title: Education in Sweden

text: Education in Sweden is mandatory for children between ages 5/6 and 15/16 depending on when on the year they were born. The school year in Sweden runs from mid–late August to early/mid–June. The Christmas holiday from mid–December to early January divides the Swedish school year into two terms.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Preschool is free for low-income families and subsidized with a price ceiling for all families. The year children turn six they start the compulsory preschool class (), which acts as a transition phase between preschool and comprehensive schools. Children between ages 5/6 and 15/16 attend comprehensive school where a wide range of subjects are studied. All students study the same subjects, with exception for different language choices. The majority of schools are run municipally, but there are also privately owned schools, known as independent schools.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Almost all students continue studying in three-year-long upper secondary schools where most students choose one out of 18 national programmes, some of which are vocational and some preparatory. For students not fulfilling the requirements for the national programmes, introductory programmes are available where students work to satisfy the requirements for the national programmes. In 2018, 16% of students finishing year 9 of comprehensive school were not eligible for national programmes.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The higher education system is compatible with the rest of Europe through the Bologna Process where degrees are divided into three cycles: basic level, advanced level and doctoral level. There are two degrees available in each cycle of different lengths. Universities have no tuition fees for Swedish citizens (as well for citizens of European Economic Area сountries), and student aid is available from the government.


title: Education in Sweden

text: According to Lars Petterson, the number of students grew slowly, 1900–1947, then shot up rapidly in the 1950s, and declined after 1962. The pattern of birth rates was a major factor. In addition Petterson points to the opening up of the gymnasium from a limited upper social base to the general population based on talent. In addition he points to the role of central economic planning, the widespread emphasis on education as a producer of economic growth and the expansion of white collar jobs. During the nineteenth century, as demand for education increased, more women entered the teaching force in many Western countries, including Sweden. By 1900, 66 percent of Sweden's teachers were women, many of whom worked in isolated rural areas.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In 1842, the Swedish parliament introduced a four-year primary school for children in Sweden, . In 1882 two grades were added to , grade 5 and 6. Some (pl.) also had grade 7 and 8, called . Schooling in Sweden became mandatory for seven years in the 1930s and for eight years in the 1950s. In 1962 the first version of the current compulsory school was introduced, with Swedish children having nine mandatory years in school – from August the year the child turns seven to June the year the child turns sixteen.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The 1962 curriculum included two different study paths, vocational and preparatory; this was however abolished in the 1969 revision. In 1980 came another major revision increasing the emphasis on theoretical subjects. In 1994 the grading system was changed and in the latest revision from 2011 the grading system was changed yet again, this time also introducing grades from year 6.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In 1905 was introduced for students wanting to continue studying after "." It had varying length between three and six years.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In 1968 was introduced with a similar structure to the current version. There were 22 different programmes, some of which were vocational and some preparatory. These programmes lasted between two and four years, something that was changed in 1991, making all programmes three years long.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Preschool is offered to all children whose parents are working, studying, unemployed or on parental leave from the age of one. From the age of three, all children are eligible for at least three hours of preschool education every day for free. Fees for children being at preschool for more than three hours a day or under three years of age are based on family income and number of children. Prices range from free to a maximum of 1 425 SEK (€135 or US$150) per month with exact rates set by the municipality.


title: Education in Sweden

text: It is intended to free up parents to work, establishing a foundation for children going into comprehensive schooling and promote fundamental values such as the equal value of all people. This is achieved through pedagogical activities prepared by preschool teachers often involving things such as play, singing and drawing. The preschool teachers should incorporate multiple educational moments each day.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The educational system in Sweden is based on a nine-year long comprehensive school (), with mandatory attendance between six–seven and fifteen–sixteen years of age.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In the Swedish compulsory school each student takes 16 compulsory subjects which are, sorted by time allocated: Swedish, mathematics, physical education, English, handicrafts, music, visual arts, technology, physics, chemistry, biology, history, social studies, religion, geography and home economics. All of these subjects are taken in all three school stages, lower stage (grades 1–3), middle stage (grade 4–6), and upper stage (grades 7–9).


title: Education in Sweden

text: In sixth grade students can also choose a non-compulsory foreign language course. Over 85% of grade 9 students studied a third language in 2017. All schools have to offer the three languages Spanish, French, and German. Many schools also offer additional help in the core subjects English and Swedish instead of the language course. Taking the language course can improve the students' final grade significantly and can be required for some more competitive upper secondary schools.


title: Education in Sweden

text: There is also a compulsory, non-graded student's choice subject () where the student can choose from various activities facilitated by the school. Students' choice has been criticized for potentially being a bad use of the students' and teachers' time.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In Sweden students start receiving grades from year 6 with proposals of changing it to year 4. Before grade 6 students receive an Individual Development Plan (, IUP) containing the teachers' assessment of the students' knowledge. Students have regular development talks with their teachers discussing how to improve based on their IUP and grades.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The grading system in compulsory school uses the grades A, B, C, D, and E as passing grades and F as failing. B and D work as filling grades, for when a student has not reached all objectives for C or A but has reached most of them. If the student cannot be graded, e.g. due to extensive truancy, the student will receive a dash instead of an F. A dash is not considered a grade. If a student is on the verge of receiving an F in a certain subject or course, the teacher responsible for that subject will notify the student and the student's parents. If a student is given an F, they will receive a written review of how to improve themselves.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The pupil's total score, which is used for application to upper secondary schools, is calculated by taking the pupil's subject grades and numerically adding them together, with the following letter to number conversion: E = 10, D = 12.5, C = 15, B = 17.5, and A = 20. This yields a maximum possible score of 340 for students taking 17 subjects. Pupils can have either 16 or 17 grades depending on if they take an additional language course on top of the 16 compulsory subjects. Pupils who do not study a foreign language or instead study extra Swedish or English will only have 16 grades and cannot receive a score higher than 320.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The sixteen subjects used to calculate the total must include the three core subjects – English, Swedish, and mathematics. If the pupil fails any of the core subjects, she or he lacks qualification to attend secondary school. However, the student can still attend the secondary school introduction program (), either to gain competence in the core subjects and start a secondary school programme or gain skills to enter employment.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In grades 3, 6 and 9 national tests are administered to all students in the Swedish grundskola. The primary aim of these tests are to ensure all students are assessed equivalently. The test results should be given special consideration by teachers when setting the students final grade.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In grade 3 the tests are framed around a story involving two children encountering mathematics and Swedish in everyday situations to make the test situation less intimidating. Only Swedish and mathematics have national tests in year 3. The results from the tests are not used for grading, as students do not receive grades before year 6.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In grade 6 and 9 there are tests for all three core subjects, Swedish, mathematics and English. These tests consist of both oral and written components. In grade 9 one science subject (physics, biology or chemistry) and one social science subject (civics, religion, geography or history) are tested as well.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The National Agency for Education also provide tests similar to the national tests for the purpose of assisting teachers with assessing students. These are sometimes confused for national tests; however, these tests are not mandatory and available for a greater variety of year levels and subjects.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The tests and mark schemes have been spread on the internet before the test date several times, resulting in widespread cheating. In these cases, substitute tests are to be used; however, these tests have been accused of not giving results consistent with the non-substitute tests by the Swedish Teachers' Union and cannot be used in Statistics Sweden's reports. The Swedish National Audit Office published a report regarding "the unauthorised dissemination of national tests" in 2018. The audit found the Swedish National Agency for Education's new guidelines for handling the national tests satisfactory, but implemented too late. The report recommended the Swedish School Inspectorate to monitor individual schools' compliance with these new guidelines.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In 2014, the National Agency for Education published guidelines to staff on how to act during incidents of armed violence. In the 2012–2017 period, the number of reports of physical violence in schools increased 129% and reports of threats increased by 46% in the same period according to the Swedish Work Environment Authority. The latter reports include all reported physical violence and threats, not only armed violence.


title: Education in Sweden

text: There are various types of primary education including Sámi schools, with special accommodations for the indigenous Sámi people, special needs schools for students with intellectual disabilities, and special schools for students with other disabilities such as deafness.


title: Education in Sweden

text: There is also komvux, adult education at the primary or secondary level, and introductory programmes for students who have failed compulsory education. Homeschooling is only permitted for students who for some reason, usually severe sickness, cannot participate in normal classroom education.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Upper secondary school, called "gymnasieskola", usually lasts for three years. It is elective, but with a 99% enrollment rate (OECD 2018). It is divided into 18 different national programmes with different educational focus. The system is course-based with the same courses being used for multiple programmes. There are also introductory programmes for students who do not satisfy the requirements for the national programmes. A significant number of these students are immigrants learning Swedish.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The national programmes are divided into two categories: preparatory and vocational. All national programmes give basic qualification to attend university, but preparatory programs typically also satisfy the additional requirements needed to study university courses in specific subject areas.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In 2018 approximately one third of students studying a national programme were studying a vocational programme, while two thirds were studying a preparatory programme.


title: Education in Sweden

text: All students take at least 2500 points worth of courses. Some of these courses are universal for students in all programmes. These courses are the Level 1 courses in each of the following subjects: English, Swedish, mathematics, religion, civics, natural science and physical education. In preparatory programmes additional English, Swedish and mathematics are also included as core courses.


title: Education in Sweden

text: There are also programme-specific and orientation-specific courses. Orientation-specific courses are the courses that a student elects to take by selecting an orientation within their programme. Finally, individually selected courses are courses that the student freely selects for herself/himself.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In all programs in upper secondary school, all students are required to do a diploma project. The diploma project is a project where the students are required to plan, execute and reflect on a bigger project related to something they have been studying. This project has two grading options, which is receiving an E (pass) or F (fail). The diploma project is not included in the students' merit value that is used towards further education.


