Oh What A Time... - #173 Australia and crucially, who discovered it?! (Part 1)

Episode Date: April 12, 2026

This week we’re discussing that wonderful land of Australia! We’ll be finding out what was suspected about a land down under in Antiquity, south-east Asia’s Australian mythology and we’ll answer the age-old and quite complex question: who discovered Australia?!Elsewhere, Chris has barely survived a bout with Norovirus and Tom finally admits what he’s thinking when listening to electronic dance music. Do you have any confessions you’d like to share? If so, please send them in: [e-mail] from now on Part 1 is released on Monday and Part 2 on Wednesday - but if you want more Oh What A Time and both parts at once, you should sign up for our Patreon! On there you’ll now find:•The full archive of bonus episodes•Brand new bonus episodes each month•OWAT subscriber group chats•Loads of extra perks for supporters of the show•PLUS ad-free episodes earlier than everyone elseJoin us at 👉 patreon.com/ohwhatatimeAnd as a special thank you for joining, use the code CUSTARD for 25% off your first month.You can also follow us on: X (formerly Twitter) at @ohwhatatimepodAnd Instagram at @ohwhatatimepodAaannnd if you like it, why not drop us a review in your podcast app of choice?Thank you to Dan Evans for the artwork (idrawforfood.co.uk).Chris, Elis and Tom x Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Oh, Whatter Time is now on Patreon. You can get main feed episodes before everyone else. Add free. Plus access to our full archive of bonus content, two bonus episodes every month, early access to live show tickets and access to the O Watertime Group chat. Plus, if you become an O Watertime All-Timer, myself, Tom and Ellis, will riff on your name to postulate

where else in history you might have popped up. For all your options, you can go to patreon.com forward slash O Watertime. Welcome to Oh, what the time. It's a history podcast in which we look back on the past. And this past weekend, I've been thinking a lot about the bubonic plague because our house was struck down with neurovirus. One by one. The dominoes in my household fell. Who was domino number one?

I was patient zero. It was me. It was me. Yeah. Now, this is my favorite thing about norovirus or any kind of... Favorite thing? In your long list of favorite things. The funniest thing I think about tummy upsets or diarrhoea or stomach bugs or gastro issues

is the post-mortem about where you think you got it. Yeah. Because you'll never know. Okay, interesting. So then you just, oh yeah, yeah. It was that chicken I ate from that place on Thursday. Oh, I don't think it was that. It was when I lit the railing outside that school.

I think it was that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I should never have cleaned my own toilet bowl, my tongue. Yeah. Oh, do what I did. I did. I dip my toothbrush in. A bloody toilet and then I brush my teeth straight after it.

It would have been that. You've named the main culprit for me every time. Chicken is always, that's the one that comes in. It's always chicken is always blamed by me. But for any kind of sickness, it's always chicken. Me and my daughter, my six-year-old daughter, were the first two. I went about two hours before her. So we were trying to run the maths thinking, well, it must be.

It must be. It must be like you're trying to get oasis tickets. I'll tell you what. I was in the queue about two hours before my friend Paul. But bizarrely, he bought them before me. The chief suspect is an Easter egg. Really? Well, I don't actually know if I really believe that.

What, a chicken-flavored Easter egg? There was enough much less than one. The kids have got this little karaoke, like wireless microphone that they run around. You know Easter eggs, by the way, Chris, are chocolate eggs, not eggs laying by actual chickens. No, the Easter bunny lays them. What are you on about? It's a kind of, nature's chicken. Nature's chocolatey chicken.

This wireless karaoke mic was being handed around the family. And at one point I noticed it had a lot of dribble on it. That is another... Right. That is another suspect. But basically the trail's got it, it went a bit cold. We don't know for sure. There wasn't much chicken consumed.

I was fully across the fact that your wife, Sophie, was the last remaining person because she was texting my wife, Claire, saying, essentially, I know it's coming. Oh, my God. But there's still that sort of hope, isn't it? You might somehow avoid it, but you know deep down. Maybe I'm just a tough guy. It's a bit like maybe being on one end of the Titanic, seeing the bow go down and going,

well, we're all right here for the minute. Yeah, they said in the brochure that it was unsinkable. Okay? But it's not the ocean, it's just vomit and shit. The guy at Southampton said unsinkable. Honestly, I've never been so ill. It made me think that this is what the bubonic plague must have been, Like just one by one, just lying in bed, cold shivers, horrendous, just the house, just stunk.

Well, let me present a historical, well, difference, I think. The point is, I assume you didn't work. No, I didn't, I didn't. Back in the day, if you were sick and vomiting. So low a water times. Hello, and today we are discussing the corn laws. Oh, History podcast that likes to talk.

Hi. Sorry if it sounds echoey, but I'm in my bathroom. My point was going to be this. You were able to stop working. There would have been a point in the past where that wasn't an option of people. People would have been deeply sick, vomiting, etc. We don't need to go into the final details of it.

And they'd still... Don't worry, I can come in. I can still come in. Don't worry, I'll plow that feels. Exactly. They'd have to still plough the fields. They'd have to still gather as turnips, whatever it would have been, in the cold rain.

