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Where In The World? • Puzzle #100 • 2022-11-08 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Azerbaijan)
I know almost nothing about the actual shape on Azerbaijan--were I challenged to draw the country on a sheet of paper, I wouldn't be able to do it. All I could tell in this puzzle was that the presented country did not appear to be an island and that it had a relatively sizable exclave. Azerbaijan was the only country I could think of that has an exclave that large (Nakhchivan).
Where In The World? • Puzzle #99 • 2022-11-07 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: South Africa)
South Africa's southern coastline looks parabolic to me, which is a feature I notice right away. Other notable features of its border include the straight north-south border of ZF Mgcawu District in the northwest and the hook-shaped area to the east that borders Eswatini. Interestingly, the WitW picture does not remove Lesotho from the map.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #98 • 2022-11-06 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Norway)
Norway's most recognizable feature to me, beyond its general shape, is its highly-intricate coastline. The coast actually has a fractal dimension of over 1.5, the highest fractal dimension for any national coastline in the world.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #97 • 2022-11-05 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Australia)
Where In The World? • Puzzle #96 • 2022-11-04 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Austria)
There are some countries that have appeared three or four times now, and other countries that haven't shown up at all. acidus once mentioned on Station that each puzzle is chosen deterministically based on the date, which leads me to wonder if other countries will be selected more often once 2023 rolls around.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #95 • 2022-11-03 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Central African Republic)
Where In The World? • Puzzle #94 • 2022-11-02 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Australia)
Where In The World? • Puzzle #93 • 2022-11-01 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Argentina)
I hesitated on this one for just a moment. The clue that helped me figure out the answer was the small island in the south-southeast of the country, which is part of Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #92 • 2022-10-31 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Pakistan)
Pakistan has a few recognizable features, including Chagai District pointing westward in the south of the country and the hook-shaped northern province of Gilgit, the missing area from the hook being Kashmir.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #91 • 2022-10-30 ✅✅✅✅❌↘️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬆️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↗️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬇️ ✅✅✅✅🤏➡️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Chad)
That was close! I remembered right away that this country was in Africa, and probably in northern central Africa, but I couldn't remember which one it was. I deliberately chose the wrong answer of Algeria at first just to get a bearing. The next three guesses were Congo, Cameroon and Libya--none of which felt correct, but I was at a loss. A chance guess of Niger pointed me east, and it was only then that I wondered if the answer might be Chad. For the future, the feature of Chad that stands out the most to me is its western border, which resembles a face.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #90 • 2022-10-29 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: United States)
Where In The World? • Puzzle #89 • 2022-10-28 ✅✅✅✅🤏↗️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Senegal)
The shape of Senegal really threw me off at first, mostly because I thought the large missing strip in the southern part of the country might be water. The high-resolution picture didn't confirm it. The strip is actually Gambia, which was the part of the picture I recognized first and my first guess. It was only after studying the picture a little more that I realized the small western peninsula was Cap-Vert, the location of Dakar and the westernmost point of the Afro-Eurasia landmass (and the cape after which the Atlantic island nation of Cape Verde is named).