title: Education in Sweden

text: To be eligible for upper secondary education, the pupil needs to pass eight out of sixteen subjects for the vocational programmes and 12 out of 16 for preparatory programmes. The pupil also needs to pass the three core subjects mathematics, Swedish and English.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In 2018, 15.6% of pupils who left compulsory education did not qualify to proceed to upper secondary education. This is a significant increase from 2011, the first year with the current syllabus, where 12.3% of pupils did not qualify. The group not mastering compulsory education is predominantly boys and pupils with foreign origin.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Pupils who did not qualify for upper secondary education can still proceed to an introductory programme () which helps students gain eligibility for the national programmes.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The prospective student applies to attend a certain program at a certain school, competing for entrance based upon his or her elementary school grades. In a few cases, such as the arts program () at certain schools, the student applies for both the program and the orientation. Some programmes, generally the arts programmes and certain more specialized programmes or orientations, have some form of entrance exam in addition to the elementary school grades.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Introductory programmes are for students who did not qualify for the national programmes, most often by failing Swedish, English or mathematics. There are different types of introductory programmes, the most common of which being language introduction for immigrants learning Swedish and individual alternative, a highly individualized programme intended to help students who did not satisfy the eligibility requirements for the national programmes gain eligibility.


title: Education in Sweden

text: After upper secondary school, students can apply to university in order to receive tertiary education. General academic degrees are offered by public universities and university colleges that tend to attract students on a regional basis. Besides general academic degrees, the higher education system also provides a number of professional degrees at a bachelor's or master's level in fields such as engineering, law and medicine. Independently from the Bologna Process-compatible university system, there is a system of higher vocational education where subject areas such as business finance and administration, IT, and hospitality and tourism are taught.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Swedish degrees are incorporated in the Bologna Process, the European higher education framework. In this system degrees are divided into three cycles, corresponding to bachelor's level, master's level and doctoral level. In Sweden, there are two general qualifications for each cycle of different lengths and various professional degrees and various professional degrees at bachelor's or master's level.


title: Education in Sweden

text: To be admitted to a programme at the basic level, a student must complete an education at the level or its equivalent. The degrees that can be obtained at the basic level are:


title: Education in Sweden

text: To be admitted to a programme at the advanced level, a student must have obtained a three-year Swedish degree at the basic level or a corresponding degree from another country or some corresponding qualification. The degrees that can be obtained at the advanced level are:


title: Education in Sweden

text: The Degree of Master (two years) is a new degree that is intended to be closely linked to continuing education at the graduate level.


title: Education in Sweden

text: To be admitted to a programme at the doctoral level, a student must have obtained a Swedish degree at the advanced level or completed at least four years of full-time study with at least one year at the advanced level or a corresponding degree from another country or equivalent knowledge. The degrees that can be obtained at the doctoral level are:


title: Education in Sweden

text: The grading system used vary between different universities and university colleges. There are currently five different systems in use, all of which are criteria-referenced. The three most common systems are the seven-grade scale (A–F, Fx), the three-grade scale VG, G, U which is very similar to the pre-2011 compulsory and upper secondary grade system, and the pass or fail system G/U. The grades from all systems can be converted to the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) for grade comparison with other universities across Europe.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Before being accepted to a higher education programme in Sweden, all applicants must demonstrate a minimum proficiency in Swedish and English. For international applicants, the Test in Swedish for University Studies is used to test Swedish language proficiency and Test of English as a Foreign Language or the Cambridge First Certificate in English exam may be used for English.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The Swedish Scholastic Aptitude Test () is a standardised test used as one of the means to gain admission to higher education in Sweden. The test itself is divided into a mathematical section and a verbal section, which both contain four subdivisions, for a total of 160 multiple-choice questions. Apart from the English language reading comprehension test, all sections are taken in Swedish. To gain admittance to courses or programmes using the SweSAT, students need to independently fulfill the eligibility requirements.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Swedish students receive help from the National Board of Student Aid (CSN) while studying. CSN is a Swedish governmental authority which issues financial aid for studies. This includes loans and grants for students studying in Sweden or abroad.


title: Education in Sweden

text: As of autumn semester 2011, higher education is free of charge only for Swedish, EU/EEA, and Swiss citizens.


title: Education in Sweden

text: All universities are required to have guidelines on how to handle cases of discrimination. They are also required to work together with the equality ombudsman to ensure admission, tuition and examinations are fair.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Post-secondary vocational education usually consists of many one- to two-year-long subject specific programmes consisting of roughly three quarters theoretical work and one quarter workplace experience. Higher vocational schools cooperate with various employers to improve the students' employment prospects. The system is independent from the other types of higher education in that it is not Bologna compatible, does not award a bachelor's or master's degree (while professional degrees do) and is not taught by universities or university colleges.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Prior to the 1990s, there were only a handful of private schools in Sweden, mostly tuition-funded boarding schools, of which Sigtunaskolan and Lundsbergs skola are the most well known. A major education reform in 1992 allowed privately run schools offering primary or secondary education to receive public funding for each student at a level similar to what public schools receive. These are called independent schools (), and there were around 900 of them.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The independent schools, similar to charter schools in the United States or academies in the United Kingdom, are funded with public money () from the local municipality based on the number of pupils they have enrolled, in the same way Swedish public schools are. Consequently, they are not allowed to discriminate or require admission examinations, nor are they allowed to charge the students any additional fees. They are, however, allowed to accept private donations. Regional economic differences directly affect how much money each municipality can provide per pupil.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Anyone can start an independent for-profit school, or a chain of such schools, in Sweden. Many of them offer an alternate pedagogy (such as Montessori), or a foreign/international, religious or special needs (such as hearing-impaired) profile. There are also several secondary schools with an elite sports profile. Internationella Engelska Skolan and Kunskapsskolan are the two largest independent school chains. In 2008, more than 10% of Swedish pupils were enrolled independent schools.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The independent school system has divided public opinion in Sweden, especially regarding religious schools and for-profit schools. During the 2018 election several parties, including the Moderate Party and Social Democratic Party, suggested some kind of profit limit, while the Liberals and Centre Party opposed such a limit. A ban on religious independent schools has also been suggested with support from the Left Party and Social Democratic Party, while the Moderates, Green Party, Christian Democrats and Centre party are satisfied with the current system banning religious elements in the classroom, but allowing them during breaks or before lessons start.


title: Education in Sweden

text: The Swedish model has been put forward as a possible model for similar solutions in both the United Kingdom and the United States, where Per Unckel, County Governor of Stockholm and former Conservative Minister of Education, in 2009 summarized the advantages of the Swedish system in an opinion piece produced by the Libertarian think tank Pacific Research Institute: "Education is so important that you can’t just leave it to one producer. Because we know from monopoly systems that they do not fulfill all wishes".


title: Education in Sweden

text: In February 2013, "The Guardian" published an article by a former political advisor to the Swedish Ministry of Education, Karin Svanborg-Sjövall, on the independent school system: "Sweden proves that private profit improves services and influences policy. Even education unions came on board when private provision was introduced into Swedish schools", citing the paper on average educational performance produced by research institute under the Swedish Ministry of Employment, IFAU, which found "that an increase in the share of independent-school students improves average performance at the end of compulsory school as well as long-run educational outcomes". However, in June 2015, another article by the education correspondent from "The Guardian" quoted then Education Minister, Gustav Fridolin, as saying that the system was "a political failure" and stated that standards in learning had dropped dramatically over the years and were in a state of "crisis".


title: Education in Sweden

text: Sweden came in first in the United Nations Children's Fund 2008 ranking of early childhood education.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Swedish results in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) were in 2015 close to the OECD average. Swedish scores had declined between 2006 and 2012, which was heavily reported and adopted as an important talking point for many political parties, including the Alliance and the Social Democratic Party.


title: Education in Sweden

text: In the 2015 PISA report, Swedish scores increased for the first time since the programme started in 2006. Both the Moderate Party and the Social Democratic Party have suggested actions to improve education and increase PISA scores in the future.


title: Education in Sweden

text: Sweden’s performance in the international fourth-grade reading assessments (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study, PIRLS) dropped by 19 points from 2001 (561) to 2011 (542) and recovered by 13 points in 2016 (555).


title: Education in Sweden

text: The influx of immigrants to Swedish schools has been reported as a major contributor to why Sweden's score dropped more than any other European country by a National Agency of Education report.


title: Education in Sweden

text: However, this does not account for the entirety of the drop in results. In the spring of 2021, the nationwide newspaper "Expressen" published a series of articles describing major flaws in the testing carried out by the National Agency for Education. A comparatively large number and range of students had, in violation of the intention of the tests, been exempted from testing, generating a result showing a positive trend. An investigation into how this could have happened despite several officials at the Ministry for Education having raised questions concerning the testing methods is taking place. Some MPs have called for the resignation of the Minister for Education, who in turn has directed the liability for testing towards the school authority.


title: Marionberry

text: The marionberry ("Rubus L." subgenus "Rubus") is a cultivar of blackberry developed by the USDA ARS breeding program in cooperation with Oregon State University. A cross between the 'Chehalem' and 'Olallie' varieties, it is the most common form of blackberry cultivated. It accounts for over half of all blackberries produced in Oregon.


title: Marionberry

text: The marionberry is a vigorously growing trailing vine, usually producing just a few canes up to 20 feet long. The vines have many large spines, and the fruiting laterals are long and strong, producing many berries. The berry is glossy and, as with many blackberries, appears black on the plant, but turns a deep, dark purple when frozen and thawed. It is medium in size and tends to be conical, longer than it is wide.


