Posted
on November 4, 2016
Wow
– I really thought I had talked about all the countries in the
world at LEAST once, in the seven years I've been writing this blog.
I mean, there are only 196 nations in the world, and I've written
more than 2,500 posts! But I guess Tonga slipped by somehow!
Tonga
is one of the smallest nations on Earth, and it's one of the many
(many, many) island nations located in the South Pacific. It's made
up of 169 islands, 36 of which people actually live on.
The
islands were called “the Friendly Islands” by Westerners, for a
while after their “discovery” by Captain James Cook in the late
1700s. That's because Cook and his men happened to arrive during a
festival, a time of goodwill to all, perhaps? – and so he was
invited to the festivities. However, some claim that there was a plan
afoot among the Tongan leaders to kill Cook – the plan just didn't
get put into action. That may or may not be true; I'm not sure what
evidence has been put forward to back this idea.
Somehow
Tonga escaped being colonized – it was the only South Pacific
island nation to avoid being formally colonized – but it did have
“protected state status” with the United Kingdom for most of the
20th Century. It became a constitutional monarchy when it
adopted a constitution on this date in 1875.
I
read that Tonga is one of the most corrupt nations in the world!
Apparently the royal family and the nobles have almost all of the
money and own the telecommunications and satellite companies. But
there is a large “non-monetary sector,” which probably means
people growing their own food and making the things that they need,
and trading with one another. Apparently there are moves to make
Tonga richer and more diverse economically speaking, and Tongans hope
to develop the tourist industry.
That
shouldn't be too hard. I mean...look:
Also
on this date:
Plan ahead:
Check
out my Pinterest boards for:
And
here are my Pinterest boards for:
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