Why Do They Live There?

As a young man I was required to go to Australia. We were based in Singapore at the time where everything seemed civilised and orderly – it is far more so now, of course. 

On entry to Australia at a place called Adelaide, I was surrounded by Customs Officers and Police demanding to see the SLR that I had declared on my customs form pre-landing.

I showed them my Miranda ‘G’ Single Lens Reflex camera. They failed to understand. I explained.

They then informed me that, in Australia, a SLR is a Self Loading Rifle. Everyone else thought it was funny!

Later I discovered that there are a host of creatures in Australia that will kill you. It is not just snakes that are lethal but spiders, too. And Duck-Billed Platypuses. It seems that those little bundles of fun have venomous spines. 

Of course they do. They are Australian!

Naturally I asked the indigenous people why they lived there. They told me that they had no choice – it was the 'flaming Brits' that dumped them there.

I have, over the years, spent some time in Africa. There are animals, snakes, bugs and germs that will do you lots of harm. It is not just venom there but also sicknesses like Malaria and Trypanosoma – sometimes referred to as Sleeping Sickness where the ‘sleep’ is actually being dead!

Oman and Yemen where there is heat and, in Yemen particularly, extraordinarily high levels of humidity. And sand. They have lots and lots of sand. It is everywhere.

Speaking of sand, I went to Sudan and Mauritania. Sudan is on the East side of North Africa where the sand is course. It is very much like tiny pieces of broken glass. Sudan also has plants with spines on that are a couple of inches long and made out of hardened steel. Driving across the desert from Khartoum to Port Sudan requires a couple of trucks laden with spare tyres and even then it will not be enough!

The sand in Mauretania is fine like dust. If you pick up a handful and then drop it, it will float to the ground and leave your hand stained with the residue. The wind, especially the Sirocco, will pick it up into the air where it forms layers – like mist. 

Because Mauretania is on the West side of North Africa the wind blows the dust across the Atlantic to Brazil where it fertilises the rain forest there.

Sudan and Mauretania have sand in abundance. Mauretania also has vast quantities of fish that are flown off to China from the huge fish market on the beach near Nouakchott. Nothing else.

Now I live in Malaysia where we only have a few snakes and a few mosquitoes to worry us. Malaria has been wiped out in the urban areas but dengue fever is still a worry; my friend’s daughter has just contracted it so we are deeply concerned right now.

We also have, here in Malaysia, television. I was watching an episode of ‘Young Sheldon’ for some inexplicable reason; it was the episode where he and his family cowered in the bathroom from a tornado. 

Tornadoes, it is well known, occur in specific areas of the United States. Rather like hurricanes. It is generally known where tornadoes and hurricanes are likely to appear.

The Caribbean Islands, the Gulf of Mexico and Florida in particular, are known to attract hurricanes due to their proximity to the Atlantic Ocean, which is where hurricanes pick up their energy.

Canada. Canada the White. Well, not in summer, perhaps, but in winter Canada is well known for being buried under masses of snow. Alaska, too. Alaska is white.

Snow only exists at temperatures below zero degrees Centigrade. It is at this temperature that water becomes a solid. While I understand that snow is nice and soft and flaky made up, as it is, of tiny little six-pointed flat pieces, it is still solid water. It is cold. And heavy. We aviation people know that snow, and its friend, ice, is heavy because we have to get tons of it off aeroplanes every winter.

On the other hand, our neighbours, Indonesia, are living in places that are surrounded by volcanoes! The residents of Hawaii are having a problem with one of theirs right now. Now they know how the Pompeians felt.

This is by no means an exhaustive survey of the World’s nasty places to be but it does serve to beg the question: “Why does anyone live there?”

Why?