title: Marionberry

text: The berry has a somewhat tart flavor, fairly earthy with traces of sweetness. It is larger, sweeter and juicier than the 'Evergreen' blackberry. The relative complexity of its flavor has led to a marketing label as the "Cabernet of Blackberries". The more powerful flavor of the marionberry has led to it dominating current blackberry production.


title: Marionberry

text: The marionberry was developed by the USDA Agricultural Research Service at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon. It was bred by George F. Waldo, as a mix between the small, flavorful 'Chehalem' berry and the larger, better-producing 'Olallie' berry. Both the 'Chehalem' and 'Olallie' berries are caneberry hybrids, as well. Waldo made the initial cross in 1945, selected it as OSC 928 in 1948 in Corvallis, and tested it in Marion County and elsewhere in the Willamette Valley. The berry was released in 1956 under the name Marion, after the county where it was tested extensively.


title: Marionberry

text: Oregon produces between 28 million and 33 million pounds annually, with Marion County and the Willamette Valley collectively accounting for over 90% of current production. The marionberry is well adapted to the mild, maritime Oregon climate, with its mild rains and warm summers. The berries ripen throughout late spring and early summer. The harvesting season is typically between July 10 and August 10, with a single acre producing up to six tons in a harvest.


title: Marionberry

text: There is a hybrid variety with boysenberry in Australia called "Silvanberry". Classed under the blackberry family, Sylvanberry plants have many characteristics commonly found among other blackberry varieties. These plants are long living (15 to 20 years) perennials, hardy and cold tolerant, easy to grow, and productive spreaders.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: The Shadow in My Eye (Danish: "Skyggen i mit øje)", also known as The Bombardment, is a Danish feature film from 2021 written and directed by Ole Bornedal. The film deals with, among other things, Operation Carthage carried out by the Royal Air Force (RAF) in Copenhagen, Denmark during the Second World War, where one of the planes crashed near Institut Jeanne d'Arc, causing the school to be misidentified as the target and also bombed.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: In 1945, a Royal Air Force (RAF) de Havilland Mosquito strafes a car carrying several bridesmaids while flying over German-occupied Denmark, mistaking it for a German staff vehicle. The RAF pilots Pete and Andy learn about the accidental killing of civilians from the Danish Special Operation Executive agent Major Truelson.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: A teenage boy named Henry is traumatized by the strafing incident and loses his ability to speak. His parents send him to Copenhagen with the hope of improving his mental health. While living in Copenhagen, Henry boards with his cousin Rigmor and her family. Henry also becomes acquainted with Rigmor's friend Eva. Rigmor and Eva attend the "Institut Jeanne d'Arc", a French-language Roman Catholic school run by nuns led by Sister Hanna. Rigmor and Eva help Henry to overcome his trauma including his fear of walking under open skies.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: Meanwhile, a young novice named Sister Teresa struggles with her faith in God. In an attempt to prove God's existence, Teresa strikes an illicit romantic relationship with a HIPO officer named Frederik, who works for the German occupation authorities. Teresa also teaches Eva and Rigmor's class.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: At the request of the Danish resistance, the Royal Air Force agrees to bomb the "Shellhus", the Gestapo headquarters in Copenhagen with the goal of freeing imprisoned resistance members and destroying Gestapo documents. The planned Operation Carthage is complicated by the Germans imprisoning several Danish resistance hostages under the roof of the "Shellhus". The air raid consists of several de Havilland Mosquito fighter-bombers from the RAF, the Royal Australian Air Force, and the Royal New Zealand Air Force, which are escorted by RAF P-51 Mustangs.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: On the day of Operation Carthage, Eva argues with her parents over not finishing a bowl of porridge. Frederik, persuaded by Teresa, informs his parents that he is deserting the service. While Eva and Rigmor attend a class, Sister Hanna confronts Teresa over her relationship with Frederik and announces plans to expel her from their order. During the air raid, Peter and Andy's Mosquito fighter-bomber hits a searchlight tower, causing it to crash near the "Institut Jeanne d'Arc". Other Mosquito fighter-bombers mistake the school for the target and bomb the building, killing and wounding numerous students and teachers. However, other RAF bombers succeed in targeting the "Shellhus", damaging the building and destroying Gestapo documents. In the ensuing chaos, several Danish resistance prisoners take the opportunity to escape.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: During the air raid, Henry gradually regains his ability to speak and assists firefighters with identifying the bodies of the wounded. Rigmor and Teresa are trapped under the rubble amidst rising water from damaged pipes and sewers. Frederik attempts to rescue Teresa from the rubble, but she jumps into the water in an attempt to save Rigmor. However, she dislodges some rubble in the process and the two are crushed to death. Eva's parents are distraught when they are unable to find their daughter, with her father regretting arguing with her. When Henry suggests that Eva may have gone home, Eva's mother finds her daughter at home eating the cold porridge.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: On November 12, 2021, it was announced that producer Miso Film would be changing the film. They would remove a scene where a named British pilot fires at a civilian vehicle. The pilot took part in the bombing and died when his plane crashed, but the scene of the shooting is fiction. Miso Film decided to change the scene after complaints from the pilot's family that the pilot was being portrayed as a murderer. According to film expert Peter Schepelern, it is unique for a film to be changed after its premiere because of complaints about the portrayal of historical figures.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: "The Shadow in My Eye" was distributed in Denmark in October 2021. Netflix acquired the international distribution rights for the movie, which was released under the name "The Bombardment", in late March 2022.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: The film depicts a fictitious fatal air attack on a group of innocent women carried out by the pilot Peter Kleboe who later crashes by the school. The family of the real life Peter Kleboe demanded an excuse in one of the largest Danish news papers Berlingske on November 11th 2021 and that the film should be recut since it portrayed their family member pilot Kleboe as a killer and slandered his legacy. Days later the production company admitted it was wrong to portray Peter Kleboe as a killer and promised that editorial changes to the film would be made to hide the name of Kleboe.


title: The Shadow in My Eye

text: During the marketing of the film the director Bornedal made claims that the film was based on the best possible research. However in several interviews and a large TV show Bornedal claimed that a key final scene of the film were based on a real life conversation between a nun and a dying child. But when the Danish documentary filmmaker Martin Sundstrøm investigated the story it turned out to be false. The conversation was between two nuns, and did not involve a dying child. Bornedal admitted the poor research and in a public response admitted that this might cast doubts of the quality of the historical accuracy of his film.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Concrete Cowboy is a 2020 American Western drama film directed by Ricky Staub from a screenplay by Staub and Dan Walser. The movie is based on the novel "Ghetto Cowboy" by Greg Neri, which was inspired by the real urban African-American horseriding culture of Philadelphia, and in particular, the Fletcher Street Urban Riding Club. The film stars Idris Elba, Caleb McLaughlin, Jharrel Jerome, Byron Bowers, Lorraine Toussaint and Clifford "Method Man" Smith. While the film is completely fictional, several real members of the Fletcher Street riding community play supporting characters who give voice to real issues that the community faces.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: "Concrete Cowboy" had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 13, 2020, and was digitally released on Netflix on April 2, 2021.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Fifteen-year-old Cole is from Detroit and always getting in trouble at school, so his mom drives him to Philadelphia to live with his estranged father, Harp. Dropping him off on Harp's North Philadelphia block, she quickly drives away. A neighbor, Nessie, recognizes Cole, and tells him his father is at the stables.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: When Harp brings him in the house, Cole finds a horse standing in the living room, and the fridge and cupboards empty. He says he'll only stay one night. The next day when trying to call his mom, he runs into his older cousin, Smush, who drives him around and gets him some food. The two stay out all night. When Smush drops Cole off at Harp's the next morning, Harp won't let Cole in because Cole has been hanging out with Smush, a drug dealer. Cole refuses to accept Harp's rules, stalks off and asks various neighbors, including Nessie, whether he can stay at their house. The answer is always no. He ends up crawling through a window and finds himself face to face with a horse. At first, he's terrified, but he soon realizes that the horse doesn't intend to hurt him.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: The next morning, Nessie finds Cole asleep in the stall with the horse standing nearby. It is revealed that the horse he has bunked with, Boo, has a reputation of not letting anyone near him. No one has been able to tame him- in fact, it could have killed him. Instead, it let him spend the night in the stall with him.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Cole tells the other riders he wants to learn how to ride, and is told he first must help with the stable work. He spends the day learning how to efficiently shovel manure under the instructions of Paris, a rider who uses a wheelchair. He continues to spend time at the stables and secretly with Smush as well. Harp later has a surprise for Paris- a saddle that allows Paris to ride his horse.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Cole gets upset and heads back to Harp's. Harp finds him there, and they get into an argument: Cole feels that Harp gives love to everyone except him. Harp tells him he also used to deal, and went to prison before Cole was born. Harp tells Cole he named him after jazz musician John Coltrane, a fellow Philadelphian who grew up without a father, because he wanted his son to be able to succeed as well.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Smush used to be a rider, too, but began dealing drugs to save up money to buy a ranch out West. One night Boo gets loose and the riders find him in a field. They surround him, but Harp tells Cole he's the only one who can calm Boo. Cole hesitantly approaches and is able to throw the reins over Boo and mount him.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Smush and Cole set up a drug deal that goes bad, and another dealer tries to kidnap Smush. The cops appear, chasing Smush and Cole, but they escape. Smush says they almost have enough money to move West, but Cole says he is done with that life. At the stables, Animal Control has arrived to seize all the horses due to neighbor complaints. Harp says there's nothing they can do, and Cole calls him a coward. Cole finds Smush, and they go on another drug deal. Smush is shot to death by a kid on a bike, and Cole runs.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Harp searches for Cole, eventually finding him hiding in the stables. Washing the blood off Cole's hands, he tells him Smush needs a proper memorial. That night they break into the municipal stables and free the horses. Everyone rides their horses slowly through the neighborhood to the cemetery, where Cole places Smush's cowboy boots on his grave, then stands on the back of his horse for the first time.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Not long afterward, they all watch as the stables are demolished, but Harp says they will keep riding even without their stables. Cole's mom returns to Philadelphia, and Harp thanks her for sending Cole to live with him.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: In August 2019, it was announced that Idris Elba, Caleb McLaughlin, Jharrel Jerome, Lorraine Toussaint, Byron Bowers and Method Man had joined the cast of the film, with Ricky Staub directing in his feature film directorial debut from a screenplay by himself and Dan Wasler based upon the novel "Ghetto Cowboy" by Greg Neri. Elba and Lee Daniels served as producers on the film. The role of Amahle was originally written to be a drug addict, and when Liz Priestley auditioned for the role she built up a few days of sleep deprivation to make her performance believable. The character was later rewritten to be a nurse.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: Filming began in North Philadelphia in August 2019. Staub originally got the idea for the film after seeing a man riding a horse down a Philadelphia street, which led him to research the Fletcher Street Urban Riding Club and the discovery of Neri's book.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: The film was set to have its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival in September 2020, prior to its cancellation due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Its world premiere was then held at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 13, 2020. In October 2020, Netflix acquired distribution rights to the film for a release in 2021. In March 2021, it was announced that the film will be released on April 2, 2021.


