The+english+speaking+world

= __**The cayman Islands**__ =

//The Cayman Islands is a group of 3 Islands located in the western Caribbean Sea. The land is a British overseas territory, most known for the good financial possibilities.//

__<span style="font-size: 120% The islands Grand Cayman, Cayman Brac and Little Cayman, which together is called “the Cayman Islands”, were accordingly discovered by the famous Christopher Columbus on the 10th may 1503. He originally named the islands “Las Tortuga's” which means sea turtles, right after he sighted them (due to the huge amount of sea turtles). It wasn't before a new Englishman, Sir Francis Drake, came there in 1586 that the Islands got their name as we know it today. The whole thing started when the adventurous Englishmen wanted to explore the world. On one of the trips they made they captured the Cayman Islands and along with nearby Jamaica they got ceded over to Britain in 1670. The Cayman Islands status was for a long time known as a governed single colony together with Jamaica. But finally in 1962, several centuries after they had got ceded over to England, they became a separate British overseas territory and Jamaica independent. In reality this meant that the Islands got their own administration, governor and many other leading positions. It was a breakthrough, but the Caymanians' got still unsatisfied when they heard about Jamaica's independence, and realized that they didn't.
 * color: #EC1D13">__**__**History:**__**__ __

Beside the long-lasting combat about whether the small island should become independent or not, it hasn't been a lot of important happenings worth mentioning. If it is, I think it only could be the Islands vulnerability when it comes to hurricanes. In fact, The Cayman Islands are most affected by hurricanes and tropical systems in the entire world. In average they are brushed or hit every 2.23 years. One of the worst was now recently in 2004. The hurricane called “Ivan” hit the Cayman Islands so bad that it became the worst in 86 years. It destroyed and damaged as much as 70% of the buildings. It was a big tragedy and many people died.

<span style="font-size: 120% The Cayman Islands are located in the Western Caribbean Sea, not far from South of Cuba and West of Jamaica. The biggest Island is Grand Cayman with an area on about 76 square miles. The “sister” Islands, which is Cayman Brac and Little Cayman, are located around 80 miles east of Grand Cayman and have areas of 14- and 10- square miles. The highest “mountain” on the Islands lays on Cayman Brac and rises to 42.6 m above sea level. Therefore the rest of the Islands are very close to the sea level. This is the main reason why the Cayman Islands are so vulnerable above hurricanes. A big hurricane causes normally a breakdown in the infra structure, which take years to rebuild. The capital and the largest city on the Cayman Islands are called “George Town”. This is the most known city from the Islands and is also the most important one for the community. This is the place they go if they want to buy clothes or something they don't get on the other Islands.
 * color: #f41d10">__**Geography:**__

<span style="font-size: 120% The estimated population on the Islands is on about 60 000 people, with a variation on 110 nationalities with people from every continent (except of Antarctica of course). The Caymanians standard of living is very high, but if you look at “who owns what” you will only find the same names. Because the most prominent and wealthy families control the largest proportion of the real estate property and business enterprises, along with having the most significant positions in the financial sector. Unfortunately there are often a lot of illegal stuff these people do and work with, but it's rarely anyone who ever get arrested for it. So therefore it's a lot of “secret” bank-accounts, criminality, money laundering, “slave trade” with prostitutes, narcotic trafficking and much more going on. Luckily it hasn't always been like this. Because the economy was once centered around turtles. But now in the 20th century tourism and “financial services” have become the biggest income. In fact, over a million people visit the small islands annually. And believe it or not, the Cayman Islands have more registered businesses than they have people! One reason for that is well-known from especially movies and then I'm thinking on what I just mentioned, the illegal “businesses”. The reason why businessmen have secret bank-accounts here is because saving and investing in Cayman can turn out to be a pretty lucrative venture, because it's no taxes here. The government only got their money from indirect taxes. Also working here then seems to give an instant gratification due to the “tax-free” politic. This may also explain some of the reason why the citizens on Cayman have become so rich. Because some of them just takes a full advantage of all this, and gives a damn if they are breaking the law or not. But of course not every Caymanian does this. The most of them is law-abiding citizens. Many countries and organizations have tried to stop all this, but the Cayman Islands always seem to get out of the situations as the winning side. It's simply a heaven for criminals.
 * color: #f22a18">__**Demographics & economy:**__

<span style="font-size: 120% Britain has definitively taken a lot of the things that is just typical for them and transferred it over to the Cayman Islands. The most important thing the Englishmen left behind was definitively their English language. Cayman have also the same queen and national anthem as the Englishmen. The reason is of course that Cayman is still a part of Britain, because as I mentioned a couple of times earlier in this little article Cayman is just a separate British overseas territory. This means also that the British government picks out the Governor to represent the monarch and many other people to the other highest ranked positions. The education system is mostly based on the English system. On the Cayman Islands they both have private and state schools just like in Britain. Various churches and private foundations operate several private schools that offer American and British based studies for children in primary and secondary schools. When this project started it quickly became very popular and almost every kid in the “country” wanted to go there. Also many of the colleges and universities are branches from the English schools, so the Caymanian students often learn exactly the same as they would if they were going to a school in Britain. This is something they are very pleased with and at the same time getting a very good education.
 * color: #f43325">__**Similarities between the Cayman Islands and Britain:**__

The Cayman Islands have a very modern health care system, both government-run and private as in the UK. But due to the low number of people living on the Cayman Islands, the hospitals haven't all of the necessary equipments needed for some of the most advanced surgical interventions. Instead they have specialized the equipments and doctors on what they mostly have to threat, like scuba-diving accidents and that sort of things. The religion the Englishmen took with them was the Christianity. Today it's still being practiced as the most holy religion on the Islands. And just as in the U.K almost everybody is a Christian, whether they are a “believer” or not. But it's still a lot of denominations of Christianity like Catholicism and Presbyterian, as well as a few others. In fact, religion is such an important aspect of the culture of the Cayman Islands that on Sundays, most of the local businesses as well as the harbors and ports are closed. These establishments are also closed during Christian holidays like Christmas and other religious days. So this has definitively become a big part of the culture thanks to Britain. Other thing they left behind that has become a big part of the culture is rugby. Everyone, at least all men, is huge fans of it and they are actually pretty good at it too compared with the number of citizens. They also play cricket, football and many other sports which are almost just as popular.

<span style="font-size: 120% I think the reason is obvious. Because it just has to be that Britain has ruled over Cayman in the last centuries. Because if for example Norway ruled over Sweden the Swedish people would of course speak Norwegian too (just like Sweden did to us). Actually, it was also the Englishmen who first settled on Cayman, but right afterwards it also came a lot of immigrants. So now the Islands are full of different accents and variations of English. But this have only turned out to be a big advantage for the Caymanians, so the English language was maybe the best thing that could ever happen to them. The weird thing is that Britain didn’t take advantage of the little country. This is what happens everywhere else in the world. But to be fair in the beginning the Englishmen they took a lot of resources out of the area, but that was before anyone lived there. So I think rather the Cayman Islands owe the Englishmen a big apologise than the Englishmen owe the Caymanians. It’s thanks to Britain the Cayman Islands have succeeded so well in the rest of the world.
 * color: #ff1700">__**Why I think the Cayman Islands is an English talking country:**__

(take a look at my video about the Cayman Islands) media type="youtube" key="ilob6J-Nnsg&hl=en&fs=1" height="344"

__**Sources:**__

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