Flag: Grenada

It is Grenada, an English-speaking island nation in the Caribbean.

Grenada sits at the southern end of the Lesser Antilles, north of Trinidad and Venezuela, with about a hundred thousand people and the capital St. George's. It also includes the smaller islands of Carriacou and Petite Martinique. Its nickname is the Spice Island: for generations it has been one of the world's main growers of nutmeg, and that is what the small oval on the flag is, a nutmeg pod split open, sitting in the green triangle by the hoist.

The rest of the design is just as deliberate. The flag was adopted on 7 February 1974, the day Grenada became independent from Britain, and was designed by Anthony C. George. The red border stands for courage and vitality, yellow for the sun and the friendliness of the people, green for the lush land and farming. The seven stars, six on the border and one in the central red disc, are the seven parishes of the country. Anyone who grew up there learned this list in school, which is why the flag is a point of real pride rather than just a national logo.

What does it mean when someone sends 🇬🇩?

They are talking about Grenada: going there, being from there, or cheering for it.

Most of the time the words around it tell you which. Next to a date or a beach photo it is a holiday; next to "my mom's side" it is heritage; next to a result it is sport. Grenada is small, so its flag carries a lot of warmth: diaspora Grenadians in London, New York and Toronto use it as a badge of identity, and it fills timelines every 7 February for Independence Day and in August for Spicemas, the national carnival.

In sport it mostly means athletics. Kirani James won the 400 metres at the 2012 Olympics, Grenada's first Olympic medal, and track finals are when non-Grenadians most often meet this flag. In cricket Grenadians play for the shared West Indies team, so 🇬🇩 appears beside other Caribbean flags rather than on its own.