Numud

Cities of the World

Sep 262013

Cities in the world are both similar and different. All of them are societies of many thousands people living next to each other and doing works that do not directly create food. Cities are both products and power of the civilization. Most of todays achievements, industrial and scientific, are created there. They are hubs for entertainment, infrastructure, education, shopping, tourism. Even rural people regularly visit cities. The life in the cities is more individual and varied.

While similar cities are also greatly different all over the world. Architecture, urbanisation, culture, religion, lifestyles and different ethnic communities form a distinct blend unique to the region.

The first cities have been established in Mesopotamia 3200 BC. For centuries urbal lifestyle was limited to a select minority: nobility and craftsmen. Majority had to grow food to avert famine. Only the largest empires were able to support massive megalopolises (e.g. Rome) using food and water from vast areas around them. All this started to change in 1700s-1800s, when improved agriculture allowed more and more peasants to leave for urban factories. This “Industrial revolution” changed the city life from an exception to a rule. In 19th century already some European nations had a larger population in their cities than villages. In 20th century most American and Asian nations followed suit. At ~2006 there were more people living in cities than villages all over the world.

Americas	Asia	Europe	Africa	Oceania
United States city	Subcontinent city	Post-Soviet city	North African city	Australasian city
Latin American city	East Asian city	British city	Central African city	Oceanian city
	Chinese city	Mediterranean city	South African city
	Gulf city	Nordic city
	Southeast Asian city	Central European city
	Mideastern city

Climates of the World

Climates No Responses »

Sep 022013

Climate regulates everything in nature. The heat and cold, the daylight duration, what plants will grow, what animals will live, what uses will be possible for the land – all this depends on climate.

There are five main climatic zones:
1.Tropical humid, with rainforests, wet savannas, always hot weather and much rain.
2.Tropical arid, with deserts, steppes, little life and an extremely hot summer sun.
3.Temperate, with survivable summers, never-cold winters and so many villages/cities that the nature is nearly displaced.
4.Continental, with hot summers and cold winters and soil ranging from fertile to nearly useless as one goes closer to the Poles.
5.Polar, with frozen ground and ice, cold all year round and little human habitation.

Additionally Alpine climate zone is sometimes established to cover the mountains where climate is different from nearby lowlands.

Simplified Koppen scale of world climate

Map of the world’s main 5 climate zones (Koppen scale)

General rules for the climate helping to understand the differences in seasons, heat, cold, day duration, etc. in various locations.

Distance from the equator:
*The further the location is from the Equator the colder it is.
*The further the location is from the Equator, the longer are the days in summers and the shorter are the days in winter. At the Equator every single day and night are of the same equal duration (12 hours). At the Polar Circles in a single summer night the sun not sets and similarly at a single winter day the sun does not rise. The further from the Polar Circle to the Pole the location is the more there are “dark winter days” and “light summer nights”. At the Poles half of the year is day and half of the year is night.
*If the location is south of the Equator summers are December-February and winters are June-August. If the location is north of the Equator summers are June-August and winters are December-February. At the equator there are no seasonal climate variations.

Altitude:
*The higher the location the colder it is.
*The higher the location the bigger is its difference between day and night temperatures.
*The higher the location is the less there is oxygen, making those unused to it become tired quicker.
*The higher the location is the more there is ultraviolet radiation, making the skin tan quicker.

Distance from the Ocean:
*The further the location is from the Ocean the colder are its winters and the hotter are its summers. Larger Oceans influence climate more than small inland seas.
*Warm or cool currents in nearby oceans makes the cliamte warmer or cooler than it otherwise would be.

Climate of the location greatly influences culture, economy and traditions of each particular area.

Sep 022013

An impassably lush jungle, a savanna full of animal life, heavy rains, exotic hot locations – all this is the Tropical humid climate.

Western	Middle Eastern	South Asian	East Asian	Other
Latin script	Arabic script	Devanagari	Chinese script	Other scripts
Cyrillic script	Other Middle Eastern	Bengali script	Japanese script
Other European		Other Indian/SE Asian	Korean script