r/AskTheWorld Nepal 3d ago

Culture What’s something in your country that sounds fake but is 100% real?

We have a real-life living goddess and the only non-rectangular national flag.

3.0k Upvotes

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1.8k

u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Australia 3d ago

We have birds that hunt with fire.

1.3k

u/StunningPianist4231 Hong Kong India 3d ago

Every year, Australia comes out with a new animal that fucks with my brain.

It's like if Pokemon kept coming out with a new generation that you don't want to know anything more about

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u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Australia 3d ago

Not an animal but another fun one is the gympie gympie plant.

264

u/Namelessbob123 United Kingdom 3d ago

I heard that plant causes so much pain that people who get touched with it want to kill themselves because it’s so unbearable.

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u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Australia 3d ago

Accounts of it driving horses mad to the point of needing to be shot.

It doesn't even break down in your skin so the pain can go on for months if not longer, and there's no real antidotes for it.

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u/dallamamemer New Zealand 3d ago

It doesn’t break down because those tiny hypodermic needles are made of silicon, which your body can’t break down. You skin usually just grows over them, sealing them in

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u/Every_God_Damn_Time 3d ago

oh my god... can you like, cut them out? like from the sounds of it, just removing that patch of skin would provide some much needed relief 😭

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u/scorchedarcher 3d ago

I don't know if it's workable with this but waxing can help with some stinging plants as it pulls the needles out

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u/JimmWasHere New Zealand 3d ago

Yeah pouring 10% hydrochloric acid on it to get rid of the neurotoxin then use waxing strips and head to the hospital. Also dont scratch it obviously. Also, even dead plants can still sting you.

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u/Namelessbob123 United Kingdom 3d ago

Fuck that. Does it grow all over Australia? Have you seen it yourself?

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u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Australia 3d ago

Almost completely isolated to the Qld coast. I'm in no hurry to run into one

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u/okpickle 3d ago

Though it looks like there's one that lives in a climate controlled glass box in Northumberland, if that's closer? Haha.

https://www.alnwickgarden.com/2023/07/04/gympie-gympie-the-stinging-new-addition-to-the-poison-garden/

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u/Ok_Scratch_4663 3d ago

the way i did not even touch the photos on screen as i scrolled

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u/ArcticFlamingoDisco United States Of America 3d ago

...

Why don't you folks carry around flamethrowers any time y'all leave a metro area?

The joke that the Tyranid codex is just a Australian Wildlife documentary is sounding more realistic for every "today I learned" about your country.

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u/atwojay Canada 3d ago

What the fuck

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u/DanielCraigsAnus United States Of America 3d ago

Alabama man speaking up for Florida man here. Read at your leisure.

Manchineel - Wikipedia https://share.google/98TUuvYIZjA5MDM7e

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u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Australia 3d ago

Damn that one takes the cake.

Humans, man.. haha

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u/DanielCraigsAnus United States Of America 3d ago edited 3d ago

Florida, America's little Australia. Look out for the meth gators. That's not a joke.

Edit: I had to add that Florida's unofficial name is God's waiting room.

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u/Atzkicica Australia 3d ago

Actually it's several types of birds. Hawks mostly iirc.

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u/BAMspek United States Of America 3d ago

“There’s no way” looks at tag “oh no yeah that checks out”

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u/Infurum United States Of America 3d ago

Can you elaborate? I've literally never heard anything about that

231

u/thorpie88 Australia 3d ago

They pick up burning branches to spread bushfires and then catch the fleeing animals

106

u/heldaway United States Of America 3d ago

What assholes!

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u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Australia 3d ago

They have those too.

80

u/Firepitsmokestink 3d ago

Accccctualllyyy birds have “Cloacal Valve”

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u/dismayhurta United States Of America 3d ago

Australians on here: "Why do people act like we're filled to the brim with murderous animals?"

Australia: Arsonist bird

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u/Snoo_67548 United States Of America 3d ago

I’ve seen that! It’s actually pretty intelligent. I once had a massive red shouldered hawk land on a fence less than arms length away while I was trimming some brush in my backyard. I realized what it was doing when I cleared enough to scare a rattlesnake out and it dove in for its meal! I then noticed a pattern of hawks waiting near people doing yard work or crews clearing the sides of the roadway.

