Unit 8: Western Europe – Flashcards

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Iberian Peninsula
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Southwest Europe, basically the countries of Spain and Portugal, warm and somewhat tropical year round
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Northwest Highlands
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Northwestern Europe, Scotland, northwest France, and parts of England, has large amount of rugged terrain, and ancient eroded hills
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Northern European Plain
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large flat plain located in northern Europe, biggest of all five regions, it stretches from France to Russia and is the best place to grow crops
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Central Uplands
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center of Europe, rocky and not good for growing crops, basically Eastern France and Southern Germany
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Alpine Mountains
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major mountain range, also known as "The Alps", located in Middle of Europe, completely surrounds Switzerland and stretches down the coast
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Mediterranean Sea
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Biggest body of water in Europe, sits in south of Europe, border between Europe and Africa, this also helped the rest of the world grow because of the traders/sailors helped the kingdoms of Europe, Africa, and Middle East communicate with each other, these sailors created one of the first written alphabets
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Navigable
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water is only useful when it is this, Europe has the biggest percentage of this water over the rest of the world
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Black Sea
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located in Southeastern Europe, close to Russia and Turkey, this body of water got this name because there is oil beneath it, major shipping port for Middle East, to get out of this you have to go through the Mediterranean, to get out of Mediterranean you have to go through the Bosporus Strait
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Bosporus Strait
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Controlling this is very important because if you control this you control the Black Sea
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North Sea
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considered to be England's because this body of water separates England from rest of Europe
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Baltic Sea
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northern most sea in Europe, near Sweden and Norway, it is frequently frozen so the countries have to deploy icebreakers to break ice
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icebreakers
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Special ships that basically have plows on the front
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Charlemagne, "Charles the Great"
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this person brought order to Europe and ruled around 800 A.D., the name of his domain was the Frankish Kingdom, in the 1300's his kingdom fell apart because of the Bubonic Plague
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Bubonic Plague
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also known as "Black Death", this was when your internal organs liquefy and you got large black boils filled with puss all over your body. This killed 1/4 to 1/3 of Europe and we thought it was witchcraft so we started killing cats even though that helped because it was actually spread by rats and fleas
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Dark Ages
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result of Bubonic Plague, when Europe basically collapsed, they needed to protect themselves so they created the Feudal System
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Feudal System
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New form of government made to protect Europe, the people were divided into two groups, the serfs and the lords, because of this type of government, countries started to develop because the lords would fight each other for land
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serfs
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regular people of Feudal System
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lords
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rich and powerful people of Feudal System
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Renaissance
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"Rebirth", during this there was an emphasis in art, education, and culture throughout Europe, the reason they did is because of Plague, they realized that if stupidity was what brought plague, smartness could keep it away, it also started in Italy so there was an emphasis on studying the ancient
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Rise of Nations
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by the time you hit the 1500's, there were four big countries running Europe, Spain, Portugal, France, and England, they were competing with each other to see who could be the best and the brightest, by the 1800's France takes over most of Europe
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Waterloo
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At this battle, England defeats France and became the leader of Europe by default
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Imperialism
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in 1800's this idea began to sweep Europe, this was the idea that European countries could take over the world, part of the reason for this is pride, the other part being economics, Europe doesn't have some resources like oil and coal, so they would get it if they took over, after that they started taking over, because of this they said the sun never set on the British Empire
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Balance of Power
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as they took over, European countries got jealous and paranoid of each other, so the created this to keep peace in Europe, this was developed by Otto Van Bismarck, he said that they should create a network of alliances, he said that every country in Europe should create an alliance with every other country, this worked for 100 yrs. but when it failed it failed miserably
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World War I
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this was result of when the network of alliances failed, because of alliances it was basically a gigantic free-for-all, all of the winning countries get together and decide to blame it on Germany
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World War II
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Result of WWI, Germany is angry and wants revenge, this is why Hitler came into power, the only reason Hitler chose the Jews was because the Jews had a lot of money and Germany was broke, after this ended the countries are divided into two groups, communist and non-communist
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Non-communist
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basically western Europe, created NATO - North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the US also decided to join, NATO still exist today
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Communist
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Eastern Europe, created Warsaw Pact
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WWII until 1990
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during this time period the two groups were balanced, but after this when the Russia gave up, so did the Warsaw Pact
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European Union
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Economic alliance between countries of Europe, they agree to help each other economically, but are trying to make sure they don't become one nation, Europe is very multilingual, most people speak at least 2 languages. Modern day Europe doesn't have the balance between individuality and teamwork
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Great Britain
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the island, the physical land mass that England and other colonies are located on
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United Kingdom
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made up of England, Scotland, Whales, Northern Ireland
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Constitutional Monarchy
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Government used by England, both a democracy and a monarchy, you have a king, queen, and a Prime Minister, the king and queen are the figurehead leaders, the don't actually have any power, they handle the ceremonial duties
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England
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can be divided into two regions, Lowlands and Highlands, also good industrially, in tourism, and education, Oxford university - one of the most respected colleges in the world
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Lowlands
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South and Eastern part of England, swampy and rainy
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highlands
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North and western part, elevated rolling hills
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Lochs
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lakes found in Highlands, specifically made from glacier holes
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Thames
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primary river of GB, lots of shipping and hydroelectricity
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Industrial Revolution
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this is why England became major role in world, period of time when we made machines to do things faster and better, started in 1800's i England, there was two important things needed to create it - coal and iron, which England had abundance of, made England become leading producing of textiles
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tourism
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England is good with this because they owned so many countries, people from those countries would want to visit it
