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South African (Off-Topic) Quiz

DamhuisClan

By DamhuisClan
in South Africa

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Bouts777

+Bouts777

Posted
Posted (edited)

Ok, ok, sorry. I got carried away. I just submitted an EC about an escarpment.

A cuesta is a ridge formed by gently tilted sedimentary rocks. In other words, the other side of a sharp escarpment.

 

Here is an easier one:

What is a parsec?

Edited by Bouts777
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DamhuisClan

+DamhuisClan

Posted
  • Author
Posted
Ok, ok, sorry. I got carried away. I just submitted an EC about an escarpment.

A cuesta is a ridge formed by gently tilted sedimentary rocks. In other words, the other side of a sharp escarpment.

 

Here is an easier one:

What is a parsec?

 

(I seem the think it has something to StarTrek)

A unit of time?

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besem

besem

Posted
Posted

What is a parsec?

 

The parsec is the distance a star has to be away from the sun so that it shows a PARallax of one SECond of arc over the period of one earth year, hence the name. A little trigonometry and knowing that the Earth is 150 million km away from the sun quickly gives this as roughly 3.26 light years. :huh:

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Wazat

+Wazat

Posted
Posted

Pratley Putty?

You are it...

 

Pratley's famous glue, Pratley Putty, is the only South African invention that has been to the moon. In 1969 the putty was used to hold bits of the Apollo XI mission's Eagle landing craft together. Krugersdorp engineer George Pratley invented his famous sticky stuff in the 1960s while looking for a glue that would hold components in an electrical box

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Discombob

+Discombob

Posted
Posted

Huzzahh, my years of watching cartoons as a kid has paid off!

 

Ok A slightly different type of question this time, in that there is no right or wrong answer.

 

I am looking for the longest or most interesting palindromic sentence, phrase, paragraph, word or entire novel that you can come up with.

 

I will give you all a certain time, or until I see someone come up with a winningly long one. Please note I am not fussed about the spaces, they don,t have to be exactly palindromic.

 

Anyone who comes up with Madam I'm Adam, or Able was I ere I saw Elba will be viciously scoffed at :):):D

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besem

besem

Posted
Posted

Huzzahh, my years of watching cartoons as a kid has paid off!

 

Ok A slightly different type of question this time, in that there is no right or wrong answer.

 

I am looking for the longest or most interesting palindromic sentence, phrase, paragraph, word or entire novel that you can come up with.

 

I will give you all a certain time, or until I see someone come up with a winningly long one. Please note I am not fussed about the spaces, they don,t have to be exactly palindromic.

 

Anyone who comes up with Madam I'm Adam, or Able was I ere I saw Elba will be viciously scoffed at :):):D

 

My favourite one's always been "A man, a plan, a canal; Panama".

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Discombob

+Discombob

Posted
Posted

To bastardise a some of the others above

 

I saw rats alive step on kak, no pets evil, a star was I

 

Nice one Malo Mystery, never seen that before, and its the longest, so you're up.

 

41 letters!

 

of course, the ultimate prize must go to Weird Al Yankovic, with his song "BOB". Every line is a Palidrome!

Have a listen here:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nej4xJe4Tdg

 

Have a listen first, but if you can't, here are the Lyrics:

 

I, man, am regal a German am I

Never odd or even

If I had a hi-fi

Madam, I'm Adam

Too hot to hoot

No lemons, no melon

Too bad I hid a boot

Lisa Bonet ate no basil

Warsaw was raw

Was it a car or a cat I saw?

 

Rise to vote, sir

Do geese see God?

"Do nine men interpret?" "Nine men," I nod

Rats live on no evil star

Won't lovers revolt now?

Race fast, safe car

Pa's a sap

Ma is as selfless as I am

May a moody baby doom a yam?

 

Ah Satan sees Natasha

No devil lived on

Lonely Tylenol

Not a banana baton

No "x" in "Nixon"

O, stone, be not so

O Geronimo, no minor ego

"Naomi", I moan

"A Toyota's a Toyota"

A dog, a panic in a pagoda

 

Oh, no! Don Ho!

Nurse, I spy gypsies -- run!

Senile felines

Now I see bees I won

UFO tofu

We panic in a pew

Oozy rat in a sanitary zoo

God! A red nugget! A fat egg under a dog!

Go hang a salami, I'm a lasagna hog"

 

Here are some interesting Palindrome facts for you.