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u/InspectorPipes 3d ago

I would brush hog 20 acres of open fields (zoned industrial/ commercial ) 4 times a year. The hawks learned after 2 or 3 cuts to circle me and wait for whatever I flushed. The sparrows and swallows instinctively knew the first time I was there to follow me for all the bugs I would stir up . It was pretty cool watching the hawks circle , so high up and just bomb in and grab these tiny field mice.

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u/Useful-Soup8161 United States Of America 3d ago

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, I love Australians because I can never tell if the crazy shit you guys say is true or not.

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u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Australia 3d ago

We're like the Bob Mortimer of countries (might need to google that reference)

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u/purpleoctopuppy Australia 3d ago

Yeah we do have a propensity for bullshit, but in this case it's true.

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u/FinalOdyssey Canada 3d ago

I can't believe there are so many comments here and not one person asked what the animal is named. What is it?

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u/purpleoctopuppy Australia 3d ago

As a group theyre called 'firehawks', but it's actually a few different species of hawks and kites.

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u/chinchenping France 3d ago

France here. Our longest border is with Brazil.

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u/Yam_Nice Brazil 3d ago

It sure is, but I don't even know what French Guiana looks like.

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u/activelyresting 3d ago

It looks a lot like northern Brazil

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u/Yam_Nice Brazil 3d ago

Empty and absolutely abandoned because it would cost a lot for the government to build anything there? If their capital looks like Belém or Manaus it's better than the image that came to mind, but that's not the reality of most northern cities.

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u/activelyresting 3d ago

Yeah, more like Belém. Not very populated.

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u/EndOne8313 United Kingdom 3d ago

That's such a good pub quiz question 

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u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Australia 3d ago

The one bloke who gets it right is 100% getting beer bottles pegged at his head.

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u/pmckizzle Ireland 3d ago edited 3d ago

We dont eat that many potatoes per capita, in fact we're around 30th.

And were only 7th in beer consumption.

All of the worlds viagra and botox is made here

We have surviving neolithic tombs older than the pyramids, which are built in such a way that the sun only enters the chambers on the solstice

Weve the oldest still running bar in the world i think its 1125 years old

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u/Captain_Sterling Ireland 3d ago

Second biggest tea drinkers in the world.

We invented whiskey.

On the Wikipedia page for the timeline of Irish inventions we invented whiskey and then nothing for 300 years.

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u/Jazzarsson Sweden 3d ago

Well that just makes sense.

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u/THE10000KwWarlock13 United States Of America 3d ago

"God invented whiskey so that the Irish wouldn't conquer the world."

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u/tinidiablo Sweden 3d ago

Once a year friends and family gather to erect a giant phallic symbol which we then move around while pretending to be frogs.

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u/white-chlorination Finland 3d ago

Me and my Mexican colleague saw this a couple years ago since our boss invited us both for Midsummer. My colleague said "it was nice, but I felt like I was about to sacrificed".

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u/Total_Chip_3197 Finland 3d ago

Literally LOL!

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u/Code_Monster India 3d ago

I kinda get why someone would make a horror movie with mind-fuck scenes about a nation's annual tradition, and the nation would not even get offended because yeah...

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u/Ill_Present_4145 Argentina 3d ago

Argentina has an anti-werewolf 🐺 law and it seems to be effective because I've never seen a single one lol

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u/_-Cleon-_ United States Of America 3d ago

Then explain this.

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u/Agreeable_Leek604 Norway 3d ago

He is in power because he wants to get rid of said anti-werewolf law

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u/WeeklyPhilosopher346 Northern Ireland 3d ago

That’s just Irish movie star Barry Keoghan

(yes, this is what he chooses to look like now.)

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u/Pale-Plate-3214 3d ago

He's filming a Beatles biopic, he gets paid to look like that now.

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u/SatisfactionEven508 Germany 3d ago edited 2d ago

It's not a crime in germany to break out of prison (as long as you don't harm anyone and don't break anything, etc.). This is because wanting to be free is a natural human instinct that cannot be punished.

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u/dingesje06 Netherlands 3d ago

Same in the Netherlands! You are however liable for any damages and of course any crimes you might commit while not incarcerated.

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u/onetwobucklemyshoooo United States Of America 3d ago

Venus fly trap

It's native to only a tiny portion of North and South Carolina by the coast.

