# Strangest Places Where People Actually Live

An episode of [Be Amazed](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1687637469), 20 Apr 2026, 27 min.

Audio: https://audio4.redcircle.com/episodes/8953e89b-59db-42e6-aca5-ecaf6f3b49b0/stream.mp3

Humans are resilient and can live in all sorts of crazy places. For example, I live in a windowless padded room with nothing but a microphone, the internet, and a bottle... don't ask what I use that last one for. Still, as bizarre as my home is, some are even crazier! From miniscule islands to cities literally brimming with garbage, let’s explore some of the strangest places people actually live. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

## Transcript

[0:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Humans are resilient and can live in all sorts of crazy places.
[0:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: For example, I live in a windowless padded room with nothing but a microphone, the internet, and a bottle.
[0:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Don't ask what I use that last one for.
[0:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Still as bizarre as my home is, some are even crazier.
[0:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: For menace fuel islands to cities literally, breaming with garbage, let's explore some of the strangest places people actually live.
[0:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The first time you hear about men's shirt naiser, it might sound like a dream.
[0:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Situated in sunny Cairo Egypt, men's shirt naiser has a low unemployment, extremely cheap housing, and a populist that self-describes as generally happy.
[1:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The only problem is it used permanently buried in garbage.
[1:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, yeah, can't have it all, I guess.
[1:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: garbage bags, broken bottles, tattered newspaper, discarded plywood, 10 cans of wrappers, only humanity's grind flows freely through Manchyard Nayser.
[1:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The reason this garbage city exists is that Cairo, despite being a major city with a population of 20 million people, never invest in an advanced waste management system.
[1:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because of this, it felt an individual's citizens to dispose of their trash.
[1:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: as the city grew larger, however, residents began to run out of places to dump their waste.
[1:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Manchyard Nacer eventually became the unofficial dumping ground for the city's trash, and the people living there took up the mantle.
[1:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's not uncommon for residents of Manchyard Nacer to go door to door in Cairo collecting trash, which then bring back to their own homes.
[2:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This is led to their nickname, The Sabeline, which translates to the trash people.
[2:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The Zabaline sort through the garbage in order to recycle the glass or use the plastic and collect various other pieces of trash to re-purpose.
[2:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Despite the unglamers work, the Zabaline are efficient, apparently recycling up to 85% of the garbage they sort.
[2:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If true, this makes them more than four times as efficient as conventional waste management companies.
[2:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Unsurprisingly though, illness and poor living conditions are common here in the Zabaline make up some of the poorest people in Cairo.
[2:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This makes moving out difficult.
[2:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you're born here, the idea of looking out your window and seeing anything besides trash might feel like an unattainable dream.
[2:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Treat your garbage man with respect everyone.
[2:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Have you ever wanted to live on a desert island, but just hate sand?
[2:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, let me introduce you to the principality of C-lind.
[3:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: majestic, huh?
[3:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's basically a metal platform of the eastern coast of the United Kingdom consisting of just one acre of surface area, or 0.0015 square miles.
[3:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The platform, formerly known as Fort Russ, is one of several constructed during World War II by the British for defensive purposes, but was decommissioned in 1956 when it was no longer useful.
[3:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Several years later, in 1967, the platform was common-deared by Patty Roy Bates, a former major in the British Royal Army.
[3:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Bates then declared the principality of sealant and dependent from the United Kingdom.
[3:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If taken seriously, sealant is the smallest nation in the world by a wide margin.
[3:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Currently Vatican City is the smallest country consisting of just 110 acres, but that's still 110 times bigger than sealant.
[3:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I said if taken seriously because, well, sealant's independence isn't actually recognized by any nation on Earth.
[4:05] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Right now, only Prince Michael Bates, son of Roy, and his wife, Carl Seelen home, though they admit to spending most of their time in more traditional nations, and I mean who could blame them?
[4:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Their home country is smaller than a football field.
[4:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: While sealant is opened to visitors, you need to be lifted aboard via a pulley and the interior of the fort is pretty modest.
[4:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Despite its ministerial size and population, sealant has many things you'd expect from a real nation.
[4:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The coat of arms, a tourism board, its own currency of the sealant dollar, and even pass boards.
[4:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Which, again, aren't recognized by any nation on Earth.
[4:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sealin' even has its own political turmoil when back in 1978 a band of mercenaries attempted to seize sealin' but were fought off by the Bates family.
[4:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah, really.
[4:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When the invaders were captured, a German diplomat was sent to sealant and negotiate their release.
[5:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Patti Bates delightedly considered this a defecto admittance that sealant was in fact a real country.
[5:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What do you think, is sealant a real country, or just a massive chunk of metal in the ocean?
[5:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Are you ready for some houses that are rock?
[5:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Please enjoy these next few moments before you realize just how lazy that pond was.
[5:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Let's explore the town of Cooper Petty in Australia.
[5:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Half of Kubernetes' population of 2,500 live, underground.
[5:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Houses, shops, and even churches have been slowly dug into this surrounding sandstone bedrock.
[5:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But how did the people of Kubernetes become a real-life moment?
[5:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, it's surprisingly simple.
[5:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Over 100 years ago, Kubernetes began life as a mining town.
[5:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The land there has a mineral-rich bedrock that's full of ovals, which miners flock to trying to make their fortune.
[5:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes when they found a particularly old dense chunk of rock, they would start sleeping and eating near it to make sure no one else claimed their territory.
[6:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Over the years and the further down they dug, this slowly led to the rocky underground society you see today.
[6:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: While opals have dried up a little in recent years, the town still produces the occasional beautiful gemstone.
[6:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: There's another reason living underground suits the people of Cooper Petty though, and that's the weather.
