen Wilson and Big & Rich and the whole Muzik Mafia thing came along a few years ago, I said that, for the first time since the Garth phenomenon in the early ’90s, there seems to be a real movement happening here. It didn’t last long, because it was more of a fad than a trend; Gretchen really only had that one huge hit, and while Big & Rich have continued to have big songs, it’s been with their more traditional-sounding ballads. But there is definitely a need for a younger artist, younger feel.” Curtis thinks Swift’s adolescent-themed songs have a dual appeal to older and more youthful listeners: ”A lot of the theme of the album is first love, and those are things everybody can get sentimental about, no matter the demo. With things like ‘Our Song,’ a lot of people can relate because it takes them back to their innocent years — and in her case, she just happens to be living her innocent years right now.”

Barker, her manager, offers up some specifics about how they used MySpace to make the Taylor Case to radio. ”Radio does research, and we have no idea who they’re researching, but it was saying people weren’t digging ‘Tim McGraw.’ So we had to go out and create our own research — and that’s what we did with MySpace. What she did was put up a blog on her MySpace that said, ‘Guys, I would like to thank whatever station you’re hearing my song on.’ And people started telling us” — even with stations that were only tentatively programming the song in the middle of the night. ”We were able to take those comments back to radio in individual markets and say, ‘You’re saying researching is telling you it’s not doing that great, but here are 85 people who are telling us they love your station because you played ‘Tim McGraw.’ What MySpace and online told radio stations was: She’s already familiar to your audience. And radio loves familiarity.

”MySpace allowed us to tell the story about Taylor. And it really is her space,” adds Barker. ”She wrote her bio, writes her blogs, and if someone gets commented back to, it’s from Taylor. A lot of times, you can tell it’s somebody else hired to sit there at a computer. Taylor’s space is her space — that’s our secret.”

NEXT PAGE: Embracing the fame

Taylormania. On a brisk night in late January of 2008, the nexus for all this popularity is the Rabobank Theatre, a sold-out 3,000-seater in inland California where Swift is doing a headlining show. About a third of the way back, one delusionally hopeful suitor holds up a sign with his plea: ”PROM? 343-7547.” In the front row, a college-aged dude in a cowboy hat patiently waits for a break in the shrieking before finally blurting out, with half-shy boisterousness, ”Taylor, you’re hot!” But it’s hard for a male fan to get a word in edgewise when the young women in the house spend the entire show standing and screaming, much as their little sisters would for Hannah Montana. There are enough kids and parents on hand that it’s clear she has some appeal to the Disney Channel demographic, as well as to the 17- to 25-year-olds who make up most of the audience, though she writes about adolescent romance not as an aspirant but a fellow survivor. Swift represents the countrified missing link between Miley Cyrus and Alanis Morissette.

She is introducing her soon-to-be-released fourth single, the gleefully vengeful ”Picture to Burn,” which, like many of her songs, was inspired by an old school flame she refers to as ”Bad Cheater Guy.” Swift’s so impressed by the screaming, while going into her nightly spiel about getting back at the boys who spurned her, she adds a nod to tonight’s host city. ”Please know that I try to be a really nice person, in general,” she says as her band vamps through the intro. ”But, if you break my heart, or if you hurt my feelings — or ANY OF MY FRIENDS FROM BAKERSFIELD, CALIFORNIA — well, I will have to write a song about you!” Total eruption, as she marches across the stage in her spangly sun dress and cowboy boots, strumming on her six-string and singing: ”I hate that stupid old pickup truck you never let me drive/ You’re a redneck heartbreak who’s really bad at lying…”

Before the show, we watched her pose for photos for an hour at a meet-and-greet full of fan-club and radio-contest winners. (That’s nothing, for her; at most of the hundreds of shows she’s played so far, she stayed afterward to sign autographs till the last fan was gone, which might last anywhere from two-and-a-half to four hours. But as the crowds grow, those late-night signings are becoming increasingly more difficult to work in.) It’s clear that Swift doesn’t have the steeliness of a lot of starlets her age who were groomed for that by their parents almost from birth. Maybe because this whole massive career thing was her idea, she’s still digging it. When a little kid approaches, she gets down on her nyloned knees and cranes her neck in so that it is pressed against the tot’s. In pretty much every picture, she will look like that person’s conjoined twin. Every so often, with someone closer to her own age, she’ll say, ”Let’s do a funny one,” and urge the fan to screw up his or her face with her.

”She can’t go now to a store without having people come up to her — which she loves,” says her mom, Andrea. ”It makes her day when she’s gone somewhere and people have come up to her and said, ‘I love your music — can I take a picture?’ She’s always grabbing the camera and going, ‘Come here’ and getting the MySpace shot, holding the camera and posing together. She likes that attention. I think where she differs from some people who get to that spot and realize that they don’t really like their privacy sort of being restricted — well, for her that’s not an issue.

”But she never in her life ever said, ‘I want to be famous’ or ‘I want to be rich’ or ‘I want to be a star.’ Those words absolutely never came out of her mouth. If they had, I would have said, ‘Honey, maybe you’re doing it kind of for the wrong reasons.’ For her, the happiest I ever see her is just after she’s written a killer song. As a parent, I felt really good about that. If that’s where she draws happiness from, she’ll have that the rest of her life. She’s not always gonna have the awards, or the attention, or the celebrity, but she will always have the ability to write a song.”

”She has the combination of that 30-year-old business mentality with a real innocence,” says R&R‘s Curtis. But can country fans and programmers — who tend to be a little bit territorial — expect to keep Swift to themselves? Will the pop crossover success get to her? ”We’re talking about an 18-year-old, so it’s hard to know for sure what she’ll be doing five years from now,” Curtis says. ”But just from talking with her, I would say that her value system is a really good fit for country.” And though MTV recently did its first airing of her ”Teardrops on My Guitar” video on TRL, it did look a little bit uncharacteristically wholesome, programmed between Britney and Pitbull, so it’ll be interesting to see how things play out.

In the meantime, there’s still high school to finish up — home-schooled version, while her mom accompanies her on some dates this spring, when she’ll be opening an arena tour for Rascal Flatts. Says Swift, ”I already finished most of my course work, so I just have two electives left.” Which are? ”Public speaking and vocal performance. I guess I’m kind of coasting.”

[fabbyf1]

Top 5 tourist destinations/attractions

This list is based off places I've actually visited, but they're in no particular order because they're all #1 in my heart.

(Friendly reminder that I was born and raised in the US)

Brighton, England (the place I've spent the most time in outside of my own country. 10000/10 would recommend. I love everything about that city and would love to live there one day.)

Hinterstoder, Austria (this place was fucking gorgeous, and it's where I stayed while in Austria for the race. But honestly, everywhere in Austria was beautiful.)

Dublin, Ireland (again, everywhere I went in Ireland was incredible. Cliffs of Moher on the western side of the country is one of the coolest places I've ever visited.)

Wroclaw, Poland (biased because my friends live here. I spent a week here and saw so many cool things.)

Seattle, Washington (Also biased because I live here, but I am not from here! I'm from the other side of the country and didn't move here until 2021. It's definitely my favorite place in the US.)

[gingerbravecookie]

it sure has been a year: cursor's kind of retrospective (or resume idk) on 2022

happy new years everybody,, or new years eve depending on where you live at the time of reading this

I'll go straight to the point 2022 has been one of the most mixed bag of a year I've had since i have the memory

The start of the year was kinda cool honestly,, the weather in my country was great and i was starting to get new interests,, of course also expecting you know what games near the end of it,, going back to normal class was weird and tiring but i got to make new friends and recconect with old ones i hadn't talked to since the start of the pandemic,, i got to see the coolest fucking movie at the start of april and i loved it,, i had also met kit and joined pocket home and i met good people in there shout out to everyone,, the start of the year seemed pretty good

and then things started going downhill

for starters right at my birthday i started feeling kinda weird,, specially my nose felt funny,, the next day at school i was barely on my feet,, with my entire respiratory system in shambles,, with an awful fatigue and trembling every single moment,, i wanted to go to the nurse's office but i persisted due to having to show a cosplay i worked hard on that same day

long story short the next day arrived and i got positive for covid,, i spent two weeks at home

it didn't help that i missed multiple tests due to quarantine and had to do 5 the same day,, my stress level was on the god damn clouds

in that next month i caught colds and stuff way more easily but hey,, it was june!!! pride month!!! Gay month!!!! also i had finally decided to get into artfight and was ready to make refs for my oc's

Also i had made my very own server and got to meet cool people!!! shout out to kino,, harp and jaz

and then right before winter break started and got time to work on them and the event itself my knee snapped off

yes it did hurt like hell,, i went to the hospital and luckily i didn't need surgery but it was still awful,, i got out of the thing at 3 am and i couldn't even move

I spent the first few days of july on bed,, when i finally was able to barely walk again i got to do a few art fight attacks but then my family from the capital arrived and i couldn't access my laptop for two weeks,, i was pretty bummed out i barely got to do attacks AND that i had to be almost every single day to the doctor in order to heal my leg

also i joined ballcord and then maincord as my cookie run interest started coming back to me

anyways september came along and of course it was independence day for chile,, cool date tbh,, and i decided one of the most drastic meassures i took on my irl image,, i cut my hair

"what's the great deal with that" thing is i've had my hair pretty long and i didn't like cutting it at all,, but as i grew i pretty much realized i was growing out of it and it also became more tiring after it getting tangled everywhere,, best desicion of my life tbh it felt great

I got the funni squid game 3 as well

well i also continued getting sick as a downside of things,, which was weird as fuck since years prior i only got sick at least once a year

my school situation became worse every day,, my grades started lowering and to top that. i started getting bullied. again

i had been on that school since 10 fucking years and they still fucking bullied me,, none of the teachers did shit about it

my mom got an interview at school where they took account of my anger issues and fucking guess what happened there

after years and years of asking i finally got therapy

proper therapy as i had a meeting with one of them before and he just said i was a spoiled child lmao

so news!! I'm pretty much part of the autistic spectrum,, with very minor traits according to my therapist but yeah pretty much that

she's a cool person,, she really helps me and i mean that in a genuine way

my family. well,, they're trying,, our relationship has gone two sides and sometimes made me feel kinda shitty tbh,, anyways back to topic

even if my teacher knew about the bullying it still got worse and worse from heavy verbal abuse to almost physical attacks

the school said they would talk to the bullies and me to get to an agreement and then. never talked to me again

it would all come to a close in early november,, after i snapped in front of the whole class about it

i had a massive panic attack

i had to ask my mom to come get me early and i had to talk to the teachers where it turns out. they talked to the bitches but never to me.

