Remember: Nature Is A Mother

It's been a tough few years for South East Asian coastal resorts. Damned thing also makes you conscious that you live in a low-lying area close to water. Hmm.

Dave and Joanne Ali, honeymooners and tsunami survivors, said, among other things, that they had felt abandoned by comparison to survivors from other countries. In the immediate aftermath, the German government had sent a plane to ferry home Germans, a bus appeared to take people from Hong Kong out of the disaster area, people were arriving with vehicles to collect survivors of certain nationalities. What did Australians get? An SMS message informing them that Alexander Downer was sending water and blankets. (And I'll link this post-ed when I find the damned article - so much has happened so quickly the story I want has been pushed off the ABC news page but not yet into its archives).

What DFAT has to say regarding tidal waves, which essentially boils down to:
1. Don't go there; and
2. Bring bottled water.

Just how big and bad was this thing? Apparently, it changed the physical map of parts of the world, and put a wobble in the earth's axis.

Meanwhile, buried elsewhere in the news but no less noteworthy, Cricket Australia has honoured the 1868 team of Indigenous players who represented Australia admirably in the first ever Australia vs England tour, nine years before the Ashes began, and who have finally been awarded their individual player numbers. Congratulations, guys.

And in a nearly complete segue from the headlines (so it's sea-related), you may find it a helpful distraction to consider that whales get the bends.