Category: Extraordinary

The Deserts of Bolivia Hold The Key to Your New Electric Car

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Read time : 5 mins

Level : Intermediate

By Carley Rojas Avila

The next generation of technological advancement might rely on the same place it has turned to since the days of the Spanish conquistadors: Bolivia. Despite being one of the poorest nations in the Americas, this landlocked South American country is exceedingly rich in the resources required to make our world move.

With global supplies of lithium, the critical element needed for electric car batteries dwindling fast, Bolivia’s vast, remote salt flats may hold the key to the future. But one of South America’s most famous natural wonders may be at stake. Continue reading

UK: Climate protesters throw soup on Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

Handout photo issued by Just Stop Oil of two protesters who have thrown tinned soup at Vincent Van Gogh’s famous 1888 work Sunflowers at the National Gallery in London, Friday Oct. 14, 2022. The group Just Stop Oil, which wants the British government to halt new oil and gas projects, said activists dumped two cans of Heinz tomato soup over the oil painting on Friday. London’s Metropolitan Police said officers arrested two people on suspicion of criminal damage and aggravated trespass. (Just Stop Oil via AP)

LONDON (AP) — Climate protesters threw soup over Vincent van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” in London’s National Gallery on Friday to protest fossil fuel extraction, but caused no damage to the glass-covered painting.

The group Just Stop Oil, which wants the British government to halt new oil and gas projects, said activists dumped two cans of tomato soup over the oil painting, one of the Dutch artist’s most iconic works. The two protesters also glued themselves to the gallery wall.

The soup splashed across the glass covering the painting and its gilded frame. The gallery said “there is some minor damage to the frame but the painting is unharmed.” It was cleaned and returned to its place in the gallery on Friday afternoon.

The work is one of several versions of “Sunflowers” that Van Gogh painted in the late 1880s.

London’s Metropolitan Police said officers arrested two people on suspicion of criminal damage and aggravated trespass. Continue reading

In Brazilian Amazon, a 1,000-mile voyage so people can vote

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

A worker carries an electronic ballot machine at a polling station during general elections in Lago de Catalao, Amazonas state, Brazil, Sunday, Oct. 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Edmar Barros)

By EDMAR BARROS and FABIANO MAISONNAVE undefined

MANAUS, Brazil (AP) — In most democracies, citizens go to the polls. But in Brazil’s sparsely populated Amazon region, the polls often go to the voters.

Most people in the vast rainforest live in urban areas, but thousands reside in tiny villages several days from the nearest city by boat. Amazonas, Brazil’s biggest state, is triple the size of California yet has only about one-third the population of greater Los Angeles. More than half its cities can’t be reached at all by road, and some are hundreds of kilometers from the state capital, Manaus.

Logistics pose a challenge even in Manaus, a sprawling municipality of 2.2 million people. On Saturday, The Associated Press accompanied election workers setting up a voting place in the Bela Vista do Jaraqui community, a three-hour boat trip from the city. Continue reading

Queen Elizabeth is featured on several currencies. Now what?

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

Australian $5 notes are pictured in Sydney, Saturday, Sept. 10, 2022. As the United Kingdom’s reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II was depicted on British bank notes and coins for decades. It’s less well known that her portrait was featured on currencies in dozens of other places around the world, in a reminder of the British empire’s colonial reach. (AP Photo/Mark Baker)

By KELVIN CHAN AP Business Writer

LONDON (AP) — Queen Elizabeth II has been depicted on British banknotes and coins for decades. Her portrait also has been featured on currencies in dozens of other places around the world, in a reminder of the British empire’s colonial reach.

So what happens next after her death this week? It will take time for the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and other countries to swap out the monarchs on their money.

Here’s a look at what is next for the paper cash featuring the late queen:

SWITCHING MONARCHS

The queen’s portrait on British notes and coins is expected to be replaced by a likeness of the new King Charles III, but it won’t be immediate.

“Current banknotes featuring the image of Her Majesty The Queen will continue to be legal tender,” the Bank of England said. An announcement on existing paper money issued by the U.K.’s central bank will be made after the official 10-day mourning period has ended, it said. Continue reading

‘A servant queen’: World pays tribute to Queen Elizabeth II

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Read time : 4 mins

Level : Advanced

The Sydney Opera House is illuminated with a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II in Sydney, Australia, Friday, Sept. 9, 2022. Queen Elizabeth II, Britain’s longest-reigning monarch and a rock of stability in a turbulent era for her country and the world, died Thursday, Sept. 8 after 70 years on the throne. She was 96. (AP Photo/Mark Baker)

By ANDREW MELDRUM Associated Press

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — Across the globe, the death of Queen Elizabeth II has prompted reflections on the historic sweep of her reign and how she succeeded in presiding over the end of Britain’s colonial empire and embracing the independence of her former dominions.

Tributes to the queen’s life have poured in, from world leaders to rock stars to ordinary people — along with some criticism of the monarchy.

It was in Cape Town, marking her 21st birthday in 1947, that the then-Princess Elizabeth pledged that her “whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.”

The British empire soon crumbled, but Elizabeth managed to maintain a regal — if ceremonial — position as the head of the Commonwealth, the 54 nations of mostly previous British colonies.

“The Queen lived a long and consequential life, fulfilling her pledge to serve until her very last breath at the age of 96,” Cape Town mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis, said Friday. “She was an exemplary leader of the kind seldom seen in the modern era.” Continue reading

Covering Gorbachev: AP remembers his wit, wisdom, warmth

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Advanced

Soviet Union President Mikhail Gorbachev toasts with a small glass of lemon-flavored vodka at a going-away party for his staff on Dec. 26, 1991, the day after his nationally televised address in which he announced his resignation as president, in Moscow. Associated Press correspondent Brian Friedman is back right of Gorbachev. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

The Associated Press undefined

When news hit that Mikhail Gorbachev had died at age 91, Associated Press journalists around the world began sharing their “Gorby” stories from covering the last Soviet leader or interviewing him in Russia or abroad in the three decades that followed. They remember his temper and sense of humor, his sharp intellect even in his later years, when he was willing to talk at length about his hopes and his regrets.

