Southern Cross' Glitter! - The Southern Hemisphere

Folks, Extremely sorry for having been away for so long! Was caught up with many things, especially on the family front. I know that I had promised an article about a Bangalore nightspot, but due to a recent incident at office, I am going to "pen" something different.

Around the middle of last week, I suddenly received an e-mail from my colleague. I opened it with nervous anxiety, wondering what the contents would be! On opening the e-mail, I was pleasantly amused after reading it. My colleague, who was supposed to travel to New Zealand on a short-term business trip, expressed surprise at the fact that June-Sept ("Summer" in the Northern Hemisphere) were "Winter" months Down Under!! I smiled and replied to the e-mail stating that it was no surprise, but a fact depicted by Mother Nature on account of the Earth's (while tilted on its axis) annual revolution around the Sun.

The above incident, reminded me of another one which had happened around 4 to 5 years back. The guy who used to live next door had been sent to Australia on a 6 month assignment. He flew from India to Australia in the middle of July. Imagine his state when he found himself frozen to the bone in the Aussie winter, without any warm clothing. He was wondering what had hit him, since just 20 Hrs back, the stifling summer heat in India had been killing him! So much so for all the "cross-cultural" training sessions, where the aspect of climate is left out of the reckoning most of the times. Given this, I am wondering the shock experienced by ancient explorers and seafarers, at a time when we knew much less about the earth's climate and its links with movements of planetary bodies.

Why am I not surprised at all? Read on below, to know...

-->Reason 1: Only 10% of the world's population stays South of the Equator. So naturally most of the annual seasonal changes depicted in movies, books etc is in tune with what the majority (90%) living in the Northern Hemisphere experiences. Examples abound with respect to this, and I am listing some of them below as (a), (b), (c), and (d)

(a)Christmas (Dec 25th) is always associated with snow and reindeers, when Down Under we have forest fires raging all over the place due to the severe summer heat

(b)The "Summer"(May-Aug) months are most often than not, rarely associated with a sport like skiing. However full-time professional North American skiers know very well that, to continue their training uninterrupted all through the year (without incurring heavy travel expenses), they need to push off to the Andes mountains in South America!

(c)You hear everyone speaking about the "Northern Lights" seen in the skies of the Artic region. Very rarely do you hear folks speaking about the "Southern Lights", even though as a natural phenomenon this is common to both of Earth's poles. Simple Reason: The Northern Lights occur in a region which is relatively more populated (Sweden, Norway, Finland etc), while the Southern Lights occur in regions with hardly any trace of human population (Antartica, Oceans south of New Zealand)

(d)The Solstice(12 Hrs of day and 12 Hrs of night) that the Earth experiences on June 21st every year, is termed as "Summer" Solstice. Similiarily, the Solstice which occurs on 22nd Dec every year, is termed as "Winter" Solstice.


--> Reason 2: Another simple reason is purely geographic in nature. Most of the countries in the Southern Hemisphere are very close to the equator, and hence have a summerlike weather throughout most of the year. So we do not mentally associate these regions with the "snowy white Christmas" image. On the other hand, there are lot of inhabited landmasses closer to the Northern Pole

--> Reason 3: The economic and cultural standing of many of the countries south of the equator, on the global stage. Some points regarding this aspect are listed below, as
(a)For one, most of them do not keep going to war with each other etc, and hence are not able to evince enough interest in media circles.
(b)Let us go region by region, to understand things better with respect to this aspect:-
*Antartica: A desolate, huge expanse of solid ice. Needless to say why it does not generate much interest
*South America: Since most of the continent is Hispanic in terms of the racial profile of their populations, language proves to be a barrier to the outside world understanding them better. Things like drug cartels etc in some of the countries, have only helped in sullying further the image of the culture which is already vaguely known outside of the continent.
*Africa: Needless to say most parts of this "Dark" continent (especially the Southern parts), have been subjected to neglect by the rest of the world, despite being the birthplace of humanity. The fact that like many of the South American countries, poverty rules the roost in most parts, makes the continent less appealing and glamourous to the world media
*Islands in Oceania (Papua New Guinea etc): They are not alluring to the outsiders, like their richer cousins in the proximity like Singapore etc
*Australia-New Zealand (ANZ) Region: Due to the population vastly consisting of Caucasians, they are perceived in most minds as "Western" nations like UK etc, despite being at the Easternmost periphery of earth


--> Reason 4: Geography as a subject taught in school (at least in India), is perceived by most students as a "non-critical" subject. It makes economic sense to them since, study of the subject does not open up a whole lot of job avenues. Maybe things would have been different in the days when explorers and conquerors amassed wealth leveraging among other things, a good knowledge of geography, maps etc.

Geography is also viewed by many as a "non-scientific", "non-mathematical" subject, which does not require application of the brain and instead requires cramming texts (It is sad, since Geography is an interesting science if taught properly, and importantly it pertains to the Earth on which we all live)

So, is what is described above a major source of concern for the world? Of course not, when we have more pressing issues like hunger, poverty etc to be solved. However, for the purpose of better global awareness about the Southern Hempisphere and its peculiarities (After all it makes up exactly half of our Earth!), I believe the following should happen:-
(i)The vastly Northern Hemisphere controlled world media, should start focussing more attention on the region
(ii)The countries in the Southern Hempisphere themselves should break linguistic barriers etc of the kind that exist in S.America, to promote their regions across the world more aggressively. The more affluent and influential among them like Australia, should take a lead in this.

Catch you later with more:-)...