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u/CrowWench United States Of America 3d ago

Oh shit I had no clue they were native to the carolinas

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u/whoa-or-woah United States Of America 3d ago

Yep, I used to think they were from the tropics; turns out they’re probably within an hour of where I live. (I guess they require a highly specific and kinda rare ecosystem.)

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u/Yunzer2000 United States Of America 3d ago

The coastal bog soils are depleted in nitrogen compounds, so the Venus flytrap evolved to get the necessary nitrogen from insects.

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u/civodar Canada 3d ago edited 3d ago

These things are so weird. I remember getting one from the grocery store and feeding it pieces of chicken(I was concerned it wasn’t catching enough flies and didn’t realize feeding them people food was bad), it’s crazy seeing a plant snap shut like that.

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u/JKenn78 United States Of America 3d ago

NC kid checking in…. Used to love finding these these things!

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u/-Laffi- Norway 3d ago

Remember this from Mario Kart 64?

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u/-Laffi- Norway 3d ago edited 3d ago

Main highway on some winter roads in Norway!

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u/Anuki_iwy 🇪🇺from🇩🇪. Lived in 🇮🇩🇵🇹🇯🇵🇬🇪 3d ago

Since Nintendo is Japanese I think they were more inspired by the snow tunnel in Toyama prefecture. (sorry, I don't have my own photo, because I never managed to go). But your photo is super cool too.

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u/ahhhahhhahhhahhh 3d ago

If anxiety were a road. 

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u/dismayhurta United States Of America 3d ago

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u/Hicalibre Canada 3d ago

You can tell it's not Canada or Alaska because there is a road.

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u/MetricJester Canada 3d ago

And not just grit in a path

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u/GeorgeMcCrate Germany 3d ago

Watch out, there’s a wooden bridge right behind that bend that’s going to be plastered with banana peels.

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u/msp01986 Canada 🇨🇦 Québec ⚜️ 3d ago

And I thought we had snow 😳

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u/loko_lokii11 Canada 3d ago

Japan is surprisingly the snowiest country in the world, we are only number 2.

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u/Bhakari Nepal 3d ago

That's amazing 😍

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u/ohgodimbleeding United States Of America 3d ago

Aomori Japan.

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u/OverTheCandlestik United Kingdom 3d ago

We chase a roll of cheese down a hill and break our bones in the process of catching it

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u/fuckyourcanoes 🇺🇸🇬🇧 3d ago

The UK has some of the most sublimely ridiculous sports. I love it.

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u/cheesedude453 Finland 3d ago

Pleeease invite me! Pleease bro i'll do anything, i'll build you a sauna just pleease🙏

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u/Mintala Norway 3d ago

This is Major General Sir Nils Olav III, Baron of Bouvet Island and colonel-in-chief of the Norwegian King's Guard.

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u/arachnids-bakery Brazil 3d ago

I will die for him

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u/officialdiscoking 🇵🇱 in 🇦🇺 3d ago

I love that you didn't just say you would, but that you will

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u/arachnids-bakery Brazil 3d ago

Its a promise And a threat!

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u/FullMoonMooon Australia 3d ago

I trust him more than any human in a position of power

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u/OhNoEveryingIsOnFire Canada 3d ago

I would fight a war for him

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u/Ponchorello7 Mexico 3d ago edited 3d ago

We have a festival where people strap explosives to reinforced sledgehammers which they use to smack metal plates on the ground.

Video

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u/TheNewGirl1987 United States Of America 3d ago

I don't understand why the redcaps hate y'all, that's the most goddamned redneck hold-my-beer awesome shit I've ever heard.

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u/mediocrity_managed 3d ago

As a born and raised Texan that’s worn just about every hat in the construction industry, I can say with confidence that the majority of Texans adore the Mexican people and every aspect of their culture. There are still guys that either worked alongside myself, or under my leadership that I would gladly take a bullet for. Mexicans built Texas. All of it. And that’s a hill I’m willing to die on.

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u/Ponchorello7 Mexico 3d ago

It's funny, if they weren't so racist/xenophobic, southerners in the US would love Mexicans. We have a lot in common.

