Everybody welcome back to flag fan Friday. Hope you like the Madagascar episode
Alright, so, you know the deal before we go into it
This is usually the part where I either like add stuff that we didn't talk about in the episode or I kind of fix up
The small mistakes we made one thing I wanted to talk about, but we just didn't have time
Was the fact that the country has these kind of like taboos called Fadi they exist either nationally or regionally
some of them might include
See what I have here in my notes don't wear red at a Funeral or point a finger at a grave
Don't bring pork to certain sites like the 12 sacred Hills of Antananarivo
According to some of the people groups giving birth to twins is considered bad luck in some areas
It's customary to wash your hands and your mouth before getting into a boat for certain lakes in certain areas
You cannot pass an egg from one hand to the other and according to many of the people groups
You must bring a white male chicken with you if you climb modern moco
Throw summit the tallest peak in Madagascar on another thing Madagascar is very famous for their Lombok cloths
another thing that I kind of wish I could have talked a little bit more about was the fact that in the 70s they were
Kind of like under the influence of Soviet political ideologies and those were kind of like the weird years
But anyway, yeah, it's just too much look into if you're interested, but we got to move on. So without further ado
Madagascar it's like a black and Asian country. It's a blasian country. So unique. What else can we cover?
Oh, yeah
The flag the flag of Madagascar has two horizontal bars of red and green
adjacent to a vertical white band on the left waist side the red and white stands for the kingdom of Marina which previously ruled the
Land prior to the French taking over in the 19th century
Some say the colors may also stand for the ethnic origins of the Malagasy people being from Southeast Asia
Which is why Indonesia's flag also contains red and white. However, this claim is not completely confirmed
But hey
the green gives honour to the Hova the largest class of commoners in
Madagascar that played an important role in the independence movement against the French prior to this, of course
They're under the French flag under French colonialism prior to that
It was the Malagasy Protectorate under the French which has this flag
And it had like a little crescent on the hoist side and prior to that
It was the marina Kingdom yours which they had this swag, which was basically indistinguishable from the modern flag of Poland
Yeah that Kingdom was important in their history
I mean looking up lots of stories on just a little side note. You might see this flag every so often in Madagascar
It's the flag of the ethnic morena people the largest people group in Madagascar
But anyway, yeah moving on the coat of arms, which is not a coat of arms. It is a national seal
The seal is a yellow disc which contains a red outline map of the country in the center in a white circle with the disputed
Glorioso and tromelin islands included
Yep Conflict claim statements and symbolism is great, isn't it from the center radiates green and red rays?
Positioned in a way to emulate the Ravana LaPlante endemic to the country
All of this is placed above the head of a zebu cattle with the words above on the top of the seal Republic honey, II
Madagascar Kara meaning the Republic of Madagascar and I'm a base the words. Oh, geez. Let me try this tanning trot
Sauna, ha ha ha Hana and fawned Rosa Juana which means home and liberty and development
Keep in mind though throughout the years. They've had quite a few steel changes
The last one was white instead of yellow during those years. They dabbled in socialism. They used this emblem
Which kind of used a lot of Soviet influence imagery right after independence?
They use these under the French they used this during the marina Kingdom years
They actually did have a coat of arms and the Queen actually had her own
But yeah, basically when it comes to Madagascar symbolism
They are very intent on making sure that you know that they are a unique people group descended from austronesians
all right now with that all being done and said
You know what time it is geography fan mail time over the past few weeks. It's been kind of piling up
Let's just get it over with alright, so, you know the deal we always start off with postcards. We got a lot of them
Let's just cover it Jakub who is checked, but sent this from the Netherlands Holland Alex sent this from San Marino Ian from Denver, Colorado
Mitch sent this from Bonn Germany Garrett from Orange County my fellow, California
We got two postcards from Japan Timothy who is Filipino but was visiting Osaka Osaka Castle and Spencer. Who is from, North Carolina
But is studying at BYU and Utah and he went to Japan for his two-year missionary trip and take a wild guess and say that
You're Mormon because that is like the most Mormon thing to say policy
Chris sent this from Belgrade Serbia, Emma whom I believe is German, but she was visiting Latvia. I think her name is Jonathon
He visited India specifically the town of link or and I believe there's a Tibetan Buddhist
Building Stephan from Germany visited Stein tail from Seattle Alex who is a seminary student in Montreal visited the Vatican
Sammy sent this from Scotland. I was really cool
This is like a holographic postcard and it was sent from Alexey and Alexandra from Germany is really cool
Fred sends this from Kenya Nairobi on this great Katya and Matteo
They sent this from Italy and they outlined the letter in the handprint of their daughter
If you guys don't remember, these are the people that hosted me and my mom when we visited the Tuscany region of Italy
Thank you guys so much by the way, how you doing?