Milk the cows. Don't worry, Daisy. Honestly, I don't know it could be passed from human to cow. I'd say one good thing. We're going to Spain for the Easter holidays, and the weight has just fallen off. There you go. I'm going to be the trimest, leanest man in Spain.

The sexiest family on the beach. Taurus asking you, how do you do it? All all we need to do is vomit for five days straight. Beach, body, red. I've got to ask me, how did you get those hubs? Oh, man, it was so bad. I'm glad you've survived. Yeah, just about.

How do you think you'd have dealt with gathering the turnips or ploughing the field in that sort of state? Let's say it was medieval Britain and you had no choice because your family had to eat and then sick up what they'd eat. Oh, I don't even know. What would you have done? I don't think I'd be capable of it.

One thing I thought of, you know, there's this, I think it's like a Central American tradition. Is it ayahuasca? Oh, yeah. Where these tribes would take, what is effectively poison to induce a fever and make you like really sick. Hallucinogenic poison. Yeah.

I've watched all the documentaries on Netflix. I find it hilarious. There was an element of that where I was just like violently throwing up and a really high fever and just like your mind is all over the place. It made me think, this must be what ayahuasca's like. Yeah. I've had ayahuasca without even needing to leave the house. You think yourself, I'm going to leave the podcast in.

I'm going to become a DJ, do all the festivals. You only get one go at life. Not trying to do latitude. I'll do green man. Obviously, Glastonbury is the dream. I'll tell Sophie, I'm going to buy some decks. Do you want to hear something quite lame, that Chris is more than aware that I do?

Because I've told him about it a number of times, It's my embarrassing little secret. Oh, yeah. When I'm walking along sometimes, I'm listening to dance music on my headphones. What do I do, Chris? I can't believe you're about to admit this on a podcast. This is so tragic.

Why am I omitting this? This is so lame. Go on, Chris, tell him. It's not only when you're walking along. You've told me as well you do this when you're like running on a treadmill or something. I'm on a treadmill as well, yeah, yeah. You can tell L.

Tom will imagine that if he's listening to like a dance track, he was imagining himself DJing in Ibether on some decks. Yeah. Maybe his shirt's off and he's really ripped and the crowd are loving it. Absolutely loving it. I would like Pasha or some of that and often I can imagine my friends turning to one other

and going, I thought this would be bad, but this is really, this is really badging. He's absolutely storming. No, it's not just that. You turn up at the club but you don't go to stage door. You actually walk through the Dunspot to get to the decks. And everyone's like, oh my God, that's him. And one guy says, is that what he looks?

I love his tunes, but I've never actually seen what he looks like. It's the handsome. And he's so ripped. Why has he got his shirt off already? What a cool. He's so ripped. What a cool guy. As he had neurovirus.

Has he got that ripped? What a cool guy. For some reason I routinely imagine myself in a full tux. That's my look. It's dark behind me. Then the lights come up and then you see the tucks and everyone go. Too hot. It's him.

No, no, no. Too hot. Your look would be the tiniest truce. Trunks. Tiniest trunks and knee-length boots. Speedos. And there's an extra, even more tragic detail. And I think listeners don't agree that this is the name as part of all. I am completely rigid-faced to begin with.

I'm not smiling at all. Serious business. I only smile when the beat dropped. So I'm a very serious character, and then the beat drops, and then suddenly I burst into smile and everyone's, yay! No, no, no, no. The beat drops, and you don't smile. you smile and nod.

You're like, yeah, yeah. The best night of your life is starting now. I've done it again. Creating a great night? Guilty. Guilty as charged. Well, Chris, I'm glad you're better, and it's good you're better because we have a great episode today, don't we?

We've got a really fun one. What is today's episode about? Australia? Yeah. The continent, the country. Is it a continent of Australia? Or is it Australasia? Australasia.

It is. Absolutely fucking massive, as they say in Wales. Well, I've never been. I'd mentioned before we started recording it's on my bucket list. I want to go to the Boxing Day test of the Ashes. Oh, yes. Melbourne, isn't it? MCC.

But I've never been. It's definitely something I want to do. But, Elle, you are a well-established Australia goer. Well, I've been there. I only went there once, but I was there for quite a long time. I did all the Australian comedy festivals. So I was there for about three and a half months. So I did Adelaide, Brisbane.

Sydney, Melbourne and then I did gigs in rural Victoria. And that's, so it's called the Melbourne International Comedy Festival Roadshow. So there's several road shows all happening at the same time where, because who've done Melbourne

or will be doing Melbourne, just two of the parts of Australia that tend not to get big touring comics. We were playing towns. So what was that like? What were the small towns in the middle of nowhere like? It was great fun, so remote.

Was it, really? Okay. So. So rural. So how were you getting there? Do you fly, I guess? We were being driven, yeah. All the cars were in the...

All the comics were in a minibus. Is it in the bunk beds in it? Like a proper tour bus? No, we were still in hotels, but there were long drives. The country is vast. Yeah. Like, it's so huge. I think there's five different time zones.

