Paragraph about your small village
Answers
Hometown
"My native place" is Chattanooga, Tennessee. Yes, that Chattanooga. All over the world, even in Finland and India, people know "the Chattanooga Choo Choo," a wartime big band song made famous by Glenn Miller. There really is a Chattanooga ChooChoo; Chatt. used to be a railway hub back before the internet highway system killed the American rail system. All the Southeastern trains had to go through Chatt-town.
Perhaps we have more Silly Nicknames than any other town: ChattaBoogie, Chatt-town, Chatta, ChooChoo Town, 'Nooga. Population: about 150,000.
Chattanooga is in the Tennessee River Valley, surrounded by ancient, sloping mountains, foothills of the Smokies. These mountains are older than the Himalayas - they are some of the oldest mountains in the world. Chattanooga was the capitol of the Cherokee Nation at one time, and from here the Trail of Tears began. The name is actually a Cherokee word meaning "rock coming to a point" (refers to the most prominent peak, Lookout Mtn).
Our fall foliage season is famous and people come from all neighboring states to see the amazing colour changes of the trees, and take a river cruise on a vintage steamboat. My town is also known as the Scenic City of the South. I grew up with all this beauty, and just took it for granted. Then I went to Memphis, Alabama and Louisiana and realized what people were talking about (other places were flat and ugly! how could people actually live there?).
Chattanooga made two major contributions to world cuisine: it was here that both CocaCola and the Moon Pie were invented. You can still visit the original CocaCola bottling plant (all local school kids have to), but manufacturing moved to Atlanta many years ago. Some major Civil War battles were fought here and nearby (another mandatory school field trip).
Blues legend Bessie Smith was born here and we have an annual blues and jazz fest, the Bessie Smith Strut.
The state of Tennessee is well known for having spawned three of the major American musical forms: rock, blues, and country. Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Dolly Parton, Hank Williams et al all came from here. Okay, technically Elvis was born in Tupelo MS, but he only lived there about a week. Tennessee is also the HQ of both black and white Christian gospel music, in case you're hankering to hear it. At Uncle Dave Macon Days in Smithville, you can still see old-time fiddlin, banjo, clog-dancin, gitar-pickin, country singin and storytelling contests. And of course Nashville is the home of the Grand Ole Opry. Bob Dylan recorded "Nashville Skyline" here, in the city that now houses one of the largest Hindu temples in America, the Sri Ganesha Mandir.
If you don't want to be stared at here, drive a red pickup truck. American, of course.