Where In The World? • Puzzle #88 • 2022-10-27 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: United Kingdom)
This is a pretty obvious country. A few clues are the relatively flat bottom of the island of Great Britain, the Hebrides in the northwest of Scotland, and Northern Ireland nearby to the west.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #87 • 2022-10-26 ✅✅✅❌❌⬅️ ✅✅❌❌❌➡️ ✅✅❌❌❌➡️ ✅✅✅✅❌↙️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬅️ ✅✅✅✅❌⬅️
(Answer: Vanuatu)
I know this is an excuse losers often make, but if I'd had just a few more guesses, I really think I would have gotten this one. My first guess was French Polynesia, which is not very close but is in the right ocean. The next two guesses of Maldives and BIOT were complete wastes. Fiji was closest of the remaining guesses. The south-southeast slant of the Y-shaped archipelago, plus its larger islands of Espiritu Santo and Malaku to the northwest, should make it a little easier to recognize next time.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #86 • 2022-10-25 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Belgium)
I forgot about Belgium again! I was ready to guess a country at random and see how far off I was, but as I thought about it, the countries that came to mind all had a different general shape. The closest country I could think of was Belgium--and that happened to be correct.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #84 • 2022-10-23 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Israel)
To me, one of the more discernible geographical features of Israel is the almost perfectly-triangular shape of its southern end, bordering Jordan, Sinai, and the Gulf of Aqaba. The exclusion of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip might be considered a political stance, but it's a political stance most of the world agrees with, and one I support as well.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #83 • 2022-10-22 ✅✅❌❌❌➡️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬅️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↘️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Central African Republic)
Yet another country whose shape I recognized but whose location I couldn't quite remember. My first guess was Honduras, whose shape vaguely resembles CAR but with the northern portion removed. South Sudan and Niger were also incorrect, but with those triangulation points, I was reminded that CAR is nearby, and that's when I remembered its shape.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #82 • 2022-10-21 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Gibraltar)
This is at least the third time Gibraltar has appeared as a puzzle. I wonder why that is. Gibraltar is so small that its western marine docks are quite prominent in the high-resolution picture, as is the airport runway at the north end.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #81 • 2022-10-20 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: French Southern Territories - Kerguelen Islands)
These islands are a location I'd imagine few people would know. The only reason I recognized them is that I have a fascination with Antarctica and other remote places in the world, and I've wasted a lot of time in the past just wandering around the Southern Ocean in Google Earth.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #80 • 2022-10-19 ✅✅✅✅❌⬆️ ✅✅✅✅❌⬆️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Portugal)
I definitely overthought this puzzle. My first guess was Ghana, which was far enough away from the answer that I wondered if the answer was on the African continent at all. It was only after trying to get my bearings with Côte d'Ivoire that I suddenly realized the answer was Portugal.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #79 • 2022-10-18 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Lebanon)
Where In The World? • Puzzle #78 • 2022-10-17 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Philippines)
I was actually a little unsure of this one, mostly because island nations can appear deceptively large or small in a vacuum. After a little thought, I figured the only country I knew that was so fragmented was the Philippines.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #77 • 2022-10-16 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Egypt)
Egypt is particularly recognizable to me due to a certain circumstance of my own life. I mostly grew up in the US state of Missouri, and when I first saw Egypt on a map in those days, I immediately noticed how similar the shapes of Egypt and Missouri are. Specifically, if one were to move Sinai from the northeast corner of Egypt to the northwest corner, it would mirror the location of the Platte Purchase in Missouri and create an almost perfect match.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #76 • 2022-10-15 ✅✅✅❌❌↗️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↘️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↘️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↘️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Lebanon)
This is exactly the level of difficulty that I like. My first guess was Liberia, which has a somewhat similar shape to Lebanon but is "tilted" in a different direction. The range and direction of the clue led me to guess some countries in the Balkans, but all of these were northwest of the target. The country's shape resembles the Gaza Strip to me, but its borders are too varied, and Gaza is not a choice. I knew the answer wasn't Israel, so I went for Lebanon.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #75 • 2022-10-14 ✅❌❌❌❌➡️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Nepal)
It may sound strange, but Nepal's shape to me is reminiscent of a package delivered by an unscrupulous postal carrier that arrives thoroughly damaged. Another country that has a long, slightly-tilted shape is Cuba; this was my first guess, and I was actually caught a little off-guard by how wrong that guess was.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #74 • 2022-10-13 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Saudi Arabia)
Saudi Arabia is shaped broadly similar to the Arabian peninsula, as the country takes up most of it. Ash Sharqiyah Province even has a small section that juts out to the east, mimicking the location of Oman on the larger peninsula.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #73 • 2022-10-12 ✅✅✅✅🤏↙️ ✅✅✅✅❌➡️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↖️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↗️ ✅✅✅✅❌➡️ ✅✅✅❌❌⬅️
