This city of nearly 150,000 residents is closer to over 100 national capitals than it is to its own. Spoiler
What is Saint-Denis, Réunion?
It's closer to every African capital, all but three Asian capitals, most European capitals, and perhaps most remarkably, Canberra, Australia - than it is to Paris (about 5810 miles).
mas3cf wrote: ↑Wed May 20, 2020 7:03 am
WORLD CITIES
This city of nearly 150,000 residents is closer to over 100 national capitals than it is to its own. Spoiler
What is Saint-Denis, Réunion?
It's closer to every African capital, all but three Asian capitals, most European capitals, and perhaps most remarkably, Canberra, Australia - than it is to Paris (about 5810 miles).
My guess was
Honolulu. Turns out Honolulu has more than double the population specified. I wonder how it fares in the national capital proximity category. Canberra is farther away than Washington D.C.—5,224 vs 4,826 miles, so not a huge difference. Tokyo and Seoul are closer. Mexico City and Havana are closer, but Port-au-Prince and Bogota are farther. So I'm guessing it doesn't reach the 100 mark. Still an attractive decoy for this clue and one that would make it TOC level or harder, I think.
Of course, we could go the read-the-writers'-minds route and note that Honolulu is not a "world" city. It's in the US.
mas3cf wrote: ↑Wed May 20, 2020 7:03 am
WORLD CITIES
This city of nearly 150,000 residents is closer to over 100 national capitals than it is to its own. Spoiler
What is Saint-Denis, Réunion?
It's closer to every African capital, all but three Asian capitals, most European capitals, and perhaps most remarkably, Canberra, Australia - than it is to Paris (about 5810 miles).
My guess was
Honolulu. Turns out Honolulu has more than double the population specified. I wonder how it fares in the national capital proximity category. Canberra is farther away than Washington D.C.—5,224 vs 4,826 miles, so not a huge difference. Tokyo and Seoul are closer. Mexico City and Havana are closer, but Port-au-Prince and Bogota are farther. So I'm guessing it doesn't reach the 100 mark. Still an attractive decoy for this clue and one that would make it TOC level or harder, I think.
Of course, we could go the read-the-writers'-minds route and note that Honolulu is not a "world" city. It's in the US.
Spoiler
Honolulu has the disadvantage of being nowhere near Africa and Europe, where there is a high concentration of capitals.
It did cross my mind as a decoy, along with Cayenne, Vladivostok, and Stanley (Falkland Islands) which might actually also be over 100 (I haven't counted) but has a tiny population, not to mention the dispute over which country it's in...
mas3cf wrote: ↑Wed May 20, 2020 7:03 am
WORLD CITIES
This city of nearly 150,000 residents is closer to over 100 national capitals than it is to its own. Spoiler
What is Saint-Denis, Réunion?
It's closer to every African capital, all but three Asian capitals, most European capitals, and perhaps most remarkably, Canberra, Australia - than it is to Paris (about 5810 miles).
My first thought was Cayenne, but I didn't think a circle (or whatever it would be called on the surface of a spheroid) with a Cayenne-to-Paris radius would encompass 100 national capitals. It's got a metro population in the 130,000s, which might qualify as "nearly 150,000."
mas3cf wrote: ↑Wed May 20, 2020 7:03 am
WORLD CITIES
This city of nearly 150,000 residents is closer to over 100 national capitals than it is to its own. Spoiler
What is Saint-Denis, Réunion?
It's closer to every African capital, all but three Asian capitals, most European capitals, and perhaps most remarkably, Canberra, Australia - than it is to Paris (about 5810 miles).
My first thought was Cayenne, but I didn't think a circle (or whatever it would be called on the surface of a spheroid) with a Cayenne-to-Paris radius would encompass 100 national capitals. It's got a metro population in the 130,000s, which might qualify as "nearly 150,000."
The number I counted for Cayenne was 57, but I'd need someone to double-check me. Being in the Americas works to its disadvantage in that respect.
mas3cf wrote: ↑Wed May 20, 2020 7:03 am
WORLD CITIES
This city of nearly 150,000 residents is closer to over 100 national capitals than it is to its own. Spoiler
What is Saint-Denis, Réunion?
It's closer to every African capital, all but three Asian capitals, most European capitals, and perhaps most remarkably, Canberra, Australia - than it is to Paris (about 5810 miles).
My first thought was Cayenne, but I didn't think a circle (or whatever it would be called on the surface of a spheroid) with a Cayenne-to-Paris radius would encompass 100 national capitals. It's got a metro population in the 130,000s, which might qualify as "nearly 150,000."
The number I counted for Cayenne was 57, but I'd need someone to double-check me. Being in the Americas works to its disadvantage in that respect.
Yeah, it's got all of the Americas, West Africa, Iberia, and Ireland and UK within the radius.
mas3cf wrote: ↑Tue May 26, 2020 12:22 pm
19TH CENTURY FIGURES
His epitaph reads, "A friend to honesty and a foe to crime." Spoiler
Who is Allan Pinkerton?
Spoiler
I should have known better with the category title, which nicely eliminated my only response of "Sherlock Holmes". I literally knew that Holmes was written on both sides of the TURN of the century, so you'd have to futz with the date a little. Although technically, Holmes could have an 1890s epitaph, as he died once and came back to life.
Nice clue, though, as it showed me a blind spot with respect to Pinkerton. Time to secure that.
mas3cf wrote: ↑Mon Jun 01, 2020 6:26 am
AFRICAN CAPITALS
These two nations on the Atlantic coast have capitals whose names mean the same thing; one in English, the other in French. Spoiler
What are Sierra Leone and Gabon? (Freetown and Libreville)
Oh I like that one...except I read the question too fast and gave the cities...
I read it slowly enough to realize I needed the countries and was therefore sunk. The cities were easy enough. This is a good clue, just too tough for me. I couldn't have named even one of the two countries with any confidence. I think on a guess I would've gone with Côte d'Ivoire. That said, if I got The Call, this would be an area I'd spend some time learning.
And if you'd asked me to guess which country had the French-named capital, which the English, I'd have gotten it backwards.
mas3cf wrote: ↑Thu Jun 04, 2020 7:01 am
THE PERIODIC TABLE
The only country with two elements named after it Spoiler
What is France? (francium, gallium)
I like it! The right response came pretty quickly to me--basically got there after a brief stop at germanium. But I can see needing to spin the wheels a bit on this one. There aren't a lot of choices. You just have to run through them. Germanium, polonium... maybe americium? Thulium is named after the ancient Greek name for Iceland or Scandinavia or the area that includes Iceland and parts of Scandinavia, so that's pretty squishy and they wouldn't go there. So this is mostly about creating a short list in your head under pressure and picking the right response--that and knowing that gallium is named for France. That may be the toughest part.
Hate to see a contestant get almost all the way there and write "What are francium and gallium?" because they lost track of what was being asked. I could see me doing that.
These two writers with the same initials died two years apart in New York City; one used the other’s words for the title of a 1959 work. correct response
Who are Lorraine Hansberry and Langston Hughes?
note
*their “full name” initials are not the same, but...