Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Christmas and Sibera

I'm sorry in advance if this is hard to follow or isn't interesting.
chuckles

One of my all time favorite Christmas songs is by The Trans-Siberian Orchestra and it's called "Chirstmas Canon". If you have never heard it, you must download it.

So I'm listening to this song on my iPod. I'm thinking about The Trans-Siberian Orchestra and suddenly remember a girl I met a year ago who was from Sibera. It was weird. You never think you'll meet someone from Sibera. She was 19 and was going to college here. We talked for a short time and I didn't really have time to pepper her with all the questions I had...one of which was, where the heck is Sibera? So I looked it up on the internet later and, boy did I find out a lot about Sibera!

Siberia is a HUGE part of Russia. It extends from the Ural Mountains to the Pacific Ocean, and from the Arctic Ocean to the borders of Mongolia and China. All but the very south western end of Siberia is in Russia. It makes up about 60% of Russia.

It's horrible climate limits development and population. It has a large amount of natural resources, like minerals, oil fields, forests, and in some parts the fields are good for farming. However, the winters are long. They have ice and snow for six months of the year. Temperatures drop to -90° below freezing! Most of the shorelines, lakes, and rivers are frozen for most of the year. Their summers last for one month. One month. Can you imagine? I cannot imagine.

The population is three people per 1 acre. Most Siberians are Russian but there are some Slavic, Mongolian and Turkish people there. I have no idea what they do for a living. What can they do if winter if six months long and it's -90° below? Well, unless you're a member of The Trans-Siberian Orchestra. No wonder they are always touring...

Okay, so there you have it. More than you ever wanted to know about Sibera :)

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

A pretty good chuckle at "No wonder they are always touring..."

Thanks for another grand history lesson re Siberia :)

Lastly, I assume the TSO hit you mention is the one I "always hear"...good stuff indeed.

Kitty said...

Actually, the first time I heard the song was last year and I don't think it was on the radio....so it might not be one of their most well known. If you go to

http://music.allofmp3.com/r2/Trans-Siberian_Orchestra/
The_Christmas_Attic/group_3581/album_2/
albref_29/mcatalog.shtml

you will hear a little bit of it.

Anonymous said...

that's pretty pretty....

( well put )

Anonymous said...

Hey there, as it turns out Dianne and I are going to their concert in this Sunday evening. Should be awsome!

Love, Bob

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