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Lusaka is the capital and largest city of Zambia. It is one of the fastest developing cities in southern Africa. Lusaka is in the southern part of the central plateau at an elevation of about 1,279 meters (4,196 ft). As of 2019, the city’s population was about 3.3 million, while the urban population is estimated at 2.5 million in 2018.Lusaka is the center of both commerce and government in Zambia and connects to the country’s four main highways heading north, south, east, and west. English is the official language of the city administration, while Nyanja and Bemba are the commonly spoken street languages.

The earliest evidence of settlement in the area dates to the 6th century AD, with the first known settlement in the 11th century. It was then home to the Lenje and Soli peoples from the 17th or 18th centuries. The founding of the modern city occurred in 1905 when it lay in the British protectorate of Northern Rhodesia, which was controlled by the British South African Company (BSAC). The BSAC built a railway linking their mines in the Copperbelt to Cape Town and Lusaka was designated as a water stop on that line, named after a local Lenje chief called Lusaaka. White Afrikaner farmers then settled in the area and expanded Lusaka into a regional trading center, taking over its administration. In 1929, five years after taking over control of Northern Rhodesia from the BSAC, the British colonial administration decided to move their capital from Livingstone to a more central location, and Lusaka was chosen. Town planners including Stanley Adshead worked on the project, and the city was built out over the subsequent decades.

Lusaka lost some of its status to Salisbury (now Harare in Zimbabwe) when the latter became the capital of the merged Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland in 1953 but regained it when it was named as the capital of newly independent Zambia in 1964. A large-scale building program in the city followed, including government buildings, the University of Zambia, and a new airport. Wealthy suburbs in Lusaka include Woodlands, Ibex Hill, and Rhodes Park. Large-scale migration of people from other areas of Zambia occurred both before and after independence, and a lack of sufficient formal housing led to the emergence of numerous unplanned shanty towns on the city’s western and southern fringes. Wikipedia

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The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The Czech Republic has a hilly landscape that covers an area of 78,871 square kilometers (30,452 sq mi) with a mostly temperate continental and oceanic climate. The capital and largest city is Prague; other major cities and urban areas include Brno, Ostrava, Plzeň, and Liberec.

The Duchy of Bohemia was founded in the late 9th century under Great Moravia. It was formally recognized as an Imperial State of the Holy Roman Empire in 1002 and became a kingdom in 1198. Following the Battle of Mohács in 1526, the whole Crown of Bohemia was gradually integrated into the Habsburg monarchy. The Protestant Bohemian Revolt led to the Thirty Years’ War. After the Battle of the White Mountain, the Habsburgs consolidated their rule. With the dissolution of the Holy Empire in 1806, the Crown lands became part of the Austrian Empire.

In the 19th century, the Czech lands became more industrialized, and in 1918 most of it became part of the First Czechoslovak Republic following the collapse of Austria-Hungary after World War I. Czechoslovakia was the only country in Central and Eastern Europe to remain a parliamentary democracy during the entirety of the interwar period. After the Munich Agreement in 1938, Nazi Germany systematically took control over the Czech lands. Czechoslovakia was restored in 1945 and became an Eastern Bloc communist state following a coup d’état in 1948. Attempts to liberalize the government and economy were suppressed by a Soviet-led invasion of the country during the Prague Spring in 1968. In November 1989, the Velvet Revolution ended communist rule in the country, and on 1 January 1993, Czechoslovakia was dissolved, with its constituent states becoming the independent states of the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

The Czech Republic is a unitary parliamentary republic and developed country with an advanced, high-income social market economy. It is a welfare state with a European social model, universal health care, and free-tuition university education. It ranks 12th in the UN inequality-adjusted human development and 24th in the World Bank Human Capital Index. It ranks as the 9th safest and most peaceful country and 31st in democratic governance. The Czech Republic is a member of NATO, the European Union, OECD, OSCE, and the Council of Europe. Wikipedia

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Chengdu is a sub-provincial city which serves as the capital of the Chinese province of Sichuan. It is traditionally the hub in Southwest China. Chengdu is considered a “Beta + (global second-tier)” city classification (together with Barcelona and Washington, D.C.) according to the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. Chengdu is a leading financial center in the Asia-Pacific region and ranks 35th globally the 2021 Global Financial Centres Index.

Chengdu is located in central Sichuan. The surrounding Chengdu Plain is known as the “Country of Heaven” (Chinese: 天府之国; pinyin: Tiānfǔ zhi Guó) and the “Land of Abundance”. Its prehistoric settlers included the Sanxingdui culture. The site of Dujiangyan, an ancient irrigation system, is designated as a World Heritage Site. The Jin River flows through the city.

Founded by the state of Shu prior to its incorporation into China, Chengdu is unique as a major Chinese settlement that has maintained its name mostly unchanged throughout the imperial, republican, and communist eras. It was the capital of Liu Bei’s Shu Han during the Three Kingdoms Era, as well as several other local kingdoms during the Middle Ages. During World War II, refugees from eastern China fleeing from the Japanese settled in Chengdu. After the war, Chengdu’s importance as a link between Eastern and Western China expanded, with railways built to Chongqing in 1952, and Kunming and Tibet afterwards. In the 1960s, Chengdu became an important center of China’s national defense industry.

Chengdu is now one of the most important economic, financial, commercial, cultural, transportation, and communication centers in China. Its economy is diverse, characterized by the machinery, automobile, medicine, food, and information technology industries. Chengdu Shuangliu International Airport, a hub of Air China and Sichuan Airlines, is one of the 30 busiest airports in the world, and the Chengdu railway station is one of the six biggest in China. Chengdu also hosts many international companies and more than 16 consulates; more than 270 Fortune 500 companies have established branches in Chengdu. Chengdu is the seat of the Western Theatre Command region of the People’s Liberation Army. Chengdu hosted the FISU Summer World University Games, an international multi-sport event. It is considered one of the most livable cities in China.

Chengdu’s culture largely reflects that of its province, Sichuan; in 2011, it was recognized by UNESCO as a city of gastronomy. It is associated with the giant panda, a Chinese national symbol, which inhabits the area of Sichuan; the city is home to the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding.

Chengdu is one of the world’s top 40 cities by scientific research output, and home to the greatest number of universities and research institutes in Southwestern China, notably Sichuan University, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu University of Technology, Sichuan Normal University, and Xihua University. Wikipedia

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