Some of the World's Biggest

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Size can matter. Here are some of the biggest . . .

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World’s biggest mall: Dubai Mall

Outside Dubai Mall – fountains, lake

• The Dubai Mall is a shopping mall in Dubai and the largest mall in the world by total area.

• It is the nineteenth largest shopping mall in the world by gross leasable area. 

• It is located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and is part of the 20-billion-dollar Downtown complex. It includes 1,200 shops and in 2011 was the most visited building on the planet, attracting over 54 million visitors each year.

• Dubai Mall opened on 4 November 2008, with about 1000 retailers.

• It has an ice rink, an underwater zoo, a large waterfall, and an aquarium. It also has 22 cinemas, a luxury hotel and over 100 restaurants and cafes.

• It is surpassed in gross leasable area by several malls including the New South China Mall, which is the world's largest, albeit largely derelict, Golden Resources Mall, SM City North Edsa, and SM Mall of Asia.

South China Mall

• South China Mall is the biggest in gross leasable area but second to Dubai Mall in total area. 

• Opened in 2005, until recently it was called Ghost Town because it had been vacant for years, very few merchants having entered into leases. 

• In 2015 a CNN story reported that the mall had begun to attract tenants after extensive renovations and remodelling, though large portions remained vacant.

• There is enough space for 2,350 stores and it is divided into seven zones which are modeled after different cities. They are Amsterdam, Paris, Rome, Venice, Egypt, the Caribbean, and California. The Mall includes replicas of famous buildings such as the Arc de Triomphe, and St. Mark’s Bell Tower Venice.

Another impressive mall, Darth Maul, a Sith Lord.  

(The problem with this bit of humour is the difference in pronounciation.  In Australia we pronounce "mall" as "maul", whereas I am aware from watching the Brit TV show Escape to the Country that the Poms pronounce "mall" to rhyme with "shall", as I imagine the Seppos do too.  hence the joke doesn't work if the Sith Lord is Darth Maul whereas the shopping mall is pronounced quite differently.

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World’s biggest mosque: Masjid al Haram

• The Great Mosque of Makkah (Masjid al-Ḥarām, "the sacred mosque"), also called the Grand Mosque, is the largest mosque in the world and surrounds Islam's holiest place, the Kaaba, in the city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. 

• Muslims face in the Qibla (direction of the Kaaba) while performing Salat (obligatory daily prayers).

• One of the Five Pillars of Islam requires every Muslim to perform the Hajj pilgrimage, one of the largest annual gatherings of people in the world, at least once in his or her lifetime if able to do so, including Tawaf (circumambulation) of the Kaaba.

• Masjid al Haram is the holiest mosque in the world and is the primary destination of the Hajj pilgrimage.

• The mosque complex covers an area of 356,800 square metres and can accommodate up to 820,000 worshippers during the Hajj. 

• The Holy Mosque is the only mosque that has no qibla direction, since Muslims pray facing the Ka'ba in the central courtyard. 

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World’s biggest outdoor pool: San Alfonso Del Mar Resort, Chile

• Located at the San Alfonso de Mar resort in Chile, the pool holds the current Guinness record as the world’s largest crystalline water pool, with an extension of 1.013km in length, eight hectares and 250 million litres of water. 

• It is the equivalent to 6,000 familiar 8-metre-long pools. 

• The pool is so large that tourists use it for sail boats and kayaks. 

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World’s biggest trees: Sequoias

• Also known as giant redwoods, Sierra redwoods, Sierran redwoods and FBT’s (big trees), the common use of the name sequoia generally refers to Sequoiadendron giganteum, which occurs naturally only in groves on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California.

• Giant sequoias are the world's largest single trees and largest living thing by volume. 

• Giant sequoias grow to an average height of 50–85 m (164–279 ft) and 6–8 m (20–26 ft) in diameter. Record trees have been measured to be 94.8 m (311 ft) in height. 

• The oldest known giant sequoia based on ring count is 3,500 years old. 

• Giant Sequoias are among the oldest living things on Earth.

• The following photos are therefore quite sad . . .