By Aisha Jamal, 8 years

 

“Thus we have sent by inspiration to you an Arabic Quran that you may warn the Mother of Cities (Makkah) and all around her and warn them of the day of Assembly of which there is no doubt when some with be in the Garden and some in the blazing fire” (Surah Shura: 7)

 

Assalamu alaykum. My name is Aisha. I am going to talk about Asia. Asia is the largest continent in the world. It holds 3.8 billion people, more than half of the world’s population. You might think that Asia has the largest number of countries, but no. Asia has the second largest, while Africa has the most.

 

Where is Asia?

Asia stretches from approximately 40⁰W Longitude to 180⁰E and from 80⁰N to 5⁰S latitude. The equator passes through Asia, so does the Tropic of Cancer. The main water bodies that surround Asia are the Indian Ocean to the south and west, the Artic Ocean to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the east. Africa and Europe lie on the west side of Asia, North America and South America to the east and Australia to the south.

 

Some landforms of Asia

Some major mountain ranges in Asia are the Himalayas between China, India and Nepal; the Urals that divide Russia into Europe and Asia. The mountains are cold. The plants that live on the mountains are just wood and trees like firs at the very bottom of the mountain at the timber line. Above the timber line there are no trees but alpine plants which are low lying flowering plants. Then after he alpine line, nothing grows – it is pure snow, unless of course some people put trash like plastic. The animals that live on the mountains are the mountain lion, snow leopard, the mountain goad, some birds, rabbits and hare.

 

The Asian deserts are the Gobi desert which is actually a cold desert just under Russia. The Thar desert and the Arabian desert are hot deserts. The weather is windy and cold. Some of the plants of the desert are the cactus and near the oasis are date palms. The animals in the hot desert are camels, lizards, scorpions and snakes. In the Gobi desert the Bactrian camel lives. It has two humps, much different from the Arabian camel which has only one.

 

The tundra is a place where there are a lot of forests. The tundra is very cold all year long and the flora that grows there are trees. Just under the tundra, most of Russia is boreal grasslands.

 

The temperate grasslands lie to the north of the Arabian Desert and the hot grasslands spread into India. The grasslands are hot and plants that live there are mostly grass and sometimes trees. Grasslands are very important to us for farming. Plants like maize, barley, wheat, rice grow there. The animals that live there are elephants, squirrels, lions, rhino and deer.

 

The rainforest in Asia start from Burma and go down to Indonesia. They are hot, rainy and lots of trees grow there. Lots of animals live there.  Did you know that rainforests cover only 10% of the world but yet they contain 1/3^rd of the world’s animals? There are three levels in a rainforest.  The ground level which is very dark as trees cover the light, the slightly higher level where little more light comes and the very top where you get the most light. The animals live in the rainforest are snakes, lizards, tigers and orangutans.

 

People and Culture

There are 47 countries in Asia. It is hard to say them all so I’ll only say a few but you can refer to the map in the project. The biggest country is Russia, then China. India is a special country because it has many different kinds of people who live there. It has 1 billion people. Indonesia has the most Muslims in the world. Saudi Arabia is a Muslim country and it has the Kabah in Meccan and Masjid un Nabawi in Medina. There are the two most important mosques in the world. In Palestine is the third most important mosque in the world – Masjid ul Aqsa in Jerusalem.  Did you know that Dubai has the largest tower in the world called Burj Khalifa? It is 828 metres tall. Singapore has the Merlion which is a huge statue – half  lion, half fist blowing water.

 

Did you know that Asia has a lot of different religions ranging from Islam, Christianity, Judiaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and Shinto. Saudi Arabia is mostly Muslim while Japan is mostly Shinto. Russia where they are semi Christian to Sri Lanka where they are Buddhists. Asia has many kinds of houses – mud houses, brick houses, cement houses, wood houses, tree houses, yurts, slums, palaces, houseboats, houses on stilts etc. There are also many languages – Tamil, English, Urdu, Japanese, Arabic, Korean, Sinhalese etc. Games played in Asia include football, cricket, hopscotch, and local games like “Dhappa”, “Kabaddi”, and “Langdi Taang”. Indoor games include chess, hand cricket, checkers, board games etc. One of the most staple foods in Asia is rice. Famous Asian dishes are Shawrma (Middle East), Sushi (Japan), Borsht (Russia), Kanji (India), Haleem, Naan (Indian sub continent), Fish Kanji (Hong Kong), Noodles (China and South east Asia) etc.

Asia is a big content with a lot of diverse cultures

 

Assalamu Alaykum

By Ayshaf, 4 years

There are seven continents in this world: Asia, Europe, Australia, Antartica, Africa, North America, South America are the names of the continents. We live in Asia continent. Asia is the biggest continent in this world. Asia has so many countries. We live in India. Russia is the biggest country in Asia. Mount Everest in India is the biggest mountain in the world. Pandas are very famous in China. It loves to eat bamboo. Antarctica has no countries. It is very cold - mountain and snow and ice. There are volcanoes. Afifa lives in Australia. It is very flat because most of Australia is desert. If you want to see koalas go to Australia. There are many kangaroos. In Africa lion, cheetah, elephant, zebra, camel are there. The Africans look very dark. There is a biggest desert and a river in the world and pyramids also there. My Aathif comes from Sri Lanka and Sri Lanka is in Asia continent. Tiger is India's national animal. National bird is the peacock. And national flower is the lotus.

By Abdurrahman Jamal, 6 years

The Sahara Desert is a desert in Africa. It is the hottest of any deserts. The temperature is 120^oF. The addax is the third largest and thirstiest of all the animals in the Sahara desert. The camel is the largest and thirstiest of any animal living in the desert. The only living thing much more thirsty than the camel is the human. The humans in the Sahara Desert are Africans.  

Below the Sahara Desert lies the grasslands of Africa. They are huge and have bulky animals like lions, zebras, rhinos, elephants, wildebeest, buffaloes, crocodiles, hippopotamus, and giraffes. Also next to the grasslands there are camels. And in the grasslands there are monkeys. Monkeys are small, active and harmful animals. They bite people. And that spreads rabies. Rabies is a bad disease.  

The rainforests in Africa are in the Congo Basin countries. There are many kinds of animals – monkeys, gorillas, bongos, macaws, Debrazza’s monkeys. Okapis are the shyest animals. They won’t even come near or make a sound. When you are in the rainforest, you feel like you are in the woods. There are thick thick forests in Africa. The problem that is happening there is that they are cutting down the trees. Not the animals, the humans! The humans are cutting down the trees and it is bothering the animals. The government should give laws about cutting down the trees, but doesn’t.