Orosháza
Orosháza is a city situated in the westernmost part of Békés county, Hungary, on the Békés ridge bordered by the rivers Maros and Körös. Orosháza is an important cultural and recreational centre of the region; the city's main attractions are the Szántó Kovács János Museum, the Darvas József Literary Memorial House, the Town Art Gallery. The only museum in the country devoted to water wells is found in Orosháza. At the Rágyánszky Arboretum, more than 2000 plant species in 6000 varieties can be seen; the Lutheran church, was built between 1830 in late Baroque style. It is located in the centre of the town; the bell carried by the first settlers, who migrated from Zomba, is kept in front of the altar of the church. A number of cultural and entertaining programmes are organised in the town every year; the cantor Marcel Lorand was born in the city in 1912. He learned music with Béla Bartók and became the cantor of the Synagogue de la Paix in Strasbourg, France, in 1964, he died in 1988. Júlia Goldman, was born in Oroshaza and is noted as an "outstanding writer" of fantasy and adventure.
Gyula Gömbös, prime minister of Hungary was made an honorary citizen of the city in 1932. Orosháza is twinned with: Carei, Romania Kuusankoski, Finland Băile Tuşnad, Romania Panjin, China Llanes, Llanes Srbobran, Serbia Official website in Hungarian Orosháza at funiq.hu
Szombathely
Szombathely is the 10th largest city in Hungary. It is the administrative centre of Vas county in the west of the country, located near the border with Austria. Szombathely lies by the streams Perint and Gyöngyös, where the Alpokalja mountains meet the Little Hungarian Plain; the oldest city in Hungary, it is known as the birthplace of Saint Martin of Tours. The name Szombathely is from Hungarian szombat, "Saturday" and hely, "place", referring to its status as a market town, the medieval markets held on Saturday every week. Once a year during August they hold a carnival to remember the history of "Savaria"; the Latin name Savaria or Sabaria comes from the Latin name of the river Gyöngyös. The root of the word is the Proto-Indo-European word *seu, meaning "wet"; the Austrian overflowing of the Gyöngyös/Güns is called Zöbern, most a derivation of its Latin name. The city is known in Croatian in Slovene as Sombotel and in Yiddish as Sambathali; the German name, means "stone on the green". The name was coined by German settlers.
The Slovak name, Kamenec stems from the root'stone', similar to the German variant. Szombathely is the oldest recorded city in Hungary, it was founded by the Romans in 45 AD under the name of Colonia Claudia Savariensum, it was the capital of the Pannonia Superior province of the Roman Empire. It lay close to the important "Amber Road" trade route; the city had a public bath and an amphitheatre. In 2008, remains of a mithraeum were discovered. Emperor Constantine the Great visited Savaria several times, he ended the persecution of Christians, which claimed the lives of many people in the area, including Bishop St. Quirinus and St. Rutilus; the emperor made Savaria the capital of the province Pannonia Prima. This era was the height of prosperity for Savaria: its population grew, new buildings were erected, among them theatres and churches. St. Martin of Tours was born here. After the death of Emperor Valentinian III, the Huns invaded Pannonia. Attila's armies occupied Savaria between 441 and 445; the city was destroyed by an earthquake in 456.
The city remained inhabited throughout the Middle Ages. Its city walls were restored, new buildings were constructed using the stones from the remains of Roman buildings. Much of the Latin population moved away to Italy, while new settlers Goths and Longobards, arrived. In the 6th -- 8th centuries, the city was inhabited by Slavic tribes. In 795, the Franks occupied the city. Charlemagne visited the city. King Arnulf of the Franks gave the city to the archbishop of Salzburg in 875, it is that the castle was built around this time, using the stones from the Roman baths. Around 900, they were succeeded by Hungarians. In 1009, Stephen I gave the city to the newly founded Diocese of Győr; the city suffered during the war between King Sámuel Aba and Holy Roman Emperor Henry III, between 1042 and 1044. Szombathely was destroyed during the Mongol invasion of Hungary in 1241–1242 but was rebuilt shortly after, it was granted Free royal town status in 1407. In 1578, it became the capital of Vas comitatus; the city prospered.