title: Concrete Cowboy

text: On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of based on reviews, with an average rating of . The website's critics consensus reads: "Well-acted and solidly directed, "Concrete Cowboy" lassos old-fashioned uplift with its story of a father and son in a little-seen corner of American culture." On Metacritic, it has a weighted average score of 67 out of 100, based on 33 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".


title: Semarang

text: Semarang (, Pegon: سماراڠ) is the capital and largest city of Central Java province in Indonesia. It was a major port during the Dutch colonial era, and is still an important regional center and port today. The city has been named as the cleanest tourist destination in Southeast Asia by the ASEAN Clean Tourist City Standard (ACTCS) for 2020–2022.


title: Semarang

text: It has an area of and is located at . The population of the city was 1,555,984 at the 2010 census and 1,653,524 at the 2020 census, making it Indonesia's ninth most populous city after Jakarta, Surabaya, Bekasi, Bandung, Medan, Depok, Tangerang and Palembang. The built-up urban area had 3,183,516 inhabitants at the 2010 census spread over two cities and 26 districts. The Semarang metropolitan area (a.k.a. "Kedungsepur") has a population of over 6 million in 2020 ("see Greater Semarang section"). The population of the city is predominantly Javanese with significant Chinese presence.


title: Semarang

text: The history of Semarang goes back to the 9th century, when it was known as Bergota. At the end of the 15th century, an Arab named Kyai Pandan Arang founded a village and an Islamic school in this fishing village. On 2 May 1547, Sultan Hadiwijaya of Pajang Kyai declared Pandan Arang the first bupati (mayor) of Semarang, thus creating Semarang administratively and politically.


title: Semarang

text: In 1678, Sunan Amangkurat II promised to give control of Semarang to the Dutch East India Company (VOC) as a part of a debt payment. In 1682, the Semarang state was founded by the Dutch colonial power. On 5 October 1705 after years of occupations, Semarang officially became a VOC city when Susuhunan Pakubuwono I made a deal to give extensive trade rights to the VOC in exchange of wiping out Mataram's debt. The VOC, and later, the Dutch East Indies government, established tobacco plantations in the region and built roads and railroads, making Semarang an important colonial trading centre.


title: Semarang

text: The historic presence of a large Indo (Eurasian) community in the area of Semarang is also reflected by the fact a creole mix language called Javindo existed there.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang was handed by the Sultan of Mataram to the Dutch East Indies in 1678. The city was pictured as a small settlement with a pious Muslim area called "Kauman", a Chinese quarter, and a Dutch fortress. The fortress has a pentagonal form with only one gate in the south and five monitoring towers to protect the Dutch settlement from rebellion actions, segregating the spaces between Dutch settlement and other areas. In fact, the city of Semarang was only referred to the Dutch quarter while the other ethnic settlement were considered as villages outside the city boundary. The city, known as de Europeesche Buurt, was built in classical European style with church located in the centre, wide boulevards, streets and villas. According to Purwanto (2005), the urban and architectural form of this settlement is very similar to the design principles applied in many Dutch cities, which begun to concern on the urban beautification.


title: Semarang

text: Due to the long and costly Java War, there was not much funding from the Dutch East Indies government, which affected Semarang's development. The majority of land was used for rice fields and the only small improvement was the development of a surrounding fortress. Although less developed, Semarang has a fairly arranged city system, in which urban activities were concentrated along the river and the settlement was linked to a market where different ethnic groups met to trade. The existence of the market, in the later years, become a primary element and a generator of urban economic growth.


title: Semarang

text: After the departure of Herman Willem Daendels, Napoleonic governor of Java, the Dutch reorganized Java into Residencies, and Semarang became the seat of the new Semarang Residency in 1817. An important influence on urban growth was the Great Mail Road project in the 1847, which connected all the cities in the northern coast of Central and East Java and positioned Semarang as the trade centre of agricultural production. The project was soon followed by the development of the Staatsspoorwegen Railway and the connecting roads into the inner city of Semarang at the end of the 19th century. Colombijn (2002) marked the development as the shift of urban functions, from the former river orientation to all services facing the roads.


title: Semarang

text: The Dutch East Indies' mail and railway projects improved communication and transportation, bringing an economic boom to the city in the 1870s. Hospitals, churches, hotels, and mansions were built along the new main roads of Mataram Street, Bojongscheweg, and Pontjolscheweg. The Javanese quarters of town known as kampongs grew increasingly densely populated, reaching as many as 1000 inhabitants per hectare and degrading living conditions. Mortality remained high into the early 20th century, with newcomers, overcrowding, and poor hygiene triggering cholera and tuberculous outbreaks. Dysentery, typhoid, and malaria were also rife. The city doctor Willem T. de Vogel advocated strenuously for reducing overcrowding and improving living conditions by extending Semarang into the less malarial hill country to its south; his fellow councilman Hendrik Tillema had campaigned on a platform of combatting malaria and joined De Vogel's scheme, broadening it into a "village improvement" () movement. Purchasing land in the heights with their own money, the two men and some friends passed it on to the city with an initial zoning plan by KPC de Bazel in 1907 but could never convince a majority of the council to support its development. Changing tack, Tillema then worked to improve the existing kampongs in the city's malarial districts by improving drainage and providing more sanitary public toilets and public housing.


title: Semarang

text: A decade later, the town approved Thomas Karsten's revised plan for the area, using it to build larger villas for the Dutch and wealthy Chinese and Javanese rather than allowing its use by the poor. This area became known as Candi Baru () and forms the core of the present-day Candisari District. Although it remained highly stratified by class, Candi Baru had less ethnic segregation than the older area of town and incorporated public squares, athletic facilities, and places for public bathing and washing that could be used communally. With most work remaining in the lower city and transportation slow or expensive, few of the lower classes were interested in moving to the district but it set a pattern that was followed with three more successful housing plans between 1916 and 1919. The population grew by 55%, adding 45,000 Javanese, 8500 Chinese, and 7000 Europeans. Karsten's approach to town planning emphasized its aesthetic, practical, and social requirements articulated in economic terms rather than purely racial ones.


title: Semarang

text: Driven by economic growth and spatial city planning, the city had doubled in size and expanded to the south by the 1920s, creating a nucleus of a metropolis where multi-ethnic groups lived and traded in the city. The villages in the suburbs such as Jomblang and Jatingaleh steadily became the satellite towns of Semarang, more populated with a bigger market area. Before the invasion of Japan in 1942, Semarang had already become the capital of Central Java province, as the result of trade and industrial success and spatial planning.


title: Semarang

text: The Japanese military occupied the city, along with the rest of Java, in 1942, during the Pacific War of World War II. During that time, Semarang was headed by a military governor called a Shiko, and two vice governors known as Fuku Shiko. One of the vice governors was appointed from Japan, and the other was "chosen" from the local population.


title: Semarang

text: After Indonesian independence in 1945, Semarang became the capital of Central Java on 18 August 1945, headed by Mr. Moch.Ichsan. It also became the site of a battle between Indonesian and Japanese soldiers in October 1945.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang city administration is headed by mayor, with a legislative assembly. Both mayor and members of legislative assembly are elected by direct vote. The government of Semarang City had implemented the smart city concept since 2013.


title: Semarang

text: Juridically, Semarang City is a municipality (second level area) consisting of 16 districts ("kecamatan"), which again divided into 177 urban villages ("kelurahan"). The districts are tabulate below with their areas, their populations at the 2020 census and 2020 census, and the number and names of the urban villages in each district. The city of Semarang is divided into five urban areas, including: Central Semarang, East Semarang, West Semarang, South Semarang, and North Semarang.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang is located on the northern coast of Java. The city of Semarang is one of the important cities located on the north coast of Java and as the main hub connecting Jakarta and Surabaya, and cities in the southern interior of Java Surakarta and Yogyakarta. Semarang City has a height ranging from below sea level up to above sea level with a slope of 0%–45%. Semarang City is a city that has a unique topographic condition in the form of a narrow lowland area and hilly areas extending from the west side to the east side of Semarang City. The city is located about east of Jakarta and west of Surabaya.


