Innholdsfortegnelse for Aug-15 i National Geographic Magazine

WHERE DO FOODS COME FROM? AVOCADO The fruit originated in Mexico and Central America. Today three types grow, each in different conditions. SUNFLOWER This plant is one of North America’s few native crops, its seeds often harvested for oil. GRAPE Wild grapes were do› mesticated only once, in the South Caucasus. Cultivars traveled around the world. APPLE Originally from Central Asia, the fruit is thought to have first spread along the Silk Road. CITRUS FRUIT Today’s oranges and tangerines evolved from primitive man› darins and pomelos in East Asia. STRAWBERRY The modern berry is a hybrid of two varieties, one from each of the Americas. PINEAPPLE The fruit originated in the Amazon. European explorers are thought to have carried samples east. COFFEE Ethiopia grew the crop first. It traveled to…

More and more people around the globe are dining out, largely because incomes are rising in developing countries. For many, fast-food restaurants are an increasingly popular choice, especially those offering ethnic dishes that cater to local tastes. Fine dining took a big hit following the 2008 financial crisis. “Recessions make consumers willing to try less expensive, experimental food,” says Michael Schaefer of Euromonitor International. Consumers now want high-quality, authentic cuisine in informal settings. CHINA’S FAST-FOOD MARKET China accounts for one-quarter of all money spent worldwide on eating out. This spending is driven by its growing middle class—more than 300 million strong. China has 57 percent of Asia’s food outlets, giving the middle class a variety of options. A TASTE FOR FAST FOOD Lifestyle changes and population growth have caused fast-food…

The papal line begins with Peter, the disciple Jesus Christ chose as the “rock” on which to build his church, according to the Gospel of Matthew. The unbroken succession, which continues with Francis, includes pontiffs who are revered, such as Peter and John Paul II, and others notorious for their transgressions. Bishops of Rome Little is known about the first leaders of the church, who would come to be known as the bishops of Rome, a title still held by popes today. The earliest popes are all considered saints by the Roman Catholic Church. Antipopes Disputes over papal succession at times led to the election of rival popes. Those deemed illegitimate by the church are called antipopes. Persecution The growing influence of the church in its first centuries is seen…

In the cavernous convention center in St. Charles, Missouri, I make my way past a zebra tossing a lioness 15 feet into the air and a life-size great white shark chasing a baby seal. The animal world’s great predators—lions, cougars, leopards, wolves—line the exhibit aisles along with a Cape buffalo, a blackbuck antelope, and a rattlesnake. As visitors arrive for the World Taxidermy Championships, they pass a giraffe whose neck and head have been mounted as if it were about to take a drink. The animal’s body is gone; inside the neck is a little tableau of three miniature giraffes leisurely munching tiny treetops. Not every feat of taxidermy qualifies as art. But as the art of taxidermy has endured and evolved, it has given form to a paradox in…

On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina slammed into the United States Gulf Coast and became one of the most devastating storms in the country’s history. Failed levees in New Orleans, along with poor preparation and a slow governmental response, would have repercussions for years to come. The city became a focus of human tragedy and triumph that riveted the world. To mark Katrina’s ten-year anniversary, we selected photographs that tell a story of resilience—from views of destruction made soon after the storm to present-day portraits showing the vitality of the Mardi Gras Indian and second-line parades. The photographers who made these images show us loss, renewal, and survival. They remind us that New Orleans, iconic as ever, is still thriving in a precarious landscape. Robert Polidori September 2005 Two weeks…

Locals are farming sustainably, jobs are on the rise—and the landscape is blanketed with fields of white blossoms. This isn’t some bucolic dream world. This is Rwanda, the central African country long wracked by civil conflicts, where a 1994 genocide claimed up to a million lives. Now the nation is recovering, thanks in part to those fields of lovely—and lucrative—flowers. Although Chrysanthemum cinerariifolium is generally a finicky plant, it thrives in Rwanda’s hills, where the soil is volcanic and the rainfall ample. Chrysanthemums contain pyrethrins, a sought-after natural insecticide. In the 1970s processing and selling the extract called pyrethrum to pest control companies abroad was a big business in Rwanda. That slowed as violence surged, but today the industry is rebounding. Pyrethrum has become the country’s third largest export after…

They’d been raised in zoos and breeding centers. Still, when the European bison were put in a fenced tract in Romania’s Transylvanian Alps in May 2014, most took well to their surroundings. This June, 14 of them were set free—the latest step in an ongoing effort to reintroduce Bison bonasus in Europe. Bison first roamed the continent about 10,000 years ago. By the eighth century hunting and habitat destruction had reduced their range and pushed them eastward. Later, kings shot them on royal hunting grounds, and then wartime carnage thinned the remaining herds, until the last wild bison succumbed in 1927. From just 12 bison surviving in zoos, the next generation was bred. Reintroductions began into eastern Europe in the 1950s. Once the 14 bison were freed to roam, more…

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EDITOR’S NOTE Christopher Lee Griffin Charleston, South Carolina The final step before a recruit becomes a U.S. marine is a test called the crucible, a three-day simulation of field conditions. At dawn in Parris Island, South Carolina, Griffin watched three female recruits complete an obstacle course. Saba Khozoui Highwood, Illinois Khozoui’s windshield was iced over one morning as she prepared to leave for work. While waiting for the ice to melt, she took several frames, then repositioned the car toward the sun for this shot. “At first the light is barely noticeable. As it brightens, shadows give shape to the landscape, until it blinds you like a spotlight. First light—its beauty is fleeting, and that’s what makes it so special.”—Kurt Mutchler, National Geographic senior photo editor…

