Happy Birthday to Panama!

An aerial photo of the capital St George’s. *Photo from Wikipedia February 7 is Grenada’s Independence Day, celebrates the independence of Grenada, a sovereign state in the southeastern Caribbean Sea, from the United Kingdom in 1974. First settled by indigenous peoples, by the time of European contact it was inhabited by the Caribs. French colonists drove most of the Caribs off the island and established plantations on the island, eventually importing African slaves to work on the sugar plantations. Control of the island was disputed by Great Britain and France in the 18th century, with the British ultimately prevailing. Grenada

Lithuanians dancing at a festival in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania and its largest city. *Photo from Wikipedia July 6 is Lithuania’s Statehood Day, commemorates the coronation in 1253 of Mindaugas as the first and only King of Lithuania. For centuries, the southeastern shores of the Baltic Sea were inhabited by various Baltic tribes. In the 1230s, the Lithuanian lands were united by Mindaugas, the King of Lithuania, and the first unified Lithuanian state, the Kingdom of Lithuania, was created on July 6, 1253. During the 14th century, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania was the largest country in Europe; present-day

Crowd cheers Hungarian troops in Budapest. *Photo from Wikipedia October 23 is Memorial day of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. Also the day of the proclamation of the Third Hungarian Republic (1989). The day is celebrated with speeches and exhibitions. The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 or the Hungarian Uprising of 1956 was a nationwide revolt against the government of the Hungarian People’s Republic and its Soviet-imposed policies, lasting from October 23 until November 10, 1956. Though leaderless when it first began, it was the first major threat to Soviet control since the USSR’s forces drove Nazi Germany from its territory