Johannesburg- Interesting Facts.

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1. Among all the oldest cities in the world-e.g. Damascus, Jerusalem (inhabited from 2800BC) Athens, Beirut, Plovdiv- Johannesburg is a baby. Johannesburg was established in October 1886, which makes it 130 years old. It started as a city built from tents and now it is a modern city with skyscrapers.

2. 50storey Carlton Centre building is the tallest skyscraper in the African Continent.

3. 40% of gold was found in Johannesburg. Because of this fact the other name of Johannesburg is “Egoli”, the City of Gold.

4. There are 20 000 millionaires in Johannesburg.

5. Population in Johannesburg is about 10,5 millions people consist of Black Africans -76.4%; colored 5.6%; White 12.3%; Indian/Asian 4.9%. From other nationalities there are Brits. Americans, Argentinians, Italian, Greek, German Portuguese, Polish, Russian, Ukrainian and,of course, people from different African countries (Zimbabweans, Zambians, DRC, Mali and many more). Johannesburg is biggest Jewish city from all non-Jewish cities with 50000 Jews living here. Indian Community gather once in a year for Bolliwood nights in Sun City. Big Greek Community is very prominent in Johannesburg. Portuguese, Italian restaurants are all over the city. Johannesburg has been known as “melting pot” of all nationalities.

6. You can easily see Christian church, a mosque, a synagogue peacefully situated on one street. There is even Russian Orthodox Church in Midrand, beautifully decorated with 19th century silver icons. It domes covered with 9 carat gold, interior decorations styled in 13th century paintings. There is Greek Orthodox Church in Rosebank.

7. The JSE Securities Exchange is the fourteenth largest securities exchange in the world with the total market capitalization of 2.3 trillion rands.

8. Johannesburg area is home to the Cradle of Humankind- one of the world’s Heritage Sites. It occupies 47000 hectares. World’s oldest hominid fossil “Mrs Ples” was found in the Cradle of Humankind. The area includes Maropeng Cultural Centre, Sterkfontein Caves and Wonder Cave. There is third caves system in SA- Sudwala Caves in Mpumalanga, even older then Sterkfontein and Wonder caves. It existed 240 millions years ago. Sudwala Caves have interesting history. In the beginning of 20th century, during the Second Boer War, Boers used Sudwala Caves to store ammunition for their Long Tom Guns. Also the legend says that Kruger Millions might disappeared in Sudwala Caves when Paul Kruger fled form Pretoria to Mpumalanga.

9. The city has 10mln trees, which makes it one of the greenest cities in the world. In spring we see jacarandas in full bloom, making Johannesburg looks like a big garden, colored in purple. The city is built on 12 river systems and it is over 1000 meters above sea level.

10. The infrastructure (roads,highways)are well developed. Unfortunately it does not make life of commuters easier during the traffic jam. Average time to travel in the morning is 48 minutes. However if you compare to the traffic, let’s say, in Nairobi-traffic jam in Nairobi is so severe, that all the transport comes to a complete stop for hours during mornings and evenings. The best way to travel is by car. Public transport is developing. Gautrain (train and buses) are good, as well as Reya Vaya buses. Now Uber started to operate in Johannesburg as well.

11. Johannesburg is home to many Guinness Records.

* Clapham Gold Night Club in Johannesburg became famous after 435 people participated in speed dating event on the 14th of February 2011.

* Johannesburg had largest chocolate rabbit 3,8 meters tall, weighted 3010 kg. It was on show in Sandton on the 19th march 2010.

* Vredefort Crater near Johannesburg with a diameter 300 km is one of the largest impact craters in the world. It was formed 2 billion years ago.

Inventions.

* “Pratley Patty” was invented by George Pratley from Krugersdorp in 1948. Neil Armstrong used Pratley Patty to keep parts of the landing ship together during the first Moon landing in 1963.

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