How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
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@Pepijn Does this count former parliaments? If so, I'm counting the Þing in Iceland, at its original location of Þingvellir
@bellinghman Isn't that basically a rocky field?
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@Pepijn I’ve walked past the UK parliament often, but never gone inside. My son had a school trip there recently but it was just the students studying Politics who went (and were just an hour from London)
@Pepijn and same son also visited some state buildings in Berlin on another school trip, so he’s doing a lot better than me and fits your expectation!
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How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
My hypothesis is that a significant mid-double-digit percentage of people have at least visited the one in their home country (often as part of a school trip) and the other options will all be single digit percentages.
I'm not gonne do the "boost for scientific accuracy" thing here.. but, uhm.. if you can boost this it'll be more accurate, in a scientistic way.
Mainly: tell us about your experiences!
@Pepijn Answers to this are in large part a measure of wealth and the size of the country.
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@Pepijn I just realized that I have never been in the US Capitol despite only living 30 miles away (about 48 km). The closest I’ve been in another country is the exterior of the UK parliament. And only one state legislative building, the Maryland State House.
@Pepijn I have, however, been in Independence Hall, former seat of the Continental Congress and where the US Constitution was written.
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@bellinghman Isn't that basically a rocky field?
@Pepijn Well, yes. I concede it's not the *current* location, and insisting on 'building' would rather exclude it. I'm also going to need guidance on whether touching a building counts, or whether you have to enter it
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How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
My hypothesis is that a significant mid-double-digit percentage of people have at least visited the one in their home country (often as part of a school trip) and the other options will all be single digit percentages.
I'm not gonne do the "boost for scientific accuracy" thing here.. but, uhm.. if you can boost this it'll be more accurate, in a scientistic way.
Mainly: tell us about your experiences!
@Pepijn Westminster (work; tour of, got to see Magna Carta) and den Haag (tourism; wandering about publicly accessible bits).
I've been outside others (Senedd, Hungarian, Danish, etc) but not inside.
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Typical. We're a 100 participants in and my hypothesis are utterly unsupported.
I'm surprised to see not a single "5 or more" vote.
Already some interesting comments!
@Pepijn I have visited 0, but just to visit the US Congress building would mean traveling nearly 1000km, and I live relatively close to Washington DC
If I wanted to visit the capitals of the two nations that share a land border with the US, That adds another 4000km to the trip
North America is a terrifying large place
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Typical. We're a 100 participants in and my hypothesis are utterly unsupported.
I'm surprised to see not a single "5 or more" vote.
Already some interesting comments!
@Pepijn Unfortunately we are at a point where more people would go out of their way and line up to see the interior of the bookshop in Porto that appeared in a Harry Potter film than would visit a parliament building.
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How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
My hypothesis is that a significant mid-double-digit percentage of people have at least visited the one in their home country (often as part of a school trip) and the other options will all be single digit percentages.
I'm not gonne do the "boost for scientific accuracy" thing here.. but, uhm.. if you can boost this it'll be more accurate, in a scientistic way.
Mainly: tell us about your experiences!
@Pepijn About ten years ago, I was taken on a spontaneous backstage tour of Portcullis House and the Palace of Westminster by a friend who works in the Parliamentary Service. It was fascinating, but that place is falling apart...
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How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
My hypothesis is that a significant mid-double-digit percentage of people have at least visited the one in their home country (often as part of a school trip) and the other options will all be single digit percentages.
I'm not gonne do the "boost for scientific accuracy" thing here.. but, uhm.. if you can boost this it'll be more accurate, in a scientistic way.
Mainly: tell us about your experiences!
@Pepijn Germany and the USA — maar niet de Tweede Kamer y tampoco aqui en España. And I see you are not counting the EU (which I have visited) and luckily I haven't been inside the Palau del Parlament de Catalunya so I can avoid asking whether it counts as a “nation”.
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F folfdk@helvede.net shared this topic
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Typical. We're a 100 participants in and my hypothesis are utterly unsupported.
I'm surprised to see not a single "5 or more" vote.
Already some interesting comments!
"isn't this just asking if people are rich and/or in a big country"
People replied the same thing on the poll asking whether they'd personally sat on a cow

