Since this supposed travel blog appears to have morphed into a trail of disaster reports, I feel obliged to note the major one that happened early this morning (NZ time). It is, of course - deep sigh - the inauguration of that ghastly, ghastly man whose stupidity, selfishness and ego will have wide-reaching and long-lasting ill effects on not just societies and economies around the world, but the actual planet, and all the life that, so far at least, exists on it.
While nobody here, so far away yet still so vulnerable to the Orange One’s whims, is downplaying the threat he poses, it’s kind of comforting how our media have united, in a classic Kiwi response, against his claim, in a long and boastful list, that the USA first split the atom.
To be (teeth currently gritted) fair, he’s not alone in this misconception. Regular 😀 readers will recall my pointing out several times - here and here - that, despite the official-looking claim in the Willis Tower in Chicago, it was Lord Ernest Rutherford, a NEW ZEALANDER and Nobel prize winner, who first discovered how to split the atom. We’ll gloss over some of the less positive results of that process and just concentrate on how Trump’s false claims to achieving that split are actually uniting our nation. Such a shame that the U of the S is now officially suspended for the next 4 years.