Queensland Floods
It may be that Australians, in particular rural Australians, are coping with the floods so well because they are used to fending for themselves. Easy going because they know they have to find a solution: it seems a waste of time to whinge about it. Especially in an emergency situation. In Holland for instance, people seem to complain, sometimes because they are used to other people fixing their problems. I've heard about farmers lifting their harvests on barges (flat bottomed big boats), to be picked up by a semi-trailer truck. The post offices are still delivering and keeping mail that can't be delivered at the post office. Centrelink, the organisation that deals with unemployment benefits, has set up mobile offices to visit people that are unable to collect their money. Even insurance companies come to set up business close to the people that need it.
If the pub is surrounded by water, well, you find a tinny or a row boat to get to the pub.
Just amazing for people from Europe I think. How well people adapt here.
If the police department is short of a boat, they wade to a scene of crime, waist high in water.
It's still a tragedy though; the impact of this all will last for months. Most farmers are not insured against flooding, because the premiums are astronomical. Many farmers have lost everything...
Premier Anna Bligh says that the over-all damage will exceed 5 billion dollars. She has appointed an army dude, Major General Slater, to oversee the rebuilding of the state of Queensland.
Many flood-affected people are keeping their spirits up by playing ball games whilst waiting for the water level to go down, helping neighbours and council sand bagging where needed, helping distribute food supplies etcetera.
I still have the New Orleans Cyclone TV pictures in mind- where many people panicked, cried, seemed hopeless and helpless. Not so in Queensland it appears... for now.
About the Queensland Floods for Radio Netherlands
If the pub is surrounded by water, well, you find a tinny or a row boat to get to the pub.
Just amazing for people from Europe I think. How well people adapt here.
If the police department is short of a boat, they wade to a scene of crime, waist high in water.
It's still a tragedy though; the impact of this all will last for months. Most farmers are not insured against flooding, because the premiums are astronomical. Many farmers have lost everything...
Premier Anna Bligh says that the over-all damage will exceed 5 billion dollars. She has appointed an army dude, Major General Slater, to oversee the rebuilding of the state of Queensland.
Many flood-affected people are keeping their spirits up by playing ball games whilst waiting for the water level to go down, helping neighbours and council sand bagging where needed, helping distribute food supplies etcetera.
I still have the New Orleans Cyclone TV pictures in mind- where many people panicked, cried, seemed hopeless and helpless. Not so in Queensland it appears... for now.
About the Queensland Floods for Radio Netherlands
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