In 1605 it was occupied by the armies of István Bocskai. During the Ottoman occupation of Hungary, the Ottomans invaded the area twice, first in 1664, when they were defeated at the nearby town of Szentgotthárd. Nearly twenty years they invaded again in 1683, during the Battle of Vienna; the city walls protected Szombathely both times. A peaceful period followed the retreat of the Turks until Prince Rákóczi's rebellion against the Habsburgs in the early 18th century. During the rebellion, the city residents supported the prince; the city was occupied by Habsburg armies in 1704, freed in November 1705 occupied alternately by the two armies over the next years. In June 1710, more than 2,000 people lost their lives in a plague, on May 3, 1716, the city was destroyed by a fire. After such losses throughout the region, the Habsburg Crown recruited Germans to resettle the depopulated areas along the Danube River, they were valued for their farming abilities. The Crown allowed them to keep their religion.
As a result, the city had a German majority for a long time. With increased population, the city began to prosper again. With the support of Ferenc Zichy, Bishop of Győr, a high school was built in 1772; the Diocese of Szombathely was founded in 1777 by Maria Theresa. The new bishop of Szombathely, János Szily, did much for the city: he had the ruins of the castle demolished and had new buildings constructed, including a cathedral, the episcopal palace complex, a school. In 1809, Napoleon's armies occupied the city and held it for 110 days, following a short battle on the main square. In 1817, two-thirds of the city was destroyed by fire. In 1813, a cholera epidemic claimed many lives. During the revolution in 1848-49, Szombathely supported the revolution. There were no battles in the immediate area; the years after the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867 brought prosperity. A railway line reached the city in 1865, in the 1870s Szombathely became a major railway junction. In 1885 the city increased its area.
In the 1890s, when Gyula Éhen was the mayor, the city underwent significant infrastructure development: roads were paved, a sewage system built, the tra
Ghent
Ghent is a city and a municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of the East Flanders province, the second largest municipality in Belgium, after Antwerp; the city started as a settlement at the confluence of the Rivers Scheldt and Leie and in the Late Middle Ages became one of the largest and richest cities of northern Europe, with some 50,000 people in 1300. It is a university city; the municipality comprises the city of Ghent proper and the surrounding suburbs of Afsnee, Drongen, Ledeberg, Mendonk, Sint-Amandsberg, Sint-Denijs-Westrem, Sint-Kruis-Winkel and Zwijnaarde. With 260,467 inhabitants in the beginning of 2018, Ghent is Belgium's second largest municipality by number of inhabitants; the metropolitan area, including the outer commuter zone, covers an area of 1,205 km2 and has a total population of 594,582 as of 1 January 2008, which ranks it as the fourth most populous in Belgium. The current mayor of Ghent, Mathias De Clercq is from the liberal & democratic party Open VLD.
The ten-day-long Ghent Festival is attended by about 1 -- 1.5 million visitors. Archaeological evidence shows human presence in the region of the confluence of Scheldt and Leie going back as far as the Stone Age and the Iron Age. Most historians believe that the older name for Ghent,'Ganda', is derived from the Celtic word ganda which means confluence. Other sources connect its name with an obscure deity named Gontia. There are no written records of the Roman period, but archaeological research confirms that the region of Ghent was further inhabited; when the Franks invaded the Roman territories from the end of the 4th century and well into the 5th century, they brought their language with them and Celtic and Latin were replaced by Old Dutch. Around 650, Saint Amand founded two abbeys in Ghent: Saint Bavo's Abbey; the city grew from the abbeys and a commercial centre. Around 800, Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, appointed Einhard, the biographer of Charlemagne, as abbot of both abbeys. In 851 and 879, the city was however plundered twice by the Vikings.