As with the cows there's much more to it. There's lots of European countries with subsidised trips for schools to visit the legislature. And other, small countries, without that.
Also: Seriously. I'm not asking if you own a moon. The fast majority of us have the financial means to visit another city at least once in our life..
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How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
My hypothesis is that a significant mid-double-digit percentage of people have at least visited the one in their home country (often as part of a school trip) and the other options will all be single digit percentages.
I'm not gonne do the "boost for scientific accuracy" thing here.. but, uhm.. if you can boost this it'll be more accurate, in a scientistic way.
Mainly: tell us about your experiences!
@Pepijn Does having been outside the building count?
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How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
My hypothesis is that a significant mid-double-digit percentage of people have at least visited the one in their home country (often as part of a school trip) and the other options will all be single digit percentages.
I'm not gonne do the "boost for scientific accuracy" thing here.. but, uhm.. if you can boost this it'll be more accurate, in a scientistic way.
Mainly: tell us about your experiences!
@Pepijn do rooftop-only visits count (which is kind of a giveaway as to which parliament I've been to)?? I grew up as far away from Paris as you can be while still being on the continental part of France, so school visits to l'Assemblée Nationale weren't something we did. The only assembly rooms I've been inside of were the UNESCO and a couple city councils.
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How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
My hypothesis is that a significant mid-double-digit percentage of people have at least visited the one in their home country (often as part of a school trip) and the other options will all be single digit percentages.
I'm not gonne do the "boost for scientific accuracy" thing here.. but, uhm.. if you can boost this it'll be more accurate, in a scientistic way.
Mainly: tell us about your experiences!
@Pepijn At least 12 for me, many more if counting state/provincial level or intergovernmental seats (EU, UN) as well. A travel rule of thumb for me is that if I’m in a capital, I’ll see if there’s a tour available or at least grounds open to the public. Ironically I haven’t toured the U.S. Capitol because I was too busy with a protest the one time I visited my nation’s capital!
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How many national parliaments (the buildings) have you visited?
My hypothesis is that a significant mid-double-digit percentage of people have at least visited the one in their home country (often as part of a school trip) and the other options will all be single digit percentages.
I'm not gonne do the "boost for scientific accuracy" thing here.. but, uhm.. if you can boost this it'll be more accurate, in a scientistic way.
Mainly: tell us about your experiences!
@Pepijn
Note that the UK "Yes Minister" series famously and deliberately had no scenes set in Parliament.Access also may be difficult.
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@Pepijn Does having been outside the building count?
@aslakr I mean, that means you've visited every parliament ever

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"isn't this just asking if people are rich and/or in a big country"
People replied the same thing on the poll asking whether they'd personally sat on a cow

As with the cows there's much more to it. There's lots of European countries with subsidised trips for schools to visit the legislature. And other, small countries, without that.
Also: Seriously. I'm not asking if you own a moon. The fast majority of us have the financial means to visit another city at least once in our life..
@Pepijn I mean for Russia, the USA or Canada to visit the /national/ one may be a bit of a push. But if you allow for state/provincial/regional parliaments and such, it becomes a lot more common even there. — Violet
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@Pepijn At least 12 for me, many more if counting state/provincial level or intergovernmental seats (EU, UN) as well. A travel rule of thumb for me is that if I’m in a capital, I’ll see if there’s a tour available or at least grounds open to the public. Ironically I haven’t toured the U.S. Capitol because I was too busy with a protest the one time I visited my nation’s capital!
@Pepijn Of the national parliaments I think the Binnenhof tour was my favorite, but the Japan National Diet and UK Houses of Parliament were really great too. Out of American state capitols (which are often built on a scale as grand as national parliaments), Minnesota had by far the best tour.
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@Anneke I'd love to visit the Hungarian one. Their website (https://www.parlament.hu/web/visitors/visitor-route) makes it out to be mostly a show of the building, and not so much the political stuff going on inside. Is that your experience as well?
@Pepijn yes that was my experience (30 years ago
). First building with airconditioning I think? -
@Pepijn Of the national parliaments I think the Binnenhof tour was my favorite, but the Japan National Diet and UK Houses of Parliament were really great too. Out of American state capitols (which are often built on a scale as grand as national parliaments), Minnesota had by far the best tour.
@Pepijn Side Note: If anyone on this thread knows how to get an English-language tour of the Polish Sejm, let me know! As far as I could tell, tours are only available in Polish, other languages only on request for large groups. I’d love to do a tour while visiting Warsaw next month!