Right now Australia is being gripped by two natural disasters. This morning I woke up and checked the news for the Victorian fires.
How terribly sad, 108 so far have lost their lives. We have never had a fire, bushfire that has been that bad. Many years ago we had the "Ash Wednesday" fires where 48 people lost their lives. This is far worse, far more dangerous.
In the north flood waters are still rising, the rain that has been dumped is the biggest rainfall experienced for some years. People's homes are distroyed but thankfully no loss of life as yet. There is a serious shortage of food north of Townsville, nothing in the supermarkets up here where we live, if you don't think I'm telling the truth try to imagine going to your supermarket for some basics like an onion or potato, a carrot and find yourself in a large empty space with black boxes staring back at you. Shelves are diminishing, tinned vege is now like gold, there is corn, there are olives, there are beans thank god but not much left of those.
It doesn't look like we will have any deliveries of food for at least five days, what we do until then is anyones guess.
We live in a country of extremes yet these two disasters have caught people out. Many of those who have lost their lives in the fires lost them whilst trying to drive out of fire storms so strong, so hot there is little but ashes left.
Also it would seem that a young child has been taken by a croc in the Daintree (Rupert I heard how it happened now on our local radio station) he was walking his dog on a wooden platform with his older brother. The crock took the child off the platform.... why are parents so lazy and overconfident with crocs on that river in summer is beyond me. They have paid the ultimate price for not educating their sons to the dangers and now only one son is left.
No one in their right mind would allow a young child to wander close to the daintree river bank on his own without an adult whilst crocs are this active and rivers are this flooded. It is a shame a damn shame his parents now will live with it for the rest of their natural lives.
In your warmth and cosy homes, sipping hot chocolate or drinking a wine, eating a large meal full of goodness, remember others that have nothing but the clothes on their backs, remember those who are unable to feed themselves, life is always going to throw these disasters at us, we never really expect them to hit us until they do.