if i had known that then i could have told them so they would actually stop

and then they started twisting the blame onto me for staying quiet when they didn't fucking tell me shit to start

anyways,, my mom decided i wouldn't go to that school again,, i have been home ever since,, we are hoping another school accepts me in the meantime

As of social media well. i have gotten into a few projects i want to really get through,, i still need to do owed art and i apologize for making it so late. i really really do

my first comic project,, a game (RPG maker Is a bitch sometimes btw) and of course my askblogs and au's,, I'll try to get them fully moving in 2023,, i really want for everyone to see what i have to tell storywise

also i hope i stop getting sicker lmao

i guess this Is going nowhere tbh,, kind of a long resume of the shit that happened to me this year and an excuse for why i barely post decent art and ideas here nowdays (sorry),, but hey at least i met cool people

thanks for sticking around Is pretty much what i have to say

2022 has been kind of a bitch,, here's to hoping 2023 Is at least a little bit better

happy new years everyone,, happy to still be here

-cursor

[jastourism]

12 Absolute Best Dubai Tours & Excursions

Dubai is home to several famous landmarks, including the Global Village, Burj Al Arab, Burj Khalifa, Ski Dubai, Dubai Mall, Dubai Garden Glow, Desert Safari, Dubai Miracle Garden, Dubai Dolphinarium, Palm Jumeirah, Dubai Marina, Dubai Frame, and many more.

The options for sightseeing on Dubai tours are extensive. Simply select a class, and a long list of possibilities will be shown to you. Dubai is a city with seemingly limitless options; visitors can spend the day visiting the Dubai Aquarium or have a romantic dinner on a traditional Dhow. With its larger-than-life theme parks and jaw-dropping shopping malls, Dubai has quickly emerged as a top travel destination.

Each tourist destination in Dubai has been meticulously crafted by keeping the potential impact that it will have on its explorers in mind. The Palm Islands' engineering will astound you, and the Burj Khalifa as well as Burj Al Arab will dwarf your wildest imaginations, all of which you can see on this Half-Day City Tour of Dubai.

Bollywood Parks, Atlantis Aquaventure Waterpark, Wild Wadi Water Park, and many others can be found among Dubai's various attractions. Every type of tourist can find something to do in Dubai, from taking the Burj Khalifa tour or Ferrari world tour, to families with young children enjoying shopping as well as adventures.

01. Global Village:

All your entertainment, shopping, and dining needs can be met in one convenient location at Dubai Global Village, where different countries set up pavilions to showcase their cuisine, products, and culture. Explore various cultures by visiting one of the roughly 26 pavilions on your Dubai tours.

One of the coolest things to do in Dubai is to stop by Global Village to take pictures with the scale models of the World’s seven wonders. The nearly 1500 shops and stalls here offer a wide variety of traditional and modern clothing, jewellery, and accessories.

Indulge your taste buds at one of the many restaurants serving cuisine from around the world. Let yourself be captivated by the carnival's excitement, games, and attractions here in Global Village.

●    Location:

It is located at 3895+466 القرية السورية,Sheikh Mohamed Bin Zayed Road, Exit 37, E311, Dubai, UAE.

●    Timings:

Saturday-Wednesday: 04:00 pm - 12:00 am

Thursday-Friday: 04:00 pm - 01:00 am

How to Reach?

You can reach Global village in around 50 minutes by taking the red line to the First Gulf bank and hiring a taxi further.

Four bus lines to and from Global Village have been restored by Dubai's RTA.

02. Burj Khalifa:

The Burj Khalifa's Observation Deck provides breathtaking sights of the handsome Dubai skyline. Climb into the world's fastest elevator and reach all the way to the top of the Burj Khalifa, floor 124.

When you are on your Burj Khalifa tour, eat at At.mosphere, located on the 122nd floor of Burj Khalifa - the world’s tallest skyscraper. Awe at the Burj Khalifa's internal fountain as it glows under 6,000 lights.

Relax at what is claimed to be the world's highest lounge, the Burj Khalifa's Lounge. The Observation Deck, located on the 124th floor, offers spectacular, unrestricted views of the Dubai Fountain display, further enhancing your time here.

●    Location:

It is located at 1 Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Blvd, Downtown Dubai, Dubai, UAE.

●    Timings:

For 124th & 125th Floor:

Non-prime hours - 10:00 am to 3:30 pm & 07:00 to 11:00 pm

Prime hours - 4:00 pm to 6.30 pm

For 148th, 124th & 125th Floor:

Non-prime hours - 07:00, 08:00, & 9:00 pm

Prime hours - 12:00 to 6.00 pm

How to Reach?

The best method to reach Burj Khalifa is to take the metro, which only takes twenty minutes and then hop into the Red Line to reach the Burj Khalifa/Dubai Mall Station.

You also have an option of reaching Burj Khalifa by hopping onto the F13 bus, that will drop you off at the Dubai Mall after about 40 minutes.

03. Palm Jumeirah:

The Palm Jumeirah islands are among the most popular tourist destinations in Dubai due to their unique architecture that was inspired by the shape of palm palms. Let your inner child out at Aquaventure Waterpark, where you can go on water slides that have set world records, swim in wave pools, or lounge on a private beach while sipping a cocktail. Come snorkel or scuba dive among 65,000 marine creatures at the aquarium, including 14 different kinds of sharks and rays.

Enjoy a boat ride along the shore of Palm Jumeirah and see some of the city's most famous landmarks. Skydive Dubai offers a thrilling tandem skydiving experience over Palm island in a freefall that is sure to please adrenaline junkies.

●    Location:

Palm Jumeirah is an artificial offshore island located in Dubai, UAE.

04. Museum of the Future:

The Museum of the Future, Dubai is one of the most popular attractions in Dubai, and it's a futuristic museum that's all about imagining what the world might be like in 2071. Admire Shaun Killa's mastery of architecture in the Arabic poetry carved on the museums' outside walls.

Learn more about astronaut survival by checking out Journey to the Future. Visit the Amazon Digital exhibition to venture into the Amazonian rainforests where few people have ventured before.

In the DNA Library of the Museum of the Future, known as the Vault of Life, you can find out what you can do to mitigate the negative health impacts of the change in climate on us. Participate in a series of events and debates featuring prominent business leaders who will explore their hopes and plans for the future.

●    Location:

It is located at Sheikh Zayed Rd, Trade Centre, Trade Centre 2, Dubai, UAE.

●    Timings:

10:00 AM to 6:00 PM

How to reach:

You may reach your location, which is located 228 metres along Sheikh Zayed Road, by taking the metro to the Emirates Towers Metro Station.

05. Desert Safari with BBQ Dinner:

One of the best ways to appreciate the rich cultural heritage of the Dubai deserts is on a daylong safari across the sand dunes. Explore the shifting dunes of the desert at sunset and watch the sun go down without any obstructions. It's also possible to do sandboarding if you're the adventurous type. Along with the Burj Khalifa tour, you can also include Desert safari with BBQ dinner package in your Dubai family holiday package.

After a long day on safari, retire to the comfort of the Bedouin tents and prepare to be enchanted by a classic belly dancing routine. Take part in a barbecue buffet meal where you may pick from a wide variety of non-veg as well as veg dishes to round out your day.

06. Dubai Aquarium and Underwater Zoo:

Explore the intricate underwater tubes of the Dubai Aquarium, home to hundreds of aquatic animals.

Visit the Underwater Zoo to view the critically endangered tiger sharks that are kept in enormous tanks. The adventurous can sign up for the "Swim with the Sharks" activity, which will take them into the deep shark tanks.

Stop by the King Croc display and meet the 750-kilogram crocodile, the largest reptile in the world. Experiment with a guided diving lesson as well as cage snorkelling that takes you through the aquarium's aquatic exhibits.

●    Location:

3rd Floor, Dubai Mall, Financial Center Street, Along Sheik Zayed Road, Next to Burj Khalifa, Dubai, UAE.

How to reach?

If you're travelling by metro, once you have reached the Burj Khalifa or The Dubai Mall station, take an exit onto the main road. Every 15 minutes, there is a bus that runs between the train station and the shopping centre. Alternatively, it only takes about 15 minutes to walk to the mall from the station across the climate-controlled Metro Link Bridge.

If you're driving to The Dubai Mall from the city centre, take the first interchange and continue down Financial Center Road. On the right is the entrance to The Dubai Mall.

07. Dubai Fountain:

Be sure to check out the marvellous Dubai Fountain, the world's largest synchronised fountain performance. Take an Abra boat trip during the fountain display to see the spectacle from the Marina waters, which adds a new dimension to the experience.

While exploring the Burj Khalifa tour, don’t forget to take a glimpse of the Dubai Fountain show next to Burj Khalifa. With the Dubai Fountain Boardwalk, you can get an up-close look at this spectacular water show from a little nine metres away. Enjoy a sumptuous supper at one of the lakeside restaurants while taking in the spectacular display put on by the Dubai Fountains.

●    Location:

Fashion Parking, Dubai Mall, Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid Blvd, Dubai, UAE.

●    Timings:

5:45 pm-11:30 pm

How to reach?

From Bur Dubai, take the metro to Burj Khalifa Station, it won’t take you more than 20 minutes, and from there it's a short walk to the dock area where you can enjoy the Dubai Fountain show.

Take bus line 29, it will take you there in around 38 minutes. A trip to the Burj Khalifa from Bur Dubai just takes about 15 minutes.

08. Burj Al Arab:

The Burj Al Arab is Dubai's most opulent hotel, with interiors gilded in 24-karat gold. The nicest thing to see in Dubai is the sail-shaped hotel, which is set against the azure waters of the Gulf. Visiting Burj Al Arab is one of the must-do things that need to be included in your Dubai tours. If you are looking to book your family holiday packages to international destinations, consult with Jas Tours and Travels to get the best deals on international packages like Dubai Tours, Singapore tours, Australia tours, etc.