That is if you could follow his long, rambling sentences in his southern Russian accent and his annoying tendency to refer to himself in the third person. For some of them, though, it was the warmth of an aging Gorbachev that they remember. The shared tea, the arm around the shoulder. Gorbachev was a man who changed the world, and the AP was there.

Gorbachev came to power in 1985 with no less of a goal than to transform the Soviet Union and the lives of his fellow citizens, many still desperately poor. The obstacles he faced were monumental. Continue reading

Italy’s Lake Garda shrinks to near-historic low amid drought

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

A view of the peninsula of Sirmione, on Garda lake, Italy, Friday, Aug. 12, 2022. Lake Garda water level has dropped critically following severe drought resulting in rocks to emerge around the Sirmione Peninsula. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)

By ANDREA ROSA and LUIGI NAVARRA Associated Press

SIRMIONE Italy (AP) — Italy’s worst drought in decades has reduced Lake Garda, the country’s largest lake, to near its lowest level ever recorded, exposing swaths of previously underwater rocks and warming the water to temperatures that approach the average in the Caribbean Sea.

Tourists flocking to the popular northern lake Friday for the start of Italy’s key summer long weekend found a vastly different landscape than in past years. An expansive stretch of bleached rock extended far from the normal shoreline, ringing the southern Sirmione Peninsula with a yellow halo between the green hues of the water and the trees on the shore.

“We came last year, we liked it, and we came back this year,” tourist Beatrice Masi said as she sat on the rocks. “We found the landscape had changed a lot. We were a bit shocked when we arrived because we had our usual walk around, and the water wasn’t there.” Continue reading

Cold showers, no lights: Europe saves as Russian gas wanes

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Advanced

Hadj Benhalima from the the collective “On the Spot” jumps to turn off lights during a night of action where they will extinguish the lights on dozens of storefronts in Paris, Friday, July 29, 2022. The collective had been acting against wasteful businesses in Paris long before Russia started cutting energy supplies to Europe in a battle of wills over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. As such, the campaigners were precursors of the energy economy drive becoming all the rage in France, Germany and elsewhere. (AP Photo/Lewis Joly)

By JOHN LEICESTER and NICOLAS GARRIGA Associated Press

PARIS (AP) — Fanning out like urban guerrillas through Paris’ darkened streets well after midnight, the anti-waste activists shinny up walls and drain pipes, reaching for switches to turn off the lights.

Click. Click. Click.

One by one, the outdoor lights that stores had left on are extinguished. It’s one small but symbolic step in a giant leap of energy saving that Europe is trying to make as it rushes to wean itself off natural gas and oil from Russia so factories aren’t forced to close and homes stay heated and powered. Continue reading

Why Louvre’s Mona Lisa keeps a smile: Paris’ cooling system

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Read time : 4 mins

Level : Advanced

A worker inspects machines at part of Fraicheur de Paris’ underground cooling system, in Paris, Tuesday, July 26, 2022. The system, which uses electricity generated by renewable sources, is the largest in Europe and goes unnoticed above ground. (AP Photo/Lewis Joly)

By THOMAS ADAMSON and NICO GARRIGA Associated Press

PARIS (AP) — The Mona Lisa may maintain her famously enigmatic smile because she benefits from one of Paris’ best-kept secrets: An underground cooling system that’s helped the Louvre cope with the sweltering heat that has broken temperature records across Europe.

The little-known “urban cold” network snakes unsuspecting beneath Parisians’ feet at a depth of up to 30 meters (98 feet), pumping out icy water through 89 kilometers (55 miles) of labyrinthine pipes, which is used to chill the air in over 700 sites. The system, which uses electricity generated by renewable sources, is the largest in Europe — and chugs on around the clock with a deafening noise totally inaudible above ground.

Paris City Hall has now signed an ambitious contract to triple the size of the network by 2042 to 252 kilometers (157 miles). It would make it the largest urban cooling system in the world. The new contract intends to help the city to both adapt to and combat the threat of global warming. Many parts of Europe hit 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in July. Continue reading

Greece gets European assistance for summer wildfire season

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Read time : 4 mins

Level : Intermediate

Romanian firefighters stand in front of fire engines during a ceremony, in Athens, on Saturday, July 2, 2022. Twenty eight Romanian firefighters, the first of more than 200 firefighters from other European countries that will help their Greek colleagues in fighting wildfires, were welcomed by Climate Crisis and Civil Protection Minister Christos Stylianides and the leadership of Greece’s Fire Service. (AP Photo/Yorgos Karahalis)

By DEMETRIS NELLAS Associated Press

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece is receiving European assistance for the summer wildfire season, with the first group of firefighters arriving in Athens.

The 28 Romanian firefighters were welcomed Saturday by Climate Crisis and Civil Protection Minister Christos Stylianides and the leadership of Greece’s Fire Service. A total of more than 200 firefighters from six European countries will eventually be deployed to Greece.

“Romania is happy to join the pre-positioning program with a specialized firefighting force,” Romanian team leader Col. Alexandru-Adrian Csilik said. “We have a previous experience here in Greece.”

The Romanians, along with other countries, including Russia and Turkey, helped Greece fight widespread wildfires in August 2021, which broke out across the country and devastated the northern part of Evia, Greece’s second-largest island, as well as the southern Peloponnese peninsula. Continue reading