title: Semarang

text: Lowland areas in Semarang City are very narrow. The lowland area in western Semarang only has a width of from the coastline, while in the eastern Semarang, the low-lying area has a width of from the coastline. This lowland area is a flood plain from the large rivers that flow in Semarang City, such as Kali Garang (West Flood Canal), Pengkol River, and Bringin River. This low-lying area stretches on the northern side of Semarang and covers almost 40% of the total area of Semarang. This lowland area is known as the lower town (Semarang Ngisor), as well as the center of the city's economic activity. Under these conditions, the lower city area is often hit by annual flooding and its peak during the rainy season. In a number of regions, especially North Semarang, floods are sometimes also caused by overflowing sea tides (tidal floods). The hilly area in Semarang stretches on the south side. These hills are part of a series of northern Java mountain ranges that stretch from Banten to East Java. The hilly area in the city of Semarang is known as the upper city (Semarang Dhuwur). This hilly region is also the upstream area of the big rivers that flow in the city of Semarang. The upper city area is also near Mount Ungaran.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang features a tropical rainforest climate that borders on a tropical monsoon climate ("Am"). The city features distinctly wetter and drier months, with June through August being the driest months. However, the average monthly rainfall does not fall below , hence the tropical rainforest categorization. Semarang on average sees approximately of rain annually. Average temperatures in the city are relatively consistent, hovering around . Diurnal temperature variation slightly increases in the dry season.


title: Semarang

text: Like Singapore River, Semarang is constructing Semarang River at Banjir Kanal Barat (Garang River) near Karangayu Bridge. In the middle of July 2011, gardens in river banks and some traditional boats are available to use. The project will be finished in 2013 with river gardens, trotoars, garden lighting, water activities, art sites, sport sites and balconies and stairs for sightseeing.


title: Semarang

text: In August 2011, a tunnel dodger at Kreo river has been finished and Jatibarang Dam construction can begin, with completion targeted for July 2013. The dam is planned to release of flood water and will generate 1.5 MW of electricity, provide a drinking water resource and a boost to tourism.


title: Semarang

text: The largest ethnicity of Semarang includes the Javanese, followed by minorities of Chinese, Indian, Arabic, and others (including local ethnicities such as Sundanese, Batak, Madura, etc.). The dominant religion is Islam.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang has a large Chinese community. As in other regions of Java, especially in Central Java, they have mingled closely with the local population and use Javanese in communication for hundreds of years. About 4–5% of the city's population is ethnic Chinese, many residing in a Chinatown in the vicinity of Gang Pinggir. The Chinatown is called "Kampong Pecinan Semawis" and expresses many aspects of traditional Chinese culture including foods, rituals, and houses of worship.


title: Semarang

text: As the capital city of Central Java, and fifth largest city of Indonesia, the economy of Semarang is quite large. Semarang has transformed and changed dynamically towards a better direction. In a period of less than 10 years, Semarang Metropolitan continues to build a vital financial contribution to Indonesia due to the growing trade and industry and services. As a consequence, people's purchasing power increased, capital inflows, consumer confidence, and doing business indexes were relatively conducive to the development of several CBDs such as "Simpang Lima City Center (SLCC)", "Pemuda Central Business District (PCBD)", and "Gajahmada Golden Triangle (GGT)". Major Indonesian and international financial and banking sectors alikes such as Bank Mandiri, BCA, BNI, BRI, Panin Bank, HSBC, Bank Permata, Standard Chartered, RaboBank, Citibank, DBS, UOB, OCBC NISP, KEB Hana Bank, CIMB Niaga, and Maybank have regional offices in Semarang.


title: Semarang

text: The western part of the city has many industrial parks and factories. Like other metropolitan cities within Indonesia, due to a developing economy and increasing income, Semarang has many shopping malls, like Ciputra Mall, Simpang Lima Plasa, Paragon City, Java Supermall, DP Mall, Pollux Central City. Some of the malls are under construction, such as Queen City Mall (a.k.a. Sri Ratu Pemuda), Tentrem Simpang Lima, Uptown Mall at BSB and the Park Semarang. The supermarket and department store chains Hypermart, Giant, and Carrefour Transmart also have a presence beneath the city. Carrefour Transmart has 4 places in Semarang: Transmart Setiabudi at South Semarang, Transmart Majapahit at East Semarang, Carrefour at DP Mall in Central Semarang, and Carrefour at SMC Tlogorejo Hospital in Simpang Lima. Uniqlo, an infamous brand from Japan and H&M, respectively, opened their presence within the city in 2019 and 2020 in DP Mall, one of Sinarmas properties spots in Pemuda.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang is on the Indonesian National Route 1 road, which connects it to Merak and Ketapang (Banyuwangi). Indonesian National Route 14 toward Bawen starts here. Semarang has a toll road, the Semarang Toll Road. The city is connected to Solo by Semarang–Solo Toll Road.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang's largest bus terminals are Mangkang and Terboyo. The primary means of public transportation is by minibus, called ""bis"". "Ojek" (motorcycle taxis), "Angkot" (share-taxi) micro-buses, taxi-cabs plays vital role in public transportation of the city. Go-Jek and Grab have online taxi and "Ojek" services.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang is served by bus rapid transit called "Trans Semarang", which operates in six routes. Perum DAMRI also serves in six designated routes in the city.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang was connected to Surakarta (Solo) by a rail line in 1870. At present there are two large train stations in Semarang: Semarang Poncol and Semarang Tawang. Semarang is connected to Bandung, Jakarta, and Surabaya by inter-city train services. "Kedungsepur" commuter rail connects Semarang Poncol Station eastward to Ngrombo Station in Grobogan Regency.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang's Ahmad Yani International Airport is served by a number of operators including AirAsia, Citilink, Batik Air, Garuda Indonesia, and Lion Air which provide services to Jakarta, Bali, Kuala Lumpur, and Singapore. In 2018, the airport terminal was relocated to a new and much larger site; the old terminal continues to be used for government and military flights.


title: Semarang

text: There are 593 elementary schools, 220 junior high schools, 106 senior high schools, and 88 vocational high schools, both public and private in Semarang.


title: Semarang

text: There are 20 universities in Semarang, 12 of them private and 8 public. The most renowned universities of Semarang are Diponegoro University and Soegijapranata University.


title: Semarang

text: There are several sport centres in Semarang. Jatidiri sport centre or Jatidiri Stadium is one of the biggest sport centres in Semarang, located in Karangrejo, Gajahmungkur. The centre comprises a soccer field, in line skate track, tennis filed, climbing wall, swimming pool, and many others. The capacity of the centre is about 21,000 people.


title: Semarang

text: Knight Stadium is a futsal and basketball centre in Semarang, located in Grand Marina complex. There is a café and fitness centre in Knight Stadium.


title: Semarang

text: Semarang is widely known for its bandeng presto (pressure-cooked milkfish), Lumpia, Wingko, Tahu Gimbal, and Ganjel Rel. Semarang has also been called 'The city of Jamu' because it is an important centre for the production of "jamu" which are a range of Indonesian herbal medicines that are popular across Indonesia Semawis Market, also known as Pecinan Semarang (Semarang's Chinatown), hosts a plethora of street food vendors, offering a wide varieties of dishes.


title: Semarang

text: is an annual festival in Semarang desecrated to welcome the Ramadan month (a fasting month for Moslems). The word "dug" describes the sound of bedug (traditional Indonesian musical instrument). The word "der" describes the sound of fireworks.


title: Semarang

text: The icon of the festival is a special puppet dragon-like animal called Warak Ngendog. The word "warak" stands for "holy" and the word "ngendog" expresses a reward for Muslims. Warak Ngendog's feet are chained, representing people's desire that should be postponed during this holy month. As Dugderan is a festival unique for Semarang, it represents an important attraction for both local people and visitors.


title: Semarang

text: "Suara Merdeka" is the major local newspaper in Semarang, as well as Central Java. Other major newspapers include "Tribun Jateng" and "Wawasan".


title: Semarang

text: Semarang has got Adipura Award for 6 times in a row since 2012. Adipura Award is given for achievement in cleanliness and greenery at parks, streets, markets, shop buildings, premises, schools, even cleanliness of water ways and rivers. Semarang City received the title of Best Smart Living and Best Smart Economy City in the Indonesia Smart Nation Award 2018.


title: Semarang

text: Greater Semarang was initially defined by the government as Semarang city, Semarang Regency, Salatiga city, Kendal Regency, and Demak Regency. It was later extended to include the western part (12 districts only) of Grobogan Regency. Despite the definition, it includes a lot of rural areas and the urban cores remain distinct; they have not amalgamated into a continuous urban sprawl as in Greater Jakarta.


title: Qixi Festival

text: The Qixi Festival (), also known as the Qiqiao Festival (), is a Chinese festival celebrating the annual meeting of Zhinü and Niulang in Chinese mythology. The festival is celebrated on the seventh day of the seventh lunisolar month on the Chinese lunisolar calendar.


title: Qixi Festival

text: The festival was derived from Chinese mythology. People celebrated for the romantic legend of two lovers, Zhinü and Niulang, who were the weaver girl and the cowherd, respectively. The tale of "The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl" has been celebrated in the Qixi Festival since the Han dynasty. The earliest-known reference to this famous myth dates back to over 2600 years ago, which was told in a poem from the "Classic of Poetry". The Qixi festival inspired the Tanabata festival in Japan, Chilseok festival in Korea, and festival in Vietnam.