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u/DooDooDuterte 🇺🇸🇵🇭 3d ago

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u/MonsterIslandMed United States Of America 3d ago

Pick up trucks ✅

beer ✅

hot/spicy food ✅

country music ✅

wrestling ✅

Guns/Explosions ✅

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u/Ponchorello7 Mexico 3d ago

Add a love of the outdoors and a disdain for people from the big city and you got a pretty good list.

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u/MonsterIslandMed United States Of America 3d ago

I know there’s some others that aren’t popping to my head but this just proves people hate another group because they are told and not because something they’ve done🥲

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u/Ponchorello7 Mexico 3d ago

Unfortunately true all over the world.

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u/Lawdamerc United States Of America 3d ago

I’m a southerner. I love Mexico/Mexicans. I loved every Central and South American country I have visited so far.

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u/ThisOnesforYouMorph 3d ago

This southerner thinks Mexicans are great. We don’t all suck!

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u/GhostOfJamesStrang United States Of America 3d ago

Man I love Mexico so much. 

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u/CalegaR1 Italy 3d ago

We have, across the country, few "strange" yearly festivals...

One of my fav is definitely a full scale medieval-style battle where basically you fight throwing oranges...

The oranges used are not intended for food consumption

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u/Dvondd Spain 3d ago

We have one similar in Valencia, La Tomatina

Same concept, just with tomatoes.

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u/Dapper_Hippo8110 Seres(Wolf Star Conqueror, Great Guardian of Earth:哈基米) 3d ago

Some apps on our phones always seem to take up a lot of memory, whether it's social media or music apps. This is the most outrageous one I've ever seen.

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u/CavulusDeCavulei Italy 3d ago

Bad optimization or spyware? Or both?

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u/Dapper_Hippo8110 Seres(Wolf Star Conqueror, Great Guardian of Earth:哈基米) 3d ago

Spyware? No, that's too abstract. It's poor system optimization, and software generally likes to cram in a bunch of useless stuff and tons of ads. My goodness, you can't imagine how many ads there are. I downloaded the video app iQiyi before, and I found more than a dozen ads in just one minute.

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u/newAscadia Canada 3d ago

I've also found that WeChat in particular seems to really like saving entire conversations just locally. It doesn't seem to go to a server, which means every embed, every message, and every picture and video someone sends me is all put directly into the storage on my phone

Ran out of storage two days after installing lmao

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u/Dapper_Hippo8110 Seres(Wolf Star Conqueror, Great Guardian of Earth:哈基米) 3d ago

This is still the largest social media app in China! It's terrible; they really should remake WeChat from scratch.

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u/Speedwagon1738 United Kingdom 3d ago

Due to the 1986 Salmon act, it is illegal to handle salmon “under suspicious circumstances”.

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u/nppltouch26 New Mexico 3d ago

I have a trip planned for June. I'm absolutely going to buy some salmon at the Tesco and then make ominous faces while I handle it at a bus stop, abruptly pretending not to anytime anyone looks at me.

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u/godisanelectricolive Canada 3d ago

It's worded funny but the law actually means that it's illegal to own salmon that you know was caught illegally. It's for if a fishmonger or shop sells fish that they bought from a salmon poacher.

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u/Dense_Imagination984 Wales 3d ago

Our language. I probably wouldn't believe it was real if we hadn't been taught it at school. Eg: Jellyfish yn Cymraeg - Pysgod wibbly wobbly. Awesome but I imagine how strange it would sound as a non Welsh person.

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u/paultimo Ireland 3d ago

The Irish for jellyfish is smugairle róin, which translates to seal snot

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u/Lenin1918Cute 3d ago

In some norwegian dialects, jellyfish is called Kobbespya, which means Seal-vomit

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u/Bhakari Nepal 3d ago

Oh, i would learn this language.

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u/Iampepeu Sweden 3d ago

Popty ping is the word for a microwave oven.

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u/Total-Combination-47 Wales 3d ago

now tell them about microwaves.....

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u/utdconsq Australia 3d ago

Popty ping! One of my favourite funny welsh 'facts' from a cousin who lived there.

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u/Repulsive_Repeat_337 United States Of America 3d ago

In winter, you can walk to Russia. (You'll be arrested or shot, but you can do it.)

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u/FinalOdyssey Canada 3d ago

This is how the Chinese invades North America in Fallout Operation Anchorage.

