17. India – History

• The East India Company (EIC) was an English and later (from 1707) British joint-stock company formed for pursuing trade with the East Indies but which ended up trading mainly with the Indian subcontinent, North-west frontier province and Balochistan. [1617] The East India Company traded mainly in cotton, silk, indigo dye, salt, saltpetre, tea and opium.

• During its first century of operation, the English East India Company focused on trade with the Indian subcontinent, as it was not in a position to challenge the powerful Mughal Empire, which had granted it trading rights in 1617. This changed in the 18th century as the Mughals declined in power and the East India Company struggled with its French counterpart, the Compagnie française des Indes orientales, during the Carnatic Wars in the 1740s and 1750s. The Battle of Plassey in 1757, in which the British, led by Robert Clive, defeated the Nawab of Bengal and his French allies, left the Company in control of Bengal and as the major military and political power in India. In the following decades it gradually increased the size of the territories under its control, either ruling directly or via local rulers under the threat of force from the British Indian Army, the vast majority of which was composed of Indian sepoys

• Mahatma Gandhi was an Indian politician who was against British occupation and supported non-violent civil disobedience

• Indira Gandhi – Prime Minister 1966-1977, 1980-1984, the only child of Jawaharlal Nehru, Pakistan and Bangladesh got their independence, tried to prove the lies, assassinated.

• Jawaharlal Nehru – the ‘Architect of Modern India’, first Prime Minister of India, Rajiv Gandhi – his grandson

• India became independent in 1947

• [!] Raziya Sultana (1205-1240) was the first woman leader of India. She was considered a great leader, though she ruled for only three years before being murdered

18. New Zealand

• The Māori are the indigenous Polynesian people of New Zealand. Over several centuries in isolation, the Polynesian settlers developed a unique culture that became known as the "Māori", with their own language, a rich mythology, distinctive crafts and performing arts. Early Māori formed tribal groups, based on eastern Polynesian social customs and organisation.

• Moriori are the indigenous people of the Chatham Islands. These people lived by a code of non-violence and passive resistance, which led to their near-extinction at the hands of Taranaki Māori invaders in the 1830s.

• Wellington – capital, Auckland [was the capital in 1865], Canterbury, Blenheim, Christchurch, Queenstown

• The kiwi is a national symbol of New Zealand, and the association is so strong that the term Kiwi is used all over the world as the colloquial demonym for New Zealanders. Aggressive [at night], can’t fly, feathers smell mushrooms, strong legs help to go through swamps, has the big nostrils, lives for 50-60 years, eats insects, worms, hen-sized

• [!] New Zealanders love their cars! 2.5 million cars for 4 million people (including the kids) makes New Zealand’s car ownership rate one of the highest in the world.