title: Qixi Festival

text: The festival has variously been called the Double Seventh Festival, the Chinese Valentine's Day, the Night of Sevens, or the Magpie Festival.


title: Qixi Festival

text: The popular tale is a love story between Zhinü (, the weaver girl, symbolizing Vega) and Niulang (, the cowherd, symbolizing Altair). Niulang was often abused by his sister-in-law. They eventually kicked him out of the house, and gave him nothing but an old cow. One day, the old cow suddenly spoke out, telling Niulang that there would be fairies bathing in the spring nearby that night. The fairy would stay there if she failed to go back to heaven before morning. In accordance with what the old cow said, Niulang saw those beautiful fairies in the spring, and fell in love with one of the beautiful fairies who was the heavenly weaver. In order to make her stay, he took her clothes that helped her to go back to heaven; this made her an ordinary earth woman without any power. Then they got married and had two children. The Emperor of Heaven (, ) found out about this and was furious, so he sent minions to escort the heavenly weaver back to heaven. Niulang was heartbroken. The old cow suddenly spoke out again, telling Niulang he could take his skin to make it into a flying coat to chase after them; and Niulang did. However, the Queen Mother of the West drew a Silver River (The Milky Way) in the sky and blocked his way. Meanwhile, the love between Niulang and the weaver moved the magpie, and so they built a bridge of magpies over the Silver River for them to meet. The Emperor of Heaven was also moved by the sight, and allowed this couple to meet on the Magpie Bridge once a year on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month. That was the origin of the Qixi Festival.


title: Qixi Festival

text: During the Han dynasty, the practices were conducted in accordance with formal ceremonial state rituals. Over time, the festival activities also included customs that the common people partook in.


title: Qixi Festival

text: Girls take part in worshipping the celestials () during rituals. They go to the local temple to pray to Zhinü for wisdom. Paper items are usually burned as offerings. Girls may recite traditional prayers for dexterity in needlework, which symbolizes the traditional talents of a good spouse. Divination could take place to determine the possible dexterity in needlework. They make wishes for marrying someone who would be a good and loving husband. During the festival, girls make a display of their domestic skills. Traditionally, there would be contests amongst those who attempted to be the best in threading needles under low-light conditions, like the glow of an ember or of a half moon. Today, girls sometimes gather toiletries in honour of the seven maidens.


title: Qixi Festival

text: The festival also held an importance for newlywed couples. Traditionally, they would worship the celestial couple for the last time and bid farewell to them (). The celebration stood as a symbol for a happy marriage and showed that the married woman was treasured by her new family.


title: Qixi Festival

text: On this day, the Chinese gaze up at the sky to look for Vega and Altair shining in the Milky Way, while Deneb, a third star, forms a symbolic bridge between the two stars. It was said that if it rains on this day, it was caused by a river sweeping away the magpie bridge or that the rain is the tears of the separated couple. Based on the legend of a flock of magpies forming a bridge to reunite the couple, a pair of magpies came to symbolize conjugal happiness and faithfulness.


title: Qixi Festival

text: The eating customs of Qixi Festival vary from place to place, and are called eating Qiao food. The most famous traditional food people eat on Qixi Festival is Qiao Guo, which has a history of more than one thousand years since it became popular during the Song dynasty. The main ingredients are flour, oil and honey, sometimes adding sesame, peanuts, kernels, roses and other different ingredients. After mixing those ingredients, the people then deep-fry them. Beyond that, people would eat crunchy candy, refreshments and fruits together, expressing the people's pursuit of ingenuity, family health, and happy life wishes.


title: Qixi Festival

text: In some places people gather together and build a four meter long bridge () with big incense sticks and decorate them with colourful flowers. They burn the bridge at night and wish to bring happiness in life.


title: Qixi Festival

text: Due to the romance, elegance, and beautiful symbolic meaning of the festival, many pieces of literature, such as poems, popular songs and operas, have been written for this festival since the Zhou dynasty. Many describe the atmosphere of the festival or narrate related stories. This has left a valuable literary legacy which helps modern scholars better understand ancient Chinese customs, feelings, and opinions relating to the festival.


title: Qixi Festival

text: Interactive Google doodles have been launched since the 2009 Qixi Festival to mark the occasion. The latest was launched for the 2022 Qixi Festival.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: J. R. R. Tolkien's maps, depicting his fictional Middle-earth and other places in his legendarium, helped him with plot development, guides the reader through his often complex stories, and contributes to the impression of depth in his writings.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Tolkien stated that he began with maps and developed his plots from them, but that he also wanted his maps to be picturesque. Later fantasy writers often include maps in their novels.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: The publisher Allen & Unwin commissioned Pauline Baynes to paint a map of Middle-earth, based on Tolkien's draft maps and his annotations; it became iconic. A later redrafting of the maps by the publisher HarperCollins however made the maps look blandly professional, losing the hand-drawn feeling of Tolkien's maps.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: "The Hobbit" contains two simple maps and only around 50 placenames. In the view of the Tolkien critic Tom Shippey, the maps are largely decorative in the "Here be tygers" tradition, adding nothing to the story. The first is Thror's map, in the fiction handed down to Thorin, showing little but the Lonely Mountain drawn in outline with ridgelines and entrances, and parts of two rivers, decorated with a spider and its web, English labels and arrows, and two texts written in runes. The other is a drawing of "Wilderland", from Rivendell in the west to the Lonely Mountain and Smaug the dragon in the east. The Misty Mountains are drawn in three dimensions. Mirkwood is shown as a mixture of closely packed tree symbols, spiders and their webs, hills, lakes, and villages. The map is overprinted with placenames in red. Both maps have a heavy vertical line not far from the left-hand side, the one on the map of Wilderland marked "Edge of the Wild". This line represented the printed delineation of the margin of the school paper, which came with the printed instruction "Do not write in this margin".


title: Tolkien's maps

text: "The Lord of the Rings" contains three maps and over 600 placenames. The maps are a large drawing of the north-west part of Middle-earth, showing mountains as if seen in three dimensions, and coasts with multiple waterlines; a more detailed drawing of "A Part of the Shire"; and a contour map by Christopher Tolkien of parts of Rohan, Gondor, and Mordor, very different in style.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Tolkien worked for many years on the book, using a hand-drawn map of the whole of the north-west of Middle-earth on squared (not graph) paper, each 2cm square representing 100 miles. It had many annotations in pencil and a range of different inks added over the years, the older ones faded until almost illegible. The paper became soft, torn and yellowed through intensive use, and a fold down the centre had to be mended using parcel tape.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: He made a detailed pencil, ink and coloured pencil design on graph paper, enlarged five times in length from the main map of Middle-earth. His son Christopher drew the contour map from the design. The finished map faithfully reproduced the contours, features and labels of his father's design, but omitted the route (with dates) taken by the Hobbits Frodo and Sam on their way to destroy the One Ring in Mount Doom. Father and son worked desperately to finish the map in time for publication:


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Shippey notes that many of the places so mapped are never used in the text. The map of the Shire is the only one to include political boundaries, in the shape of the divisions between the administrative districts or Farthings.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: The first edition of "The Silmarillion" contains two maps. There is a large fold-out drawing of Beleriand. The Ered Luin mountain range on its right-hand edge approximately matches the mountain range of that name on the left-hand edge of the main map in "The Lord of the Rings". The other is a smaller-scale drawing of the central region of the same area, with coasts, mountains, and rivers but without forests, overprinted in red with the names of the leaders of the Elves in each part of Beleriand.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: The other continents and regions described in "The Silmarillion" are not mapped in the book, but Tolkien drew sketches of Arda in its early stages including of Valinor (Aman), and a map of the star-shaped island of Numenor, with little detail other than coasts (with waterlining) and mountains, which was eventually printed in "Unfinished Tales". Some other absences may be significant; Christopher Tolkien wrote that the frequently mentioned Dwarf-road over the mountains bordering Beleriand is not shown, because the Noldorin Elves who lived there never crossed the mountains.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: The style of Tolkien's maps varies between illustration and cartography. Alice Campbell, in "The J. R. R. Tolkien Encyclopedia", writes that while they have what Tolkien called an "archaic air", they are not authentically medieval in style. In particular, he allows for blank spaces between features, an 18th-century innovation that meant that the features that were drawn were reliable. Campbell states that Tolkien's mapping style echoes William Morris's Arts and Crafts: "they are functional, but with an eye to grace and beauty", and in her view lie somewhere between illustration and cartography.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Tolkien indeed wrote that "there should be picturesque maps, providing more than a mere index to what is said in the text". His maps thus have at least three functions: to help the author construct a consistent plot; to guide the reader; and through the "picturesque", the aesthetic experience, to lead the reader into the imagined secondary world.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Tolkien developed not only maps but names and languages before he arrived at a plot. He had already used Old Norse for the Dwarves of Dale (to the east) in "The Hobbit", and he was using modern English for the Hobbits of the Shire (in the west); his choice of Old English for the riders of Rohan implied a linguistic map of Middle-earth, with different peoples, languages and regions.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Karen Wynn Fonstad, author of "The Atlas of Middle-earth", commented that in such a world, writing has to be based on detailed knowledge of each of many types of details; she found herself, as Tolkien had, unable to proceed with the atlas until she had mastered all of them. Distances travelled, the chronology of the quest, geology, and terrain all needed to be understood to create the work.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Campbell stated that the "lovingly detailed" maps helped to shape the stories and create a "believable whole". In Shippey's view, "the names and the maps give Middle-earth that air of solidity and extent both in space and time which its successors [in 20th century fantasy] so conspicuously lack". One way that this works, he argues, is that readers, far from analysing the etymology of place-names as Tolkien habitually did, take them as labels, "as things .. in a very close one-to-one relationship with whatever they label". That in turn makes them "extraordinarily useful to fantasy, weighing it down as they do with repeated implicit assurances of the existence of the things they label, and of course of their nature and history too."


