Ah, there's gonna be a special one. It's not very often. We cover a place like Nauru.

Usually we get you guys, the Geograpeeps, to help out with these videos

But sadly not a single Nauruan was available to contact us. No surprise.

I mean, there's not many in the world and it's kind of hard to find them or visit them.

Like, literally, this is the least visited country in the world. So NAU we cover NAURU

[Good pun, no punching?]

Hi everybody, I'm host Barb's. Yes. It's pronounced "Now-roo", not "Nah-oo-roo"

The Pacific Islands are always so fun to research because they really are like the hidden gems concealed within the massive expanse of seemingly endless

ocean and with Nauru you find a new type of gem that nobody quite knows how to classify but it's shiny

Let's go treasure hunting on the map now. Shall we?

Linguist speculate that the name Nauru may be derived from the Nauruan word Anaoero

Which means "I go to the beach." Of course most island nations have beaches

But the ones on Nauru are sectioned off in a special way

First of all, the country is literally just one island located on the confluence of all three oceanic regions of Oceania: Melanesia, Micronesia

And Polynesia, however categorically they belong to the region of Micronesia (not to be confused with the Federated States of Micronesia

which is a country within Micronesia. We already talked about it)

Anyway

The country is the smallest country in Oceania and only about 8.1 square miles or 21 square kilometers

The entire perimeter of the country is only about 12 miles or 19 kilometers long

That means you could literally take a nice morning jog around the entire island and make it back in time for lunch

Just a few hours later. The country is divided into fourteen administrative districts

However when election time rolls around, the country is divided into eight constituencies to send representatives to the Parliament and this is where things get weird

Nauru is the only country in the world that doesn't have an official capital

Most sources will tell you that its Yaren simply because that's where the parliament and

administration buildings are as well as the only airport on the island "Nauru International".

However, it is only the de jure capital and only listed as a main district with only about 1300 people

Yaren is actually the third largest town on the island. The largest actually being Arijejen in Aiwo with a whopping

2,400 people and Menen in the Meneng district with about 1,400. Aside from the airport coming into Nauru by boat is nearly impossible

For large commercial ships as the entire country is surrounded by jagged sharp coral reefs that have been known to puncture holes

Which is why they have no major seaport

There are only two small

harbors able to accommodate small or medium sized boats one at Anibare on the east side at Anibare Bay and another one

On the town of Aiwo on the west side of the island. Right below that harbor though

You see these strange long extending pier-looking things and think, "Oh, isn't that like a shipping port?" Well, no

Those are actually really long phosphate cantilever booms that were used to transport.

Phosphate minerals to large ships out to sea past the coral wall.

There's another one further south that is currently being disassembled as neither of them are being used much anymore

Otherwise getting around Nauru is pretty easy

I mean

It's just one island

unlike those confusing

disjointed atolls in Kiribati or Tuvalu. Having one solid chunk of land is quite advantageous in the Pacific because it keeps you stable

and strong. The country has a single paved road that goes around the entire nation known as the island Ring Road

It takes just about an hour to go around the entire country by car

And if you want to take public transport a community bus goes around once every hour or so for less than a dollar in fare

There is only one traffic light at the airport to allow planes to cross the road into the airport terminal

Otherwise, you can take the rugged unpaved gravel path road

Shortcuts through the interior of the island to get to the other sides if you prefer. Not very popular

but still possible. On these paths

You can pass the Nauru Detention Centers which are sites that cooperate with the Australian government to detain illegal immigrants

We'll explain more about this later

The country does have three miles of rail track reserved for phosphate

transport and sometimes people will cling on to this train to move back and forth from the coast of Aiwo to the inland mining areas

Yeah, they actually have a train and it's still kind of running. Nonetheless

Nauru is definitely not quite the tourist hotspot. Annually the country receives on average less than a thousand tourists a year

sometimes as low as

200. Speaking of which if you are one of the lucky few that treks over here some spots of interest might include places like

Yaren's Parliament building. Buada Lagoon. The Moqua Well & Caves.

Frigate bird games. Anabare Bay. The central plateau known as Topside. The old World War II artillery

bunkers near Yaren. The Linkbelt oval sportsfield where you can play sports. And of course, there's scuba diving everywhere.

Alright, so that pretty much rounds up this segment. Let's see what type of landscape they have on this one little island, shall we?

Well, there's gonna be interesting because we only have about eight square miles of land to work with

How can we possibly extract a complex data analysis on such a limited surface area?

I've been doing this show for years guys. Watch me. First of all, Nauru

sits on the middle of the Southern Pacific Plate only about 34 miles (56 kilometers) away from the equator. Out of all the islands in

Oceania, Nauru sticks out as one of the three great phosphate rock islands.

The first one being Kiribati's Banaba Island right next door, and Makatea Island over

3,000 miles away across the International Dateline on Makatea Island in French Polynesia

Why do they have so much phosphate? Simple: bird poop! Over thousands of years

Guano droppings in the inland areas from migrating birds have accumulated making these islands super rich in the limited resource. Going back to Nauru though

After we pass the jagged coral reef barrier

You see that the entire

Coastal ring around Nauru about 300 meters inland is the most fertile part of the country. If you look over here in the south

though you'll see Buada Lagoon, the largest inland body of water

Nauru has no rivers or streams which means the majority people depend on either rain collection

storage tanks on their roofs for water or 3d salinization plants located at the National Utilities

Agency if you move inland further from that though

You'll notice the green fertile strip ends and you reach the grassy shrubby central plateau

Composed of coral ridges and cliffs the highest point being command ridge at about 233 feet 720 meters high

This is the phosphate zone where all the phosphate was mined over the past few decades. Whoo. Yeah, I mean quite a backstory, right?