Within the protection of the County of Flanders, the city recovered and flourished from the 11th century, growing to become a small city-state. By the 13th century, Ghent was the biggest city in Europe north of the Alps after Paris. Within the city walls lived up to 65,000 people; the belfry and the towers of the Saint Bavo Cathedral and Saint Nicholas' Church are just a few examples of the skyline of the period. The rivers flowed in an area; these rich grass'meersen' were ideally suited for herding sheep, the wool of, used for making cloth. During the Middle Ages Ghent was the leading city for cloth; the wool industry established at Bruges, created the first European industrialized zone in Ghent in the High Middle Ages. The mercantile zone was so developed that wool had to be imported from Scotland and England; this was one of the reasons for Flanders' good relationship with England. Ghent was the birthplace of John of Duke of Lancaster. Trade with England suffered during the Hundred Years' War.
The city recovered in the 15th century, when Flanders was united with neighbouring provinces under the Dukes of Burgundy. High taxes led to a rebellion and the Battle of Gavere in 1453, in which Ghent suffered a terrible defeat at the hands of Philip the Good. Around this time the centre of political and social importance in the Low Countries started to shift from Flanders to Brabant, although Ghent continued to play an important role. With Bruges, the city led two revolts against Maximilian of Austria, the first monarch of the House of Habsburg to rule Flanders. In 1500, Juana of Castile gave birth to Charles V, who became Holy Roman King of Spain. Although native to Ghent, he punished the city after the 1539 Revolt of Ghent and obliged the city's nobles to walk in front of the Emperor barefoot with a noose around the neck. Saint Bavo Abbey was abolished, torn down, replaced with a fortress for Royal Spanish troops. Only a small portion of the abbey was spared demolition; the late 16th and the 17th centuries brought devastation because of the Eighty Years' War.
The war ended the role of Ghent as a centre of international importance. In 1745, the city was captured by French forces during the War of the Austrian Succession before being returned to the Empire of Austria under the House of Habsburg following the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748, when this part of Flanders became known as the Austrian Netherlands until 1815, the exile of the French Emperor Napoleon I, the end of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars and the peace treaties arrived at by the Congress of Vienna. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the textile industry flourished again in Ghent. Lieven Bauwens, having smuggled the industrial and factory machine plans out of England, introduced the first mechanical weaving machine on the European continent in 1800; the Treaty of Ghent, negotiated here and adopted on Christmas Eve 1814, formally ended the War of 1812 between Great Britain and the United States. After the Battle of Waterloo and Flanders ruled from the House of Habs
Floor (gymnastics)
In gymnastics, the floor refers to a specially prepared exercise surface, considered an apparatus. It is used by both male and female gymnasts; the event in gymnastics performed on floor is called floor exercise. The English abbreviation for the event in gymnastics scoring is FX. A spring floor is used in all of gymnastics to provide more bounce. Cheerleading uses spring floors for practice; the sprung floor used for indoor athletics, however, is designed to reduce bounce. The apparatus originated as a'free exercise' for men similar to the floor exercise of today, it wasn't until 1948. Most competitive gymnastics floors are spring floors, they contain springs and/or a rubber foam and plywood combination which make the floor bouncy, soften the impact of landings, enable the gymnast to gain height when tumbling. Floors have designated perimeters—the "out of bounds" area is always indicated by a border of white tape or a differently colored mat; the allowed time for a floor exercise is up to 70 seconds for males and up to 90 seconds for females.
Unlike men, women always perform routines to music. Measurements of the apparatus are published by the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique in the Apparatus Norms brochure; the dimensions are the same for female competitors. Performance area: 1,200 centimetres x 1,200 centimetres ± 3 centimetres Diagonals: 1,697 centimetres ±5 centimetres Border: 100 centimetres Safety zone: 200 centimetres Floor exercise routines last up to 90 seconds; the routine is choreographed in advance, is composed of acrobatic and dance elements. This event, above all others, allows the gymnast to express her personality through her dance and musical style; the moves that are choreographed in the routine must be precise, in sync with the music and entertaining. At the international elite level of competition, the composition of the routine is decided by the gymnast and her coaches. Many gymnasiums and national federations hire special choreographers to design routines for their gymnasts. Well-known gymnastics choreographers include Lisa Luke, Adriana Pop, Nancy Roche, Geza Pozar.