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Northern Ireland
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Only part of UK that is not on GB, it is located on Ireland, created so Protestants in Ireland have place to live, because of the religious differences, this place has been conflicted
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IRA - Irish Republican Army
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fight against British and Northern Irish in order to kick them out, they basically just do terrorists acts, at the moment they aren't a big problem
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Ireland
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country located to west of England, referred to as Emerald Isle because they have many green plants
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Bog
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area of soft, water-logged land, but not quite a swamp, peat can be found there, peat is useful fertilizer
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Celtic
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these people were believed to run Ireland around 400 B.C., in 1500's they were conquered by English, i 1921 they became a dominion, and in 1949 they regained independence
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Irish Potato Famine
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period of time when potato crop failed, occurred during 1850's, caused by Potato Blight, caused many people to move to America during 1850's and 1860's
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Potato Blight
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Turned potato into inedible purple mush
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Dublin
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capitol and major city of Ireland, also the economic center
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technology
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through 1980's Ireland became wealthy thanks to this, but in recent years their economy has gone broke
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Scandinavia
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Collection of five countries, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, and Iceland, they are all grouped together because of culture
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Norway
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Has one of longest coastlines in the world, because of this they have heavy emphasis on the sea, they also have history tied to Norsemen, very cold, either arctic tundra or marine west coast, have steep mountains along coastlines, many fjords, big on hydroelectricity and fishing. also the 2nd largest Scandinavian country
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London
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capital city of England and most important
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Fjords
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inlets of the sea interspersed into the mountains
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Oslo
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Capital city of Norway
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Sweden
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largest Scandinavian country, warm enough to grow forest and crops, also big on mining, have lots of iron and steel. they are a very wealthy socialist country, they have one of the highest tax rates, but it is okay because the government pays for things like healthcare, they are very neutral, one of few countries that have not joined NATO
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Stockholm
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capital of Sweden
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Skane
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region in southern Sweden and most fertile region, less than 5% of Swedish people are farmers, but this region is productive enough to provide for all of Sweden
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Socialism
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Economic practice where the government owns the means of production
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Finland
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has the most extreme climate of all Scandinavian countries, very cold, only 10% of the land is farm-able, the rest is permafrost, it is difficult to ship things because Baltic Sea is usually frozen, their major source of money is from manufacturing, they make stuff and fly it to their immediate neighbors
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Helsinki
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Capital and largest city of Finland, 25% of population lives there
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Lapland
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Frozen region across top of Norway, Finland, and Sweden, the only people that live there are the Lapps, which are the natives, the governments of these countries don't care what they do there, they also have tourism because of the have reindeer
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Denmark
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the smallest of the Scandinavian countries, located north of Germany, known for banking and money, the used to be the richest country in Europe, at a certain point in time they owned most of Europe, but they lent out money and never go it back, 60% of their land is farming and Legos were created there
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Copenhagen
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Capital City of Denmark
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Greenland
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large island located north of Canada, 85% of this land is frozen, technically they are colony of Denmark because they never paid Denmark back, very uninhabitable, the only people that live there are the Inuit, it got this name because of a mistranslation or a sales attempt, it is believed it was supposed to be called Wine land, it also believed that the founder, Erik the Red purposely misnamed it
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Iceland
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Green and lush, very big on geothermal power - energy from the heat of earth, this place basically sits on crack in Earth, big fishing nation and also volcanic, referred to as Most Green Country because of their economy, but in 2008 they went bankrupt
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France
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about the size of Texas, but three times the population, have very fertile farmland, they have been a monarchy since they were founded. Today this country's culture just tries to do their own thing
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Northern Plain
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Most fertile farmland in all of continental Europe, located in France, also the biggest exporter of farm goods in all of Europe
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Ardennes
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Huge national forest located on border of France and Germany
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Seine
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River that cuts through northern section of France, main system of shipping and water, has many canals to help rest country with water
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French Revolution
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in 1792, the French have this to overthrow monarchy, it was inspired by American revolution, also because there was massive difference between rich and poor, they tried to replace it with democracy, the poor started beheading everybody
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Reign of Terror
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when the French Revolution got out of hand, it was led by Cardinal Richelieu, he said the wealthy were being immoral, so they started beheading the wealthy, Cardinal Richelieu ended up being beheaded
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Napoleon Bonaparte
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Ended Reign of Terror, the public decides to make him leader, he decides to lead French Army into conquering world, the French take over all of Europe except for Russia, he is stopped at battle of Waterloo, he fled after this and came back later. He was the best leader they ever had, since him France had tried to avoid conflict and war
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Maginot Line
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what they used to try and avoid war, it was a line of forts between French-German border designed to prevent was from ever occurring again, it was ineffective because Hitler just went around it
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Steel
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Northern France is known for the production of this
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Wine
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Big in Southern France, they grow a variety of grapes
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Paris
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Very old city, founded 2,000 years ago, known as "'The City of Lights" and "The City of Love", also known as the Primate city, built on the Seine River
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Primate City
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City that has the majority of people and produces the most money
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Marseilles
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Major port on Mediterranean Sea, also big on tourism
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Colonies
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French doesn't know what to do with these, they are one of the few countries that still has these
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Generation Gap
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Problem in France, very large gap between young and old - they changed retirement and employment laws, college kids started creating problems because of this
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Religion
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most of France is Catholic, but they also have huge Muslim population so they fight a little
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