Choose from one of the many exquisite fine dining establishments located within the property. Guests can relax in the outdoor pools that offer a breathtaking view of the Arabian Gulf below.

Dine on fresh seafood while viewing the fascinating underwater world at Al Mahara, an underwater restaurant. Relax with luxurious treatments offered by the Talise Spa.

●    Location:

It is located near Jumeirah beach.

09. Dubai Marina:

One of the greatest ways to see Dubai is by strolling over the Dubai Marina - the city's most scenic walkways. Visit any of the excellent restaurants or cafes that are located along the lines of the Marina for a sumptuous meal with a view of the water.

Enjoy a leisurely supper while cruising by the lit skyscrapers of Dubai aboard a traditional Dhow Boat. Discover the beautiful marine life by going deep-sea fishing at Dubai Marina.

To experience the Dubai Marina in style, charter a yacht through the Dubai Marina club. Enjoy a thrilling speedboat ride around Dubai Marina and see the city's most famous sights up close.

●    Timings:

9:00 PM to 10:30 PM (Everyday)

How to reach?

If you want to use the tram, Jumeirah Lakes Towers is the closest stop. It's a 12-minute walk or 901 metres to the nearest Tram stop.

Take the M1 metro line, which is part of the Red Line, to go to the closest metro station;

You may reach Dhow Cruise Dubai easily by using any of the following bus lines: Bus-8, Bus-88, or Bus-F55A.

10. IMG Worlds of Adventure:

IMG Worlds of Adventure is the largest indoor amusement park in Dubai and features more than 20 thrill attractions spread across a variety of themed areas.

In the Jurassic area of IMG Worlds, you may experience a wide variety of thrilling roller coasters.

Visit the park to get your photo taken with your favourite Cartoon Network as well as Marvel characters!

Get a taste of the world at the many various themed eateries in Dubai's top tourist attraction.

Get a souvenir from one of the many themed shops located throughout the park's several adventure zones.

●    Location:

Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Road, Dubai, UAE.

How to reach?

The Dubai Mall and the Emirates Mall are the closest metro stations accessible by foot. Metro stops in Dubai are easily accessible by taxi for tourists.

Distance-wise, it's about 9.7 km, or around a 15- to 20-minute drive, from Dubai International Airport. If a round-trip transfer is offered, that's the one to select.

11. Dubai Dolphinarium:

Visit the Dubai Dolphinarium, which is widely regarded as one of the most enjoyable aquatic theme parks in Dubai. At the dolphin show, you may catch the interaction between the dolphins and the fur seals as they put on a vibrant display. You will have the chance to interact with dolphins in a variety of ways, including swimming, feeding them, and playing with them, all under the watchful eye of an experienced trainer. Once you have been on your Burj Khalifa tour to please your eyes with a breathtaking view from the world’s tallest building, don’t miss out to experience the marine life and explore the depths of the Dubai Dolphinarium.

During the event at Creek Park, enjoy the flight of the exotic birds and their interaction with both each other as well as the crowd. The Mirror Maze is a place where you can put your brain to the test by navigating through a maze that is entirely composed of mirrors. You can also stop at one of the best restaurants in the area, the Happy Valley restaurant and grab yourself a meal and enjoy around the poolside.

●    Location:

Riyadh Street, Dubai, UAE.

●    Timings:

Dolphinarium: 11.00 AM, 2.00 PM, and 6.00 PM (Monday to Saturday)

Swimming with Dolphins: 1:00 PM, 3:00 PM, and 4:00 PM (Monday to Saturday)

Exotic Bird Show: 12:15 PM, 3:15 PM, 5:15 PM, and 7:15 PM (Monday to Saturday)

How to reach?

If you are travelling by Metro, the station at Dubai Healthcare City, which is located on the Green Line, is the one that is the closest to the Dubai Dolphinarium. Once you reach the Dubai healthcare City station, exit the metro and hire a taxi further to reach the destination.

12. Dubai Frame:

The unique Dubai Frame building, which resembles a picture frame, provides stunning panoramas of both the modern city and the historic district. Cross the glass roof that connects both sides of the frame and takes in the sights of Dubai, including the Burj Khalifa and Jumeirah Mosque.

The Frame's first floor hosts the gallery of Old Dubai, where you can learn about the rich history of Dubai through a variety of multimedia exhibits. Check out the virtual reality experience "Future Dubai," which predicts the city's future attractions.

Consider a stroll across the upper bridge at dusk, when the light is at its lowest and the sights are at their greatest. For a unique experience, book the "45 Minutes of Gold" breakfast at the Dubai Frame's peak.

●    Location:

Zabeel Park

●    Timings:

9:00 AM to 9:00 PM (Monday-Sunday)

How to reach?

To reach Gate 4, also known as the Zabeel Park Star Gate, via the metro, ride the Red Line to the Al Jafiliya stop, and exit the station.

If you're taking a taxi or cab to Zabeel Park, the closest public parking is located near Gate One; simply enter that address into your GPS device to get directions. You can easily reach Gate 4, also known as Star Gate, from here.

[pinkvelve]

some tag i found..wee woo wee woo we

2. Age: 20 😊

3. City that you live in: right in thid moment fc co

4. What do most people not know about you?: i think russia is the coolest country ever

5. What do most people know you for?: being insane

6. Hobbies: listeing to music from seven years ago...reading...reading something different...writing

7. What are your passions?: psychoanalyzing people

8. What do you search for in a significant other?: also being insane

7. What are you most proud of?: having new jeans in my top five literally every week

8. When was the last time you had a significant conversation with someone you love?: save me just came on

9. Have you ever collected anything? What was it?: maybe stickers i guess. or notebooks

10. List 10 things off of your bucket list.: TEN?

northern lights

live in spain

ride a train

go to japan...omfg so bad..

read all of jjk

paint somethinga ctualy good

russia

GO to bts concert..

make this dumb clock i keep putting off

go austria/swiss

11. What was the last thing you learned?: dude idk actually my dad was telling me about the grand canyon earlier and he said if the damns were let back out the water would be so poisonous it would kill all the natural environment of the canyon. so

12. How many relationships have you been in?: girl you mean SITUATIONship

14. Turn offs: constant validation

15. Favorite food: onigiri

16. Favorite drink: chai

18. Are you optimistic or pessimistic?: i'm bipolar

19. Do you sleep during class?: actually no...i don't know how that's possible. now listening to music is a different question

20. What is the most expensive thing you own?: probably my computer i guess

21. What is the cheapest yet most useful thing you own?: a pencil? or tissues..

22. How many times a day on average do you check your phone?: ELRIS? HERE I AM

23. Text or call?: do NOT call my phone

24. Opinion on long distance?: np for me

25. What is your definition of success?: not wnting to d!e

26. Favorite song?: OHHHright now...uhhh...tumblr girls or champagne coast

27. Favorite artist?: new jeans geazy childish gambino

28. Celebrity crush/crushes? male: kim taehyung female: karina

29. When was the last time you read for fun?: literally fifteen minutes ago

30. Favorite flower?: in bloom by zb1

31. What is the best gift you could receive right now?: not something i'm writing on this.

32. Any guilty pleasures?: snapchat

33. What is one thing you would like to change about yourself?: i wish i would listen to more music instead of the same EFFINg songs

34. What do you search for in a friend?: not being fake

35. How many times have you said "I love you" in the past month?: i love you by 2ne1 comes in my mind for no reason

36. Where did you last go other than your room/home?: costco...........

37. Why do bad things happen to good people?: because people ARENT GOOD AND BAD.

38. In your opinion, what hurts more? Being left out or being stabbed in the eye?: left out omfg. what do yall know about that

39. How many green shirts do you own?: DUDE SO MANY

40. Do you like anime?: i cannot tell you how many sukuna edits i liked earlier

41. What do you invest the most time in?: reading dumb things writing stupidthing s

42. What was the name of the last book you read?: YALL DO NOT WANT TO KNOW THIS...omfg... eternity enshrined by apartment

43. What's the difference between loving and liking someone?: for me its like if they haunt you. then you are in love 😊

44. Where are you most productive?: the library

47. Do you believe world peace will ever exist?: sorry i skipped some

48. Do you have any allergies?: sometimes my body just shuts down wjen i eat things

51. What was your last dream about?: i genuinely have not remembered any of my dreams for like two months

53. How many countries have you visited?: cinco

54. What is your favorite medium of art? (Music, dance, painting, etc.): ALL OF THE LISTED ONES.

56. When was the last time somebody complimented you?: that's a good question

56. If you switched bodies with someone, how would you recognize yourself?: i would just know? tf

57. Do you consider yourself mature?: honestly no

58. How many days in your life do you think you have wasted on tumblr?: like five maybe

59. What is your favorite quote?: WAIT...goes to pinterest board

dude like. omfg

60. If you started a new religion and you had to create 3 rules or commandments for your new followers to live by, what would those 3 rules be?:

gojo satoru

fushiguro megumi

ryomen sukuna

62. Do you believe in the death penalty?: yes actually

63. What are your goals for life?: spain

64. What do you think your soulmate is doing right now?: girl...i know what they're doing

65. If you could live anywhere, where would you live? The place can be in an imaginary, fantasy, or the real world.: i just answered this spain

66. What were you like in 2013?: happy asf because it was 2013

67. Do you have a job?: JOBLESS 💜

69. If you could change one thing about society, what would it be?: NO MORE Inflation

70. How many all-nighters have you pulled before?: probably like fifteen

71. Is tumblr your favorite website? If not, then what is your favorite website?: no tf it's ao3

72. What is the craziest thing you would do for a million dollars?: girl anything

73. Does money equal happiness?: its part of it

74. How many times have you experienced true happiness in your lifetime?: i'm experiencing it right now listening to that one laboum song

75. How many times have you experienced true sadness in your lifetime? last december when taehyung and jk enlisted

77. When was the last time you looked at the news?: actually my mom had the news on when i walked downstairs today. there was a shöotīng in aurora if anyone is shocked by that

78. If you could say one thing to the world, what would you say?: gojo satoru

79. What is your favorite animal?: swiss mountain dogs

80. If you could earn a million dollars by pretending to be dead for 3 years, would you do it?: ALREADY DONE? where's my check

82. What time do you normally sleep? How many hours of sleep do you usually get?: well right now it's 3:20 so that's a really good question

83. Does age necessarily equal maturity?: maturity is a dumb word

84. What is your favorite clothing store?: ragstock

85. In the winter- beanies or gloves?: neither

86. Would you rather have wings or a fish tail?: bitter sweet just came on

87. If you had the power to erase one person from the world so that nobody remembered him or her except you, would you do it?: dude yes

88. What do you fear the most?: rejection

89. How many digits of pi can you recite?: 3.14..5 ?

90. If you could travel back to one year and relive it again, which year would it be?: 2016 ONE BILLION TIMES OVER

91. Describe yourself in one word.: stupid

92. Describe your last victory.: not crying when run came on

95. Would you rather forget all of the past or remember everything in vivid detail?: i do not want to know what would happen to me if i remembered everything in vivid detail

96. Have you ever broken a bone before?: no 💛 the power of infinity

97. Is it harder to love or to hate somebody?: it's the same thing

98. Coffee or tea?: chai

99. What are some little things that you do that have changed your life in a positive way?: listening to loona

100. karina

[umichenginabroad]

[week 4] Prague to Paradise

Ahoj everyone!

