These are the happiest places in the world 🌎

November 12, 2022
by RJ Hamster

Saturday, November 12, 2022

In today’s newsletter, we explore what makes a country happy, hear about the real women warriors who inspired Wakanda Forever, hunt for Puerto Rico’s legendary bloodsucking devil dogs … and celebrate, ahead of tomorrow’s World Kindness Day, 5 ways that animals can help.

PHOTOGRAPH BY CORY RICHARDS

What is it that makes a country happy? A verdant, temperate climate and family-centered lives? Tight-knit communities with guaranteed health care, education, and retirement income? A free-market paradise on the water?

Nat Geo went worldwide to explore places that regularly score highly on annual “happiness surveys.” Writer and Nat Geo Explorer Dan Buettner found things in common—“three different strands of happiness that braid together in complementary ways to create lasting joy. I call them pleasure, purpose, and pride.”

What can we learn from Denmark (pictured above), Costa Rica, and Singapore? How can we bring some of that happiness and satisfaction to our own lives?

Read the full story here.

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PHOTOGRAPH BY MATTHIEU PALEY

Work hard, play hard: Douglas Foo, after complaining of shoulder pain, gets a massage from his sons as his wife looks on. Known for his infectious laugh, Foo runs Singapore’s largest chain of quick-service sushi restaurants. His work ethic, which includes 14-hour workdays, has earned him the kind of affluent lifestyle that is sought by many Singaporeans. While Nordic nations like Denmark score highest overall in happiness surveys, Singapore is regularly near the top of Asian nations surveyed. Read how happiness is measured.

PHOTOGRAPH BY MATTHIEU PALEY

Time to dance: Taking a spontaneous midday break from the restaurant she runs, María del Carmen Yoursrecha Paterson (at right) dances in a nearby bar in Costa Rica. The nation regularly scores among the highest in happiness in the Americas. Photographers and Nat Geo Explorers Cory Richards and Matthieu Paley both considered changes as they documented happiness. Richards, who has struggled with personal demons, says he realized commitment helps him through fluctuations in happiness. Paley, after taking the photo above, says we need to make time every day to socialize with our families and friends. Read more.

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See: The ocean’s currents and how they’re changing

Do these animals suck blood? On the trail of the legendary chupacabras—and a nearly forgotten people

Equal time: 5 ways that animals can boost kindness

Why do people lie? And what makes us believe liars? Science has answers.

IN THE SPOTLIGHT

COURTESY MARVEL STUDIOS

Who inspired Wakanda’s warrior women? It has been a big year for the long-ago group of women warriors known as the Agojie. The West African group inspired the protective unit in the just-released Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (pictured above). The Agojie’s story earlier had been brought to film in Viola Davis’s much-praised The Woman King, Nat Geo reports. “These women proved themselves to be just as strong and just as smart and just as capable as any man and as willing to risk it all for their country as any man,” author Rachel Jones says in this week’s episodeof Overheard, Nat Geo’s podcast. Hear it!

THE REAL WARRIOR WOMEN

PHOTO OF THE DAY

PHOTOGRAPH BY @PAOLOVERZONE

Lost tribes: Nearly two decades ago, paleontologist Paul Sereno led an expedition into the Sahara looking for dinosaur fossils. What he found, however, was hundreds of human bones emerging from the sand. “It was as if the desert winds were pulling them from their final resting places,” said the team’s photographer in our 2008 story on the discovery. Today Sereno, a Nat Geo Explorer, is back searching for more clues about these ancient human fossils. (In the photo above from our Instagram, Sereno holds a fossilized human jaw.)

SKELETONS OF THE SAHARA

LAST GLIMPSE

PHOTOGRAPH BY MOISES SAMAN, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

What can be saved? For a half-century, UNESCO has designated important areas in the world for preservation, such as the distinctive architectural character of the Old City in San’a, Yemen (pictured above). But how far can a World Heritage designation go in saving areas, like battered Yemen, that are in the middle of a civil war fueled by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Iran?

READ ON

This newsletter has been curated and edited by David Beard, Jen Tse, Heather Kim, and Sydney Combs. Amanda Williams-Bryant, Alec Egamov, Rita Spinks, and Jeremy Brandt-Vorel also contributed this week. Have an idea? We’d love to hear from you at david.beard@natgeo.com. Thanks for reading!

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What Nation’s National Animal Is A Unicorn?

Putting them on trial

RJ Hamster

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These are the happiest places in the world 🌎

These are the happiest places in the world 🌎

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