Hope your daughter's doing great. And you have a son coming along the way Congrats
Okay. Now we have a lot of letters to open up Josh from the UK. Thank you for sending these are British candies lollies
I guess you call them a circa from Ireland. It would be really super happy mega
Awesome, if you could open this one on episode closest to May 30th, because that's my birthday. Well, happy birthday
Circa, but it is cool. I actually got something from China
it's not very often that I get something from China because you know
The the internet rules over there unless you have a VPN proxy server. You can't watch YouTube
So usually I get stuff from like Taiwan or Hong Kong. But yeah, Kevin from Beijing Wow
He sends its really cool postcard of the Forbidden City says I'm a viewer from Beijing and you have a community from Beijing
I've been watching since the Germany episode. That's really cool. It's like even though YouTube is restricted out there
You still find a way to watch it. And that's crazy. You guys are I appreciate that. Alright Prashant from India. Ooh
Flag hey Paul, Noah, ken Keith and Caleb, by the way, guys, you can send fan mail to those guys too. Not just me
I am sending you an authentic flag made of cloth specifically khadi cloth from the
Karnataka kadhi gram mood yoga Samyukta song area they are the only
producers authorised by the Government of India to produce flags Oh
Andre from Poland beautiful postcards of Warsaw the capital big old book on Poland
Well, I hope I do the Poland episode of justice and I hope you like it man. It is really cool
We got something from Belarus. I think I've only gotten a few things from Belarus before so you're in the minority little fridge magnets
Hey Barb's and the team. I'm Yulia from the beautiful country Belarus, by the way
We have a 5 day free visa for tourists applied in 2017. I heard of that. It's really tempting me now
I really wish I could go sometime then from, Missouri
I'm sending you some local honey that my dad and his old work pal Karthus. Ah, this is really cool
We got something from curse out
Yeah, look at these postcards and of course the coração flag on top I Barb's how are you? My name is Kevin?
I'm 24 from coração, here are a few sentences
You can say in papiamentu heavily resembles a mixture of Spanish and Portuguese one. Beanie means welcome quanta by means
How are you, Bon? Dia Tati? No Qi means. Good morning afternoon evening
Nolan from Illinois, he is a Russian American. He's proud of it Ava from
Kosovo
Serbians I know I know. Hey, I'm Ava I'm from Kosovo. I was born and raised in Pristina
I learned from your videos and found out some information on countries. I didn't even know existed good for you sometimes
I wonder if you're gonna do an episode on Kosovo. Yes
So Ava as you know
I'm following the UN and so
I'm gonna do all the fully recognized States first and then the observer States Kosovo is an observer state so you will have to wait
I'm sorry, but yes, that's the rule. I follow I go by what the UN does
Yeah, I think that's very ancient
I've gotten postcards from Kosovo
But I've never gotten like an actual close of our person send me something. So I think you're the first one. Thank you
Okay. Now this is the best thing ever Mateus from the Czech Republic. He wrote like the funniest letter ever
First of all, I'm guessing he drew a picture of him and his friends on the letter
He says hey Barb's after two days. We have finally finished watching all the geography now episodes in a marathon
We started at 4 p.m. On Friday
We went to sleep after the Republic of Congo we continued to get on Saturday from Costa Rica at the Iceland episode
We took a bottle of wine and played the drinking game due to your horrible pronunciations
We ran out of wine before the episode ended we started to go crazy around the Ireland episode
But we made it at 2 a.m. We finally finished the Luxembourg episode
We'd like to ask you a small favor
Please use Comic Sans in your video at least once also try to say this Czech tongues twister. Oh, geez stole
teacher yet
Awesome, and he also sent this picture of the GN crew me Noah Ken and Keith and over there on the side at the Bob
Saget
You go check people. I get you check people are party animals, you know that and now we got some packages
Let's open them up first one Tyler from Pennsylvania. This is a ship happy
Shippensburg University I've sent you a t-shirt from my school shit finn's burg University PS. I hope I got your shirt size, correct
Let me check. Is it a men's size medium? Ah
Yeah, you didn't get a large. Sorry, man. You got it wrong
I'm a men's size medium medium just uh, just a little heads up. Okay next up
We got a package from Ireland. Okay. Look at that. This is the most Irish thing I've ever seen in my life
Leprechaun on top of the box what is inside? Oh
They love these chips so much. They literally made a theme park based off of them
What is this a shamrock thing and a leprechaun hat? I guess a leprechaun glasses
Leprechaun bowtie. Hey Paul, my name is pronounced Ian with an R before it rien, I guess rien rien
Okay Your name is Ryan and I am a teacher here in Ireland while watching a flag Friday episode the children asked if they could send
You any something and we put together this little box for you
If you could show this in one of your videos, it would make them so very happy. Well, not only am I showing it
I'm wearing it. There is also a letter here for you written in going to get the Irish language. Yeah, that's so cool
I honestly think that's one of the coolest things about Ireland just the fact that you're trying to keep the language alive
Keep on speaking your language and finally one more package from Denmark
Hey Barb's that right - from Aarhus Denmark as a historian
It's very interesting to learn about new information and often inspires me to research more
I send you some Danish stuff nice little postcard, of course Legoland Danish flag
Danish schnapps, by the way, as we always say kids if you're underage do not drink we do not condone underage drinking
I am of age though so I can enjoy this but if you are not of age do not drink and even if you are
Of age drink responsibly. Yeah, I can't wait to try this. All right, so that's just about it
But before we go, you know what time it is it's time for a return address contest
I put all of your return addresses in this bag right here
I pick one out and whoever wins I send a little gift - and that gift is a scratch-off map
We are collaborating with geography Frederico. He has his own online store where he sells these things
It's at this link right here, or you can go to the one in the description
So if you win you get one for free if you don't win you can buy one if you want
But yeah, let's do this. All right, so I'm just gonna pick
See
Aziz from
Kazakhstan, ooh, we never got a Kazakhstan equator before you just want to yeah guys. That's the episode
Thank you so much for putting all your hometowns and places and countries on display. Really appreciate it. Thanks for watching
You guys have just been flagged stay tuned for the next episode stay cool. Stay tuned. I kind of just said that but whatever