Welcome back to my blog where we have officially passed the halfway point of our Engineering in Prague program! I am currently on a 10 hour train ride through the alps back to Prague from this week’s weekend trip, so shockingly this blog may come out on time! 

Let’s get right into it with a little bit about my classes from this week. On Monday we had a midterm for my Engineering Statistics class which was a bit difficult but hopefully we did well? I also had a quick midterm for my Cross Cultural Management class which was very straightforward, followed by a trip to the European Parliament experience in Prague. This was a really interesting experience where we learned about how the EU parliament works to pass legislation and even participated in a simulated activity where we played certain countries and parties in the EU and attempted to pass certain laws. It was a really eye opening experience and showed us a bit more insight into European politics. Closing out the class week, I had my final for my Cross Cultural Management class and officially finished up with that course for the summer. I highly recommend this course if you are interested in learning about different cultures, interactions, anthropology, sociology, psychology, and international business. 

Now for this weekend trip, this was the trip I was most looking forward to and it was to Lake Bled, Slovenia. I was initially planning this as a solo trip but was able to convince a friend to come with me on this journey. We woke up bright and early Thursday morning and began our 10 hours of train rides to this hidden gem. Shockingly, we made it to the final train station without any issues despite us having 4 transfers and there being an international cellular data outage while we were traveling (gotta love Verizon). When we arrived at the station in Lake Bled, there was a massive thunderstorm where we couldn’t walk to our hostel and with the lack of service we were a bit stuck. Fortunately, we met two Finnish girls who were able to call a taxi and offered to split it with us (shoutout Moona and Heela). Upon arriving at our hostel, the rain finally cleared up and there was a double rainbow which honestly set the tone for this trip. 

Friday morning, I had booked a white water rafting tour for us where we ventured through one of the most beautiful rivers in the world surrounded by insane nature. Our Slovenian guides were super knowledgeable and let us swim in the freezing yet refreshing water. It was definitely one of the coolest experiences I've ever had! We even saw a bunch of horses afterwards which were so adorable too! 

For the rest of the day we explored the town surrounding Lake Bled. We took a traditional Pletna boat to Bled Island and then hiked up to Bled Castle for some of the most insane views of the lake and mountains. Up on the castle we had a local Slovenian wine tasting and discovered a traditional printing shop. We also stumbled upon a wedding on the top of the castle which was pretty interesting to see ahaha. 

On Saturday we woke up super early and went to the alpine coaster which was a bit sketchy but really fun with some amazing views of the lake. After that we had the brilliant idea of renting mountain bikes to go to Vintgar Gorge. The ride there was so so difficult because it was basically entirely uphill directly in the sun. However once we arrived at the gorge, it was completely worth it. We were required to wear helmets as we ventured through the rocky terrain and were met with some of the most breathtaking rapids, waterfalls, and canyons. We then hiked back to the start of the gorge which was about two miles through the mountains with some insane views. Thankfully the bike ride back was much more enjoyable going downhill lol. To finish off the night, we watched the Germany vs Denmark Euro Cup match in our hostel’s pub.

On Sunday morning, we began our trek back to Prague and are currently on our final 6 hour train traveling through the Austrian alps. Moving into next week, I’ll have some friends visiting for a few days before a bunch of us head to Barcelona for the weekend! Thank you so much for reading and I’ll see y’all next week!

Matt Sinanis :)

Aerospace Engineering

Engineering in Prague 

[refersmss]

Top 10 Coolest Destinations in India to Travel to in May: Your Ultimate Guide

As May approaches, the scorching summer heat prompts travelers to seek refuge in cooler destinations across India. From serene hill stations to picturesque coastal getaways, the country offers a myriad of options to escape the sweltering temperatures. In this guide, we unveil the top 10 coolest destinations in India that are perfect for a refreshing May getaway.

1. Darjeeling, West Bengal: Nestled in the foothills of the Himalayas, Darjeeling is renowned for its cool climate and breathtaking views of the surrounding mountains. Explore tea estates, visit monasteries, and take a ride on the iconic Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, also known as the “Toy Train.”

2. Shimla, Himachal Pradesh: The quintessential hill station of Shimla beckons travelers with its colonial charm and pleasant weather. Stroll along the Mall Road, visit historic landmarks like Christ Church, and soak in panoramic views from the Ridge.

3. Manali, Himachal Pradesh: Surrounded by snow-capped peaks and lush valleys, Manali offers a perfect blend of adventure and tranquility. Trek to scenic spots like Solang Valley and Rohtang Pass, or simply unwind amidst the serene beauty of the Himalayas.

4. Munnar, Kerala: Escape to the tranquil tea plantations and misty mountains of Munnar in Kerala. Embark on nature walks, visit tea museums, and savor the aroma of freshly brewed tea while enjoying the cool climate of this picturesque hill station.

5. Coorg, Karnataka: Known as the “Scotland of India,” Coorg entices visitors with its verdant landscapes and pleasant weather. Explore coffee plantations, trek to scenic waterfalls, and indulge in adventurous activities like river rafting and zip-lining.

6. Mahabaleshwar, Maharashtra: Perched atop the Western Ghats, Mahabaleshwar offers respite from the summer heat with its cool climate and lush greenery. Explore viewpoints like Arthur’s Seat and Elephant’s Head Point, and savor delicious strawberries grown in the region.

7. Ooty, Tamil Nadu: Fondly referred to as the “Queen of Hill Stations,” Ooty is a perennial favorite among travelers seeking cooler climes. Take a boat ride on Ooty Lake, explore botanical gardens, and ride the Nilgiri Mountain Railway for panoramic views.

8. Nainital, Uttarakhand: Set around a sparkling lake amidst the Kumaon Hills, Nainital is a picturesque hill station known for its pleasant weather and scenic beauty. Enjoy boating on Naini Lake, trek to viewpoints like Tiffin Top, and visit historic landmarks.

9. Gulmarg, Jammu and Kashmir: For those craving cooler temperatures and breathtaking vistas, Gulmarg in Jammu and Kashmir is an ideal destination. Experience the thrill of skiing in winter-like conditions, ride the Gulmarg Gondola for panoramic views, and explore the stunning Alpine meadows.

10. Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir: Surrounded by snow-capped mountains and verdant valleys, Pahalgam offers a serene retreat for travelers seeking cooler climes. Explore scenic trails, visit Betaab Valley and Aru Valley, and immerse yourself in the tranquil beauty of the Kashmir Valley.

Conclusion: With May fast approaching, it’s time to plan your escape to one of these coolest destinations in India. Whether you prefer the misty mountains of the Himalayas, the serene backwaters of Kerala, or the picturesque hill stations of South India, there’s a perfect getaway awaiting you. Embrace the cooler temperatures, breathe in the fresh mountain air, and create unforgettable memories amidst the natural beauty of India’s coolest destinations. If you want to know more about these type of topics so,

Visit here➡️Refersms

[kieraelieson]

Here’s the whole thing under a readmore.

Much smaller and easier to reblog without filling the dashboard.

Presidential Debate Summary

Question: So the economy is bad, some even say it’s worse under Biden than it was before, what do you say?

Biden: So Trump left me a mess. Everything was in freefall, and there was so much catch up to be done. I’ve been working on it this whole time and made some solid progress, especially with lowering prices of prescriptions and making jobs. But there’s still so much to be done and I am working on it.

Trump: Listen, I made the coolest economy ever. It was so good that the whole world was jealous and wanted to copy us. I did amazing. Then Covid hit and we had to spend a whole lot of money, but we managed that amazingly too. We’d practically finished dealing with Covid when Biden took over and did mandates and made everything suck so bad.

Biden: You made the greatest economy? Who thinks that other than you?? And maybe the wealthy people you gave tax cuts to. That caused a lot of our problems, those tax cuts and all the debt you racked up. Also, you have people fighting and dying in Afghanistan. I’ve got no Americans dying in wars.

Question: Trump, you want to make a 10% tariff, won’t that make things more expensive?

Trump: No, it’ll only make things more expensive for other countries, like China. And we need that money cause Biden spent way too much money. The only good things he’s done with jobs were actually my long term plans finally coming into effect during his term, he can’t take credit for that. And also Afghanistan, I made us look super cool there, he made America look so embarrassing.

Question: So Trump, your tax cuts are about to expire but you want to continue them. You made America have 8 Trillion dollars in more debt and Biden made us have 4 trillion more. Don’t we need all the taxes we can get?

Trump: No, the tax cuts Made the super cool amazing economy! I made everything come up to the coolest place where I could pay off that debt and More and then Covid hit. So I used some of that money and time to deal with almost all of Covid, and then handed Biden a neat little solution with a bow on top. But then he did mask mandates and vaccine mandates! And people died under his leadership! I dealt with the most of Covid, but he couldn’t handle the tail end of it. And now he makes America look stupid to the world. All the immigrants he lets in are felons or crazy and make things even worse.