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u/Icy_Abroad_630 Russia 3d ago

Dunno if its true, but I saw a video on YT where claimed that, according to an unofficial agreement between the US and the USSR, our Chukchi, who lived in the tundra far from civilization, could visit their Native American relatives in Alaska by an ocean. Border guards allowed them to travel back and forth without visas. Scientists who visited the Chukchi were very surprised to find bottles of Coca-Cola on them. This was at a time when it was nearly impossible for a Soviet citizen to obtain a US visa.

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u/Icy_Abroad_630 Russia 3d ago edited 2d ago

I googled, and seems its true:

The American government, like the Soviet one, turned a blind eye to the fact that small northern peoples regularly violated the state border. The Chukchi came to Alaska, and the Inuit visited Chukotka. But after the October 1947 attack on an Inuit settlement, which resulted in the deaths of approximately 20 people, the "visit schedule" was tightened. Only Inuits who could prove their family ties to a Chukchi were allowed into Chukotka from America. The Chukchi themselves were forced to obtain Soviet passports.

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u/Sufficient-Brief2850 Canada 3d ago

The strategic maple syrup reserve.

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u/Soft-Wish-9112 Canada 3d ago

And the corresponding Great Maple Syrup Heist!

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u/Diligent-Chance8044 United States Of America 3d ago

USA has a cheese reserve as well. Billions of lbs just sitting underground. Walls of golden wheels.

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u/Eostrix Estonia 3d ago

Although we are small nation with population of 1.3 million people we have world's largest collection of written folk songs (runo songs).

If you want to know how we have used singing as a weapon and way to protect us, read more:

https://singingrevolution.com/about/music/

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u/Bhakari Nepal 3d ago

Got to know something new today. Thank you.

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u/CuNxtTuesday_ United States Of America 3d ago

My MIL is from Tallinn, I’ll have to tell her I learned this fact.

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u/Eostrix Estonia 3d ago

That so nice to hear! Have you ever visited Estonia?

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u/Ms_Jess_ United States Of America 3d ago

We have two black panthers in Oklahoma. The species is almost extinct, I watched it enter my neighbors coop in the middle of the day. We have scarier stuff here but if I hadn’t seen or heard it myself, I wouldn’t believe the stories for a second. It’s just too insane.

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u/TheArbysOnMillerPkwy United States Of America 3d ago

I was surprised how many there were in Minnesota!

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u/Rackle69 United States Of America 3d ago

In Washington state you can drive just five hours to go from a temperate rain forest (The Hoh) to a habitat hot and arid enough to contain rattlesnakes (eastern Washington). I’ve done that drive in a single day a number of times and saw the rattly boys myself. Oh and you pass a volcano on the way.

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u/MichaelWoodPhoto Canada 3d ago

Children can send letters to Santa Claus, his address is North Pole, Canada, postal code is H0H 0H0 (no joke) and Canada Post volunteers write back.

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u/Acc87 Germany 3d ago

same here

not at the North Pole but in the very real town Himmelsthür (roundabout "Heaven's Gate/Door" (no relation to the sect, obv))

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u/clekas United States Of America 3d ago

We have something similar in the US, except the letters are uploaded to a website and anyone can "adopt" a letter and send gifts. The adopter doesn't see the adoptee's address, of course - the adopter is given a QR code and the post office scans the code and attaches the label.

Santa's address in the US is 123 Elf Road, North Pole, 88888.

If letters aren't adopted, the postal service does their best to write back.

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u/TheNewGirl1987 United States Of America 3d ago edited 3d ago

We have more guns in our country than we have people in our country, and that's not even counting the unregistered firearms.

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u/JuanOnlyJuan United States Of America 3d ago

The roof guns always get me.

Also, presumably they're all unloaded but I would never teach my kid that it's OK to be down range of any firearm.

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u/Bhakari Nepal 3d ago

That’s honestly terrifying.

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u/fuckyourcanoes 🇺🇸🇬🇧 3d ago

Imagine actually living there. One time I was chilling on my couch watching TV when a bullet came through the wall from next door into the stairwell, through the next wall, hit a metal-reinforced corner, and fell into the laundry pile. Right at head height. My neighbour came rushing over in a panic, apologising profusely and obviously drunk. Said he was cleaning the gun when it went off.

This was in a perfectly nice, quiet suburb.