I think... Wow. Queensland's about five times bigger than Germany. Like, it's absolutely massive. We did Adelaide. There were a double action. They had a lot of props. Dragging the props through the Outback.

But they drove to the next festival. It was like a 30-hour drive. Something you would never do in the UK. But it was really good for it. I remember when I was doing Adelaide, I remember walking to the shop just to buy a drink. And there was a thermometer outside the supermarket, and it said 39 degrees.

And I remember thinking, I am not designed for this. And on day one, we'd flown in. I was doing Adelaide first. And I remember I'd not worn shorts for about four years because we'd had a couple of, we'd had quite a few bad summers on the trot. Right. So my legs were very pale anyway.

And I just didn't own any decent shorts. The only shorts I had were like my young bro shorts that I wore for five sides. I remember putting them on walking to a cafe on day one. And a guy coming out from buying the counter and going, I guess you're from the UK. I said, how did you know? And he pointed up my legs and he laughed out loud. That's amazing.

That would be a great way. Yes, you've run the UK, Mike. Yes, yes, I am. That would be a great way for someone to give themselves away at the end of like a crime drama, wouldn't it? Well, where they claim that they couldn't have committed a murder back in London because they've lived in Australia for the last three years. They've never been, you know, they haven't been back to prison. and then they notice the pasty white legs.

Yeah, yeah. And they are new to Australia. It was also as the fact I'd set shit shorts on, nowadays I'd have bought decent shorts before going. But it just didn't occur to me. So I was like, yeah, well, I wear these five aside on a Monday night. Yeah. I've owned them since I was in Year 9.

They're a bit tight. They're a bit tatty, but they'll do. So my Phoebe Swartz to Australia is clearly an amazing place. My wife lived there for five years and just said it was incredible. The quality of life is amazing. I've got good friends who live there, good friends who've moved there. And I know this is a very particular thing because I can avoid it by not getting into it.

I'm so scared of the things that are in the sea there. It means I'm not drawn to go there because... The sea? Part of the holiday experience for me, yeah, sharks. Sharks are the big one. It's mainly the sharks, to be honest. But swimming in the sea is like a massive part of me enjoying a holiday. And I would never risk it in Australia

because I'm so deeply scared of sharks. Just mad, though. And that is where they live. Do you know what I just say? Swimming, Tom Crane, swimming in the sea is a massive part of me enjoying the holiday. I've been on holiday multiple times. I've never seen you in the sea and thought, that man is at home. That man, this is a man enjoying his holiday.

He's in his natural habitat. I've never heard you cracking the whip to get into the sea. Well, explain this, Chris. Went to Greece last year. I had a swim in the sea. As I was swimming along, a fish went past, looked me in the eye, gave me a little nod. like that, to say, all right, mate, how are you doing? And said, I saw you DJ and I'd be a couple of years ago.

Really good stuff, man. It was a nod that said, you're one of us. Well, John. No, I genuinely love the sea, but sharks... I feel like this is a new affectation you're trying to create the history of. I know sharks have a bad reputation, but they have that reputation. There's no smoke without fire. That's what I'm saying.

They have big mouths. And Trump with that Welsh guy? Just quickly in the Olympics, in the Olympics, 2000s, they did open water swimming around Sydney Opera House and they were underwater sharpshooters to protect the swimmers from sharks. Wow. Do you remember this?

Yeah, that's not reassuring me. Yeah. Sorry, yeah. Wow. But I remember that guy from Murtha, there was a shark, I don't know if it was in Australia, but there was a shark in shallow water and everyone was screaming. And this guy from Murtha went, don't worry, I'll sort it out. And he just waded it in and picked it up.

Just this Welsh guy on holiday picking up this shark and going, Don't worry, I'll sort it up. It's very, very funny. The thing is, right, John Robbins, why I do the radio show with, he is terrified of spiders. And he did those gigs in Australia,

and he was very nervous about it. But I think that sharks are more avoidable than spiders. I do get that. They're not bothering you're on dry land. No. You're not sort of sat in a restaurant and suddenly the door opens and there's a great white there.

that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or in the toilet. But it's the fact, exactly. Well, you never know there's water. They find and they get through the pipes. The reason is, I think I've talked about this before. When I was eight, I was really into sharks. I asked my mum for a book on sharks for Christmas and she got confused and bought me

a book on shark attacks, a massive book on shark attacks. Oh, no. So like 500 pages of the worst images you've ever seen. Oh, God. Like, me like a sepia picture of some guy holding up his side and he's missing half his body, whatever. It was just that. are for 500 pages, and that deeply affected me.

So I've actually managed to control my breathing when I swim in the British Sea now, and I've got over that. But still, when I get in, I have to go, okay, it's all right, control the breathing. I really like that. I have to... You're scared of sharks in Britain.

Absolutely. But I love swimming in the sea. I generally do, but I really have to override that fear by repeating to myself that it's all right and controlling my breathing. But even if I go swimming in Norfolk, I will look for Finns to begin with. Look for things.