On a hot spring morning, Galte Nyemeto stood by the shore of Lake Turkana scanning for crocodiles. The water was shallow, the odds of reptiles low, but Nyemeto, a traditional healer of the Daasanach tribe, had come with a patient, and it would be very bad luck—spiritually and otherwise—for the ceremony to be interrupted. Nearly all the larger and more dangerous hippos had been hunted out long ago, but plenty of crocs remained, especially here, below the delta where the Omo River pours from Ethiopia into Kenya. The river crocs, which sometimes follow the current south, are said to be more vicious and cunning than those hatched along the lake edge, though all are considered by the tribe to be evil incarnate, regardless of lineage. It meant Nyemeto was both…

that could convey what it means for Laos to have been one of the most heavily bombed nations in history and then to have gone on and somehow found a future. Finally, right there on a busy main street of Phonsavan, the provincial capital, I found it: a giant pile of bomb casings left over from the American bombing campaign in Laos, a stupendous and futile torrent of airborne destruction. And just beyond the junk heap of weaponry, a new ATM machine. Bright blue and gleaming white, this beckoning pagoda of money dwarfed the rusting debris of a half-forgotten war. After inspecting the bomb casings, I walked over to the ATM, stuck in my debit card, and pulled out one million kip, about $120. All those 50,000-kip notes spewing out…

Even in 1909 visitors to Atlantic City, New Jersey, had more than sand and sea to keep them busy. A look through the loupe reveals that the Steeplechase Pier amusement center offered lasting mementos. A sign there reads “Have Your Foto in a Bathingsuit.” The word “swimsuit” hadn’t yet come into use. Few women knew how to swim. Female beachgoers (in long wool or cotton dresses) simply waded out into the waves to “bathe”—often holding hands with others for stability—going as far as they could walk. Subscriptions For subscriptions or changes of address, contact Customer Service at ngmservice.com or call 1-800-647-5463. Outside the U.S. or Canada call +1-813-979-6845. We occasionally make our subscriber names available to companies whose products or services might be of interest to you. If you prefer…

Gardeners have long known that persimmon sex is complicated: Female trees bear fruit, males don’t, and some trees (the species that produce the fruit we eat) are both male and female. But until recently, scientists have not known how sex is determined for dioecious plants such as sex-splitting persimmons. Scientists working with a family of 150 Caucasian persimmon trees cultivated in Japan have now isolated a crucial gene on the Y chromosome. Dubbed OGI after the Japanese word for male tree, the gene restricts the expression of a “feminizing gene”—MeGI, Japanese for female tree—which limits pollen production. “OGI is the magic bullet that the Y chromosome uses to suppress the MeGI gene,” says geneticist Luca Comai. About 5 percent of plant species are dioecious, including such important crops as spinach,…

EDITOR’S NOTE Matt Champlin Skaneateles, New York Rain followed snow one February day. Near his home, Champlin constructed a small snowman. As he prepared to take a portrait, its head rolled off and looked forlornly at the sky. Karen Burke Enfield, Connecticut Burke moved in with her parents when her mother was diagnosed with dementia. After they returned from the hospital one afternoon, Burke observed a quiet moment of comfort. “I knew that this assignment would be difficult, that it would tax everyone’s ability to make pictures about the quality of transformation in the moment. But the rewards were stunning.”—Jim Richardson, National Geographic photographer…

When about 7,000 awed strangers first encounter him on the public stage, he is not yet the pope—but like a chrysalis stirring, something astounding is already present in the man. Inside Stadium Luna Park, in downtown Buenos Aires, Argentina, Roman Catholics and evangelical Christians have gathered for an ecumenical event. From the stage, a pastor calls out for the city’s archbishop to come up and say a few words. The audience reacts with surprise, because the man striding to the front had been sitting in the back all this time, for hours, like no one of any importance. Though a cardinal, he is not wearing the traditional pectoral cross around his neck, just a black clerical shirt and a blazer, looking like the simple priest he was decades ago. He…

His car is not a limo but a Ford Focus. His home is not the Apostolic Palace but a modest apartment. His shoes are orthopedic, his waistline growing, his humor frequent, his off-the-cuff remarks often jaw-dropping. (“If a person is gay and seeks God and has goodwill, who am I to judge?”) For the two and a half years of his papacy, Pope Francis has delighted and discomfited a worldwide audience. For the most part, that audience has been able to glimpse Francis only from afar. Outside of the Vatican’s own photographer, other news photographers are nearly always kept a good distance from the man himself. With one exception. Enter National Geographic photographer Dave Yoder, who for six months on and off last year was allowed unprecedented access to the…

“We were hearing reports of kids feeling stress, resulting in classroom behavioral problems,” said John Stevenson, President of North Shore Animal League America (NSALA). “And it’s been clinically proven that dogs make people feel good.” This simple premise—that pets improve the lives of humans—led him and the NSALA team to develop the Mutt-i-grees® Curriculum in collaboration with Yale University’s School of the 21st Century, where his wife, Dr. Matia Finn-Stevenson, is a child development expert. Launched in 2010, the pre-K to grade 12 social and emotional learning curriculum builds on children’s affinity for animals while highlighting the unique characteristics of “Mutt-i-grees®,” a term NSALA coined for rescue dogs. In a series of lessons about shelter pets, children develop critical skills related to self-awareness, empathy, cooperation, and decision-making. Today, the program…