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Travel Safety
Dangerous Animals
Advice and information
'The
lion and the lamb shall lie down together,
but the lamb won't get much sleep.' Woody Allen
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Travel
Safety and Animals:
It's
very easy for us to be complacent about our strengths given that
we are the most dominant species on the planet, but take away the
weaponry and armour that civilisation affords us, and we stand alone
in the wilderness as the naked and defenceless ape.
The world has around 800,000 identified species of animals, many
of whom while getting on with their own survival, see us either
as a meal or a threat.
While travelling away from home, you may well meet one or two of
them going about their business. Treat them with the respect they
deserve for the sake of your own safety and theirs, and remember
that in the eyes of mother nature, man is without doubt the world's
most dangerous animal. |
Travel
- it's an education!
A
few years ago trekking around Papua New Guinea, in the middle of a tropical
nowhere, some small animal bit my leg. A spider? At the time it wasn't
painful, but the site soon became a growing, red, wet and painful wound,
also known as a tropical ulcer. I cleaned it, applied antiseptic and a
bandage and continued on my way.
The hole got bigger.
Days
later I visited a tiny missionary hospital where the charming nurses scrubbed
the hole with soap and hot water and gave me antibiotics. I took the pills
for 7 days.
The hole got bigger.
I visited a dive centre at Madang where they have a lot of experience
of coral infections. They scrubbed some more then poured pure bleach into
the hole until it stopped bubbling - apparently indicating that all bacteria
were dead.
The hole got bigger.
A
few days later I met a young Australian gold prospector in the highlands.
He told me to cut a piece of papaya and tape it, fleshy side down, onto
the wound. I did so and the hole had dried up by the next morning. I applied
more papaya and the day after that the hole started shrinking. Jeez, thanks
mate! Owe you one!
Papaya,
a sweet tropical fruit, is also good for curing tummy bugs and constipation
I'm told. It's the complex enzymes they say...Don't travel without one!
'When
all the dangerous cliffs are fenced off, all the trees that might fall
on people are cut down, all of the insects that bite have been poisoned
... and all of the grizzlies are dead because they are occasionally dangerous,
the wilderness will not be made safe. Rather, the safety will have destroyed
the wilderness.' R. Yorke Edwards
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Animal
Pictures [though not usually dangerous]: Namibia
[Etosha] Pictures | South
Africa [Kruger Park] Pictures | East
Africa Safari Pictures | Madagascar
Photos | Galapagos
[Ecuador] Pictures | Costa
Rica Pictures | Australia
Animals
Dangerous Animal information © bugbog.com |