Just scan the horizon for a bit. And it's only when I've been in for five minutes that I completely become one with the ocean. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love this rebranding of you as a man of the sea. If you were attacked by a shark in Norfolk, you would be on the news for about seven different reasons. Well, do you know what to do if you get attacked by a shark?

Have you heard this? You punch it on the nose. Start podcasting. Immediately start podcasting. Get the mic out. And it will lose interest immediately. Try and reason with it, what is it? Yeah, punch on the nose, yeah, you're right.

Punch it on the nose, it's right. Totally baffles them, isn't it? Jack D had that really funny stand-up routine about this, though. Have you ever tried punching anything underwater? Absolutely impossible. People say, yeah, yeah, put it on the nose, punch it under nose. Try it, mate. All right then.

In the middle of a shark attack, getting your arm chewed off. What do I need to do again? Oh, yeah. Punch it. underwater. I know Australia's not the only place with sharks, by the way, because our friend Sam lives in South Africa in Cape Town. He wants to go and visit him. And I said to him, but what about the sharks in the sea there? She said, don't worry about there's no sharks now because the killer whales have scared them off. So this is the issue now is that he sent me

videos from just out, like two minutes from his house, he lives by the sea. So where he goes swimming and surfing, there used to be lots of sharks there in Cape Town. But because of the numbers of Killa whales are now coming close to shore, they've basically been scared down the coast. So you see Kilawhal, literally by the coast, by where you'd be swimming. So where are you willing to swim? Ireland. Would you have a swim in Ireland? Laiton Stone swimming pool.

Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's got good slides. Centre park. What about Lottness? Lockness, yes. Are you scared of nessie? Yes, that's fine.

No, not to get a nessie. It's not real. That's fine. Oh, okay. All right, so you could be rational about that then. Basically. Where just down on killer whales? Because they're fine, aren't they?

You never stand on a hilloilquoise. Famed to be angry animals. You ever seen blackfish? No. So I would swim happily in the Mediterranean. I draw the line at Australia and I also draw the line at South Africa. Incredible places, I won't be getting wet.

A slightly more reasonable reason to not go to Australia is the flight. Yes. My God. It's a long time. It's a long time to be in a small seat. What was it, 20 hours or something? 24 hours. Did you do that?

New Zealand's further. What would the comedy tour, would they put you in economy class or would they treat you to business? Oh yeah, it was economy. It's, uh, yeah. What did you do for those 24 hours? Well, I can't sleep sitting up. Yeah.

So the only way I'd be able to sleep in on a flight would be if I was mental and decided to spend thousands and thousands of pounds on a first class flight. Yes. First class? Well, yeah, exactly. That's the only way I'd be able to sleep. was because you get bed.

Right, right. So I was awake for the whole thing. But I did gays to New Zealand. I was delayed at every point. We were delayed leaving Auckland. We were delayed leaving Sydney. And we were delayed in Singapore. So I was in transit for 36 hours.

And I was awake for every single second. And I arrived at Ethrow. I didn't know who I was. Did you not sleep at all? No, I can't. I can't sleep sitting up. Oh, my God. I just can't.

I went so mad on the flight back from New Zealand that I thought, Okay, what replicates lying down? I apologise if I've told this story before. So I put a blanket over my head. Like I was a murderer being led out of court and trying to avoid my identity being revealed on the news. And I put my face where my bum would go.

And I tried to sleep that way. But it looked like I was going to blow the plane up. I remember a stewardess was nudging me their shoulders. What are you doing? You can't do that. I just had gone mad by that point. So your face was where your arse had been for the last 12 hours. What a pleasant way to travel.

So I was kneeling on all, I was kneeling, but with my face on the seat. I'm sure it looked great, Elle. Also, yeah, not just your ass that's been on that seat. Oh, thousands of asses. Thousands of the world. Breathing in the sweet, sweet scent of a thousand arces. Well, everyone else looks at you and thinks that man's having a breakdown. I'm getting Spanish spices.

I'm getting Italian herbs. So my friend, Dan, he's gone to Australia, but he broke up the journey for quite a long time in Singapore. So it sort of reset him a bit. So if I didn't want to spend money on first class travel, I suppose you could break it up that way. And all of crucially, he didn't have his face where his arse would be for the last 10 hours,

which was sure made it even more pleasant. Right. This hopefully will be a far more pleasant. and placing your face where your ass has been for the last 12 hours, it should be a good hour of history podcasting. As we say, we're talking about Australia today. I'm going to be talking about how the ancients predicted the existence of Australia and also other kind of misguided assumptions they made about the earth.

It's a genuinely fascinating subject. What are you guys going to be talking about? My section is essentially one question. Who discovered Australia? And I'll give you heads up. It's a complicated answer. But it's very interesting. Great.

I'm going to be talking about how Australia relates to Indian geography and mythology. Fascinating. But before that, it would be remiss of us not to cover some of your wonderful correspondence. So, you sent us some correspondence, have you? Well, let's take a look at you then. And today's email is from Claire Scott. And it says, thoughts on dark continent. Hello History Boys. Just listen to this episode, Dark Continent, and it really struck a chord with me.