Biden: Look, Trump made more debt than any other president in a single term. And all the ‘help’ his tax cuts made was just pointed to the very wealthy. We’ve got 1,000 billionaires in America, if we tax them just 20-25%, we could give everyone better healthcare and *stumbles over his words for a bit* beat Medicare.

Trump: Heh, beat Medicare, beat it to death more like. He’s got way too many people benefiting from Medicare! And social security! He’s gonna spend them all up giving them to people now. He makes America look dumb and stupid cause he takes in immigrants from other countries and doesn’t make those countries pay us anything to do it.

Question: So, this is the first election since Roe v Wade was overturned. The Supreme Court has a lot of sway still on abortion decisions. Trump, you take credit for turning over abortion laws to states, but the federal government still can make a decision on abortion pills, used in 2/3rds of abortion. Would you ban those pills?

Trump: Ok, so since Roe V Wade passed 50 years ago, everyone has wanted it gone. Everyone everyone. No seriously, Everyone. And I made that happen with putting those justices into the Supreme Court. They made the will of the people happen. And now states are in control. That’s how it should be. Some people wanna be super strict, some wanna be killing babies, but ultimately the people are voting and deciding, state by state, and that’s good.

Biden: Not everyone wanted it gone! And what you did is terrible! States can’t handle this kind of question, that’s like saying states should each handle their own civil rights decisions. And these poor girls and women are having such a hard time out here it’s awful. They’re dying and being raped.

Trump: Young women being raped and dying? By Immigrants. That you let in. That’s the real problem. Now abortion, that’s being handled by the states, by the people. Everyone wanted Roe v Wade gone and now it is, and I did that. If the founding fathers knew about abortion they would’ve wanted the states to have those decisions.

Question: Biden, there are seven states that have no legal limit on how far into pregnancy a woman can have an abortion. Do you support any legal limit to the lateness of abortions?

Biden: I support Roe v Wade. Politicians shouldn’t be making these decisions, doctors should. If I’m elected I’m going to restore Roe v Wade.

Trump: So then he’s gonna have babies in the ninth month and after birth killed. He’s gonna have babies ripped out of the womb. No one wants that!!

Biden: Roe v Wade does not support that happening. The only time anything close to that will happen is if the woman’s life is in danger. We do not support late term abortions. Period.

Trump: Roe v Wade = Late term abortions. That’s crazy, and only democrats would ever support it.

Biden: We had Roe v Wade for fifty years. And scholars supported it, people were happy, it was good. Then Trump got rid of it. What’s Trump gonna do if he’s elected, sign a complete ban on abortions across the board? I’ll veto that, it won’t happen with me.

Question: Biden, there’s a lot of immigrants coming into the country illegally. They’re overburdening cities and in some cases causing safety concerns. How can we trust you to handle this crisis?

Biden: I’m working towards a bipartisan agreement. We want no illegal immigrants, and the best way to do that is to have legal immigrants. Btw, border control supports me in this. Trump was tearing families apart and putting children in cages. I want more asylum, more legal immigration, and more border patrol so that there aren’t illegal immigrants anymore.

Trump: I left behind the safest, best border in history, and this guy opened it! There’s criminals, felons, crazy people, terrorists, just flooding into our country and killing people! And btw, border control actually supports me, not you. I made the best border ever, and Biden just opened it.

Biden: We’ve had one terrorist, under Trump’s administration, who killed three people. That’s it. This idea that criminals and all are flooding in is crazy. He’s exaggerating and lying.

Question: Trump, you’ve said you want to deport the illegal immigrants. Does that mean all, all? What about the ones who have families, jobs, who have been here for decades? And if so, what’s your plan?

Trump: Look, hundreds of thousands of people are dying. Our people, dying in every state, cause we have no borders! Biden’s crazy stupid policies are getting people killed! Just recently three girls died. And these migrants are living in luxury hotels while our veterans are dying in the streets. Biden is terrible at caring for veterans, cause he doesn’t like them. He reversed the good things I did for veterans, probably just cause he hates me. Biden has killed so many people by allowing people through the border.

Biden: Every single thing he said is a lie. I like veterans! I gave the veterans insurance. My son went to Iraq. I go to all these memorials all the time. Once Trump said that the people that died were losers and suckers. They aren’t. You’re the loser and sucker!

Trump: Biden made up that quote! He’s put it in magazines and in commercials and it was made up! I take the best care of veterans. And 19 people said they didn’t hear me say it. Just like the 51 things or the Russia Russia Russia, he’s made them all up. He should apologize to me for lying.

Biden: No, a general personally heard you say that. And the very idea that I should apologize to you! We really need to focus on the veterans, and on their families, and that’s what I’m doing. I’m taking care of the veterans.

Question: Turning to foreign policy. Russia’s war with Ukraine is now in its 3rd year. Putin said that he will only stop the war if Russia gets to keep all the land it’s already taken, and Ukraine doesn’t join NATO. Trump, are those terms acceptable?

Trump: First of all, veterans think Biden sucks. And they think I’m So Cool. Secondly, if America had had a cool president, Putin never would’ve invaded Ukraine. He saw the embarrassing, terrible way that Biden handled Afghanistan, and said, ‘Oh, I can do what I’ve always wanted to now’. Cause I knew he wanted to do it! But I wouldn’t have let him. See if Biden hadn’t been so dumb and embarrassing in Afghanistan, Ukraine would’ve never been invaded and Israel would have never been invaded by Hamas. See, I made Iran so broke they couldn’t do terrorist things. But the world’s blowing up under Biden.

Biden: That’s a load of malarkey. Ok first. Trump had his troops attacked in Iran and didn’t do anything about it. Second, we got over 100,000 troops out of Afghanistan successfully. Third, in Ukraine Trump told Putin to do whatever he wanted, and Putin wanted Kiev, but he couldn’t get it and lots of lives were lost.

Moderator: Trump, let’s get back to the question, which is: Are Putin’s Terms Acceptable?

Trump: Well no, of course not. But the thing is, this war never should’ve been started. That’s Biden’s fault. And he’s spending so much money! He’s given Ukraine 200 billion dollars. See I will have this war settled and over, as president elect, before I even properly take office. People are being killed needlessly and stupidly and I’ll get that settled before I even take office.

Biden: Look, Putin’s a war criminal. And this has to be dealt with carefully. He wants to restore the Soviet empire, if he gets Ukraine he may move to Poland and other NATO countries. And we’re not the only ones giving weapons and money to Ukraine, NATO is matching everything we give. We’re showing off our strength in this.

Question: Hamas attacked Israel in October. Hamas has hostages, including 5 Americans. Israel has been attacking Gaza, creating a humanitarian crisis. Biden, you put out a proposal to solve this, but so far, both sides are still fighting. What additional leverage will you use to stop this war?

Biden: Look, everyone likes my plan. The UN, America, even Israel. The only people not acting to start it going are Hamas. I’m giving Israel all the weapons they need whenever they need them, except for the bombs that would have too many civilian casualties. And hey, I saved Israel when there was the problems with Iran. America is the biggest supporter of Israel. And we’re now sending in people to stop Hamas like we stopped Bin Laden.

Trump: Back to Ukraine, we’re spending like 100 billion dollars more on then than the European nations are. But we’re a whole ocean away! We need to make Europe put more money into this before we do. And in Israel, it isn’t just Hamas still wanting to fight, Israel still wants to also, and we should let them! Let them finish! Biden’s like a Palestinian, but a bad weak one, that’s why Israel doesn’t like him and isn’t listening to him.

Biden: That’s ridiculous. And in Europe, we need to stay unified. Our strength comes from our alliances. No war in Europe ever stayed in Europe, this is potentially so dangerous, we need to keep helping Ukraine. And I already did get a lot of support from other nations as well.

Moderator: Trump, to follow up, would you support the creation of an independent state of Palestine in order to create peace in the region?

Trump: I’d have to see. But before that, we can’t do anything if we don’t have money. We need NATO to be paying more money. All of NATO together is about equal to us, so they need to be paying as much as us. And I got some of that done already by threatening to leave, but now this guy is just helping helping helping without expecting anything back.

Question: Trump, on January 6th, there was that storming of the capital. You promised to preserve, protect, and defend the constitution. What do you say to your voters who believe you broke that oath that day and may do so again?

Trump: I don’t think many people believe that, but let me tell you something. On January 6th we had a great border, low taxes, low regulations, the world respected us, and then this guy comes in and wrecks all of that. The world thinks we’re dumb now.

Moderator: You still have 80 seconds. *repeats the question*

Trump: Well I said to do it Peacefully and Patriotically. I didn’t have hardly anything to do with this, people were just a bit antsy and I could tell, so I offered 10,000 national guard for extra protecting and they were turned down! It was Nancy Pelosi’s fault and she even said she takes responsibility.

Biden: He completely spurred those people on to storm the capital. And he was being begged for three hours to go out and tell them to stop and he wouldn’t. He’s also said that he wants to pardon the people convicted that day. All these courts agree he was responsible. And he goes saying that the people were patriots, and that if he loses again there will be a bloodbath??

Trump: They put completely innocent people in jail. It’s a shame. See when there were actual problems, like in Seattle and Portland, I stopped those. And the democrats destroyed all this information, cause they found out that we were Right! They should be put in jail for that!

Biden: Trump is a convicted felon and he’s lying here. He’s supporting felons and criminals and urging these people to more in the future. He won’t even denounce the proud boys. What do you think is gonna happen?

Moderator: Following up, Trump, after you were convicted of 34 felonies you said that if you were elected that you would have every right to go after your political opponents. What exactly did you mean by that?

Trump: Well, my retribution is gonna be success. I’m going to take America and have success. And saying I’m a felon, well Biden’s son is a convicted felon too, and probably should be more times as well. And Biden should be a felon too, the terrible things he’s done in office. And that’s just quid pro quo. See you’re lucky, the system we have is rigged, that’s why you aren’t a felon even though you’re a criminal, and I am even though I did nothing wrong.

