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Strange Old Site

Pick the odd one out:

Pakistan

Turkmenistan

Kazakstan

Baldrockistan

Afghanistan

That’s right. All ‘stans’ are legitimate children, except the curious bastard, Baldrockistan.

More concept than enclave, Baldrockistan is a state of mind conjured by Herman de Vries, a member of the shadowy cartel known as State of Sabotage.

Before you get alarmed, or alert, consider this: Bald Rock is the largest monolith in Oz, after Uluru, a single granite boulder that rules the borderline scrub and canyons between Tenterfield and Stanthorpe off the New England Highway.

By no coincidence, Tenterfield is also the spot where Henry Parkes plugged the idea of Australia’s disparate colonies (essentially the Baldrockistans of their day) merging into one nation.

Measuring some 650 hectares, Baldrockistan offers the monolith, as well as deep gorges, a Mexican hacienda and a lump of land labelled Serengeti Meadow. If this is seeming a little on the ledger’s loony side, then visit http://www.sabotage.at/sos/baldrockistan.php (no visa required) and learn other bald facts.

Such as? Well, today for example, August 30, is the realm’s day of independence. Or maraschino cherries are the national dish. Don’t believe me? See for yourself.

[MICRONATIONS, $24,95, Lonely Planet, 2006]

http://shop.lonelyplanet.com/product_detail.cfm?productID=2943&

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 30th, 2006 at 5:27 pm and is filed under Suggest NSW/ACT. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Strange Old Site”

  1. drunken monkey Says:
    August 31st, 2006 at 8:07 am

    Of course the most famous of the ‘stans (and micronation depending on your definition) is the fictional nation of Bakpakistan. Began as a Lonely Planet April Fool’s day joke, it remains on their site due to the mysteries of content management systems. You might even find some of the gags are reminiscent of other parody guidebooks, so for legal reasons it must be pointed out that this pre-dates them:

    http://www.lonelyplanet.com/bakpak/

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