Now, a lot of our listeners will not be aware of this episode because it's one of our Patreon specials we just recorded. Elle, do you want to quickly explain what it was about? Dark Continent is an amazing book by the story Mark Mazzauer came out in 1998, and it is a history of Europe in the 20th century. It's an extremely highly regarded book. It's very readable, so I read it a few years ago and then reread it for a patronage. episode which was released a couple of weeks ago. Well, Elle, we've had lots of emails about this. People have absolutely loved it.

If you want to listen to that episode now, sign up become a patron and it'll be there for you. Now, Claire says, it really struck according to me because my nanny is turning 101 in July. Wow. Isn't it amazing that? I'm always fascinated about her experiences during the Second World War and the Cold War. So 1925 she'd have been born. So she'd have been 20 at the end of World War II.

That's unbelievable, isn't it? Yeah. First 20, well, first 23 years of her life. without the NHS if she lived in the UK. So that's pre-Wall Street crash. She was born. And she's still knocking around. Good on her.

What a legend. I'm always fascinated about her experiences during the Second World War and the Cold War. Her experience with rations, and in fact, she still has my great-grands ration book. I remember when COVID hit and people were moaning about having to stay inside and socially distance,

and my nanny became really upset. She couldn't understand the selfishness of people, and it was the first time she really opened up on the horrors she and her family experience from being separated from her parents and siblings to not knowing if her home would still be standing after the bombs. What we were being asked to do was nothing in comparison. My Nanny watches the news now and believes nothing has really changed.

She gets quite upset at what's going on. My papa, who passed away at only 65, has published a book on Amazon called One Foot Forward, which talks about his evacuation from Glasgow in World War II to joining the Navy and the loss of his leg after a train ran over his leg and he nearly died, and his guilt of being hospitalized, seeing his friends going to war. I've read it many times and I'm amazed by the resilience of

people who live through all of this. Love the pod. Very proud to be a full-timer, Claire. Now, that's a really interesting email, because that aspect of people, the guilt of not being going out to fight during a war is a fascinating thing. And it's a thing I've read about a number of times,

and it's something people felt acutely. In this case, it was an injury that prevented him. Or in other cases, it was people who had severe asthma, these things like this, which would prevent people from fighting. Yeah, you also had reserved occupations. Yes, exactly. So my uncle fought in more. my grandfather's, one was a farmer and one was a coal miner.

So he was, it was, you know, Britain needed coal and Britain needed food. Really? My grandfather tried to join the REF, but his eyesight wasn't good enough. They said, you're a farmer, mate. You need to. You need a farm. They said, this is a butcher's mate. This isn't even the RAF.

I'm doing. And the other one, he was Bevin Boyce. He was a coal miner during World War II. That's really interesting. I didn't know that. So minors en masse did not go to fight because of the need for coal. Is that right? Well, yeah, because Britain was...

Fascinating. Well, Bevan boys, they were young kids who often hadn't been coal miners because they were too young, which is what I think my grandfather was, if I'm looking at his age. Yeah, they were sent down, and they were often slightly resented by older colliers because they had to learn on the job. That's so interesting. Yeah, but a lot of this...

What a stressful first job as a teenage. that is as well. Cold miners during wartime. And when other coal miners are annoyed that you're there because you're not... If you want to read... Not brilliant at the job immediately. If you want to read a fantastic book about... I know I've recommended this before, about the experience of evacuees.

And just in general, the experience of the general public during the Second World War, there's a great book called The People's War by Angus Calder. and it was the first revisionist book of history about the general public in Britain during the Second World War. So it said, listen, people were shocked, they were traumatised. The evacue system often didn't work. People often came back after a while.

A lot of kids wetting themselves because they were so frightened and not getting on with the people they were being sent. Whereas we'd told ourselves a story that everything had gone really swimmingly. Yes. But it was very, very chaotic and a lot of it was very poorly organised.

but it's a very, very powerful book because it's the People's War by Angus Calder. Fascinating. I've told the story of how one of my wife's granddad's was in the Navy during the war and just basically went on a lovely cruise for the whole war. Yes.

But so my wife's other granddad, he was a sign writer before the war. And so that became a protected industry and he did sign writing for the army for the first half of the war. What do you mean by sign writing? So it would be signs for like... London, not.

army camps and luck but they they ended up getting into camouflaging vehicles oh wow so they would use their sign writing skills to camouflage to create camouflage for vehicles and they would paint camouflage into vehicles that's so interesting yeah and then when they kind of let me be a sign writer that is the dream wartime job please please let me be a sign right but he was also a very good amateur photographer. So about halfway through the war, he then became reconnaissance. They got him onto planes to photograph like enemy positions in like Borneo.

Wow. Yeah, so he spent the second half of the war like going around. I think I'd be saying at that point, I'm a much better sign. Really, I like photography, but really my skill is camouflaging jeeps back in Britain. And the problem was he had a receding hairline, and this is before the age of Suncreen. So he ended up,

getting skin cancer on his head and got compensation from the army years after the fact. Wow. Yeah. That's so interesting. And another thing about him, his name was Len, he lived to 102. And he was born in 1920. And he had an iPad, and his code on his iPad was 1920 to unlock it. It just felt like I always thought that was such a jarring thing that you'd open his iPad.