Biden: That is outrageous! I’ve done nothing that comes near all the things you’ve done, and no president just gets to go and seek retribution with the power of the presidency! You’ve done so many horrible and gross things you absolutely deserve to be a felon.

Trump: You put so many people, targeted high level democrats, into positions of power dealing with my case. You’re using your presidential power to come after me! But the public knows better. You’ll see, the polls are up for me, and I’ve been getting millions in donations since this craziness.

Question: Biden, you’ve said that Trump and Maga are fighting against democracy. Do you believe that all the tens of millions of people who may vote for Trump are voting against democracy?

Biden: The more they know about what he’s done, yes. And he’s got more coming. There’s all this Nazism, and hate and retribution, and it’s horrible. How could anyone want that in an American president? I ran for office after Charlottesville and what he said about it.

Trump: Oh this guy, those things weren’t actually tied to me. And he doesn’t want to run for moral, ethical reasons, he just wants to do something before he’s too old. But he can’t, he’s a horrible, weak president, and there’s no way to justify him doing any more. That Charlottesvilles story has been debunked over and over again.

Biden: Oh it’s all faked? Debunked? People were there. At Charlottesville, on January 6th. People saw the horrors. It impacted me, and that’s why I stand so strongly for this. There’s a reason so many of his cabinet don’t endorse him this time around!

Question: Now we will talk about challenges faced in your first terms that will surely still be issues during your second. Biden, while black unemployment has fallen to record lows, black people still make less on average than white people, they’re imprisoned more, and black mothers die from pregnancy related causes more often. What do you say to black voters who are disappointed that you haven’t done more for them?

Biden: I want to acknowledge the progress I’ve already made. There’s more black small businesses, less unemployment, less segregation in business, lower costs of childcare. There’s a lot farther to go, but they know that I’ve been working on it, I’ve made progress, and I’m not stopping.

Moderator: You have 49 seconds. *repeats the question*

Biden: I say I don’t blame them for being disappointed. Inflation is hitting very hard. That’s why I’m working to give them a $10,000 credit for new homebuyers. And I’m working to make it so they don’t have as much student debt. I’m working on many things to help.

Trump: He’s right inflation is bad. And he made that inflation. I gave him a Perfect economy, he didn’t have to do Anything to keep it. But he wrecked it with his Green new scam and spending all this money. Inflation is killing black and Hispanic people. Illegal immigrants are killing black and Hispanic people, And taking all their jobs.

Biden: Yeah, there was on paper no inflation when I became president. Because so many things were in freefall. There were no jobs! I’ve been making jobs, making healthcare, providing for the people! He wants to ‘improve’ things by cutting funding to all sorts of necessary social programs.

Question: Climate change has been increasing. 2023 was a record hot year. There have been more wildfires, hurricanes, the sea levels are rising, and people are suffering from the extreme heat. Trump, you’ve promised to do away with Biden’s climate initiatives. Are you intending to take any action yourself to solve this climate crisis?

Trump: Going back a bit, the police love me. I’m helping with criminal reform, I’m helping blacks and Hispanics make colleges. And btw, they love me too, they hate Biden. Back in the 90’s he called them superpredators, so they hate him. And all these immigrants coming in are taking all their jobs! And more terrible things are gonna happen.

Moderator: 38 seconds left *repeats question*

Trump: Ok, I want the cleanest water, and the cleanest air. Btw, did you know that when I was president the environment was the best? My staff told me that just before this debate.

Biden: The idea that that could be true. I’m the one who passed so many environmental reforms. And btw, I gave a whole lot of money to black colleges. Trump had the cleanest water?? Where? I’ve done all the climate things. Climate change affects all humanity and I’m the one doing everything to help that. Trump did nothing, and he wants to undo all I’ve done.

Trump: The Paris accords would’ve only cost the US money, not any other nations. So of course I said no! Also, Biden didn’t make insulin cheaper, I did. Biden is letting in all these immigrants who are taking advantage of all the social services, and he’s going to ruin every social service we have by giving it all away to illegal immigrants.

Biden: America makes so much pollution, but we’re well on our way to cutting that in half. We now have climate corps, that will help our environment and give thousands of young people jobs. I haven’t seen any indication that Trump actually cares about any of this at all. And also, I was the one who made the insulin cheaper.

Question: Many Americans struggle to make ends meet. And seniors particularly depend on social security. But if nothing is done, their benefits will be cut in ten years. Biden, will you name one specific step you will take to keep social security going?

Biden: Yes. I’m going to make the very wealthy pay their fair share. People already pay 6% of every paycheck into social security, except the very wealthy. I’m going to tax them. At just 1% for people making over $400,000, we will keep social security solvent. Trump wants to cut social security and Medicaid, and that’s terrible. America now has better healthcare than ever, the idea that we don’t need that, especially for our seniors, is ridiculous. I got rid of pre-existing condition restrictions with the ACA, and Americans need that.

Trump: I’ve known politicians my whole life, but I’ve never seen someone lie like Biden, he’ll lie right to your face. He’s destroying social security by letting all the immigrants have it! Biden doesn’t know what he’s doing and that’s why all the people are so angry.

Biden: The whole ‘millions of immigrants are flooding in and stealing our jobs’ just isn’t true. And honestly, our economy is growing really well right now. I’ve got professional economists that say if Trump is elected he’ll bring in a recession.

Question: Let’s turn to childcare, which many families struggle to afford. Trump, you and Biden both tried to address this, but childcare just keeps getting more expensive. In a second term, what would you do to make it more affordable?

Trump: Do you know, Biden doesn’t fire people? I fired loads of people. Firing people is hard. Biden should have fired a bunch of people who weren’t good at their jobs! You didn’t fire people who fucked up in Afghanistan! You didn’t fire people fucking up at the border! Our country is being destroyed cause you can’t handle to fire people. He’s an absolutely terrible president! He either Wants the US destroyed, or he’s just hoping all these immigrants will vote for him. If he’s elected we might not even Have a country anymore!

Biden: The United States of America is the greatest country in the world. Everyone looks up to us, and admires us, they aren’t trying to mess with us cause they know we’re strong. Trump was voted by scholars as the worst president ever. And we should increase the childcare tax credit. Trump didn’t do anything for childcare, but it needs to be done!

Moderator: Trump, the question was about making childcare affordable, if you want to take a minute.

Trump: In polls, people say I’m the very best president and Biden is the worst. I made the best economy, I cut taxes, Biden wants to raise taxes! Who ever heard of a president wanting to Raise taxes? He’s the worst president ever.

Biden: First of all, I’m not raising the taxes on Anyone making under $400,000. But these tariffs Trump is suggesting will make everything more expensive for the working and the middle class. You say you’ve helped the middle class? The middle class was destroyed under you. And we’re in a trade deficit with China too.

Question: With the Opioid crisis, overdoses got worse during each of your first terms. Trump, what will you do to help Americans caught in addiction to get the treatment they need?

Trump: Going back, our trade deficit with China got worse with Biden. He’s doing things to help China, not us. And did you notice he didn’t remove the previous tariffs I put in place, cause they’re giving us so much money and they’re so good. But he’s ruining our trade with China. They’re gonna end up owning us cause of you. You’re ruining our country!

Moderator: You have 67 seconds left. *repeats question*

Trump: Well, we had practically no problems with addiction until Covid hit, and then the immigrants started bringing all these drugs in with them. They’re bringing drugs, they’re trafficking people, trafficking women, and there’s more of them than the reports say. And it’s all Biden’s fault for opening the border!

Biden: I was working on that bipartisan immigration bill I mentioned earlier, and part of it was to have more border agents and better machines that can detect drugs more efficiently at the border. But Trump got the republicans to turn down that bill cause it would look bad for him politically. If I could get those machines and personnel out there it would help a lot.

Moderator: Trump, again, this question is about addiction and getting treatment for Americans.

Trump: Well this relates to it. See Biden is too easy on other countries. He’s doing negotiations with Mexico that aren’t good. And if there’s ever a hostage anywhere he pays like 6 billion dollars for them. Ridiculous. There’s a reporter hostage now, and Putin’s probably laughing at us and demanding billions of dollars for him. But I’d get him out so fast. I’m good at getting hostages back for practically no money.

Question: Now we have concerns people have about each of you. Biden, you’ll be 86 at the end of this term. Can you address your capability to manage the toughest job in the world, well into your 80’s?

Biden: It’s a little funny, I’ve been doing this for decades, and for the longest time I was criticized for being the youngest. But I would say look at what I’ve done. Look at how I’ve managed problems, how I’ve turned around the mess Trump left me. I’ve made 50 million jobs, I’ve gotten other countries and companies within those countries to invest billions into the US instead of other countries with cheaper labor like Trump encourages. And how is Trump, as someone wanting to be president, talking down our country all the time? Saying we’re going down, we’re failing, we’re gonna be destroyed. America is amazing. All our allies trust us, we’re powerful, we’re honest, we do everything well.

Moderator: And Trump, you would be 82. What do you say to people concerned about your capabilities?

Trump: I took two cognitive tests, aced them. Biden didn’t take any. I take yearly physicals. I just won two golf championships, that takes a lot of brains. Biden can’t hit a ball fifty yards. I feel healthy, I’m in as good a shape as I was 25-30 years ago, though lighter. I did so well on those cognitive tests, the one test guy said he’d never seen someone ace it before.

Biden: *says something vague about Trump’s weight* Well, you can see what he says about himself versus how he is.

Trump and Biden go back and forth for a few seconds insulting each other’s golfing ability before being cut off by the moderators.

Question: Trump, will you pledge tonight that after all legal challenges are exhausted, you will accept the results of the upcoming election, regardless of who wins, And, that political violence is never acceptable?

Trump: Well I shouldn’t have to say this, but of course I believe that. If you would have seen the statements I made before, you would say those are the strongest statements ever. I’d rather Biden was a better president so I could kick back and relax. But I’m here. After being attacked by him just for being his political opponent. And I’m gonna make America great again. Biden is crazy and awful and driving us into WW3!

Biden: You want a WW3? If Trump wins it’ll be a WW3. Putin will try and take over. America right now is respected worldwide and holding the peace. But it won’t be that way if Trump comes in and stops our involvement with Ukraine.