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Tolkien was not the first to use maps in a novel about strange worlds; among books that he was most likely familiar with, Jonathan Swift included maps in his 1726 "Gulliver's Travels", and Robert Louis Stevenson followed in his 1883 adventure story "Treasure Island". The frontispiece to William Morris's 1897 "The Sundering Flood" was a map showing the city on a great river, "The Wood Masterless", a "Desert Waste", and towns with English names like "Westcheaping" and "Eastcheaping". The map appears to have been the first fantasy map in the modern sense, defining a wholly invented world. Tolkien stated that he wished to imitate the style and content of Morris's romances, and that he made use of elements from them.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Critics agree that Tolkien's maps set a completely new standard for fantasy novels, so that their use has become expected in the genre, which he largely created; Peter Jackson chose to use Tolkien's Middle-earth map in his "Lord of the Rings" film trilogy. Among later bestselling fantasy authors, George R. R. Martin has used maps in all his "A Song of Ice and Fire" books,


title: Tolkien's maps

text: In 1969, Tolkien's publisher Allen & Unwin commissioned the illustrator Pauline Baynes to paint a map of Middle-earth. Tolkien supplied her with copies of his draft maps for "The Lord of the Rings", and annotated her copy of his son Christopher's 1954 map for "The Fellowship of the Ring". Allen & Unwin published Baynes's map as a poster in 1970. It was decorated with a header and footer showing some of Tolkien's characters, and vignettes of some of his stories' locations. The poster map became "iconic" of Middle-earth. She was the only illustrator of whom Tolkien approved.


title: Tolkien's maps

text: Campbell writes that the redrafting of the maps by the publishers HarperCollins for a later edition of "The Lord of the Rings" has made the cartography "bland, modern, professional illustration". In her view, this is "an unintentional reversion to decorative but technically inaccurate medieval-style maps", something that she finds misguided, as in his maps "Tolkien desired accuracy more than decoration". In addition, the redrafting loses what she calls "the illusion of Bilbo's own fair copies of older maps and which suggested a culture without printing presses or engraving", through Tolkien's own "charming hand lettering".


title: Tolkien's maps

text: The Tolkien universe has been subject to significant cartographic efforts by fans, some of whom have published their works in print. These include Karen Wynn Fonstad's "The Atlas of Middle-earth".


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The University of Portsmouth is a public university in Portsmouth, England. It is one of only four universities in the South East of England rated as Gold in the Government's Teaching Excellence Framework. With approximately 28,280 undergraduate and postgraduate students, the university is the 25th largest in the United Kingdom by higher education student enrolments. Comprising five faculties, 24 schools and several other services, the university employs approximately 3,500 staff.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: In the 2023 edition of the Good University Guide – compiled by The Times and Sunday Times – the university ranked 62nd out of the 132 universities in the United Kingdom. In the Times Higher Education REF ranking, the university was ranked third in research power for modern post-1992 universities.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Research conducted by the university has a significant global impact; in the latest edition of the Research Excellence Framework, 77 per cent of research submitted by the university was ranked as world-leading or internationally excellent, with impacts across society, health, culture and the environment.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The roots of the university can be traced back to the Portsmouth and Gosport School of Science and Art. which opened in 1870 and was funded by subscription. Technical education (including science-based subjects) later became the responsibility of the local authority, which founded Portsmouth Municipal Technical Institute in 1894 to fulfil this function. However, the city required a permanent purpose-built home for technical education and as a consequence Portsmouth Municipal College was constructed on a site behind Portsmouth Guildhall. Portsmouth Municipal College opened in 1908 (the new college replaced Portsmouth Municipal Technical Institute, although many of the staff transferred to the new institution) and the building also incorporated the College of Art, Portsmouth Day Training College for teachers and a public library. The original college building is still in use by the University of Portsmouth and is now known as Park Building.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: In 1911 two student unions were established for male and female students; as early records from the student union newspaper "The Galleon" show.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: From 1945 to 1960 the college diversified its syllabus adding arts and humanities subjects after World War II, in response to a decline in the need for engineering skills. In 1953 the institution changed its name to Portsmouth College of Technology. The college was renamed Portsmouth Polytechnic after it gained polytechnic status in 1969 and by the late 1980s was one of the largest polytechnics in the UK. On 7 July 1992 the inauguration of the University of Portsmouth was celebrated at a ceremony at Portsmouth Guildhall. As a new university, it could validate its own degrees, under the provision of the Further and Higher Education Act 1992.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: On Friday 4 May 2018, the University of Portsmouth was revealed as the main shirt sponsor of Portsmouth F.C. for the 2018–19, 2019–20 and 2020–21 seasons.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: In December 2022, an employment tribunal ruled that when the university failed to reappoint Dr Kajal Sharma to her job, it had racially discriminated against her.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The university is split between the University Quarter, which is centred around the Portsmouth Guildhall area, and the Langstone Campus.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Langstone is the smaller of the two campuses, located in Milton on the eastern edge of Portsea Island. The campus overlooks Langstone Harbour and it is home to the university's sports grounds.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Langstone Campus used to be home of the university's School of Languages and Area Studies, which has since moved into Park Building in the University Quarter. It also used to be home to three halls of residence: Queen Elizabeth Queen Mother (QEQM), Trust Hall and Langstone Flats. These used to house 565 students, however these have now been closed, in favour of those closer to the majority of the university buildings. These have now been demolished.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The University Quarter is a collection of university buildings located around the centre of the city. This area contains most of the university's teaching facilities and nearly all of the Student Halls of residence (except the Langstone student village and two halls (Rees Hall and Burrell House) located on Southsea Terrace).


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The University Library (formerly the Frewen Library) was extended in 2006 at a cost of £11 million. It was opened by the crime writer P. D. James. The university has also recently invested in the Faculty of Science, in particular by renovating the aluminium-clad main building, St Michael's.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: On 7 June 2013, the University of Portsmouth announced its partnership with the Military Technological College of Oman. This involves the University of Portsmouth providing academic guidance and academic accreditation for the education of 4,200 students with technical roles in armed services and a few civilian employers in the Sultanate of Oman. This has been criticised by the student Amnesty International Society and by Campaign Against the Arms Trade who consider Oman an authoritarian regime, likely to use military capabilities on their own citizens or in regional conflicts.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Portsmouth is formally headed by the Chancellor, currently Karen Blackett. The Chancellor is largely a ceremonial role; Portsmouth is run day-to-day by the Vice-Chancellor, presently Graham Galbraith, along with a single integrated decision-making body known as the University Executive Board https://www.port.ac.uk/about-us/structure-and-governance/our-people/university-executive-board. This includes Pro Vice-Chancellors, the Director of Finance and the Executive Deans of Faculties, together with the Chief Operating Officer, the Director of Human Resources and the University Secretary and Clerk.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The University of Portsmouth is worth £1.1 billion to the British economy and brings £476 million to the city, an independent assessment in 2017 has shown.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Portsmouth offers more than 200 undergraduate degrees and 150 postgraduate degrees, as well as 65 research degree programs.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The university formerly validated BSc (Hons) degrees in Acupuncture and MSc courses in Traditional Chinese medicine that were carried out by the "London College of Traditional Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine," a private education provider that collapsed in early 2011.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Over 60% of research submitted by the university to REF2014 was rated as world-leading and internationally excellent. In two subject areas respectively - Allied Health Professions, Dentistry, Nursing and Pharmacy, and Physics - 90% and 89% of all research submitted was rated as world leading and internationally excellent.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: In 2017 Alessandro Melis and Steffen Lehmann created the interdisciplinary project CRUNCH: Climate Resilient Urban Nexus Choices: Operationalising the Food-Water-Energy Nexus. This is a £1.6 million research project funded by Horizon 2020, Belmont Forum, ESRC and other funding bodies. University of Portsmouth is leading the project. The partners are five universities from Miami, Eindhoven, Gdansk, Uppsala and Taiwan. Crunch involves universities, local authorities and small business.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The University of Portsmouth is one of only four universities in the south east to achieve the highest Gold rating in the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF).


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Most recently, in the 2022 edition of the Good University Guide – compiled by The Times and Sunday Times – the university was ranked near the bottom at 88 out of 132.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Internationally, the university was ranked 98th in Times Higher Education's ‘100 under 50’ rankings of international modern universities 2017 but did not make the list in any subsequent year.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: Portsmouth was rated in the top 501 – 600 universities in the world by the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2022.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The University of Portsmouth Students’ Union (UPSU) is a registered charity that represents and supports all UoP students, who automatically become members upon registering for their course. The Students’ Union offers members support services, development opportunities and represent them at different levels throughout the university, in the community and beyond.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The earliest record of the Union is in the September 1911 edition of "The Galleon" student magazine. From 1965, the Union was based in Union House - now St Paul's Gym - on St Pauls Road. In 1983, it moved to the ex-NAAFI building, Alexandra House, where it remained for 19 years. Since 2002, the union has been situated at the north end of Ravelin Park. The Union previously housed two nightclubs, Lux and , but these were closed and redeveloped for other uses in 2009.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The Union Advice Service offers confidential, impartial and non-judgemental support. The service delivers a range of academic & non-academic, information, advice, and guidance to the students of the University of Portsmouth and partner institutions. The service also undertakes other activities and events throughout the year to promote the health and wellbeing of students. The Advice Service is based in Gun House at The Union, next door to Cafe Coco. Portsmouth was named the UK's most affordable city for students in the Natwest Student Living Index 2016.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The Union supports a range of over 150 student-led groups that provide extra-curricular opportunities to students, including sports clubs, societies, media groups and volunteering opportunities. Students can also create new societies with the support of the Union.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The Students' Union offers a range of sports clubs which are administered by the Athletic Union The sports range from traditional team games like athletics, football, cricket, rugby union, netball, trampolining, and table tennis to octopush (a form of underwater hockey), lacrosse, polo and pole dancing. As of October 2020 there are 38 different sports clubs .