Others opt to choreograph their FX routines in-house. Some gymnasts adopt a new FX every year, it is not uncommon for coaches to modify a routine's composition between meets if it is used for an extended length of time. It is uncommon for gymnasts to use more than one different FX routine in the same season but it is not unheard of, like at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta for instance, Russian Dina Kotchetkova's routine in the FX event finals had different music and composition than that of her all-around exercise; the music used for the routine is the choice of the gymnast and her coaches. It may be of any known musical style and played with any instrument, but it may not include spoken words or sung lyrics of any kind. Vocalization is allowed, it is the responsibility of the coach to bring the music to every competition on CD. Scores are based on difficulty, demonstration of required elements, overall performance quality. Deductions are taken for poor form and execution, lack of required elements, falls.
The gymnast is expected to use the entire floor area for her routine, to tumble from one corner of the mat to the other. Steps outside the designated perimeters of the floor incur deductions; the gymnast will incur a deduction if there are lyrics in the music. For detailed information on score tabulation, please see the Code of Points article Routines can include up to four tumbling lines, several dance elements and leaps. A floor routine must consist of at least: Connection of two dance elements Saltos forward/sideways and backward Double saltos Saltos with a minimum of one full twist A floor exercise for men is made up of acrobatic elements, combined with other gymnastic elements of strength and balance and handstands; the routine must be choreographed forming a harmonious rhythmic exercise using the whole floor area. The whole routine may last no longer than 70 seconds; as with other gymnastic events, scores are based on difficulty and overall performance quality. Deductions are taken for lack of flexibility, not using the whole floor area, pausing before tumbling lines, using the same diagonal more than twice.
Handstand skills must show gymnasts' intent clearly. A floor routine should contain at least one element from all element groups: I. Non-acrobatic elements II. Acrobatic elements forward III. Acrobatic elements backwards, & Arabian elementsThe dismount can come from any element group other than group I. Floor exercises is a category in the rhythmic gymnastics, but it considers only the youngest gymnasts, up to 10 years old, who perform their routines freehand, which means without any apparatus, their length and content is still specified and differs in each age category. Acro dance, which incorporates many FX elements in a dance context. Gym floor cover Performance surface Sprung floor Wushu, which uses a floor. Acrobatic gymnastics Tumbling Drills The 2006 Code of Points US Gym Net's glossary of floor skills US Gym Net's glossary of hops and leaps FM Online - Floor Instructions Description of gymnastics technique by animation
Artistic gymnastics
Artistic gymnastics is a discipline of gymnastics in which athletes perform short routines on different apparatuses, with less time for vaulting. The sport is governed by the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique, which designs the code of points and regulates all aspects of international elite competition. Within individual countries, gymnastics is regulated by national federations, such as Gymnastics Canada, British Gymnastics, USA Gymnastics. Artistic gymnastics is a popular spectator sport at many competitions, including the Summer Olympic Games; the gymnastic system was mentioned in works by ancient authors, such as Homer and Plato. It included many disciplines that would become separate sports, such as swimming, wrestling and riding, was used for military training. In its present form, gymnastics evolved in Bohemia and what is now at the beginning of the 19th century, the term "artistic gymnastics" was introduced at the same time to distinguish free styles from the ones used by the military.