Yeah, yeah. You had to put in the year above 1920 on this futuristic screen device. Yeah, that's so true. That is so weird that someone who's born between the wars would end up having an iPad. That doesn't feel right. I think he's gone too far into sort of... Yeah.

I think Toaster, I imagine, would be the height of the sort of inventions he can count through his lifetime. Oh, my God, let me be a sign writer. Yeah, that's an absolutely dream job. Also, I imagine quite relaxing in the summer, decorating a Jeep out in the countryside somewhere. Everyone else is getting blown to bits. You just got the paints out.

Your easel sat there. An easel. Oh, the easel life. It's a good gig, isn't it? Great impressionists. Brilliant. Well, Claire, thank you so much for emailing the show. Thank you being a full-time.

If you do want to hear Ellis' special episode on Dark Continent, genuine, he did a fantastic job. You can sign up to Patreon and listen to that right now. And the name of Claire's grandad book, by the way, let's read it one more time, is one foot forward. That sounds really interesting about his evacuation from Glasgow, the loss of a leg and the guilt about being unable to fight because of that.

It sounds like a really good read. So thank you for letting us know about that as well. I will do the People's War for my next. I'll just have to find my copy and reread it. But I will do the People's War for a Patreon special at some point. Fantastic. I know anything captures the difference between Ellis and I. Do you know what my Patreon special is going to be that we're recording on Thursday?

A history of trousers. And that's not a lie. You want to get the history of trousers. You know what to do. I'm sure you can't wait. You're not selling it, Tom. You can't wait on Zip that episode. To our history funds.

Oh, very nice. It's a real turn-up. It genuinely fascinating. History of Trails is remarkable, and it will be available should you choose to sign up. Thank you so much for your email, Claire, as I say, if any of you want to get in contact, about anything historical or just silly, whatever.

Here's how. All right, you horrible luck. Here's how you can stay. in touch with the show. You can email us at hello at oh what a time dot com and you can follow

us on Instagram and Twitter at oh what a time pod. Now clear off. Okay we mentioned Patreon for the trousers episode that I'm sure you're all excited about but there's one other benefit of sunny out for our patron.

On the top tier, oh what time, all-timer. We will figure out where in history your name may have been before and up this week, Tim Brentnall struck me either played right back for West Ham in the 90s or he was one of the founding, the co-founders of Apple

with Steve Wozniak and Oh, he's one of the ones you don't know and haven't heard about, yeah. But instrumental. Tim Brentnell, play for West Ham now runs a car dealership. He's a scratch golfer, absolutely loved at the local club. 60 years old and ripped

I was thinking 70s town planner And is now quite highly regarded Actually a lot of the buildings are not that attractive But in time they've now protected And people see there is some inventive genius in them People say Oh yeah I mean obviously aesthetically I don't like a lot of brutalist architecture

But you've got to hand it to Tim Brentnell He knew what he was doing He's one of the great 20th century architects He's the reason why Milton Keynes has so many roundabouts. You'd be looking at some massive concrete, brutalist structure, monstrosity going, that is classic Brentnell, that's. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, there's an enormous housing estate in Camden that's, I mean, it's a failing estate, but that's not Brentnell's fault. It was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was, it was,

and council didn't know how to manage the estate, true to Brentnell's vision. The problem with a lot of Brentnell structures is that they're packed the guilds with asbestos, of course. But that was not his fault. It'd be one of his fault. But that was not his fault. Brentnell didn't want that. It also, you'd see the original Brentl planning images where it's just an absolute... Oh, so utopia.

You know, an iddle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's people walking around hand in hand, sun shining, birds, and then you see the reality of it. And it hasn't quite worked. Brentnell was a dreamer. Brentnell was a dreamer. He was an extremely talented architect. He studied in London in the early 60s.

It was, yeah, yeah. Obviously, a lot of it was done on the cheap because, you know. He didn't cut the corners. He just wrote the plans. Exactly, yeah, yeah. So sad that one of his buildings collapsed on him when he was faulted to.

Yeah. That was the end of Brentnell. But that wasn't Brentnell. That wasn't his fault. Exactly. Oh, good story. Well, there you go. I love it.

So you can choose. You can either be Westtown right back. You can be town planner. Or was the other option? Ripped at 60. Yeah. Ripped at 60. Or work at Apple.

One of the phones. Found Apple. If you want to be either, I'd be one of the founders of Apple. It's probably the best. Tim Brentnell, he's one of the founders of Apple, but crucially he won't let his kids have any Apple products. And you're like, hmm, that seems to be. Interesting. What's going on.

There you go. So if you want to figure out where in history your name may have been and you want that Episode on trousers, here's what you need to do. Hello again, you are of a lot, enjoying the show. Well, why not show the love by becoming a Patreon supported today? For a mere handful of farthings, you can get ad-free shows, two bonus subscriber episodes each month, access to all the past bonus eps,

first dibs on live tickets, and even help decide what subjects the boys can. cover next. Your support makes everything possible so sign up today at patreon.com slash oh what's the time or oh what's the time.com. What are you waiting for? Stop dawdling. So on this week's show we are discussing Australia and later in the show I'll be asking the question who discovered Australia. and I'm going to be talking to you about how the ancients predicted remarkably that Australia existed. It's mind-blowing.

