Phillip Adams asks the big questions of Australia

We’ve been linked together for 84 years so it was about time that I was granted an exclusive interview with our beloved country. Here’s what I learnt from the place we call home.

“Australia looks like a vast pair of buttocks ...”

Although we’ve been close for 84 years, I’d never actually talked to him/her/it. But finally Australia granted me an exclusive interview.

I began by apologising to the country for having in the past commented on the fact that Australia looks like a vast pair of buttocks hovering over the cold toilet seat of the Antarctic, with Perth and Sydney at the hips and Adelaide serving as the sphincter. This is not an image that flatters Tasmania (or Adelaide, for that matter) and for that I apologised.

Anyway, with the air cleared, we got on with the interview. We started with the usual small talk. How was the southern continent feeling? “A bit off,” came the reply. “Hot flushes. No, nothing menopausal. It’s because of climate change. Running a high temperature.” Australia muttered that they should stop digging him/her/it up for fossil fuels and go for renewables. “Much less discomfort. How would you feel having your flesh constantly gouged by coal miners? It’s bad enough being ravished by Gina and Twiggy.” Two more shudders.

Time to placate my interviewee with a gift, I thought. I’d brought the latest demographics. Human population? Nudging 26 million (a figure that caused Australia to give a painful moan – as did the thought of 25 million head of cattle). Then to traditional occupants – with twice as many kangaroos as us. The population of Reds, Eastern Greys and others (here I asked Australia to forgive an unforgivable pun) was leaping. Sadly kangas are topped by 75 million sheep. “Too many mouths to feed,” moaned Australia. I didn’t have the heart to mention a million or more feral camels.

Though it’s impolite to ask someone their age, I couldn’t resist. A huffy response. “About 250 years according to that silly day named after me. Fifty thousand or more according to the Aboriginal people.” No, how old are you, I said. This led to a wandering conversation about Gondwana and other super-continents. “It seems only a few tens of millions of years since I was connected to Antarctica, Africa and South America,” Australia said. Shame about all the painful grinding of tectonic plates – “I’m thinking about getting hip replacements.”

Australia is home to the oldest rocks of terrestrial origin. Found in WA (but don’t tell Ms Rinehart, lest she dig them up and export them), they’re 4.4 billion years old. That’s the same age as our continental crust, I pointed out.

Now Australia’s mood had changed – a vast rumbling that wasn’t volcanic but a purr of pride and pleasure. “You realise,” said Australia. “If I’ve got the maths right that’s about the same age as the Moon!” (In contrast, that heart-breaking Uluru is a recent arrival, some 4 billion years younger.)

We spent the next hour reminiscing about his/her/its younger days, going back to the very distant past. “I’ve seen it all, young Adams,” Australia said. “Climate changes galore, the whole place covered in ice, mega-fires, mega-fauna, mass extinctions. The lot.”

So much for the past. What of the future for Australia? “I don’t think your mob has one. The stats for humans, sheep, cattle, kangaroos and feral camels will be, very sadly, very different – and very soon.”

At which point Australia sighed, stood up and walked slowly, stiffly away.