Happy Birthday to Panama!

Abras on the Dubai Creek. An abra is a traditional boat made of wood and abras are used to ferry people across the Dubai Creek in Dubai. *Photo from Wikipedia December 2 is: National Day, which is celebrated in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It marks the UAE’s formal nationalization from the British Protectorate Treaties which ended on December 1, 1971 and the eventual, federal unification of the seven emirates in 1971 which combined to form the modern-day country. The area was settled by a number of tribes along both the coast and interior and was Islamized in the seventh

Road from Nouakchott to the Mauritanian–Senegalese border. *Photo from Wikipedia November 28 is Independence Day, which celebrates the independence of Mauritania from France in 1960. Berber immigration took place from about the 3rd century. Mauritania takes its name from the ancient Berber kingdom and later Roman province of Mauretania, and thus ultimately from the Mauri people, even though the respective territories do not overlap, historical Mauritania being considerably further north than modern Mauritania. The Muslim conquest of the Maghreb in the 7th and 8th centuries did not reach as far south, and Islam came to Mauritania only gradually, from about

Estonian folk dance group performing. *Photo from Wikipedia February 24 is Independence Day, celebrates the independence of Estonia from the Russian Empire in 1918. Following centuries of successive Teutonic, Danish, Swedish, and Russian rule, Estonians experienced a national awakening that culminated in independence from the Russian Empire towards the end of World War I. In the aftermath of World War I and the Russian revolutions, the Estonian Declaration of Independence was issued in February 1918. The Estonian War of Independence ensued on two fronts between the newly proclaimed state and Bolshevist Russia to the east and the Baltic German forces