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The Students' Union runs a number of volunteering projects, such as HEFCE's Volunteering Team of the Year. In 2010, the Union was awarded a £15,000 grant to work with elderly residents in the city.


title: University of Portsmouth

text: The university has two functioning student media outlets. "Spyglass", the student magazine, and "Pure FM", the student radio station, which works alongside local radio stations including Express FM. The university formerly had an active newspaper, The Galleon, as well as a video production society called Victory Studios.


title: Wenzhou

text: Wenzhou ( ; Wenzhounese: Yuziou [ʔy tɕiɤu], ), historically known as Wenchow is a prefecture-level city in southeastern Zhejiang province in the People's Republic of China. Wenzhou is located at the extreme south east of Zhejiang Province with its borders connecting to Lishui on the west, Taizhou on the north, and Fujian to the south. It is surrounded by mountains, the East China Sea, and 436 islands, while its lowlands are almost entirely along its East China Sea coast, which is nearly in length. Most of Wenzhou's area is mountainous as almost 76 percent of its surface area is classified as mountains and hills. It is said that Wenzhou has 7/10 mountains, 1/10 water, and 2/10 farmland. At the time of the 2010 Chinese census, 3,039,500 people lived in Wenzhou's urban area; the area under its jurisdiction (which includes three satellite cities and six counties) held a population of 9,122,100 of which 31.16% are non-local residents from outside of Wenzhou.


title: Wenzhou

text: The city, then known as Yungkia (, "Yǒngjiā"), was a prosperous foreign treaty port, which remains well-preserved today. It is situated in a mountainous region and, as a result, has been isolated for most of its history from the rest of the country, making the local culture and language very distinct not only from the rest of China but from neighbouring areas as well. The city is also the native land of many emigrants to Europe and the United States, with many of these Wenzhounese emigrants being entrepreneurs who start restaurants, retail and wholesale businesses in their adopted countries. Wenzhou people make up a large number of ethnic Chinese residents of Italy, where in some regions such as Tuscany, they comprise 90% of all Chinese residents. Significant concentrations of Wenzhounese people can also be found across New York City as well as in France and Spain.


title: Wenzhou

text: Wenzhou has a history which traces back to about 2500 BC, when it became known for its pottery production as one of the cities of origin of celadon in ancient China.


title: Wenzhou

text: Wenzhou was the capital of the ancient Dong'ou Kingdom which existed from 191 BC until it was conquered by Minyue Kingdom in 138 BC.


title: Wenzhou

text: In the early second century BC, shortly after the destruction of the Qin dynasty, military and political leader Zou Yao () of Wenzhou helped the emperor Gaozu of Han, the first emperor of the Han Dynasty, defeat the prominent warlord Xiang Yu of the Qin Dynasty. After the victory, emperor Hui of Han, the second emperor of the Han dynasty named Zhou Yao the King of Dong'ou (Wenzhou), and under the administration of Emperor Hui, Wenzhou became the capital of the Dong'ou Kingdom in the modern-day area of southern Zhejiang.


title: Wenzhou

text: Around 760AD, the founding emperor of the Tang dynasty, Emperor Gaozu of Tang first used the current name of Wenzhou because of the city's mild weather.


title: Wenzhou

text: Throughout its history, Wenzhou's traditional economic role has been as a port giving access to the mountainous interior of southern Zhejiang Province. In early European sources, the name Wenzhou-Fu or -Foo was often transcribed Ouen-tcheou-fou or Wen-tcheou after the accounts of French-speaking missionaries. In 1876, Wenzhou was opened for tea exports, but no foreign settlement was ever established there. Between 1937 and 1942, during the Second Sino-Japanese War (i.e., World War II), Wenzhou achieved importance as one of the few ports still under Chinese control. It declined in the later years of the war, but began to recover after coastal trade along the Zhejiang coast was re-established in 1955.


title: Wenzhou

text: Wenzhou is the only city in China designed by Guo Pu (), the father of the Fengshui philosophical system. During the Jin Dynasty, Guo Pu organised Wenzhou on the basis of the Fengshui philosophical system along with the Twenty-Eight Mansions, and the Five Elements. These philosophies develop and manage architecture and geography as a whole in metaphoric terms of "invisible forces" that unite the universe, earth, and humanity together.


title: Wenzhou

text: Throughout its history, Wenzhou has avoided numerous militant activities that were originally set out to invade the city of Wenzhou. However, none of them were successful, and this protection is concluded to be the result of the Fengshui development of the city.. During the Northern Song Dynasty, when the Fangla Revolution took place in the now Zhejiang province, the invading army surrounded Wenzhou for over 40 days, but the mountainous isolation blocked the army's movement and the army ended up retreating.


title: Wenzhou

text: Wenzhou is still considered to possess the best Feng Shui conditions and nature of all the Chinese cities. Other cities considered to possess excellent Fengshui nature are Beijing, Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture, Kunming, Hengyang, and Shenzhen. However, none of these cities is designed entirely on the basis of philosophy of Fengshui or designed by the father of Fengshui, Guo Pu. People from all over China usually refer to the accomplishments and influence of Wenzhounese as a result of Wenzhou's Fengshui development by Guo Pu.


title: Wenzhou

text: When Guo Pu climbed to the top of West Guo Mountain () in Wenzhou, he saw the range of mountains of Wenzhou shaped as a dipper and the city itself shaped as a key. Wenzhou is still nicknamed the "Dipper city" based on the popular geographical saying "mountains as dipper, city as key" (). Legend has it that during the time when Wenzhou was being established and developed, a white deer was seen in the city with a flower in its mouth, therefore Wenzhou is also known as "Deer City" (). Today, the Lucheng District is the name of downtown Wenzhou and the White Deer theater located at downtown is the most popular theater among the locals .


title: Wenzhou

text: Guo Pu is honoured today by the renaming of West Guo Mountain, where he stood to observe the city, into Guo Gong Mountain. At the bottom of Guo Gong Mountain, a temple was also built and named Guo Gong Temple. In 2003, the local government constructed a statue of Guo Pu in downtown Wenzhou.


title: Wenzhou

text: With jurisdiction over four districts, two county-level cities and five counties, Wenzhou covers a land area of and sea area of . The population of the prefectural level city is 9.12 million including 2.30 million urban residents, divided among 3 county-level cities and 4 districts.


title: Wenzhou

text: Most of Wenzhou's landscape is mountainous, with many mountain tops reaching altitudes in excess of , for example in the Yandang Mountains, a coastal mountain range dominating the eastern part of prefecture. Another dominating landscape element is the Ou River, the largest river in Wenzhou prefecture. There are some coastal plains, notably around the mouth of the Ou (where the city proper of Wenzhou is located), the Nanxi River, a tributary of the Ou, and further south, around the mouth of the Feiyun River (in Rui'an, a county-level city). Coastal plains are used intensively for agriculture but also host much of the population and industry.


title: Wenzhou

text: The long coastline gives the city abundant marine resources and has many islands. Dongtou, one of the districts in Wenzhou, has also been called the "County of One Hundred Islands." Dongtou County was renamed as Dongtou District in September 2015 following the State Council-sanctioned administrative region adjustments.


title: Wenzhou

text: Wenzhou boasts wonderful landscapes with rugged mountains and tranquil waters, including three state-level scenic spots, namely the Yandang Mountains, the Nanxi River and the Baizhangji Fall-Feiyun Lake, and two national nature reserves, the Wuyanling Ridge and the Nanji Islands. Yandang Mountain has been named as a World Geopark, while the Nanji Islands are listed a UNESCO Marine Nature Reserve of World Biosphere Reserves. Scenic areas account for 25% of the city's land space.


title: Wenzhou

text: Wenzhou derives its present name from its climate, and has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen: "Cfa") with short winters and long, hot, humid summers. Summers are similar to the remainder of the province (albeit slightly cooler during the daytime as compared to inland areas), but winter is much milder, partly due to the southerly location and partly due to the sheltering effect of the surrounding mountains. The monthly 24-hour average temperature ranges from in January to in July and August, while the annual mean is . Heavy rainfalls occur in late spring and early summer due to the plum rains of the East Asian monsoon, while typhoons are commonly a threat in the second half of summer causing considerable damage and destruction. With monthly percent possible sunshine ranging from 26% in March to 53% in August, the city receives 1,706 hours of bright sunshine annually.


title: Wenzhou

text: The prefecture-level city of Wenzhou currently administers four districts, three county-level cities and five counties. Its population at 2010 census:


title: Wenzhou

text: Wenzhou exports food, tea, wine, jute, timber, paper, Alunite (a non-metallic mineral used to make alum and fertilizer). Alunite is abundant and Wenzhou claims to be the "Alunite Capital of the World". Its 10 main industries each exceeding 1.5 billion dollars are electrical machinery, leather products, general equipment, power supply, plastic manufacturing, textile and garment, transport equipment, chemical products, metal products and metal processing.


title: Wenzhou

text: From the 1990s, low-voltage electric appliances manufacturing became one of the major industries in Wenzhou, with some of the large private enterprises setting up joint ventures with GE and Schneider.