God's Own Country

God’s Own Country, is a phrase that was first used to describe the Wicklow Mountains and has subsequently been used to refer to several places, including Surrey, Australia, United States, New Zealand, Kerala state, Yorkshire,Cornwall, Scotland and Wales. The phrase has been abbreviated to Godzone or less often Godzown.

Early uses

Ireland and England

The expression was first used to describe the Wicklow Mountains of Ireland by Edward du Bois, writing under the pseudonym "A Knight Errant" in 1807, and in a poem describing the English county of Surrey in 1839. The phrase was also used in its more literal meaning to refer to Heaven, in a poem by Elizabeth Harcourt Rolls Mitchell in 1857.

United States

The phrase later found sporadic use to describe several American regions. Most known is the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Also was used by the Confederate army to describe parts of Tennessee in the 1860s. The phrase was also used to describe California in the 1860s, and by Clement Laird Vallandigham to describe the land of the Mississippi plains. None of these remained a widely used to describe a region, though it is still occasionally used to describe the United States overall.

Country

A country is a region that is identified as a distinct entity in political geography. A country may be an independent sovereign state or one that is occupied by another state, as a non-sovereign or formerly sovereign political division, or a geographic region associated with sets of previously independent or differently associated people with distinct political characteristics. Regardless of the physical geography, in the modern internationally accepted legal definition as defined by the League of Nations in 1937 and reaffirmed by the United Nations in 1945, a resident of a country is subject to the independent exercise of legal jurisdiction.

Sometimes the word countries is used to refer both to sovereign states and to other political entities, while other times it refers only to states. For example, the CIA World Factbook uses the word in its "Country name" field to refer to "a wide variety of dependencies, areas of special sovereignty, uninhabited islands, and other entities in addition to the traditional countries or independent states".^{[Note 1]}

Francis Lee

Francis Henry "Franny" Lee CBE (born 29 April 1944 in Westhoughton, Lancashire, England) is a former professional footballer.

Lee played for Bolton Wanderers, Manchester City, Derby County and England. A stocky forward, he won League Championship medals with Manchester City and Derby, and scored more than 200 goals in his career. In 2010, he was inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame.

He holds the English record for the greatest number of penalties scored in a season, a feat which earned him the nickname Lee Won Pen and led to accusations of diving. One such accusation, from Leeds United's Norman Hunter, led to an on-pitch fight.

After retiring from football, Lee ran a successful toilet roll business, F.H. Lee Ltd, which made him a millionaire. In 1994, he became the major shareholder and chairman of Manchester City, but stepped down four years later.

Playing career

Lee started his professional career with Bolton Wanderers. Manchester City manager Joe Mercer signed him for a club record transfer fee of £60,000 in 1967. He made his Manchester City debut in a 2–0 win over Wolverhampton Wanderers at Maine Road, and scored his first Manchester City goal the following week at Fulham. In his first season at the club, he scored 16 League goals in 31 appearances, playing a crucial role in City's push for the 1967–68 League Championship; Mercer described him as "the final piece of the jigsaw". The title was decided on the final day of the season, City requiring a win at Newcastle United. City won the match 4–3, Lee scoring one of the goals, and were crowned champions. The following season Lee was part of the Manchester City team which won the 1969 FA Cup.

Kerala

Kerala (/ˈkɛrələ/), historically known as Keralam, is a state in South India on the Malabar coast. It was formed on 1 November 1956 following the States Reorganisation Act by combining Malayalam-speaking regions. Spread over 38,863 km² (15,005 sq mi), it is bordered by Karnataka to the north and northeast, Tamil Nadu to the east and south, and the Lakshadweep Sea to the west. With 33,387,677 inhabitants as per the 2011 Census, Kerala is the thirteenth largest state by population and is divided into 14 districts with the capital being Thiruvananthapuram. Malayalam is the most widely spoken and the official language of the state.

The region was a prominent spice exporter since 3000 BCE. The Chera Dynasty was the first prominent kingdom based in Kerala, though it frequently struggled against attacks by the neighbouring Cholas and Pandyas. In the 15th century, the spice trade attracted Portuguese traders to Kerala, and paved the way for the European colonisation of India. After independence, Travancore and Cochin joined the Republic of India and Travancore-Cochin was given the status of a state in 1949. In 1956, Kerala state was formed by merging Malabar district, Travancore-Cochin (excluding four southern taluks), and the taluk of Kasargod, South Kanara.

Film festival

A film festival is an organized, extended presentation of films in one or more cinemas or screening venues, usually in a single city or region. Increasingly, film festivals show some films outdoors. Films may be of recent date and, depending upon the festival's focus, can include international and domestic releases. Some festivals focus on a specific film-maker or genre (e.g., film noir) or subject matter (e.g., horror film festivals). A number of film festivals specialise in short films of a defined maximum length. Film festivals are typically annual events. Some film historians do not consider Film Festivals as official releases of film, like Jerry Beck. The best known film festivals are the Venice Film Festival, the Cannes Film Festival, the Toronto Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, and the Berlin International Film Festival, the latter being the largest film festival worldwide, based on attendance. The Venice Film Festival is the oldest major festival. The Melbourne International Film Festival is the largest film festival in the Southern Hemisphere and one of the oldest in the world. A 2013 study found 3,000 active films festivals worldwide—active defined as having held an event in the previous 24 months.