On a Colorfully New Note

By jnadmin2 on January 9, 2014

My blog has been on my mind during the last couple of days, mostly because I did not want to go in to the 10th day of 2014 without an update but I wanted to do something new and interesting before I dove into the blogging business as usual and thanks to the folks at A Sheep No More, I am able to. I stumbled on the neatest article on 40 Maps That Will Help You Make Sense of the World. This blog is about how colorful our world is, so it makes sense to include it here. Although I must say that some of the maps make less sense to me – like number 36, but I digress. Here are my some of the ones that I really liked:

Number 1: Where a Google Street View is Available. If have ever used Google Earth and looked for an address on one side of earth and then decided to look on another side of earth (think going from the US to Europe to Africa), you know how neat this is. I like the way the world turns when this happens.

Map: Courtesy of Google

Number 3: The Only 22 Countries in the World, Britain has Not Invaded (not shown: Sao Tome and Principe)

Map by Stuart Laycock (via The Telegraph)

Number 5: McDonald’s Across the World. Interesting to note that most of the entire continent of Africa is bereft of the golden arches.

Map by Business Management EU

Number 6: Paid Maternal Leave Around The World. The fact that the US is one of the eight countries, out of the 188 with known policies, without paid leave, is brought closer to home for me, when I am reminded that I took just a month off when I had my daughter. Eight years later and nothing has really changed

Map by The New York Times

Number 8: Worldwide Driving Orientation by Country. I have friends and family that live, spend time and drive in countries highlighted in yellow and blue and I have renewed respect for them. I have never learned how to drive on the left side of the road. Although, I am told it is not that difficult

May by ChartsBin.com

Number 11: The World’s Busiest Air Routes (2012). On the map some of these countries look so close together, but air travel makes the most sense, especially the Melbourne to Sydney route which is a whopping 10 hours by road

Map by Vizual Statistix

Number 13: Flag Map of the World. By far, my favorite. So colorful

Map by andrewfahmy on Reddit

Number 19: Map of Where 28,000 Rubber Duckies Made Landfall After Falling Off a Cargo Ship in the Middle of the Pacific Ocean. To understand this, you have to know the back story. Here it is: a shipping crate was on its way from Hong Kong to the United States in 1992. It was filled with rubber duckies and possibly other plastic bath toys. Along the way, it fell overboard and its contents have been washing up on shores from Australia to Hawaii for the last 20+ years. Someone thought it would be neat to make a map of where and when the toys have been seen, which is what we have here

Map via prometheus08 on Reddit

Number 20: Map of Countries with the Most Violations of Bribery. The red dot in middle is where I am from. While I will admit that we have a problem with corruption in my country, there is so much good that comes out of there. Still, not an excuse, but just thought I would slide that in.