(Answer: Tokelau)
Another toughie. The atolls of Tokelau are so small and so spread out that they only appear as a few dots outside the high-resolution image. Oddly, that might come in handy for recognizing it next time: the fact that the Unicode rendering features only six tiny dots forming an arc.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #72 • 2022-10-11 ✅✅✅✅🤏↗️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↗️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↖️ ✅✅✅✅🤏➡️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↖️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↖️
(Answer: Turks and Caicos Islands)
Back to tiny unguessable islands in the Caribbean! This time, though, I frankly have never even heard of Turks and Caicos islands--even if I had recognized the shape, I wouldn't have known the name. To make matters worse, only one out of the eight main islands is shown on WITW, which means the majority of the land area of the country is actually omitted from the map. That's a bit unfair in my opinion.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #71 • 2022-10-10 ✅✅❌❌❌↗️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬅️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬅️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Belgium)
It's a little embarrassing that I didn't get this one sooner. My first guess was Uruguay, on a completely different continent.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #70 • 2022-10-09 ✅✅✅✅❌↘️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↖️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬇️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↙️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↘️ ✅✅✅❌❌⬅️
(Answer: Equatorial Guinea)
I managed to find both countries that have a land border with Equatorial Guinea (Cameroon and Gabon), but not the country itself. I find most African nations difficult to recognize, but in my defense, I think Western education is largely to blame. Rarely do we learn much about the individual nations of the continent, except the ancient Egyptians and apartheid in South Africa. Most people's mental image of Africa is a nebulous blob of exotic animals and white colonialists comprising the entire continent.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #69 • 2022-10-08 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Australia)
Australia is arguably one of the most recognizable countries in the world. In case you don't know it, a few noticeable features are the "horn" of Cape York Peninsula to the north-northeast, a Great Australian Bight on the south of the mainland, and the island of Tasmania on the east end of the bight.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #68 • 2022-10-07 ✅❌❌❌❌⬅️ ✅✅✅✅❌↖️ ✅✅✅❌❌↘️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬆️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Rwanda)
Rwanda's outline resembles an island, which duped me. Vanuatu was my first guess, which is almost on the opposite side of the world, and I didn't expect to be that far off. A short ping-pong between Africa and Europe led me to Burundi, which of course borders Rwanda.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #67 • 2022-10-06 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: New Caledonia)
This was one case where having a high-resolution picture really helped. It showed that the coast of the main island has many minute details, which indicates that the island is relatively large--at least larger than some of the tiny islands of previous days. The long and narrow shape is unusual, though; I couldn't think of any Caribbean or Polynesian nations that had such a shape. The closest I could think of was New Caledonia, which I actually thought would be wrong.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #66 • 2022-10-05 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Mexico)
Mexico has a number of instantly-recognizable features, from the Baja California peninsula in the west, to the Yucatan peninsula in the southeast, to the general horn-of-plenty shape of the country as a whole. One of my favorite movies is the Wes Anderson film "The Grand Budapest Hotel", in which a character happens to have a birthmark on her face in the shape of Mexico.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #65 • 2022-10-04 ✅✅✅❌❌⬆️ ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Liechtenstein)
I've actually visited Liechtenstein once, so this is one I should have remembered. I knew the shape of the country was familiar, but I just couldn't quite recall it. The relatively simple border to the west indicated to me that it was a small, landlocked nation--my first guess was Rwanda.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #64 • 2022-10-03 ❌❌❌❌❌⬅️ ✅✅✅✅❌➡️ ✅✅✅✅❌⬇️ ✅✅❌❌❌↖️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬇️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬇️
(Answer: Grenada)
Another day, another small Caribbean island nation I have no hope of being able to identify. My ignorance is frustrating sometimes. The small hook at the southwest corner of the island should help with recognizing it next time.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #63 • 2022-10-02 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Croatia)
I was really happy to see this one. From a recognition standpoint, Croatia's most obvious feature is its intricate Adriatic coastline, with hundreds of islands and peninsulas scattered throughout.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #62 • 2022-10-01 ✅❌❌❌❌➡️ ✅✅❌❌❌⬅️ ✅✅❌❌❌⬅️ ✅✅✅✅🤏⬆️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↘️ ✅✅✅✅🤏↗️
(Answer: Barbados)
These tiny Caribbean islands are killers! I had a vague familiarity with the outline of Barbados from reading histories of pirates, but there was no way I'd be able to put a name to it.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #61 • 2022-09-30 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Sri Lanka)
Sri Lanka has a very distinctive teardrop shape. Another clue is the chain of islands at the northern tip of the teardrop, where there was once a land bridge between the island and the Indian subcontinent.
Where In The World? • Puzzle #60 • 2022-09-29 ✅✅✅✅✅🎉
(Answer: Brazil)
Larger countries, especially countries with large coastlines, are easier to recognize. Brazil makes up most of the "hump" of South America, making it even simpler.
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[Last updated: 2024-05-16]