I mean at one point in 1968

They actually had the highest GDP in the world after they opened up the mines

But now after almost all the phosphate deposits have been depleted

Yeah, not so much. All right, and there's a part where no one usually comes in for the physical geography section

However, he's not here because I kind of forgot to tell him at the last minute that we're gonna fill my house

Which means Ken you're gonna have to be NOAA today. Nice. Wait, is this a promotion? Yeah, no, wait, really?

Yeah

You're promoting the information about Naru to our viewers and get to what they're waiting

Nauru Niue that they're finite phosphate deposits will eventually run thin

So in order to cushion their transition period from over-dependence, they decided to invest heavily into trust funds

The problem was many of these funds ended up mismanage and wasteful investments almost until they went bankrupt

They've tried to become a finance haven, but too many controversies ensued so they had to drop it since 2004

They have been a cash-only exclusive economy. This means you could only use cash on the island

So if you visit get your major ATM transactions in order before boarding the plane

Because none exists on the island. Resource-wise, other than the nearly depleted phosphate reserves,

all they really got going for them is fishing and minor crops that grow on the island,

Like coconuts and fruits, and the Buada lagoon, they do practice aquaculture by raising native mill fish.

It's a tradition that actually predates European contact.

Nonetheless nearly all basic and capital goods must be imported mostly from Australia and New Zealand.

Otherwise with food, it gets kind of...fatty.

Most grocery stores have to wait six weeks for every shipment.

People either have to get their food from what's available on the island or stock up on non-perishables

that might not have the highest nutritional content.

A typical traditional Nauruan meal would probably include grilled or fried fish.

Coconut milk is used very often and possibly some pandanus or pineapple use in some way.

However, the majority of the country prefers to eat Western or Eastern foods regularly.

There are over 130 Chinese restaurants on the island, burgers, pizza, and spam fried rice are typically seen in many houses.

Ah spam! America invented it but Asia glorified it.

This typical diet has been one of the many factors that has led to Nauru becoming what

the World Health Organization labels as

"the most obese country in the world" with over 70 percent of their inhabitants

being categorically obese and 94 percent overweight.

Some of the people here though need to be big because it works to their advantage.

But that's a topic later we will discuss.

In.... DEMOGRAPHICS

Thank you Ken! Follow him on Instagram. Off you go now.

[sound of door closing]

Now Nauru is kind of like... I don't know what's a good analogy.

It's like one of those shrines in the middle of the Patagonian desert in Argentina, you know

They're so far out and remote very few people stop by and visit them yet as small as they are

They're packed with fascinating backstories. Yeah, I think that works

First of all,

the country has about 11 300 people

and is the third least populated nation in the world after Tuvalu and Vatican City.

About 60% of the people in Nauru are ethnically Nauruan,

about a quarter are other Pacific Islanders, 8% are European

and about 8% are Han Chinese.

They use the Australian dollar as their currency.

They use a type I plug outlet

and they drive on the left side of the road.

Now. Here's the thing.

Let's talk about the largest ethnic group, the Nauruans.

If you include the entire global diaspora

It's estimated that there are about 15,000 Nauruans in the entire world.

Apart from the 6,000 or so Nauruans, about a thousand live in Australia,

and about 8,000 in the U.S.

Meaning that there are actually more Nauruans outside of Nauru than in it,

but what exactly is a Nauruan?

You know what?

Ken is usually like the island guy?

So, you know what? Ken, just explain what a Nauruan is.

All right, Nauruans are in themselves kind of a cultural anomaly.

They are genetically kind of a mix between Micronesia and Polynesia.

They don't even know exactly where they belong.

Although everyone on the island speaks English. The Nauruan mother tongue is Nauruan.

Obviously.

Linguists say it is technically classified as a Micronesian language,

but most Micronesians can't understand them.

Historically, the populace prior to outside immigrations was divided to these twelve tribes.

Each with a matrilineal inheritance.

Thank you, Ken. I'll take it from here.

Now, in terms of the tribes,

they each kind of had their own section of the island

and developed their own unique customs.

One of which being the Nauruan navigational system.

It's a unique way of expressing cardinal direction that can only be used on the island.

There are four main directions that cover a quadrant of the island

and a fifth and six direction that traverses the interior.

Sadly over time many of the traditions were lost to Western influence.

Pictures were taken of Nauruan warriors in the 1800s

with armour made of thick coconut fibers

and puffer fish helmets.

Similar to the ones we talked about in the Kiribati(?) episode.

The traditional music style called Teigen is usually performed at celebrations.

Finally every so often certain fishers still practice trained frigate bird fishing.

Otherwise Nauruans love AFL, rugby, weightlifting.

Sometimes weightlifting is considered the national sport.

Even women take part in it

Keep in mind in 2001 Nauru also signed the Pacific Solution agreement with Australia

Which opened up a detention center to hold people that were illegally trying to enter into Australia by sea for asylum.

This means in addition to the population that lives there permanently

Nauru has a temporary fluctuating population of detainees at any given moment.

The highest amount of people held at once was 1233 in 2014

and at the end of 2018, there are about 30.

And speaking of dates and times, History!

In the quickest way, I can put it:

Micronesian and Polynesians settle in and mix.

They have babies.

Boom! Nauruans are born.

Twelve tribes are set.

British whalers stop by and start trading.

Boom! Tribal war in 1878.

Germans come in and annex it.

They establish kings.

Phosphate discovered by this dude.

World War 1, Australia captures it.

Influenza epidemic. Japan takes over in World War 2.

They relocate a ton of Naurans to Chuuk Island.

Australia fights them off. About 800 Nauruans repatriate back to Nauru.

1968 independence, they get super rich!