The German educator Friedrich Ludwig Jahn, known as the father of gymnastics, invented several apparatus, including the horizontal bar and parallel bars, which are used to this day. Two of the first gymnastics clubs were Sokols. In 1881, the FIG was founded, it remains the governing body of international gymnastics, it included only three countries and was called the European Gymnastics Federation until 1921, when the first non-European countries joined the federation and it was reorganized into its present form. Gymnastics was included in the program of the 1896 Summer Olympics, but women have been allowed to participate in the Olympics only since 1928; the World Championships, held since 1903, were open only to men until 1934. Since that time, two branches of artistic gymnastics have developed: women's artistic gymnastics and men's artistic gymnastics. Unlike men's and women's branches of many other sports, WAG and MAG differ in apparatus used at major competitions and in techniques. Women's gymnastics entered the Olympics as a team event in 1928 and was included in the 12th gymnastics world championships in 1950.
Individual women were recognized in the all-around as early as the tenth world championships in 1934. Two years after the full women's program was introduced at the 1950 World Championships, it was added to the 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki and the format has remained to this day; the earliest champions in women's gymnastics tended to be in their 20s, most had studied ballet for years before entering the sport. Larisa Latynina, the first great Soviet gymnast, won her first Olympic all-around medal at the age of 22 and her second at 26. Věra Čáslavská of Czechoslovakia, who followed Latynina to become a two-time Olympic all-around champion, was 22 before she started winning gold medals. In the 1970s, the average age of Olympic gymnasts began to decrease. While it was not unheard-of for teenagers to compete in the 1960s—Ludmilla Tourischeva was 16 at her first Olympics in 1968—younger female gymnasts became the norm as the sport's difficulty increased. Smaller, lighter girls excelled in the more challenging acrobatic elements required by the redesigned Code of Points.
The 58th Congress of the FIG—held in July 1980, just before the Olympics—decided to raise the minimum age for senior international competition from 14 to 15. The change, which came into effect two years did not eliminate the problem. By the time of the 1992 Summer Olympics, elite competitors consisted exclusively of "pixies"—underweight, prepubertal teenagers—and concerns were raised about athletes' welfare; the FIG responded to this trend by raising the minimum age for international elite competition to 16 in 1997. This, combined with changes in the Code of Points and evolving popular opinion in the sport, led to the return of older gymnasts. While the average elite female gymnast is still in her middle to late teens and of below-average height and weight, it is common to see gymnasts competing well into their 20s. At the 2004 Olympics, both the second-place American team and the third-place Russians were captained by women in their mid-20s. At the 2008 Olympics, the silver medalist on vault, Oksana Chusovitina, was a 33-year-old mother.
She received another silver medal on vault at the 2011 World Championships in Tokyo, when she was 36. At the age of 41, Chusovitina competed at her 7th consecutive Olympics at the 2016 Olympics, a world record for gymnastics. Both male and female gymnasts are judged on all events for execution, degree of difficulty, overall presentation skills. Vault The vault is an event as well as the primary piece of equipment used in that event. Unlike most of the gymnastic events employing apparatuses, the vault is common to both men's and women's competition, with little difference between the two categories. A gymnast sprints down a runway, a maximum of 25 m in length, before leaping onto a springboard. Harnessing the energy of the spring, the gymnast directs his or her body hands-first towards the vault. Body position is maintained while "popping" the vaulting platform; the gymnast rotates his or her body so as to land in a standing position on the far side of the vault. In advanced gymnastics, multiple twists and somersaults may be added before landing.
Successful vaults depend on the speed of the run, the length of the hurdle, the power the gymnast generates from the legs and shoulder girdle, kinesthetic awareness
Ostrava
Ostrava is a city in the north-east of the Czech Republic and is the capital of the Moravian-Silesian Region. It is 15 km from the border with Poland, at the meeting point of four rivers: the Odra, Ostravice and Lučina. In terms of both population and area Ostrava is the third largest city in the Czech Republic, the second largest city in Moravia, the largest city in Czech Silesia, it straddles the border of the two historic provinces of Silesia. The population was around 300,000 in 2013; the wider conurbation – which includes the towns of Bohumín, Havířov, Karviná, Orlová, Petřvald and Rychvald – is home to about 500,000 people, making it the largest urban area in the Czech Republic apart from the capital, Prague. Ostrava grew in importance due to its position at the heart of a major coalfield, becoming an important industrial centre, it was known as the country's "steel heart" thanks to its status as a coal-mining and metallurgical centre, but since the Velvet Revolution it has undergone radical and far-reaching changes to its economic base.
