Chapter 446: Polar Island is wonderful
To Ye Chao's surprise, Greenland can also have polar day and night phenomena unique to the polar regions.
This would have been seen at the South and North Poles.
The closer you get to high latitudes, the longer the polar days and nights will be during the year.
In winter, there are polar nights that last for several months, and the Northern Lights occasionally appear in the sky over Greenland, sometimes like colorful fireworks spraying the sky, sometimes dancing like fairies with colorful silk, bringing a touch of life to the night sky of Greenland.
In the summer, the sun shines all day long, and Greenland becomes the island on which the sun never sets.
Studies have shown that the island is home to some of the world's oldest rocks, which are estimated to be at least 3.7 billion years old.
The most impressive feature of the island is its huge ice sheet, which in some places is up to 10,000 meters thick, and the ice sheet covers about 83.7% of the entire island's area. The ice sheet creates huge glaciers: the Port Jacobs glacier discharges millions of tons of ice into the sea every day, moving at a speed of about 1 meter per hour.
This has formed many icebergs, and in 1912, the giant ship Titanic was shipwrecked because it hit an iceberg. Before 1888, no one successfully crossed the ice field, and the great Norwegian explorer Feritchov? Nansen used sledding for ice travel across the Greenland ice field.
When Icelandic colonists came here in 982, they found it uninhabited.
At the extreme southern tip of the island, the Icelanders established three strongholds, which they held out for the next few centuries.
Greenland is said to be the home of Santa Claus.
The name Greenland was given to these Scandinavians.
According to the Norse mythological epic Sagas, Eriksen the Redbeard was exiled from Iceland for his murder. The Eriksons and their slaves sail northwest in search of the land where legend has been made.
When he settled on the island, he named it Greenland (meaning "green land") in order to attract more immigrants. (At least the fjord at the southern tip of the island is still grassy.) His clever plan worked, and the Nordic immigrants were able to live in harmony with the new Inuit.
In the 12th century, a Catholic bishopric was even established in Greenland. In 1386, Greenland was officially part of Norway, and since Norway was a member of the Nordic Kalmar Union, Greenland was transferred to the Danish-Norwegian monarchy after the collapse of the union.
After holding out for more than five hundred years, the Nordic settlements suddenly disappeared in the 15th century, most likely because of the widespread food shortages caused by the Xiaoice Age. The bones of the inhabitants of this period, which were later discovered, were characterized by malnutrition.
The total population of Greenland is: 57,300, of which native Greenlanders account for more than 80% of the total population, and foreign Danes account for about 1/6 of the total population. By the 1980s, pure Inuit were found only in the far northwest near Thule and in East Greenland.
Greenland's inhabitants are unusually dispersed, mostly confined to small settlements along the coast.
Greenland experienced an economic contraction in the 90s of the 20th century, but since 1993, the economy has begun to recover.
Greenland's economy is based on fishing and mining.
Once the main pillar of the economy, the seal hunt declined sharply in the early 20th century; In its place was the fishing, canning industry, and the freezing of cod, prawns and other seafood. Agriculture is distributed in the ice-free areas of the south, and the arable land area accounts for about 1% of the whole territory. The only crops are hay and vegetables.
Most of the ice-free areas are pastures for sheep and reindeer for meat, wool and milk. Hunting is still important in the northern regions, catching seals, foxes, and polar bears for meat and fur.
In addition to domestic demand, fish and shellfish are exported in large quantities. Zinc and lead are the main minerals. The main industrial products are frozen fish, canned fish, dried fish, smoked fish, and selected concentrates. The main trading partners are Denmark, Norway, Germany and the United States.
The island receives financial assistance from Denmark.
While Danish Western culture has had an impact on Greenland, many of the island's people continue to practice traditional Inuit culture.
Folk art is still popular, especially in soapstone carvings and inspiration. Because of the cold, Greenland has its own kind of sub-ice city, "Century Camp", where residents can travel through tunnels in the ice by means of small trams called "ice trams".
Football is Greenland's national sport, but Greenland is not a member of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA).
One of the requirements of FIFA that member states must have stadiums that meet minimum standards for international competition is that natural turf is required, and Greenland's climatic conditions make it impossible to have natural turf pitches that meet that standard.
Greenland is rich in natural resources and has considerable oil and gas reserves, both onshore and offshore, with 31 billion barrels of oil reserves in the north-east of Greenland alone, which is almost 80 times the oil reserves of the North Sea region to which Denmark belongs.
Greenland's mineral deposits such as lead, zinc and cryolite are economically valuable. Uranium, copper and molybdenum mines were explored in the 1970s and were discovered in 1989 with very large gold deposits, but climate and ecological concerns did not lead to excessive exploitation of mineral resources.
The U.S. Geological Survey predicts that Greenland could become one of the world's largest untapped oil fields, and energy extraction will change the history of Greenland. Greenland, which is still part of Denmark, needs about $600 million a year in Danish subsidies, which is equivalent to 1/3 of the island's annual income.
If Cairn Energy can be successfully mined in its own area, the surrounding area will soon be in action. Oil taxes could help Greenland wean itself off external dependence and create a lot of jobs in this densely populated region with high rates of alcoholism and suicide.
However, not all Greenlanders believe that oil will bring benefits. Like residents of parts of Canada, people in Greenland are worried about how to respond to oil spills. Although 75 percent of Greenlanders voted for independence from Denmark in 2008, they are not consistent in their view that oil extraction is the best way to achieve independence.
Ringer, president of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, said, "Every night I pray that they don't find oil and gas, because that would end the peace and calm here." No amount of interest in resource exploitation can help us gain more autonomy."
Greenland is mostly north of the Arctic Circle, so the sun is not visible during the long winters. But in the summer, Greenland receives a large number of breeding birds, many plants are thriving, and everyone is vying to make the most of the 24-hour sunshine.
Although many birds come to Greenland just to breed and then fly south when winter comes, there are also some birds that stop here all year round, including the ptarmigan and the little snow witch. Greenland is also home to the polar bear, the world's largest carnivore, as well as wolves, arctic foxes, arctic hares, reindeer and lemmings.
There is a large herd of musk oxen in northern Greenland, whose extremely thick coat protects them from freezing damage from the icy Arctic winds. Whales and seals are common in coastal waters. The main saltwater fish are cod, salmon, flounder and halibut, while salmon and trout are found in rivers.
There are some interesting creatures that are hard to see anywhere else.
Ye Chao was very interested in them, and coming here was a long experience.
Also, the icy and snowy place can make Ye Chao's Demon Dao Heart easier to calm down.