We have all heard the expression .....
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| Hell Yes - Its Frozen Over |
.... 'only when hell freezes over' or similar.
Well in January 2019, the small town of Hell, Michigan was at the centre of an extreme weather event (which despite Donald Trumps denials are happening increasingly as global warming bites, such as the LA fires in 2024), in which a polar vortex descended on much of North America.
Temperatures in the town dropped to -26c (-14.8F) as it froze over .... It has a website that often offers a chance to become the 'The Mayor of Hell!' for a day - for a charge, but which includes a gift of devils horns, a T-Shirt, a commemorative coffee mug, badge with the words 'mayor of hell', a wallet card and local dirt from hell and other bits and bobs.
The website got the chance to post a message that read "Yes, Hell has frozen over" .... but they admitted that of course this wasn't the first time, and that in fact they had had less snow than in other winters.
Meanwhile, in June 2023 in Poland a popular bus route, the 666 to Hel which ran in the summer along the Baltic coast to the sandy beaches in the resort of Hel, was forced to announce that it was changing to the #669, after long-running complaints by religious conservatives (are there any other sort these days?) in the country who said it was "spreading Satanism."
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| The Road To Hel |
But in a country that is now in the EU and where less conservative religious feelings are now more common in the younger population (as the Catholic Church is no longer the bastion against the Communists, but more a defender of old values), there was considerable comment on social media against the change.
Of course the irony is that the numbers have no particular meaning in this context in Poland, as the Polish word for 'Hell' is 'Pieklo' (and the Hel in question is named after the peninsular it stands on).... but as the route was popular with English speaking tourists .... as one local social media commentator pointed out "what is Hel without 666".
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