Moderator: Trump, I’ll let you follow up. As a reminder *repeats question*

Trump: Following up on what he said, Putin took land under Bush, under Obama, and under Biden, but not under Trump. He knows not to mess with me. He’ll take all of Ukraine from Biden. There’s no way, at this point, for Ukraine to win the war. They lost so much, and this war would’ve never started under me.

Moderator: Trump, *repeats question* Yes or No please.

Trump: If it’s fair and legal, absolutely. But the fraud in this last one was ridiculous! I’d love to be relaxing instead, but he was So Bad I had to run again. And here he is indicting me and coming after me politically, though it has raised my numbers, cause the people know the truth.

Biden: We’ll see what your numbers are at the election. You’ve whined and appealed about the past election to So Many Courts, and Not One said you had any credible evidence. But you can’t stand loss, you keep provoking this fraud lie. I don’t think you will be able to accept a fair loss.

Closing Remarks: Decided by a coin toss, Biden gets to go first.

Biden: We’ve made a lot of progress cleaning up the mess Trump made. I’m working towards a fairer tax system. He wants to put more taxes on the little guys. I’m working towards cheaper prescriptions, especially for seniors. He wants to cut off Medicare and Social Security. I’m making more childcare credits. I’m cleaning up the lead pipes and other things that cause health problems. And I’m working towards lower inflation.

Trump: Biden complains about all these things and says he’ll do things, but doesn’t. All he does is let immigrants in. America looks like a fool to the world. I had made Iran broke so they couldn’t do terror. The whole country is rioting about Palestine cause they don’t respect you. I made the military good, I made tax cuts. I took away all kinds of regulations. No one had ever seen someone do things like I did! Soldiers love me, I did good things for them. This nation is failing, but I will make it great again!

I am watching the presidential debate cause I feel like I have a bit of a civic duty to do so. I would rather read a good summary, but I don’t know anyone giving one I trust. Then I thought: why don’t I make a summary as I go? I’m already gonna be summarizing to my husband as I listen.

Some notes:

I’m biased. I think trump is stupid.

I’m gonna be heavily paraphrasing.

I’m watching the YouTube livestream from CNN.

[k12academics]

Nestled in the woods on beautiful Leesville Lake near Carrollton Ohio lies an award winning summer camp that has served young people since 1959. Throughout the Midwest, Falcon Camp is widely recognized as Ohio's premier summer camp. Falcon has been independently selected as one of the "Top Ten Camps in the USA" by EarlyChildhoodEducationZone.com , as "Ohio's Coolest Camp" by Philly.com, recipient of a 2019 'Best Parenting' award from Cincinnati Family magazine and honored by the American Camp Association Ohio Section with their Program Excellence Award. Falcon Camp offers an eye catching lakefront setting, a talented staff and a wide range of activities. Boys and girls ages 6-16 choose daily from a variety of activities such as sailing, horseback riding, tennis, mountain biking, theater, sports, riflery, crafts, nature study and so much more. A popular extra riding program is available in addition to the regular horseback riding program. Daily activities are gender separate with planned coed activities and divided by appropriate age/grade. The non-competitive environment is inviting to campers who may be hesitant to try something new, while the awards system challenges even the most experienced campers. Falcon has a strong reputation for making sure a camper's first camping experience is positive. The Traditional Camp offers programs in 2, 4, 6, and 8 week sessions. A 1:4 staff/camper ratio insures attention and instruction in each activity. Instruction is given from beginner to advanced in each area and campers are encouraged to try everything before choosing favorites. The Health Center is available 24/7 and the Kitchen serves excellent food with good variety and attention to individual needs. Falcon also offers an exciting one week intro 'Young Adventure' program for campers ages 6-10. This unique program is designed with care to guide younger campers towards success in their first great adventure away from home. The Young Adventure program takes place inside the Traditional Camp program and includes most of the same activities. A 1:3 staff/camper ratio gives Falcon the ability to keep a close eye and give a helping hand when needed. Basic skills are taught with an emphasis on safety as well as fun. Falcon's directors are experienced and caring. Our leadership development programs for older campers and junior staff are respected across the camping world. Our efforts to create an atmosphere of safety and healthy learning helps campers reach outside their comfort zones to feel good about trying new activities and making new friends. Falcon friendships do last a lifetime. At Falcon, good things happen by design. Most important of all: Falcon is great fun! "Fun for Now, Skills for Life" is more than a logo phrase but is truly what happens at camp. Falcon is accredited by the American Camp Association and we are celebrating our 62nd year. Campers join Falcon from across the country and from around the world. Located two hours south of Cleveland, an hour and a half west of Pittsburgh and 3 hours east of Columbus, many of our families have an easy drive to camp. There is easy airport pickup as Falcon typically hosts campers from about 15 different states and multiple countries each year. References are available and everyone is welcome to contact Falcon for more information: email info@falconcamp.com, phone 800/837-CAMP, or visit the website, www.falconcamp.com.This is an outstanding opportunity to experience an excellent summer! At Falcon, good things happen by design.

[aijamisespava]

How Each Eurovision Year "Treated" Me

The coolest thing about Eurovision in my opinion is also the most suspenseful, exhilarating, and sometimes tragic. And that is finding out where your favorite ranked among the others. Sometimes it's fun (especially when your favorite wins or does super well), sometimes it's...well...tragic (the dreaded NQ). And that got me thinking. How did MY personal favorites fare out on average in each year?

With that, I looked at my top 13 songs each year I have ranked (2008 to the present) and found the average ranking that they each got in the contest. I will be putting them in order from worst to best, and will note potential outliers (the NQs) in each year. I'll spare too much explanation and just give you the countries (Unpopular opinions ahead? Maybe).

Before I begin, this ranking isn't super fair because the Big 5 automatically qualify, and there are a different number of participants. But this is all in good fun!

15. 2008. Avg. Placement: 22.15. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Switzerland, San Marino (Dead Last), N. Macedonia, Andorra 14. 2009. Avg. Placement: 21.15. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Slovenia, Switzerland, Hungary, Poland, Cyprus, Belarus, Montenegro, Ireland 13. 2022. Avg. Placement: 19.31. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Ireland, Bulgaria, Austria 12. 2011. Avg. Placement: 18.23. Outlier Countries in Top 13: San Marino, Netherlands (Dead Last), Latvia, Bulgaria 11. 2018. Avg. Placement: 16.85. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Belarus (Personal Winner), Switzerland 10. 2010. Avg. Placement: 16.62. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Sweden, N. Macedonia, Slovakia 9. 2023. Avg. Placement: 16.23. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Latvia (Personal Winner), Georgia 8. 2017. Avg. Placement: 15.15. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Albania, Estonia 7. 2021. Avg. Placement: 14.62. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Romania, Denmark 6. 2016. Avg. Placement: 13.69. Outlier Countries in Top 13: N. Macedonia, Iceland 5. 2012. Avg. Placement: 13.46. Outlier Countries in Top 13: None. All my Top 13 made the Grand Final 4. 2015. Avg. Placement: 13.15. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Ireland, Moldova 3. 2014. Avg. Placement: 12.38. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Israel, Ireland 2. 2013. Avg. Placement: 11.92. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Israel 1. 2019. Avg. Placement: 11.38. Outlier Countries in Top 13: Poland, Belgium

Conclusions: There were some things that didn't surprise me that much. The two years where the entries that finished Dead Last (2008 and 2011) ranked low as well as the years where my personal winner NQed (2018 and 2023). I can definitely see 2009 ranking low since a I had a whopping 8 entries in the top 13 NQ. There were some surprises, though. The fact 2012 wasn't my best finishing year with all of my Top 13 making the Grand Final was a little surprising. However, my 2012 winner finished 13th whereas my personal winners in the years ahead were 4th, 3rd, 11th (outlier), and 1st. I also am not that surprised that 2019 was my best year as I agreed on both the winner and 3rd place, with the rest of the top 8 making my top 13.

That was so much fun to do, and I hope that you enjoyed the read! Until next time then everyone!

[certproperty]

As 2022 draws to a close, we take a look at the UK property market over the last 12 months and see how Manchester compares to Birmingham, Bristol, Edinburgh, Leeds and Glasgow (JLL’s ‘Big Six’ UK cities outside of London).

2022 has been pivotal in demonstrating the country’s recovery from the pandemic. The demand for homes across the “Big Six” cities has risen compared to 2020 and early 2021, where more households left urban areas in favour of the countryside. However, 2022 has shown that the pandemic is well and truly behind us with students and young professionals returning to the cities, causing a spike in rents and property prices alike, as demand exceeds supply within cities with growing populations.

Manchester’s property market is showing no signs of slowing down as the growing population continues to boost the economy and therefore the property market. Manchester offers both owner-occupiers and investors plenty of choices.

Looking into future projections, we dive into what this means for 2023 and beyond, taking facts and figures from the UK’s top property sources.

How is Manchester’s economy performing compared to its 5 main city-region competitors?

The Big Six were responsible for contributing a combined £15.2bn to the UK economy, with their combined economies growing 22% in the last 10 years. Manchester leads the GVA growth by city, with almost 35% 10-year historic growth, and a further 25% projected growth for the next 10 years.

Manchester’s economy is driven by high-growth modern industry sectors, having strong financial services, tech and creative businesses. This is a combination of both home-grown and high-growth businesses such as The Hut Group, UK Fast, and Boohoo, and national and international businesses relocating to the city. As recently as December 2022, Starling Bank has hailed Manchester’s “deep pool of tech talent and rich cultural and creative heritage” as key to its decision to open an office in the city and is set to create up to 1,000 jobs. This is just one recent example of many major financial services and tech businesses opening or relocating to the city.Not only has Manchester had the highest 10 year historic growth, it also has the highest 10 year forecasted growth of JLL’s ‘Big Six’ cities. (Source – JLL’s Big Six Residential Development Report 2022)

The city has seen large-scale investment into infrastructure such as the ongoing Metrolink expansion with over £1.5bn spent developing and expanding the tram network within the city since 2010. The government’s Northern Powerhouse rail has also recently been reaffirmed and the £39 billion investment project will improve the east-to-west travel links in the North, contributing an estimated £14.4 billion to the UK economy.