But I am going to be talking about Australia in myth. Now there's a word in Sanskrit, Australasia, which sounds very similar to Australia, so much so that in the darkest recesses of the internet, and we all know that we need to believe what's happening in the darkest recesses of the internet, as well as out there in the wild, Some believe this is evidence that Indian explorers reached Australia long before Europeans and that the Sanskrit word, Astralayo,

which means armory, is where the country's name comes from rather than the Latin. No, it's not true, of course. But the myth, as always, has got a kernel of something very interesting, so something that we can explore here. Now, in classical Indian geography, the world's made up of four continents. The Jambudvipa in the south,

the utara Kuru in the north, the Perver, Vader in the east, and the Apara Gadamaya in the west. Now, the most important of the four, since it described India itself, was the Jamboad Vipa. And this in turn was subdivided into nine separate realms, right? Now, eight were on land, ninth was surrounded by water, which was Sri Lanka. So over the time... This feels like a classic Tim Brentall plan, that is it? Yeah. Yeah.

Nine sections, some with water. Very organised. Yeah, yeah. And there's a spot for people to meet, you know, sort of there's community areas, there's community assets. Tim Brentl have thought of everything. Community garden, community library. Classic Brentle. Municipal Square.

So over time, the four-continent model evolved into a seven-continent model as the Indians explored the world and counted other civilizations. So obviously then they exchanged geographical knowledge. So the seven continents, I won't go through all of them, but. Shakad Vipa, the island or continent covering the islands of Southeast Asia, also included Australia. So they're not sure about this one because the seven continents were each thought to be enclosed by water, where there were seven oceans, each with a different flavour. What? And each one associated with a different continent, okay?

So Jamud, its associated ocean, had the flavour of brine. Well, hang on. Ellis, can I stop you there? You're dealing with a man of the sea on this podcast. Oh, of course you are. Yeah, he'll know all of this. Maybe for each sea, let's ask our resident sea expert what he thinks about whether he would go on holiday there,

given his rule there in Australia. What do you think Plaqushire, the ocean associated? All sea tastes like brine, isn't it? Okay, all I'll give you that. That's the flavour of sea. That's default. That's default sea. What do you think the sea tasted of in the continent of Plaqueshire? A very slight hint of vanilla.

Not far off sugar cane juice. Oh, really? Oh, nice. Did you have that? Yeah, you'd have jumping in that? Yeah, absolutely. Love it, yeah, completely. The associated ocean with Shalmala, taste it of wine. Would you jump in a wine ocean?

I mean, quite sticky. Swimming as you got progressively drunker would be horrible. Yeah, absolutely. Dangerous for that. One big wave, and you're hammered. Yeah. Cusha, the Associated Ocean. and had a, its flavour was ghee, and then cruncher was curds.

Gee, that's not, that's not a good one. That feels too thick. Shaka was milker, yoghurt, and then Pushkara, fresh water. So that's where Tom would be, because obviously he loves his freshwater swimming. We all know. Famously, he loves fresh water swimming. The milk and yoghurt one has a sort of, that feels custody to me in a way. Good point.

It's in that world. So I think that's my absolute dream. That's your dream. So there's a logic to all of this, and it reflects the habits of truth. or curds or cheese came from northern Europe, so clarified butter from the Middle East. So from our point of view, in the hunt for the mysterious land down under, Australia,

it's worth considering the continent of Shaka or Teak Island, which sits surrounded by an ocean of milk or yogh. Now, whether they meant Australia or not, it's difficult to determine, even if you read the sources very, very closely, but the association with teak wood contains the continent in the islands of Southeast Asia, so today teak is very common.

and in the monsoon forest of Indonesia as well as Myanmar, Thailand and Laos. But Australia is not a natural supplier of teak. So you're like, oh, what do they mean by that? They've got Crozash in Australia and Australian teak. That's native to Australia. But obviously we're dealing with mythology, things are very flexible. Is that what they meant?

Now, the reason we know all about ancient Indian geography is it was written down in a set of texts called the piranha and these piranic texts, the oldest of which date from the first millennium BC, contain all sorts of information about faith and history and rights and responsibilities and politics and mythology and of course geography. That's amazing. So geographical knowledge was spread chiefly through a subset

called the Mayatmia and the Mayatmia were in essence tour guides and they gave information about important sites of pilgrims and other explorers and they detailed what rules you ought to follow so it was a kind of rough guide. Do you remember the rough guide? travelling in the sort of 90s and early 2000s. Lonely planet. You had to have them. Lonely planet, yeah.

It's like a 3,000-year-old Indian lonely planet. Do you know, I threw out my lonely planets about six months ago. It was a real moment. I'd have been hanging on to them. I don't know why, like in case someone gave me a time machine, it'd be about to 2008 Thailand. Was that when you finally lost faith in the world? As the news became too awful, you thought, we've done it.