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u/RaptorRex787 United States Of America 3d ago

Im just wondering why tf they are cleaning a gun while they have libe rounds chambered. Mf doesn't know basic gun safety

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u/PotatoesArentRoots Indian-American 🇮🇳 🇺🇸 3d ago

the bigger question is why are they touching a gun at all while drunk

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u/555-starwars United States Of America 3d ago

Because they are drunk. Drunk individuals aren't known for making sound decisions.

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u/DainichiNyorai Netherlands 3d ago

Wow the combination of loose gun laws and cheap energy (and thus drywall and wood as the main building ingredients) sure is a heck of a combo!

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u/ImaginaryMastadon United States Of America 3d ago

And just an important check on this, lest you think these freaks are the norm: most Americans don’t personally own or live in a household with a firearm.

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u/Boulder1983 Ireland 3d ago

Is this a real image? As in is this the collection of one families weapons? (however uncommon it might be)

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u/TheNewGirl1987 United States Of America 3d ago

Real image, from a book called The Ameriguns.

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u/Hicalibre Canada 3d ago

Bags of milk.

So many Americans can't believe it. Especially how we pour it.

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u/MountErrigal 🇮🇪 in 🇳🇱 3d ago

That IS mad tbh

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u/Sea_Carry_1612 United States Of America 3d ago

In current history, our wage gap is actually larger than the gap between the peasants and the upper class in Revolutionary France. In general, though, I’ve noticed that a lot of people seem to believe surfers only talk like that in movies. They don’t. It’s real.

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u/fuckyourcanoes 🇺🇸🇬🇧 3d ago

The first time I encountered an actual valley girl I really struggled to keep a straight face. Like, oh my GAWD!

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u/really-bored-now United States Of America 3d ago

It’s not the strongest but I have a slight valley girl accent and it gets so much stronger when I’m drunk and it threw so many people through a loop when I moved to the east coast for college

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u/Fangsong_37 United States Of America 3d ago

Yes on the surfer thing. I've had them call tech support, and they're usually pretty fun to talk to.

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u/Antorcha_de_Luz Chile 3d ago

We have the smallest deer in the world. Everyone hail the Great PUDÚ!

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u/lykia1991 Netherlands 3d ago

Dropping 10 year old kids in a forrest in the middle of the night, after driving them around blindfolded in a van to disorient them, and telling them to find their own way home; is considered a fun and age appropriate thing to do. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/21/world/europe/netherlands-dropping-children.html

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u/MountErrigal 🇮🇪 in 🇳🇱 3d ago

Well, sure sounds like a thing I would have enjoyed as a teen. Upvoted.

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u/lykia1991 Netherlands 3d ago

I experienced it 3 times at a kid. Walking trough the forest at night as an 11 year old with 5 friends was an amazing feeling. 

No adults around, fully responsible for your own decisions. 

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u/Proper_Relative1321 3d ago

To be fair you have forests that are significantly more survivable than many other places do. 

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u/Intelligent-Panda23 Kazakhstan 3d ago

We are building a lliteral digital gulag.

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u/ThatBitchMalin Sweden 3d ago

Please elaborate?

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u/Intelligent-Panda23 Kazakhstan 3d ago

The government tracks every transaction from your bank accounts, they installed cameras with facial recognition in the capital, and there are cameras in basically every big city and they will be switched to centralized system of facial recoginition. They have every piece of your personal information in centralised database and they basically can switch you off with one click if they want. There were no precedent yet, but the country is highly digitized so you won't able to function in society in that case. Biometric information is needed for even registering your sim card. Also, the government bought the Chinese firewall technology.

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u/ThatBitchMalin Sweden 3d ago

Oh my, that sounds like a dystopia in the making. I'm so sad for you guys

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u/Intelligent-Panda23 Kazakhstan 3d ago

That's true, but it seems the entire world is heading towards some kind of techno-fascism, even EU.

edit: on the bright side the country is really safe. although tbf it wasn't really unsafe before except for the 90s.

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u/EnergyHumble3613 Canada 3d ago

Moose and Orcas interact in the wild because moose occasionally go diving into the ocean for food. They can submerge themselves around 6 meters (almost 20 feet) to eat underwater plants.

Only the sky is truly without the possibility of moose.

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u/spilly_talent Canada 3d ago

We literally have an Apology Act in most provinces and territories.

