The Maori people wept with joy. They celebrated their beloved river being granted the same rights as a human being by the New Zealand government. This means the river now has a legal right to exist. Defenders of the river can now use the courts to sue anyone who seeks to harm it.
Four Day Work Week
The English language is full of idioms extolling the virtues of hard work. We praise employees who are willing to fight tooth and nail for the company. Someone ready to go the extra mile is the kind of worker we want on our team. But employees who keep their noses to the grindstone might not be what companies need to be successful.
Two Minutes To Midnight
How close are we to doomsday – the destruction of the planet and the end of life as we know it? The Doomsday Clock is a symbolic way to answer this question. In 1947, a group of scientists who had worked on the world’s first atomic bomb started tracking how close the world is to doomsday. They marked the end of the world at midnight on their metaphorical Doomsday Clock. The clock is adjusted yearly according to political instability and environmental dangers that threaten the safety of the world.
Handshake History
There’s an amazing diversity of greeting customs around the world. In Tibet sticking out your tongue can be a way of welcoming people. In New Zealand, Maori greet each other by touching noses. Ethiopian men touch shoulders, and in the Democratic Republic of Congo, male friends touch foreheads. In many Asian countries, people bow to each other when meeting. And in some European countries, as well as Arab countries, hugs or kisses on the cheek are more the norm.
Adapted from image by: Donkey Hotey (CC BY 2.0)