When I finally decided I'd completed it. But I love Lonely Planet. I kind of missed that. That's one thing the internet is really deprived of self that you'd be able to pick this book up and go, oh, this place is apparently quite good for, I don't know. Well, the problem with the Lonely Planet is that the internet was better, more accurate and more up-to-date.

So occasionally you'd go on holiday somewhere and someone say, oh, I can lend you a lonely planet. And then it'd be the Lonely Planet guide 1991. So you're like, well, this is 17 years ago. All these restaurants have shut. The USSR. Yeah. I remember a friend lending me as copy of Let's Visit Greece, 1989.

I was like, mate, I just, I'm not going to read it. It's a complete waste of my time. My mate led me one which was so old. The Acropolis wasn't yet built in it here. It would just feel to when you went to that page. Things to do. Look at this field. Look at that field.

Exactly. So the Mayapia, you know, these tour guides for travellers, one describes the benefit of bathing in the river Ganges, for instance, which, you know, by its virtue, would purify the soul. So as for Shaka Deepva, which is our mysterious continent, which may or may not contain Australia, we are told various things, not least that Australia, if that is Australia, then it might be a kind of paradise.

There are the territories of the general public, which are very sacred. The people die after a long life. whence is their famine among them whence is the fear from old age and sickness the people enjoy exclusive happiness there is no greediness amongst them nor the eagerness for deception as a result of rivalry and jealousy there is no adversity among them

everything is extremely natural and timely basically they're talking about Adelaide but it that sounds but there are sharp yet there are sharp the funny thing though is that sounds like certainly in the UK post-war conceptions of Australia.

Yeah. As a land of opportunity. And, you know, the 10-pound poms, I had people, when I was doing the gigs, I had people coming up to me after the show saying, oh, my parents or grandparents were 10-pound poms. So, yeah, I'm, you know, I've got relatives in Wales or relatives, you know, in England or whatever, but, yeah, we were 10-pound bums because that was a thing. A lot of 10-pon ponds.

So what does the 10-pound pom mean? So they were British citizens who migrated to Australia and New Zealand after the Second World War. So the government of Australia initiated the assisted passage migration scheme in 1945, then the government in New Zealand did something very similar a couple of years later. So they arranged for assisted passage to Australia on chartered ships and aircraft. And the migrants were called 10-pound ponds because of the charge of a tenor in processing fees to migrate to Australia. Oh, how interesting. So you could get to Australia for 10 quid.

Wow. This description of it being like an idyll, it's interesting because Claire, as I say, lived there. Where does she live? She lived in Perth. Oh, wow. But she talks about the quality of life there just being incredible because obviously the weather means that you finish work and then your evenings would be warm and you'd meet with friends and maybe have food in a garden or it happens to be or maybe you'd go down to the beach in the evening in a way that this isn't going to be the case in Britain. Does sound like good, isn't it? Yeah, and it's just that light, the fact that it's always, well, everyone's outdoors because of the weather. It's a really outdoorsy life. So it definitely

It clearly is a really good quality of life there. Yeah, a few friends of mine from school emigrated to Australia. And they live there now permanently. And are Australian citizens, in fact. Most of my Australian knowledge is gathered from the Australia episode of The Simpsons. Yeah. Where isn't there some sort of incident? And there's a guy in his back garden going,

someone better tell the Prime Minister. And he just shouts over the fence. And the Prime Minister's in the garden next door. Yeah, mate. That's how I imagine Australia. And you haven't chosen to do any further research. Oh, he's such a funny episode though. You call that a knife?

This is a knife. That's a spoon. You've played knife as plainly before. There we go. So, yeah, the ten panpoms were looking for a better life down under. And whether or not the Pyrannic text describe Australia, well, who knows, but they do capture it,

mythic essence as this unknown land of possibility. I love that. I also, I just love whenever you hear about these ancient texts that give advice about the world and you can still read today. It's phenomenal that something that old can still be read today. I just find that

absolutely incredible. Also, the Welsh always come across as mud in these texts. They paint their dicks blue. That's the normal ones. They've got long beards and mullets. They love fighting. They're pissed. all the time and it's really cold. Oh God.

It may not have painted their dicks blue. It's just that is because it's so cold. That's all it is. They may or may not have painted their dicks blue. Wales. The Lonely Planet Guide to Wales 1000 BC. Oh, man. All right.

That's the end of part one. But if you want part two of Australia, you'll get it on Wednesday or you can get it right now. You can subscribe via Patreon. if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, you can subscribe via Apple Podcasts as of right now. So enjoy that, if you want to enjoy that. Otherwise, we'll see on Wednesday. Bye.

Bye. Oh, Water Time is now on Patreon. You can get main feed episodes before everyone else. Add free. Plus access to our full archive of bonus content, two bonus episodes every month, early access to live show tickets and access to the Oh, What a Time group chat. Plus, if you become an O Water Time All-Timer, myself, Tom and Ellis, will riff on your name to postulate where else in history you might have popped up.

For all your options, you can go to patreon.com forward slash oh what a time.