For my very first review, I have selected the travel book on Australia entitled In A Sunburned Country (331 pages, $14.95) by Bill Bryson. This blog was not initially intended as a review of travel books, but I have decided that I will occasionally make an exception.
In A Sunburned Country caught my eye during my usual book shopping frenzy in which I inevitably attempt to see how fast I can spend my savings. After returning home to collapse under the weight of my purchases, I invariably find that my eyes were bigger than my stomach, literature-wise. Usually my new books sit and wait....and wait...and wait some more for me to find time for them. Not so with Mr. Bryson's book.
For me, Australia has always sparked a sense of adventure and danger, partly due to the shocking number of things that can kill you in very nasty ways. Mostly, it is because Australia is such a mystery to me...and yet not. There are many things about Australia that are common knowledge. For example, Sydney has hosted the Olympics, Outback Steakhouse probably has no relation to the actual Outback, the Great Barrier Reef is somewhere on the East coast, koalas and kangaroos live there (on land, not the reef), Nicole Kidman was born there, and that's about it.
One point Bryson notes again and again is that Australia is a surprisingly big country/continent. I think that is the part that we Americans forget. Australia is also a continent, which implies that it is really bloody huge, and after reading Bryson's book it seems that you could not see everything in a lifetime. That point was driven home for me was Bryson's trip to the Mineral Resources Administration (it's more exciting than it sounds). A geologist named Harvey Henley showed him maps displaying Australia's known mineral resources. According to Henley, it takes fifteen years to survey and create a proper map of a block of land that is sixy kilometers by forty kilometers. By the way, Australia has eight million square kilometers of land. Even if you don't know how long a kilometer is, you can start to get an idea of how large this place really is. Out of these eight million square kilometers, hardly any of the land has been professionally surveyed. You could wander out anywhere you like and chances are you are standing on a piece of land that had never been surveyed. Think of it! Anything could be out there! Scientists have actually found species of animals living in Australia that were previously thought to have been extinct. It's a pretty crazy place.
So let's get to just a few of the things that can kill you or at the very least ruin your day. Spiders, snakes, plants, sharks, that platypus that you find weird yet oddly endearing, seashells (you think I'm kidding)... One false move in Australia, and you're toast. They have a jellyfish that is six inches long and can inject a person with enough venom to cause indescribable pain and literally scar them for life. Most people that die from these little guys die because the venom puts them into shock and the victim drowns before reaching the shore. Pretty nasty. Bill Bryson discusses a few of these hazards throughout In A Sunburned Country, and does so in a light, comical way to both make you laugh and frighten the bejeezus out of you. The man is very funny, but while you laugh away you also think, "He's kidding, right?" No, people, he's not kidding. I looked it up. Australia is not messing around. The upside is that the people seem to be remarkably friendly, and the cities sound absolutely gorgeous. According to Bryson, Australians are genuinely glad that you have come for a visit.
The one aspect of Australia that has both Bryson and me confused was the treatment of the Aborigines. Bryson writes about the Aboriginal people the way one would write about ghosts. Aborigines tend to be a rural people, but those Bryson saw in the cities appeared to simply be wandering. Bryson did not see any one of them holding any kind of job in the cities. White Australians do not make eye contact with the Aborigines and the Aborigines do not make eye contact with white Australians. Baffled and unnerved, I decided to do my own research. On average, the life expectancy of an Aboriginal person today is twenty-five years less than that of an Australian. Translation: most of them do not live to see sixty-five. The reasons for this gap between white Australians and Aboriginal people are the traditional causes that accompany crushing poverty such as poor housing, poor nutrition, and lack of education. At least, these are the topical reasons.
The truth is that Australia has a history of cruelty to its indigenous people that rivals America's history with the Native Americans. The only difference is that no one talks about the Aboriginal people. When was the last time you heard anything about them? These are people that theoretically had mastered the seas tens of thousands of years before anyone else, and yet finding much of anything about them is pretty difficult. I did find that in the 1800s it was legal for citizens to murder Aborigines. Aborigines were not considered people for a very long time, therefore, they were dispensible.
At one point in the book, Bryson interviews a lawyer concerned with the treatment of the Aboriginal people named Jim Brooks, a man who talked about some Australian legislation that I simply had to verify. Between the late 1880s and 1969, the Aboriginal people did not have custody of their own children. The Australian government thought it would be best to remove Aboriginal children from their parents so that they could be raised in "civilized" white society. The trouble was, Aboriginal parents were oddly attached to their children, and didn't take this very well. The children were taken from their parents and placed in crowded homes to learn how to become servants for white Australians. Once the children turned sixteen or seventeen, they were released and given the option of staying in white society or returning to their families. In reality, it was a choice between facing the racism of white Australians or returning to an indigenous culture which the children could neither remember nor relate to. They literally became the "lost generation".
Today, government officials, such as Australian Senator John Herron, deny the existence of this stolen generation, stating that the percentage of families whose children were removed was never more than ten percent. Ten percent, five percent, fifty percent-who cares? The point is that it happened and it is clearly influencing the present generation of Aboriginal people. (By the way, ten percent still means tens of thousands of children.) During the 2000 Sydney Olympics, the Aboriginal people threatened to have a massive protest when a report denying the existence of the "lost generation" was leaked from Australia's parliament. Clearly, Australia's leaders are in denial and the Aboriginal people are still (justifiably) bitter.
Denial does not help the situation, and Australia really does have a situation on its hands. The Aboriginal people have a high rate of alcoholism, which contributes to an early death. Aborigines also have a diabetes rate that is three times higher than other Australians. Many Aborigines living in more remote parts of Australia also suffer from trachoma, an infectious disease that causes blindness. Trachoma is very rare in developed countries since it is caused by poor hygiene, insufficient water supply, poor waste disposal, and shared sleeping spaces. Obviously, these people are being ignored. Parliament is in denial, does not have good relations with the Aborigines, and cannot provide sanitary conditions for a people that makes up 2.5 percent of its population. It does not sound like much, but it means hundreds of thousands of people. So what's with the lack of government help? Actually, it's not about the lack of help since the government has been throwing money around trying to assist the Aboriginal people with buying homes and having access to education. It may have led to some improvements, but it isn't working. Healthcare is still atrocious, and government officials like Senator Herron still display a lack of respect for the Aboriginal people.
The Australians are still thinking about the Aboriginal people in terms of white Australia. The policies of the government still reflect a desire to get the Aborigines to assimilate, and the Aboriginal people seem to want to be left alone. It's a tricky situation, and not a new one. It is no wonder whenever Bryson asks an Australian local about the Aboriginal people, he receives the answer, "It's a problem". Yes, it is a problem, and one that would be helped by attempting to see the Aboriginal point of view. Somehow, a connection is not being made between the government and its inigenous people, and that connection is essential for establishing a good relationship.
In the end, Bryson was baffled by what Australia should do to establish better relations with the Aborigines. I can't say that I blame him. It can't hurt to study the Aborigines in terms of their beliefs and culture. These are the heart of the matter. Convincing politicians to take the time and the effort is the first step.
On the whole, I was rather delighted with this book. Bryson has a way of looking at Australia, a country he obviously adores, with a curiosity and optimism that charmed me. Australia is not perfect, but then no place is perfect. Read the book, enjoy the book, and I hope you will like it as much as I did.
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