Manchester Airport is also the busiest UK airport outside of London, benefitting from the first phase of the huge £1 billion investment with the upgrade of Terminal 2 and the airport city development. The city is also awaiting the arrival of the HS2 between 2035-2040, another £44.6 billion investment which will see travel times from Manchester to London halved.

Growing population = growing demand

Manchester led the ‘Big Six’s population growth over the last 10 years with 10.7%, as people moved north away from London in search of a more affordable lifestyle in a city that still offers big city life, with a further 100,000 people predicted to move into Manchester city centre by 2025. The city saw the highest number of people moving there from elsewhere in the UK in 2021, totalling 58,800, with young professionals making up 35,000 of this figure.Manchester has had the highest level of population growth over the past ten years (10.7%), followed closely by Edinburgh (10.5%). (Source – JLL’s Big Six Residential Development Report 2022)

Manchester gathered many accolades in 2022, with its Northern Quarter being featured on two of Time Out’s Coolest Neighbourhood Lists – coming in at number 30 on the Top 51 Coolest Neighbourhoods In The World and number 4 on the Top 12 Coolest Neighbourhoods In The UK and it’s neighbour, Ancoats, named number 21 on the Top 33 Coolest Streets In The World. National Geographic also named it in the top 25 ‘Best of the World 2023’ list, citing the city’s art scene and famous football teams, and Lonely Planet recognised Manchester in the ‘Learn’ category of its ‘Best of Travel 2023’ list, the only UK city to feature. The thriving northern city was also named the UK’s top tech city outside of London in CBRE’s latest “UK Tech Cities Report”, retaining its position at the top following previous reports in 2017 and 2019. 

It’s no surprise Manchester was also named UK’s Most Liveable City once again, according to The Economist’s Global Liveability Index 2022, making it the 28th Most Liveable City In The World, beating London by 5 places. This is an accolade the city has held each year since the Global Liveability Survey by the Economist Intelligence Unit began in 2011, where cities are ranked according to factors such as political stability, infrastructure, healthcare, graduate retention rates, and access to green space. 

Manchester has the highest graduate retention rates in England, with more than 50 percent of students who study there opting to stay after they finish uni, with almost a third of people moving to Manchester from other parts of the UK aged 20-24, and young professionals aged 20-34 making up 59% of newcomers to the city annually.Young professionals aged 20-34 make up 59% of newcomers to the city annually. (Source – JLL’s Big Six Residential Development Report 2022)

Job opportunities continue to rise

Manchester employment has seen a 32% growth in employment over the last 10 years, almost twice nearly all the other cities. As more businesses come into the city, the demand skyrockets for people to work in industries such as tech, logistics, banking, and property amongst others, with 80 of the 100 Financial Times Stock Exchange’s companies having offices in Manchester. Manchester is also the European headquarters for companies like Brother and UAE firm Etihad Airways, and accounts for 7% of all financial services output and 10% of all employment in the UK.

Employment growth in the city is projected to be 14.7% through to 2040. This is a significantly high figure, particularly where the majority of the growth is from the professional, scientific, and technical services sectors, meaning high-value jobs created for professional workers with a significant disposal income available to spend on rent. The proportion of earnings spent on rent has been steadily declining in recent years and sits below the long-term average. The average renter spent 35% of their pre-tax income on rent in 2022, down from closer to 40% five years previously. For couples and sharers, this figure will be even lower.Manchester displays the highest 10-year employment growth out of the Top 6 UK Cities in the report. (Source – JLL’s Big Six Residential Development Report 2022)

How does Manchester’s House Price Growth compare to the rest of the UK?

Manchester shows great potential for house price growth as it is expected to be one of the strongest housing markets in the UK outside of London. JLL’s UK Residential Forecasts Q4 2022 reports that Manchester has the highest house price growth forecast of any UK city, with a 19.3% cumulative from 2023-2027, equalling the figure for Central London. (Source – JLL’s Big Six Residential Development Report 2022)

Manchester rental market shows the highest forecasted growth of any UK city in the next 5 years

Urban Bubble’s 2022 letting market report stated that Manchester’s lettings activity in 2022 was down almost a third compared to 2021, simply due to a lack of properties available to rent. The report stated that the number of properties available to rent in Manchester hit its lowest rate on record, just 360 properties across the entire city centre, during the third quarter of 2022. This caused asking rents to hit new highs during 2022, with rents achieved for new developments in the city centre increasing 18% in the summer compared with the same point a year earlier in 2021. The increased figures were partly a correction following obvious falls during 2020, but rents are still 15% higher on average than they were three years ago in 2019. The demand for new rental properties in Manchester has resulted in significant annual increases, up by 18.3% in the last 12 months.

Looking forward, JLL’s UK Residential Forecasts Q4 2022 reports that as well as the highest house price growth, Manchester also has the highest rental growth forecast of any UK city, with a 21.6% cumulative from 2023-2027. This is higher than the figure for Central London (19.9%), which means that Manchester has the highest forecast rental growth of any UK city, averaging 4% pa for the next 4 years.  (Source – JLL’s Big Six Residential Development Report 2022)

Will Manchester continue to thrive as a top property investment hotspot in 2023?

The projections for Manchester’s future as the UK’s leading property market look strong. The Build to Rent sector is set to grow 82% in the next five years, according to global property consultancy Knight Frank, with Manchester being the most active market.

With rental stock in Manchester still in short supply and alongside this unemployment is near record lows, wage growth remains strong, and access to mortgage finance is restricting owner occupation, this outlook is supporting rental growth and price growth through competition from Manchester’s growing population of tenants for a limited supply of properties and from a growing number of investors seeking to acquire properties in the UK’s leading property market.

Find out more about Manchester’s property market in our free Manchester Investment Guide or see how we can help you meet your property investment goals by arranging a no-obligation call with one of our Property Investment Consultants.

[rhettlevin]

Ooh this looks fun!

Mu unnamed world Summarized

1) Does this world resemble earth?

It's globe-shaped, with familiar weather and seasons.

2) What is a defining characteristic of this world?

The sky

3) What creatures roam this world?

Plenty! Humans, elves, wolves, bears, dragons, rabbits, whales, dogs, foxes to name a few off the top of my head.

4) Is there a magic that is used?

Big yes.

5) What languages are spoken?

Chandiran, Old/Ancient Lyettan, New Lyettan, Hysh, Aῆagnan and Imiselinic.

6) What is special to this world?

The night sky never stops moving and is more like sparkles of light on a dark ocean rather than having fixed stars. There is one fixed star around which the seven havens (occupied moons) orbit.

7) What makes it fantastical?

Sorcerers, wizards, mages (in order of decreasing power), dragons, talking beasts, and a pantheon of totally competent and non-petty gods.

8) Is Earth mentioned in this world?

No

9) What clothing do creatures here wear?

Very much depends on where they're from. The elves of Imeselinos wear light, flowing garments like ancient Greeks; the humans of Aῆagne wearing bold geometric patterned fabrics; the old Lyettans wear dark colours and many thick layers to deal with the cold; the Hysh favour water-repellent fabrics especially wyvern skin; and Chandira is a huge country so in the south they wear loose, brightly coloured clothes that protect their skin from the sun, while in the north they wear thicker, heavier clothes which aren't as easy to embellish (although attempts are still made through studs).

10) Describe the aesthetic

Mysterious

11) Is it similar to another fantasy world?

Game of Thrones

12) Give a brief description of the history

Someone gets powerful - oh no too much power - explosion - repeat ad nauseum.

13) What is the government system? Is there one?

In the first era, Lyet is ruled by a council of sorcerers, Aῆagne is a monarchy, Chandira is a group of disparate merchant kingdoms and Hyshan is ruled by a warlord. In the second era, Lyet is ungoverned, Aῆagne is now a theocracy; Chandira is now an empire and Hyshan is a mystery.

14) How about describing some of the diversity?

Game of Thronesy with elves and talking beasts.

15) What is ideal of this world?

Power

16) What is a distinct inequality in this world?

Patriarchal societies dominate.

17) Is the world a background or woven into the plot?

The plot shaped the world, and then the world began to shape the plot. They're very much symbiotic.

18) What is the coolest thing about this world?

I really like the everchanging sky. It's the beginning and end of all things, like a caustic primordial soup.

19) What inspired this world?

The plot.

20) What would you give to go there?

£50. Look, it's an interesting world but it's not a prime holiday location...

21) Why would you want to go there?

To speak to a wolf.

Saw this checklist by @lyralit and I decided to challenge myself to answer all the questions in one word only because insomnia is insomniaing

Illaros Summarized

1) Does this world resemble earth?

Kinda

2) What is a defining characteristic of this world?

Wet

3) What creatures roam this world?

Fish

4) Is there a magic that is used?

Yes

5) What languages are spoken?

Lots

6) What is special to this world?

'Stars'

7) What makes it fantastical?

Magi-industry

8) Is Earth mentioned in this world?

No

9) What clothing do creatures here wear?

Colorful

10) Describe the aesthetic

Swashbuckling

11) Is it similar to another fantasy world?

Camorr

12) Give a brief description of the history

Boom!

13) What is the government system? Is there one?

Fucked

14) How about describing some of the diversity?

Dnd-esque

15) What is ideal of this world?

Horizon

16) What is a distinct inequality in this world?

Classism

17) Is the world a background or woven into the plot?

Plot

18) What is the coolest thing about this world?

'Stars'

19) What inspired this world?

Dream

20) What would you give to go there?

Finger

21) Why would you want to go there?

Scientist

Please anyone feel free to do this for your wip, it was a lot of fun lol

(I'll throw the taglist on for shit and giggles ;)) @amandacanwrite @elsie-writes @riveriafalll @kosmic-kore @kaylinalexanderbooks

@bard-coded @carrotsinnovember @patternwelded-quill @somethingclevermahogony @whatwewrotepodcast

@goldxdarkness @the-angriest-author @mk-writes-stuff @frostedlemonwriter @vyuntspakhkite-l-darling

@thebejeweledwatercat