Industries have been restructured, the last coal was mined in the city in 1994. However, remnants of the city's industrial past are visible in the Lower Vítkovice area, a former coal-mining, coke production and ironworks complex in the city centre which retains its historic industrial architecture. Lower Vítkovice has applied for inclusion in the UNESCO World Heritage List. Since the 1990s Ostrava has been transformed into a modern cultural city, with numerous theatres and other cultural facilities. Various cultural and sporting events take place in Ostrava throughout the year, including the Colours of Ostrava music festival, the Janáček May classical music festival, the Summer Shakespeare Festival and NATO Days. Ostrava is home to two public universities: the VŠB-Technical University and the University of Ostrava. In 2014 Ostrava was a European City of Sport; the city co-hosted the IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship in 2004 and 2015. The city's coat of arms features a blue shield with a rearing silver horse standing on a green lawn.
The horse wears a red coverlet. At the top right of the shield there is a golden rose with a red core; the horse in the coat-of-arms wears no bridle. The oldest known depiction of this coat-of-arms is on a seal dating from 1426; the first coloured version dates from 1728. The horse is interpreted as a symbol of Ostrava's position on a major trade route, or as a figure taken from the coat-of-arms of Ostrava's first vogt, while the golden rose comes from the family coat-of-arms of the bishop of Olomouc Stanislav Thurzo; this explanation is supported by most modern literature. Another theory suggests that the Bishop granted Ostrava the right to use the horse in its coat-of-arms out of gratitude for the assistance that the town provided to the people of the Bishop's estate in Hukvaldy when the estate was being looted and pillaged; the help came so that the pillagers did not have time to attach bridles to their horses before making their escape. There is a legend which tells of a siege of Ostrava during which the besieged townspeople released unbridled horses to run in circles around the town.
This is said to have confused the attacking armies so much. In 2008, Ostrava's new marketing logo was unveiled. Designed by Studio Najbrt, the logo "OSTRAVA!!!" is used in public presentations of the city both in the Czech Republic and abroad. The three exclamation marks are meant to symbolise the dynamism and self-confidence of Ostrava and its people; the light blue colour of the city's name is based on the heraldic tradition, while the exclamation marks are a contrasting darker blue. The first written mention of Slezská Ostrava dates from 1229; the first mention of Moravian Ostrava describes it as a township. Ostrava grew up from which it took its name; this river still divides the city into two main parts: Silesian Ostrava. The settlement occupied a strategic position on the border between the two historical provinces of Moravia and Silesia, on the ancient trade route from the Baltic Sea to the Adriatic known as the Amber Road; this location helped the town to flourish. However, Ostrava began to decline in importance after the Thirty Years’ War, when it was occupied by Swedish forces from 1621–1645.
A turning point in Ostrava's history came in 1763 with the discovery of extensive deposits of high-quality bituminous coal on the Silesian bank of the Ostravice River. In 1828 the owner of the local estates, Archbishop Rudolf Jan of Olomouc, established an ironworks, named after him as the Rudolfshütte; the ironworks passed into the ownership of the Rothschild family, became known as the Vítkovice Ironworks. This company became the driving force behind Ostrava's industrial boom. By the second half of the 20th century the city was nicknamed the country's "steel heart". After the Second World War and the liberation of Ostrava by the Red Army, the city entered its greatest period of expansion; the new housing projects were on a small scale, focused on the Poruba district and featuring architecture in the Socialist realist style. The authorities built larger-scale developments of prefabricated apartment blocks in Poruba and created a series of satellite estates to the south of the city; the city centre was depopulated and people were moved out to the suburbs.
This was part of a long-term plan to
Hungary