Hello, everyone.
Welcome to this September and October edition of This Month in Flag News.
I am Vexillographer, and our first story today comes from the United States state of Vermont,
specifically the city of Burlington, the largest city in Vermont.
Now, on October 20th, seven finalist designs were announced by the city of Burlington for
their new flag contest.
Apparently, at some point, city officials took a look at their current flag.
Someone I guess found the magic lamp hidden deep inside of it, a genie popped out, granted
them three wishes.
One of their wishes was apparently for a new Burlington city flag, so they're getting a
new one.
These are the seven finalist designs.
You can take a look at them at this website and read about what they symbolize.
Now, you'll notice, a lot of the colors green, white, and blue show up a lot.
A lot of the designers use green to represent the Green Mountains, white to represent the
tons of snow that Burlington gets every year, and the blue makes sense because Burlington
is located right on the shoreline of Lake Champlain.
Now, you'll notice a lot of the designs on the website aren't really given the most interesting
names.
You know, Finalist A, Finalist B, Finalist C, etc.
I personally might have given them slightly more creative names than that.
For example, this one, Finalist F?
I probably would've called it "Borington".
Finalist G. I might call it "Burlington and Herzegovina".
Now, if you're from Burlington, Vermont, you can go to this website and vote on what you
think of each of the seven finalist designs.
Voting is open until November 17, and the winner will be announced on November 20th.
It's pretty exciting.
But remember, voting is only for Burlington residents, guys; I don't want to see any of
you cheating, okay?
It's wrong, and even if you try to cheat, there's no way you're gonna get past the double-layer
security system on the website, okay?
It's super sophisticated; let me show you.
The first layer of security?
A checkmark: "I certify that I live, work, go to school in, or own a business in Burlington."
No way you can get past that; only Burlington residents can check that checkmark.
Super secure.
And the next layer of security?
Your first name and last name.
So I guess someone with a phone book or something will double-check to make sure that you are
indeed having a name of someone who lives in Burlington, okay?
So again, no way to get past that.
No way.
There's just no way.
No one will able... no one is able to get past that.
Not at all.
There's no way.
Anyway, let's move on to our next story.
The past couple of months have been a very big time for independence movements all around
the world.
So let's talk about four of these independence movements, the flags they're using, and basically
how the independence thing is going for them so far.
And let's start with the one that's probably in the headlines the most lately: a region
of Spain called Catalonia.
It's in the northeastern area of the country, and many of the Catalonian people have been
wanting their independence from Spain for quite a while.
On October 1st of this year, however, they finally had an independence referendum...
that the government of Spain tried really hard to shut down.
Now, okay, so what about the flags they're using?
So this is a flag that you'll probably see in a lot of the pictures of the enormous rallies
and protests that have been happening in Catalonia, especially in the city of Barcelona.
This is the Blue Estelada flag.
It's basically the official flag of Catalonia, but with an extra blue triangle and a white
star on it.
This was largely inspired by the flag of Cuba and possibly the flag of Puerto Rico, which
both got their independence from Spain about a century ago.
So this is the main flag being used by a lot of the protesters in the Catalonia independence
movement.
So, how is the independence thing going for them so far?
Well, after the referendum, the Spanish authorities sent a lot of people by force to shut down
all of the independence stuff.
The leaders of Catalonia have fled the country trying to avoid arrest, and Spain has removed
their autonomous rule.
So basically, the Madrid government is now directly ruling Catalonia from Madrid.
So, how's the independence thing going for Catalonia?
Not great.
Okay, who's next?
Now let's check in on the Kurdish independence movement, especially the one in northern Iraq.
Now, the Kurdish people live in many countries in the Middle East: Turkey, Iran, Syria, Iraq.
But the part in Iraq is particularly interesting right about now.
On September 25, they held a non-binding independence referendum, and a lot of people were flying
this flag out in the streets.
The red here represents those who died for their cause.
The white represents peace.
The green represents natural beauty of Kurdistan.
And in the center is a yellow sun with 21 rays.
Now apparently, the sun and the number 21 are very important and significant to a traditional
Kurdish religion.
So, how did the Iraqi government respond to this referendum?
Well, they sent in the military to take over key areas, like an oil field and a major city
called Kirkuk.
They shut down air travel in northern Iraq, and the leader - the President of this Iraqi
Kurdistan - has resigned.
So, how's the independence thing working out for Iraqi Kurdistan?
Not well, okay.
All right.
Now what?
Now, the enormous island of New Guinea, north of Australia, is currently divided between
two national governments.
The eastern half of the island is controlled by the nation of Papua New Guinea.
The western half of the island, called West Papua, is currently under the control of the
government of Indonesia.
Now, in 1961, it was not under the control of Indonesia; it was under control of the
Dutch.
But it was looking like they were going to get their independence soon, so they got this
flag ready to go for West Papua.
It's called the Morning Star Flag.
The red represents their struggle.
The stripes represent the different tribes that live on West Papua.
And the star represents hope.
