7th August: Côte d'Ivoire Independence Day

Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) Independence Day

1. Although in English, people tend to call this country Ivory Coast, the official name is the French, Côte d'Ivoire. The government officially refuses to recognise or accept any translation from the French. Other languages have their own names for the country which generally translate as "Ivory Coast", including the Portuguese Costa do Marfim. Côte de Dents was another name, meaning "Teeth Coast", again a reference to the ivory trade.
2. There were a few names that weren't about ivory, including Côte de Quaqua, after the people that the Dutch named the Quaqua; the Coast of the Five and Six Stripes, after a type of Cotton fabric also traded there, and the Côte du Vent, the Windward Coast, after perennial local off-shore weather conditions.
3. Ivory Coast comprises 322,463 km2 (124,500 sq mi), which makes the country about the size of Germany.
4. The capital city is Yamoussoukro, which was designated the capital in 1983. The largest city is Abidjan, where most of the foreign embassies are.
5. Abidjan is said to have got its name through a mistake in translation, when a European explorer asked an old man for the name of the nearest village. The old man was startled and frightened, and didn't understand the language the explorer used. He thought he was being asked to justify his presence, so his answer was "M'bi min djan", which means, "I've just been cutting leaves."
6. Yamoussoukro is home to the largest church building in the world, according to Guinness World Records, the Basilica of Our Lady of Peace of Yamoussoukro. Yes, it's bigger than St. Peter's Basilica. It has an area of 30,000 square metres (322,917 sq ft) and is 158 m (518 ft) high. However, this includes a rectory and a villa, which are not strictly part of the church, so St Peter's still has room for more worshippers. Less than a third of Côte d'Ivoire's population are Christian, so most services at the basilica are only attended by a few hundred people. It was consecrated on 10 September 1990 by Pope John Paul II.
7. Ivory Coast is the world's largest producer of Cocoa. Other chief crops include Coffee, Bananas, and oil palms.
8. The official language is French, although many other indigenous languages are spoken.
9. The Flag looks very similar to the flag of the Republic of Ireland except the colours are reversed. The Orange represents the colour of the land, which is rich and generous; the white is for peace with justice; Green is for the hope of the country and their certainty for a better future.
10. The highest elevation is Mount Nimba, at 1,752 metres (5,748 ft) in the far west of the country along the border with Guinea and Liberia.

My Books

As well as this blog, I also write fiction and have published two novels (Death and Faxes and Glastonbury Swan) and a collection of short stories (Jigsaw). If you like ghost stories, crime stories, a bit of romance and anything slightly bizarre you might enjoy them. 

Further details on my books page