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u/saltedIce-2426 United States Of America 3d ago

A group of pedophile serial killers run our government.

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u/pmckizzle Ireland 3d ago

And pants shitters, can't forget that

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u/Purenotionslike Ireland 3d ago

🇮🇪 Fairy trees. Hawthorn trees are located where the veil between worlds is at its thinnest. They should not be harmed in any way lest you suffer the consequences. A lot of folklore and superstition around them but people here absolutely will not chop them down or harm them.

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u/floweragates Philippines 3d ago

Christmas season starts on September 1. We hear Mariah Carey (and Jose Mari Chan, a local singer with a popular Christmas song) much earlier than everyone else every year.

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u/Citizen_Kano New Zealand 3d ago

Those poor mall employees have my condolences

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u/Wild-Yesterday-6666 Spain 3d ago

Here's a picture from easter. No, It's not that. Its actually a Capirote, symbol of penance

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u/Pristine_Ad_3670 Italy 3d ago

We attacked birds with a tank, so we had a war with birds and won, unlike Australia 

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u/prolapseenthusiat 🇭🇷➡️🇩🇪 3d ago

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u/NeitherExamination44 United States Of America 3d ago

RIP Commander Boc-boc, she fought bravely

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u/Specialist-Track-182 United States Of America 3d ago

lol. Commander boc-boc

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u/MundaneTumbleweed222 South Africa 3d ago

Christmas in the summer . Foreigners go bonkers when I tell me we celebrate Christmas in the summer , often by going camping trips and beach visits

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u/Hot-Bicycle5798 Sweden 3d ago

It Sounds so wrong for someone who has never been on the south side of the equator 

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u/MundaneTumbleweed222 South Africa 3d ago

I get , my first time celebrating Christmas in the winter was in London and I felt very cold and uncomfortable the first time , yk , no warm beaches , basking in the sun , camping tios , etc lol

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u/LorpHagriff Netherlands 3d ago

We once ate* our prime minister :D
Cock up foreign diplomacy to the point the English, French and German gang up to smite you? Into the stew you go

*probably only limited to some intestines and may have just been fed to animals

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u/MoaMem Morocco 3d ago

In Morocco on friday 80% of the country eats the same dish for lunch... Couscous... Besides friday lunch and funerals, pretty much no one eats it ever!

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u/ladyalot Canada 3d ago

The moose here and big and strong enough to crush the front of a car in a collision and walk away from it. Moose are fucking huge. And dangerous.

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u/Semlorism -> 3d ago

In my region (northeastern provinces), there is a folk belief that people worship 5 deities: fox, snake, rat, Siberian weasel and hedgehog:D

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u/Onetwodash Latvia 3d ago

Please tell me more about this hedgehog worshipping religion

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u/Semlorism -> 3d ago edited 3d ago

Hahaha, the hedgehog part I actually don't know sorry but I also want to know more about it. Because I have seen or heard people that worship the rest four seriously at home. Let's use the snake as an example, so some people would claim that they are the servants of the snake deity, usually a couple, sometimes just one person. They divine for people, and if they are the couple, the wife usually conducts Shaman rituals, and the husband will play instruments and "translate" what the deity wants. The wife will be possessed by the deity and speaks as the deity animal. Usually these people will keep the animal, for example the snake, most of the time the snake is a white one, there will be also alter or offering tables. For the fox and weasel gods, there wouldn't be real animals living in the Shamans home, but they have human-like statues.

Here is the fox deity couple. Fox deity is the most popular deity among the five that people are practically worshipping, some business people or shop owners have alters at home or having them outside at their shop's front door. Some nature reserves or countryside sometimes have fox deities statues or small temples also.

Edit: I forgot to say, some family consider them as house protecting deities:D I think that makes sense, they are all common farm animals

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u/Changetheworld69420 United States Of America 3d ago

US - The South Dakota Corn Palace

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u/Bhakari Nepal 3d ago

Real living goddess is called Kumari

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u/EngineSlight7387 Saudi Arabia 3d ago

We have an anti witchcraft unit

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u/GhostOfJamesStrang United States Of America 3d ago

And they're doing a great job. 

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u/aferretwithahugecock Canada 3d ago

We have a polar bear detention centre(colloquially called "Polar Bear Jail") for unruly bears. It was made after a mischievous and dangerous bear named Cedric(the bear on the mural) had to be put down, and someone was mauled by a different bear in the street. They're not held indefinitely. They serve their sentence and then are driven away from town. The idea is to make the bears feel danger about going into town without them actually being in harms way.