They were working on getting their independence, but in the 1960s Indonesia invaded and basically
took control of West Papua for itself, and it is still controlled by Indonesia to this
day.
And pretty much ever since then, West Papua has been trying to get its independence from
Indonesia.
So, this flag is still around, but now it's more of an independence movement than the
actual flag that they were gonna use for their country that they never got to have.
So how's that been going for them?
Well, Indonesia has made this flag illegal.
Also, Indonesian military forces have over the years arrested and killed thousands of
people for protesting this whole situation.
More recently this year, a petition was gathered with thousands of West Papuan signatures.
It was sent to a United Nations committee to have their cause heard; and the United
Nations committee, partially because they didn't want to offend Indonesia, rejected
their petition.
So, how is that independence movement going?
Yes, that's what I thought.
That's what I thought.
And there's also an independence movement going on in southwestern Cameroon, a country
in central Africa.
So, how's that one going about?
Well, in Southern Cameroon, there is an area that actually uses English as its main language
of business and commerce and stuff even though most of Cameroon uses French for the same
purpose, because most of Cameroon used to be a French colony.
But Southern Cameroon, this particular area of Cameroon, used to be a British colony.
So, how'd that happen?
Well, when colonization was ending, Southern Cameroon got the chance to vote on whether
it wanted to be part of the new country of Nigeria or the new country of Cameroon.
They voted to be with Cameroon.
So you have this situation where most of the country uses French for its commerce and business
purposes, but Southern Cameroon - this particular part - uses English.
Some countries have been able to make that work, but Cameroon doesn't seem to be wanting
that to happen.
Lately, the government of Cameroon has been sending teachers to the schools in that area.
Little problem: the teachers speak French and the students speak English.
That doesn't sound like a good plan for a successful classroom if you ask me.
Teachers and students should probably understand each other.
So, a lot of people are protesting that, and some people in Southern Cameroon have gone
so far as to propose a new country to split off from Cameroon, called "Ambazonia".
And this is the flag of Ambazonia that they have been proposing.
This blue represents government and law.
White represents purity.
And the dove holding a branch appears to be a biblical reference, perhaps from the story
of Noah and the Genesis flood.
And the dove itself represents the Spirit of God.
Now, how is this particular movement going?
Well... the government of Cameroon, in response to many of the protests, has repeatedly shut
down internet access in Southern Cameroon, and has beat up people, and has gotten pretty
violent, and has killed many of the protesters.
And apparently, the violence has gotten so bad that tens of thousands of Southern Cameroonians
have become refugees and are fleeing the violence into Nigeria.
So, how's that one going?
Yeah, that's not going well at all.
All right, I'll be right back with a happier story.
Hold on.
And finally tonight, we have a story coming from the city of Montréal, the second-largest
city in Canada.
This is the current flag of the city of Montréal as of September 2017.
It's a pretty new flag, about a month old.
So, what's with the new change?
Well, let's take a look at what these things on the flag represent.
Each of these five little symbols represents one of the original settlers of the Montréal
area.
We've got a thistle, we've got a rose, we've got a lily, we have a pine tree, we have a
clover.
Man, with the maple leaf, too...
Canada sure seems to like its plants on its flags.
Anyway.
But, what was the flag of Montréal before last month?
Okay, this was the flag of Montréal from 1939 to 2017.
What's with the lack of pine tree?
What's up with that?
Well, let's take a look at what each of these little plant things represents.
The thistle represents the Scottish.
The clover represents the Irish.
The rose represents the English.
And the French are represented by this lily, or fleur-de-lis, symbol which you can also
see on the Québec flag... four times.
That's a lot of plants.
Don't tell anyone guys, but I think Canada is secretly being run by botanists.
Shh.
So why was the pine tree added?
What does the pine tree represent?
Well, it might have something to do with the fact that September 13, 2017, was the tenth
anniversary of the international Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
So I guess around this time, as this anniversary was approaching, Montréal was thinking to
itself - probably in a French accent - "Ohh!
I seem to have forgotten somebody.
Hon hon, silly moi."
And yes, Montréal had forgotten people like the Mohawk Nation or the Huron Nation.
You know, the First Nations of Canada, who were here before any of the other little flowers
showed up.
So to commemorate the anniversary of this Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples,
Montréal added a pine tree to represent the indigenous peoples of the Montréal area.
I think that's a very nice symbolic move.
You know, Canada has not shown much respect to its indigenous peoples over the years, but
they're... y'know, it's a little step.
It's a baby step.
It's something, at least.
And it's a nice shout-out.
And it's actually a pretty good symbol because one of the nations, the Mohawk Nation, was
one of the original members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy.
It was an alliance of indigenous nations that goes back hundreds and hundreds of years.
And their flag - their awesome flag - has a tree in the center as well.
So a pine tree is a great symbol to represent the indigenous peoples of this area.
So that is why the city of Montréal added a tree, y'all.
[booing] All right, okay okay okay okay, I'm done.
I'm done.
Thank you everyone for watching this September/October edition of This Month in Flag News.
I am Vexillographer, and good night.
Or, "bon nuit."