The French Open recently wrapped up, and Wimbledon crowns its champs this weekend. The famed Palio di Siena was held today, and Pamplona's legendary Running of the Bulls is Monday. The Tour de France starts Saturday, and the British Open begins July 17. Plus, the Beijing Summer Olympics will be held next month with the Opening Ceremony slated for 8:08:08 p.m. CST on 8/8/08.
This spectacular sports schedule got me thinking about the top international sports events, so I decided to take a swing at compiling a Top 20 list. I didn't include any competitions regularly held in the United States (no Super Bowl, no World Series) even if they draw international attention (no Kentucky Derby, no Indianapolis 500).
Most of the names are relatively obscure to most Americans, including the top choice, Turkish cleric Fethullah Gülen. The top Americans on the list just missed the top 10—activist Noam Chomsky (No. 11) and former Vice President Al Gore (No. 12). Russian opposition leader and chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov is No. 18.
Most amusing selection? The top write-in candidate is television satirist Stephen Colbert.
We can't resist games that combine global awareness with global causes. Earlier this year, we wrote about FreeRice, which donates grains of rice. Today, we found another addictive online game that donates cups of water.
FreePoverty is a similar game to the Traveler IQ Challenge that we mentioned in December. You just click on a world map to locate specific sites, which range from "easy" to "super hard." The closer you get to the correct answer, the more cups of water you donate.
Our post last week about the Real Equator got me thinking about Earth's imaginary lines—those lines we can't see but still observe.
Look at a globe or map, and you'll see all kinds of imaginary lines running all over the place. I started to ponder the most prominent imaginary lines in the world. What are the most important? The most famous? And why?
To address those questions, Following the Equator compiled a list of the Top 20 Imaginary Lines. What do you think? Is one line better than another? Did we overlook any lines? Scrutinize our list and post your comments below.
Technology continually finds new and exciting ways to bridge distances and cultures. LiveNewsCameras.com is doing just that with its innovative approach to news.
Now you can watch more than 150 live, streaming video news feeds from television stations around the United States and around the world. The site is a dream-come-true for news junkies, and it also could be particularly valuable to travelers, especially
international travelers who want to get a glimpse of news in the cities
they're planning to visit.
We often tend to overlook the fact that the entire world at one time was banded together on one landmass, one supercontinent called Pangea.
Next Saturday, a global event will try to bring the world together again for the appropriately named Pangea Day.
Pangea Day is an audacious idea to rally the world through the power of film—24 short films, in fact. The four-hour event, which also features seven concerts and more than a dozen speakers, will be held in Cairo, Kigali (Rwanda), London, Los Angeles, Mumbai and Rio de Janeiro, beginning at 2 p.m. EDT May 10. You can attend the live event, watch the broadcast through the Internet, television and mobile phones, and even host or attend a live local event.
Check out the official Pangea Day site, where you can hear countries sing each other's national anthems and learn about the inspiring international films that will "allow us see the world through another person's eyes." But, first, watch the trailer:
When I was a student journalist in high school, I collected newspapers from around the country and around the world. Even now, as a former newspaperman, I still love getting the papers wherever I travel.
It could be my hometown Chicago Tribune or The Philadelphia Inquirer or even La Repubblica in Rome (and I don't even read Italian). There's something fascinating about reading (or just seeing) what's news and how it's presented in different cities.
Now, though, I can get my daily newspaper fix online. The Newseum website offers front pages from newspapers around the world every day. Today, there are 565 front pages from 55 countries, including Málaga Hoy from Spain (above).
Watch this impressive display of English accents around the world:
That's Amy Walker, a 25-year-old actress who has become an Internet hit with her world tour of English accents—from the United Kingdom and Ireland to Italy, Germany, Czech Republic, Russia, France, Australia, New Zealand and around North America. For the record, that's 21 accents in two-and-a-half minutes.
The United States Census Bureau includes a section on the census that asks Americans to state their ancestry. In the 2000 census, 80 percent of respondents complied, dutifully stating their origins. The results are interesting and possibly unexpected.
The most commonly claimed ancestry in the United States is … German. Forty-two million Americans (or 15 percent) indicated that their roots were either German or part-German. The runner-up ancestry was Irish, with 11 percent. Third was African-American, at 9 percent (24.9 million people), which just barely edged out English, also 9 percent (24.5 million). Rounding out the top five was Mexican, at 7 percent.
Our post last week about the 