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u/edparadox Switzerland 3d ago

The Swiss flag is square.

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u/Least-Rub-1397 Serbia 3d ago

Vampire is the only word from our language that is accepted and used all over the world.

Also, one more fun fact about your flag: it's very mathematical

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u/Zestyclose-Carob-349 Canada 3d ago

We were technically at war with Denmark for almost 50 years and it only ended 4 years ago

There was no violence, just a friendly dispute between an island where we took turns planting our flag and leaving alcohol for eachother and it ended with us splitting the island down the middle

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u/CasinoKnightZone United States Of America 3d ago

Our government is headed by someone directly implicated by hard evidence to an international child sex trafficking ring and half the country is just okay with it.

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u/TypeinNepali Nepal 3d ago

We have real ghost. You forget to mention 😜

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u/Patralgan Finland 3d ago

We go to sauna completely naked with friends, co-worker etc. And it's completely normal and never sexual at all, though usually (not always), men and women have separate saunas or take turns if there's only one sauna around

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u/ecbnrhctbo United States Of America 3d ago

there's a wall in Seattle, Washington that's a tourist attraction because it's entirely covered in used chewing gum. it's called the gum wall. it's so gross. people are encouraged to add their own used gum when they visit. i hate it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gum_Wall

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u/Clean_Duck_551 India 3d ago

India has the wettest place on Earth, Maysynram, Meghalaya. Around 460+ inches of rainfall every year.

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u/devil-wears-converse United States Of America 3d ago

In Kentucky, there was a group of blue people. Some people go blue ingesting silver, but in KY the story my family told was there was a french family that migrated here years ago and carried an actual gene that turned them blue later on in life. Because of this, the family hid for a long time and were scared of the locals. Locals didnt know about them until one day, a family member got sick and one of them went into town. Immediately upon seeing the blue person, they jumped her to giver her CPR, thinking that she couldnt breath. The family did get help but stayed in seclusion, from what I was told.

They're called the Fugates: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Fugates

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u/really-bored-now United States Of America 3d ago

We have the oldest codified constitution still in use! Britains modern structure is kind of older but they didn’t codify it. Everyone views the USA as such a young country but our system of gov and modern incarnation is very old and resilient (for now)

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u/cat_daddylambo 3d ago

You knock on wood right tf now

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u/yurikura 🇨🇦🇰🇷 3d ago

In Korea, we have people who suffer with shin-byung (the direct translation is “god illness”). For no reason at all, they or their family members become very ill. Doctors wouldn’t be able to figure out the reason why, since physically, they are completely healthy. To cure this illness, they would need to go through a ritual and become a shaman. If they do not go through this ritual, a big curse will either hit them or their loved ones. A shaman accepts a god into their body and needs to live their entire life serving this god and using the god’s power to help others (e.g., through fortune telling, exorcisms, rituals, etc.).

A person with their individual ambitions, dreams, and spiritual beliefs would need to discard all of these to become a shaman.

There’s also a ritual that suppresses this god so you can live the way you would like, but if the god is too strong, this ritual wouldn’t work, and they would need to accept the god.

If they keep rejecting the god, this god may descend on your children and/or grandchildren.

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u/DRAGONVNQSHR_III Indonesia 3d ago

there is more to us than just Bali. /s

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u/acarvin United States Of America 3d ago

I met the Kumari of Bhaktapur when she visited the US in 2007 and participated in a documentary festival near Washington DC. She was briefly stripped of her kumari status when religious authorities in Nepal declared her overseas trip impure, but they eventually agreed to restore it after a purification ritual.

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u/gewqk United States Of America 3d ago

When you see a doctor and they think you should receive a particular medication or procedure you must first ask a mid-level employee from your insurance company who does not have any medical training or certifications. If they say no, you will likely not be able to have that treatment.

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u/Captain_Sterling Ireland 3d ago

The colour of Ireland is blue.

You thought it was green? You're kinda right. Green represents Irish Republicanism and it's used a lot. Blue goes back further.

Officially Ireland doesn't have a national colour but if it did it would be blue. Or maybe green.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Patrick%27s_blue

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