Italian town pays women to have babies to keep afloat

by Jamie Rhein on

Three summers ago we drove through Regent, North Dakota to see enormous scrap metal sculptures that were built along the Enchanted Highway as a means to get tourists to drive off the main interstate to Regent. The town was dying because making money there had become a dwindling proposition.

Recently, my husband said that he’d like to drive to Regent again to see those sculptures, so perhaps they are bringing people to the town.

According to this New York Times article, in Laviano, Italy population decline is also a problem. It started back in 1980 when there was an earthquake that killed 300 residents and destroyed many buildings.

Noticing that there was a lack of babies being born, the mayor decided to pay women to have babies. If a town is not replenishing its population, the economy goes into the tank. Even people who immigrate here can get paid. How long this will last is to be determined.

Lest you think this is a crazy proposition. Singapore has had a similar campaign for Chinese Singaporeans. When people aren’t procreating, they need a little umph sometimes.

Laviano does have a tourist draw. It’s in the Province of Salerno that features gorges, historical buildings that date back to the 14th century and a diversity of flora and fauna. Since tourists can create jobs, like Regent, North Dakota is counting on, perhaps Laviano might find some options in that domain if the baby thing doesn’t hold.

I’ve never been to Laviano, but here is my plug for what I’ve gathered make this a worthy stop.

Here is a link to a holiday rental. It’s a start.

Three extreme athletes snowkite across North Dakota

by Anna Brones on

“They’re doing what?” was my first reaction when hearing about To Cross the Moon (2XtM) expedition that took three extreme athletes across North Dakota by way of snowkite. On Friday 2XtM successfully finished their 390 mile snowkiting trek across one of the coldest states in the country, making them some of the coolest and intense travelers in my book.

Snowkiting is basically snowboarding with the help of the wind; optimal when you want to cross flat distances on your board. An offshoot of its cousin kiteboarding, snowkiting allows a snowboarder harnessed to the long reins of a power kite to launch upwards of 40 feet while riding on horizontal terrain. 2XtM team Sam Salwei, Jason Magness and Paul Cassedy spent three weeks in Ferburary snowkiting across the desolate, and incredibly cold, landscape of North Dakota to promote wind energy. Not only did they deal with below freezing temperatures, but they also carried all of their own gear.

Seems to be a pretty intense way to travel, but like any good trip it’s always a little hard to return back to home and to everyday life. An excerpt from their blog:

“What do we do now?” asked Magness. “We’ve spent the last nineteen days trying to eat enough, and worrying about freezing to death or blowing away.”

“Yeah,” agreed Salwei, “We spent the last three weeks worrying about not dying, and now as we go back into society, we have to worry about not living.”

Although it might not be on the top of my list for winter activities, it’s still pretty amazing.

North Dakota Is World’s Best Maker of Snow Angels

by Jonathon Morgan on

Florida is known for its wonderful weather, Iowa for its beautiful fields of corn, and North Dakota…for its snow angels? Believe it or not, the North Dakota Senate recently filed a resolution in praise of their recognition by the Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s best snow angel makers.

So how does one become the world’s reigning snow angel champion? It may seem simple, but it’s no easy task. To win the title, the state rounded up 8,962 people to create a sea of snow angels on the capitol grounds as far as the eye could see.

And now, today, the education curator for the State Historical Society of North Dakota received word from Guinness that they had been successful in regaining their status as world’s number 1.

North Dakota previously held the record with 1,791 snow angels in 2002, but was bettered by Michigan Technological University with 3,784 in 2006 — numbers that pale in comparison to the impressive new record.

Good news for the rest of you in snow-bearing states, this is an easy record to beat. All you need is some snow, a great big field, and the energy to galvanize 9,000 of your closest friends to lie down and roll around in it. Good luck for next year.

Word for the Travel Wise (10/08/06)

by Adrienne Wilson on

Having recently purchased a small Lakota dictionary for beginner’s I thought I’d put it to use here on Gadling. Lakota won’t be a language you run around using on a daily basis even with the majority of speakers in the U.S. For the following word I please note the letter ‘n’ should be more like a ‘n’ with a ‘j’ hanging from the second line of the ‘n’. I don’t have the correct character key, but should you really try pronouncing this one, just beware of the way it appears here and how it should actually appear.

Today’s word is a Lakota word used in North America:

wawíhangya – destroyer

Lakota is spoken in the U.S. in areas which include North Dakota, South Dakota, parts of Nebraska, Minnesota, and Montana. It is also spoken by a few people in Canada and has a total range of 8,000-9,000 speakers in all of North America. Lakota is the largest of the three languages of the Sioux, of the Siouan family as noted in Wikipedia. Head over to their page for a quick read on lingo background info. One last interesting fact is that the language represents one of the largest Native American speech communities left in the United States.

Learning Lakota online will be a bit more challenging than Spanish, but can be done to a certain point. There is a Lakotiya Yahoo group which holds live online classes. You must be a member, but I believe registration is free and from there you can start learning pronunciation and grammar. The Saskatchewan Indian Cultural Center has a decent website which includes quotes form the elders, common terms & phrases (with audio), and a grammar guide. Lakhota.org offers off-line language products like this Speak Lakota Level 2 Textbook which are said to be the finest according to the site. If you’re in the northern plains area of the U.S. try seeking out a native speaker for some lessons, otherwise you can pick up this Everyday Lakota for beginner’s dictionary at the Crazy Horse Memorial or on Amazon.

North Dakota Heritage Center

by Adrienne Wilson on


Before hitting Bismarck, ND we were told by the hotel staff to keep moving towards South Dakota (our next stop). The river boat tour, also the main attraction in Bismarck, was closed for the season and the only thing of interest for the locals was hitting up a bar at night. Not the type of thing we were going for and to piggy-back on what the locals have to say – they are very correct when stating there isn’t a whole lot to do. We managed to spend around four hours in the area after our night stay checking out the North Dakota Heritage Center and the Capitol building though. If you’re into North Dakota history you’ve just found two of the best spots to soak it all in and the best part is they are both FREE! The North Dakota Heritage Center sits on the State Capitol grounds and reflects all areas of the state history in addition to housing permanent collections: North Dakota Remembers World War II and Emigrants from the Empires.

Take a stroll outside on the grounds and you’ll discover flower gardens and sculptures. One of the most notable finds includes a large bronze of Sacajawea and her son just outside of the Heritage Center. In short it’s a very, very cool large place for both children and adults to learn a lot of information about the state.

The North Dakota Heritage Center is located at 612 E Boulevard Ave, Bismarck, ND 58505. Ph. 701.328.2666. Hours are 8 AM-5 PM, Mon-Fri., 9 AM-5 PM Sat., and 11 AM-5 PM Sun. Summer hours, May 16 to Sept. 15, are 8 AM-5 PM daily.