The worls longest palindrome is 17,259 words. I have seen the start and end, but it looks junk though, just a collection of random words.

http://www.norvig.com/palindrome.html

 

Finnish has the world's longest single letter palindromes:

"saippuakivikauppias,” which means “soap stone dealer”; and “solutomaattimittaamotulos,” which means “the result from a measurement laboratory for tomatoes.”

Depending on who you ask, “tattarrattat,” “kinnikinnik,” or “detartrated” is the longest single-word palindrome in English, though some would say these words are not really part of the English language, since they are contrived or almost never used

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malo mystery

+malo mystery

Posted
Posted

We all know what Pollsmoor is currently famous for, but what was most of the current prison area used for prior to that? The answer is not "farming" and use of it was suspended with the outbreak of WWII.

 

Golf course?

 

Thats not it, although there are two nearby, Steenberg and Westlake. Westlake apparently being the sole user of water from the Silvermine Reservoir up on the mountain?

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malo mystery

+malo mystery

Posted
Posted

Oh - wasn't it a motor car race track?? or is that not a sport?

Thats it Tom - you are it.

 

It was called the Grosvenor race track/ park and was opperational between 1937 and 1939.

 

evd-br-grosvgp37.jpg

You can see the Constantiaberg profile in the background.

 

In Cape Town the Grosvenor House company funded an event on a 4.5-mile road circuit at Pollsmoor. The 1937 Grosvenor Grand Prix was won by Ernst Von Delius in an AutoUnion and in 1938 by Earl Howe at the wheel of an ERA. The outbreak of World War II stopped all racing activity and it was not until the late 1950s that racing revived with events being held at tracks at Gunner's Circle in Cape Town, Grand Central in Johannesburg and on the Roy Hesketh circuit in Pietermaritzburg.

 

grosvenor20park2c20pollbk8.jpg

 

And another LINK

 

Handing the ball over to you Tom

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GlobalRat

+GlobalRat

Posted
Posted

I must have read this somewhere as before my time - I do remember going out with my dad to motor racing somewhere out on the Cape Flats maybe Faure area in the fifties.

 

Okay - What got pollarded and why was it done?

 

Mmmmm... don't know if you are referring to a specific event, but pollarding is the pruning off the top of a tree to promote lateral growth. It's seen quite often in Europe, less so here.

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tomtwogates

+tomtwogates

Posted
Posted

 

Mmmmm... don't know if you are referring to a specific event, but pollarding is the pruning off the top of a tree to promote lateral growth. It's seen quite often in Europe, less so here.

 

good enough GR Pollarding, a method of tree management, was used throughout the New Forest in Southern England in ancient times. A pollarded tree is one that has been cut a couple of metres above ground level, promoting outward growth of fresh branches rather than the single main trunk continuing upwards. This forced growth of numerous new branches obviously greatly increases the yield of timber from the tree. I have heard that this was also done to get the bent bits of wood for what I think are called the knees in boatbuilding.

The pollarding of oak trees in the New Forest was stopped when the Royal Navy started using the oak timber for shipbuilding at Bucklers Hard; pollarding prohibited the growth of tall, solid trunks ideal for cutting into long planks that were required for the ships of Nelson's fleet.

 

over to you

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tomtwogates

+tomtwogates

Posted
Posted

I must have read this somewhere as before my time - I do remember going out with my dad to motor racing somewhere out on the Cape Flats maybe Faure area in the fifties.

 

Okay - What got pollarded and why was it done?

 

I remember watching racing at Gunner's Circle as a very small child.

 

I guess our ages must be showing - Vic Proctor raced in a car with a rear engine, but it dod not look anything like the cars of today!

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malo mystery

+malo mystery

Posted
Posted

I must have read this somewhere as before my time - I do remember going out with my dad to motor racing somewhere out on the Cape Flats maybe Faure area in the fifties.

 

Okay - What got pollarded and why was it done?

 

I remember watching racing at Gunner's Circle as a very small child.

 

I guess our ages must be showing - Vic Proctor raced in a car with a rear engine, but it dod not look anything like the cars of today!

 

Those old cars still amaze me - all engine and power, tyres offering little to no grip and aerodynamic downforce practically non existant, drivers wearing a soft leather "helmet" and goggles. Remember the "running start" - dashing across the start line to hop in the car and race off. Glad I could spark some "old memories" - in both meanings of the phrase

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