10 Strange & Unusual Facts About Australia

10 Strange & Unusual Facts About Australia

Australia today is a vibrant multicultural country with people of British descent, as well as Aboriginal and immigrants from many countries in Europe, Africa and Asia. It is the sixth largest country in the world and the only country that is also a continent. Australia is in the Southern Hemisphere, where Summer is from December to February. Here are some more interesting things that you may not know about Australia.

01. Dingo Fence - The World's Longest Fence

Dingo Fence on the 29th parallel of latitude. Sturt National Park (right of fence) - looking east from Cameron Corner after rain.

02. The Flying Doctor

The Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia (The Flying Doctor) is an emergency and primary health care service for those living in rural, remote and regional areas of Australia. It is a not-for-profit organisation which provides health care to people who are unable to access a hospital or general practice due to the vast distances of the Outback. The Royal Flying Doctor Service is a unique icon of Australian culture.

03. Home to 100 Million Sheep's

At the turn of the new century (2000), there were estimated to be 120 million sheep in Australia. Due to the effects of ongoing drought and lower demand for wool due to the wool stockpile, this figure has gradually fallen to the point where there is currently an estimated 100 million sheep in Australia.  Therefore, Australia has five times more sheep than people (20 million inhabitants).

04. Why Canberra is the Capital of Australia?

The site of Canberra was selected for the location of the nation's capital in 1908 as a compromise between rivals Sydney and Melbourne, Australia's two largest cities. A location was chosen which was 248km (154mi) from Sydney and 483km (300mi) from Melbourne. It is unusual among Australian cities, being an entirely planned city.

05. Largest Cattle Station in the World

The Anna Creek cattle station in the South Australian Outback is by far the largest working cattle station (ranch) in the world. It covers a huge area of some 34.000 sq km (13,000 sq mi). This makes the station bigger than the country of Belgium. By comparison, the largest ranch in the USA is around 6,000 square kilometres. The ranch has a carrying capacity of 16,000 head of cattle but due to the extended drought in Australia this has currently been reduced to less than 2,000 head.

06. Australian Alps Receive More Snow Than Switzerland

Every winter the Australian Alps have more snow cover than Switzerland. The Alps (or "Snowy Mountains") are part of the Great Dividing Range on the eastern side of the country. The Great Dividing Range stretches over 3.500 kilometers (2,200 mi) and runs from north to south through the states of Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria. The snowfields are an important feature for Australian tourism. When it's summer in the northen hemisphere, it's winter in Australia. The snowfields are an important part of the local tourism industry. Thousands of visitors from the Northen Hemisphere come to enjoy the skiing and other winter activites on the Aussie snowfields.

07. Largest Organic Construction on Earth

Great Barrier Reef is the largest coral reef in the world, also, it is the largest organic construction on Earth. It stretches for 1,250 mi (2,000 km) in the Coral Sea, off the coast of Queensland, Australia. The Great Barrier Reef is actually a series of individual reefs separated from the mainland by a shallow lagoon. The reef is extremely beautiful and attracts thousand of tourists a year, which threatens to harm the delicate eco-system of the reef and its unusual marine life.

08. Sydney’s Opera House

The Sydney Opera House is a modern expressionist design, with a series of large precast concrete "shells", each composed of sections of a sphere of 75.2 metres (246 ft 8.6 in) radius, forming the roofs of the structure, set on a monumental podium. The building covers 1.8 hectares (4.4 acres) of land and is 183 m (600 ft) long and 120 m (394 ft) wide at its widest point. It is supported on 588 concrete piers sunk as much as 25 m (82 ft) below sea level. Sydney’s Opera House was designed in 1957 by Jorn Utzon, a Danish architect. Its roof weighs more than 161,000 tons.

09. Australia Was Home to 160,000 Prisoners

Britain discovered Australia and as a result used it as a place of imprisonment for thousands of convicts and political prisoners. About 160,000 of Britain's unwanted were shipped out there. Many died on the high seas during the eight month journey. Now, about twenty five percent of Australians have ancestors who were convicts.

10. Australian Antarctic Territory

The Australian Antarctic Territory (AAT) is a part of Antarctica. It was claimed by the United Kingdom and placed under the authority of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1933. It is the largest territory of Antarctica claimed by any nation. The Australian Antarctic Territory covering an area of almost 5,9 million sq km (2.3 sq mi) is the largest of these territories. 

