Welcome to another week
and whilst we all continue to enjoy this rather spectacular summery weather
(its probably the best Summer in Cloud 9’s history to date!) our thoughts are
already turning ahead to rain macs, woolly jumpers, wellington boots and
hopefully another great Summer next year.
Event planning requires
just that, lots of planning so we are already booking venues for the Autumn,
Winter, Spring and Summer of 2014 and we have got a little bit of an issue.
Our schedule for next June
includes around half a dozen awards ceremonies and conferences and it seems
that every client wants a Thursday – which is not only impossible for us unless
anyone has altered the calendar and not told us – but is also hampered by a
little football competition next year – The World Cup!
Although the
competition kicks off on Thursday 12th June, and England have yet to formally qualify, assuming they do,
they are not scheduled to play their first match until 17 June – however, World
Cup fever will no doubt have an impact on any events next year…
The Preliminary
Draw was widely adjudged to have smiled on England,
with bookmakers immediately making them odds-on favourites to top Group H.
Nonetheless, the Three Lions would do well to heed some historical warnings
before they begin booking flights for Brazil 2014.
Points have, after
all, been dropped to both Ukraine
and Montenegro
in recent preliminary campaigns, while Poland
were famously responsible for a rare English qualifying failure in 1974. Few
will envisage a similar slip-up this time around, but while Moldova
and San Marino
are unlikely to threaten the top spots, none of the leading quartet can be
discounted.
We don’t confess to
know much about football here at Cloud 9 Towers and even less about the host
country of the 2014 tournament, Brazil, but we do predict that if England,
Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland all make it through, we may need to think
about additional screens at events to accommodate any football fans and we will
have an even bigger headache on dates!
Whilst we rarely run
events or escorted tours that take us out of good old blighty, we are definitely
dipping our toes in more and more international events just recently so this
seemed like an opportune time to find out a little more about the country
hosting the World Cup in 2014, Brazil.
The largest country
in South America, Brazil stretches over almost half of the continent. With
the Atlantic Ocean on its eastern coastline, Brazil shares frontiers with Venezuela, Guyana, French Guyana and Surinam to the north. Its neighbours to the west are Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia and Peru, while Colombia is to the north-west and Uruguay directly south. Of all the countries in South America, only Chile and Ecuador do not border Brazil.
With a surface area
of 8,547,404 km², Brazil is the fifth largest country on the planet behind Russia, China, Canada and the United States. It covers 4,345 km from north to south between
its furthest points and 4,330 km from east to west. The highest population
concentrations are along the Atlantic coastlines, most notably in the two
largest cities, Sao
Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. The capital Brasilia has a population of 2,094,000, according to 2003
estimates, and it is situated over 1,000 km inland.
Nearly a quarter of
the world's coffee comes from Brazil, with its plantations spread around the states of Sao Paulo, Parana, EspirÃto Santo and Minas Gerais. Likewise, Brazil is one of the foremost producers of sugar cane,
used not only to make sugar but also the alcohol that fuels 2.5 million
specially-designed vehicles. Production levels of ricin, cocoa, corn and
oranges are among the highest in the world as well, while soy, tobacco, potato,
cotton, rice, wheat, manioc and bananas are also produced in large quantities.
In addition, sheep and cattle are reared in almost every state.
The Brazilian
rainforest is another source of natural riches, including tung oil, rubber,
carnauba oil, caroa fibre, medicinal plants, vegetable oils, resins, timber for
construction and various woods used in furniture-making. Brazil has also begun mining fairly recently, again
taking advantage of its abundant natural resources.
Brazil has roughly 190 million inhabitants, making it the
fifth most populated country on Earth. Almost 75 per cent of them are
Catholics, whilst another 26 million are Protestants. Brazil's Jewish community is very small by comparison.
The country is
divided into five regions (Centre-West, North, Northeast, South and Southeast),
which are themselves divided into 26 states plus the Federal District that
houses Brazilian capital BrasÃlia.
Known for its
enormous hydroelectric potential, the Southeast region is the most
heavily-populated in Brazil with almost 80 million inhabitants, roughly 40 per
cent of the total. It is also the most densely-populated (84.21 inhabitants per
km²) and has the highest urbanisation rate at 90 per cent.
The official
language is Portuguese, however many Brazilians speak other languages according
to their origins. German and Italian, for example, are fairly prevalent in the
cities of the South.
Better start
brushing up on our Portuguese then just in case!
In other news this
week, Brand You for Bristol Media is well underway with entries just about to be
sent off for judging to their respective juries and the Cloud 9 team will be at
The Fresh Awards judging - no easy task!
And our planning
for 2014 continues, anyone got a spare Thursday?!
That’s its for this
week, enjoy the sunshine!
See you soon
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