Crocodiles: yet another thing that will kill you.
For my book, I have been writing one of the chapters on Australia lately. It’s been a good escape to “travel” down under to write about my many trips there, especially since Stockholm seems to be eternally gray and snowy these days.
A big memory of my first trip was continually hearing, “watch out, that will kill you.” From snakes and spiders to sharks, jellyfish and crocodiles, Australia seems to have an inordinate number of things that are in the world’s most deadly category. When we went hiking, I had to look out for brown snakes. When we swam, I had to watch out for box jellyfish and sharks. And depending on where we were, crocs were a problem too. I had to look out for brown spiders even while just hanging out at Uncle Peter’s place.
It made me feel quite jumpy as the trip went on, but I noticed that Robert and all his Aussie mates were pretty casual about all those killers. And the next time I traveled down under, I also became rather inexplicably casual. During my last trip – my seventh – we went swimming at Bondi Beach the day after a shark bit off someone’s arm. I’m not sure if I had adapted to my surroundings or just gone mad.
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