Trivia Bits 20 January

 

• The New Zealand skiing and tourist centre on the shores of Lake Wakatipu is Queenstown being named in honour of Queen Victoria with many Queenstown streets bearing names from the gold mining era such as Camp Street.
• The inaugural meeting of the North/South Inter-Parliamentary Association, first envisioned in 1998 as part of the Northern Ireland peace process, was held in Dublin on 12 October 2012.
• The Strait of Tiran links the Gulf of Aqaba and the Red Sea.
• Bach created a "musical sleep scene ... that could have graced any opera of the time" in his chorale cantata Mache dich, mein Geist, bereit (Make yourself ready, my spirit), BWV 115 which was first performed on 5 November 1724.
• Argentina and Brazil are the only two countries that share borders with the South American country of Uruguay.
• Jamie and Paul’s surname in the 1992 American sitcom Mad About You was Buchman and starred Paul Reiser and Helen Hunt as a newly married couple in New York City.
• Mount Aso, whose peak is 1592 m above sea level, is the largest active volcano in Japan and stands in Aso Kujū National Park in Kumamoto Prefecture, on the island of Kyūshū.
• The 1847 Shiraz plantings at Turkey Flat in the Barossa Valley, South Australia are considered to be among the oldest grapevines still in commercial use.
• American actor Gabriel Macht stars as Harvey Specter in the 2011 TV series Suits.
• The two main ingredients in ganache are chocolate and cream and is a glaze, icing, sauce, or filling for pastries.