ELIMINATE CANCER,

Johns Hopkins Update  This is an extremely good article. Everyone should read it. AFTER YEARS OF TELLING PEOPLE CHEMOTHERAPY IS THE ONLY WAY TO TRY ('TRY', BEING THE KEY WORD) TO ELIMINATE CANCER, JOHNS HOPKINS IS FINALLY STARTING TO TELL YOU THERE IS AN ALTERNATIVE WAY . Cancer Update from Johns Hopkins:  1. Every person has cancer cells in the body. These cancer  cells do not show up in the standard tests until they have multiplied to a few billion. When doctors tell cancer patients that there are no more cancer cells in their bodies after  treatment, it just means the tests are unable to detect the cancer cells because they have not reached the detectable size.  2. Cancer cells occur between 6 to more than 10 times in a  person's lifetime.  3. When the person's immune system is strong the cancer  cells will be destroyed and prevented from multiplying and forming tumors.  4. When a person has cancer it indicates the person has nutritional deficiencies. These could be due to genetic, but also to environmental, food and lifestyle factors.  5. To overcome the multiple nutritional deficiencies, changing diet to eat more adequately and healthy, 4-5 times/day  and by including supplements will strengthen the immune system.  6. Chemotherapy involves poisoning the rapidly-growing cancer cells and also destroys rapidly-growing healthy cells in the bone marrow, gastrointestinal tract etc, and can  cause organ damage, like liver, kidneys, heart, lungs etc.  7. Radiation while destroying cancer cells also burns, scars  and damages healthy cells, tissues and organs.  8. Initial treatment with chemotherapy and radiation will often reduce tumor size. However prolonged use of chemotherapy and radiation do not result in more tumor destruction.  9. When the body has too much toxic burden from chemotherapy and radiation the immune system is either compromised or destroyed, hence the person can succumb to various kinds of infections and complications.  10. Chemotherapy and radiation can cause cancer cells to mutate and become resistant and difficult to destroy. Surgery can also cause cancer cells to spread to other sites. 11. An effective way to battle cancer is to starve the cancer cells by not feeding it with the foods it needs to multiply.  *CANCER CELLS FEED ON:  a. Sugar substitutes like NutraSweet, Equal, Spoonful, etc are made with Aspartame and it is harmful. A better natural substitute would be Manuka honey or molasses, but only in very small amounts. Table salt has a chemical added to make it white in color Better alternative is Bragg's aminos or sea salt.                                 b. Milk causes the body to produce mucus, especially in the gastro-intestinal tract. Cancer feeds on mucus. By cutting off milk and substituting with unsweetened soy milk cancer cells are being starved.                                  c. Cancer cells thrive in an acid environment. A meat-based diet is acidic and it is best to eat fish, and a little other meat,  like chicken. Meat also contains livestock antibiotics, growth hormones and parasites, which are all harmful, especially to people with cancer.                                  d. A diet made of 80% fresh vegetables and juice, whole grains, seeds, nuts and a little fruits help put the body into an alkaline environment. About 20% can be from cooked food including beans. Fresh vegetable juices provide live enzymes that are easily absorbed and reach down to cellular levels within 15 minutes to nourish and enhance growth of healthy cells. To obtain live enzymes for building healthy cells try and drink fresh vegetable juice (most vegetables including be an sprouts) and eat some raw vegetables 2 or 3 times a day. Enzymes are destroyed at temperatures of 104 degrees F (40 degrees C)..                                  e. Avoid coffee, tea, and chocolate, which have high caffeine Green tea is a better alternative and has cancer fighting properties. Water-best to drink purified water, or filtered, to avoid known toxins and heavy metals in tap water. Distilled water is acidic, avoid it.  12. Meat protein is difficult to digest and requires a lot of digestive enzymes. Undigested meat remaining in the intestines becomes putrefied and leads to more toxic buildup.  13. Cancer cell walls have a tough protein covering. By refraining from or eating less meat it frees more enzymes to attack the protein walls of cancer cells and allows the body's killer cells to destroy the cancer cells.  14. Some supplements build up the immune system (IP6, Flor-ssence, Essiac, anti-oxidants, vitamins, minerals, EFAs etc.) to enable the bodies own killer cells to destroy cancer cells.. Other supplements like vitamin E are known to cause apoptosis, or programmed cell death, the body's normal method of disposing of damaged, unwanted, or unneeded cells.  15. Cancer is a disease of the mind, body, and spirit. A proactive and positive spirit will help the cancer warrior be a survivor. Anger, un-forgiveness and bitterness put the body into a stressful and acidic environment. Learn to have a loving and forgiving spirit. Learn to relax and enjoy life. 16. Cancer cells cannot thrive in an oxygenated environment. Exercising daily, and deep breathing help to get more oxygen down to the cellular level. Oxygen therapy is another means employed to destroy cancer cells.  1. No plastic containers in micro.  2. No water bottles in freezer.  3. No plastic wrap in microwave..  Johns Hopkins has recently sent this out in its newsletters. This information is being circulated at Walter Reed Army Medical Center as well. Dioxin chemicals cause cancer, especially breast cancer. Dioxins are highly poisonous to the cells of our bodies. Don't freeze your plastic bottles with water in them as this releases dioxins from the plastic. Recently, Dr Edward Fujimoto, Wellness Program Manager at Castle Hospital , was on a TV program to explain this health hazard. He talked about dioxins and how bad they are for us. He said that we should not be heating our food in the microwave using plastic containers. This especially applies to foods that contain fat. He said that the combination of fat, high heat, and plastics releases dioxin into the food and ultimately into the cells of the body. Instead, he recommends using glass, such as Corning Ware, Pyrex or ceramic containers for heating food. You get the same results, only without the dioxin. So such things as TV dinners, instant ramen and soups, etc., should be removed from the container and heated in something else. Paper isn't bad but you don't know what is in the paper. It's just safer to use tempered glass, Corning Ware, etc. He reminded us that a while ago some of the fast food restaurants moved away from the foam containers to paper The dioxin problem is one of the reasons. Please share this with your whole email list.........................  Also, he pointed out that plastic wrap, such as Saran, is just as dangerous when placed over foods to be cooked in the microwave. As the food is nuked, the high heat causes poisonous toxins to actually melt out of the plastic wrap and drip into the food. Cover food with a paper towel instead. This is an article that should be sent to anyone important in your life...