[6:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Cooper Petty can get up to 113 degrees Fahrenheit in the summer and drop to just 33 in the winter.
[6:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Underground temperatures are much easier to regulate.
[6:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This is because while the surface of the Earth is subject to weather and the day and night cycle, the deeper down you go, the less interference there is with the ground's natural temperature.
[6:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In Cooper Vedi underground homes have a nice, predictable temperature of around 72 degrees.
[6:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Benalation shafts allow these subterranean dwellings a steady stream of fresh air too, preventing them from running out of oxygen or getting too stuffy.
[7:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Residents of Cooper Vedi buy and large design their own homes.
[7:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you've got the energy in time to carve yourself out of new gastroom, there's nothing stopping you from doing it.
[7:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: According to Locals, however, this has led to several instances where interposing residences accidentally dug into their neighbor's home.
[7:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Man, I get excited just asking my neighbors to turn their TV down.
[7:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Imagine digging a tunnel into their bedroom.
[7:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sometimes I get tired of the hustle and bustle of modern living and just want to escape.
[7:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I need somewhere remote, somewhere quiet, somewhere isolated.
[7:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And I think I found that perfect place.
[7:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'd like to introduce you to LED Island.
[7:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sorry, that's LED Island.
[7:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: My Icelandic is a little rusty.
[7:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Anyway, this miniscule scenic island is the most northeastern land mass found in the Westman archipelago which consists of 18 islands of the Icelandic coast.
[7:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The entire island measures and it just 110 acres, meaning it's about the same size as the previously mentioned smallest recognized nation on Earth, Vatican City.
[8:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Despite all this space, Eladay Island is home to one single solitary residence, which summed up the loonliest house in the world.
[8:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: dramatic name aside, the domicile is not actually a permanent dwelling.
[8:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Also, it wasn't built by a billionaire as a zombie apocalypse safe house, it isn't the vacation home of musician Bjork, or any other wacky internet rumor you might have heard.
[8:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The truth of the lonely house is that it was constructed in 1953 by a local hunting association is temporary housing for hunters.
[8:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The island is home to puffins, which, because they're not
[8:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's sure how appealing a Puff and Burger sounds.
[8:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But for the era of this lonely hunter's lodge, however, Elidae was home to five entire families.
[9:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: These families survived by fishing and raising cattle, but the last of them left the island in the 1930s.
[9:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: While the lodge has no permanent residence, it still contains many rooms and can do rent it on a nightly basis.
[9:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You'll have to figure out how to actually get there though, along with finding anything to do once you are.
[9:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You always start puffin' hunting, if you're a monster that is, can you imagine having a bedroom that's the same size as a casket?
[9:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, welcome to the nightmare that is living in one of Hong Kong Shubak's abartments.
[9:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: These are some divided housing units taken to the extreme where dozens of people live in a single room.
[9:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Each tiny apartment can be a small as 15 square feet.
[9:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's a tenth of a standard parking space.
[9:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Even Hong Kong's prisoners live in roomy yourselves and Stanley Prison, prisoners live in 80 square foot cells five times the size of some shoebox apartments.
[10:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: L.M., they're packed together, too.
[10:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Floors is smallest 400 square feet about the size of a regular two-bed apartment in New York and house up to 18 people.
[10:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This means these apartments often extend only as far as a mattress, which explains why there's sometimes called coffin apartments.
[10:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: To live this way residents of these miniature apartments my store their belongings on hoax or shelves, sometimes dangling from another bed above their heads.
[10:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And some shoe boxes, tenets, might be lucky enough to have walls between their units.
[10:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Some only have a wire mesh like dog grades.
[10:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: A what led to these awful creations?
[10:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, in Hong Kong, real estate is a precious commodity.
[10:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This is because only one quarter of Hong Kong
[10:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This means there is a huge demand for property and the people who own property in Hong Kong have realized that splitting it up into tiny chunks then running it out is very profitable.
[11:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: After all, white charge one family for one apartment when you could charge 12 people live in the same space.
[11:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: and speaking of cost, you might think that units this tiny would come cheap.
[11:15] \[SPEAKER_00\]: However, even a shoebox apartment can cost 1,300 Hong Kong dollars per month.
[11:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, that only equates to around $166 US dollars, keeping mind that the minimum wage in Hong Kong is roughly $765.
[11:28] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So almost a fit that their earnings go on renting these super small spaces.
[11:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: As of 2023, there are some 220,000 residents living in subdivided housing like this.
[11:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The Hong Kong government has declared that it intends to make housing a priority in N-Shu Bog Som's by 249.
[11:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So, just enough time for two more generations of kids to grow up in them.
[11:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Great.
[11:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It may surprise you to learn I'm an avid rock climber.
[12:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah, turns out years of playing World of Warcraft and surfing the web have actually given me pretty incredible grip strength.
[12:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Still, even with my impressive skills I can't imagine living in our next location, the hanging temple of Hingshan in Shangsi, China.
[12:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It is basically an enormous tempo, clinging to the edge of a cliff face, approximately 246 feet above the ground.
[12:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The structure is held aloft by hundreds of bars and poles that have been dug into the side of the cliff.
[12:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Winding passages carved into the rack itself lead to different rooms and areas of the temple structure.
[12:39] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This is both a stylistic and functional design decision.
[12:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The height of the temple protects it from flooding, while the cave lake and teary are protected from harsh wind and sunlight.
[12:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The exterior of the temple is mostly wooden with some stonework.
[12:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: These rudimentary materials along with general signs of aging place its construction somewhere between 386 and 534 CE, and is said to have been built by one LOMUK, Namelau Rad.
[13:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Ha ha, that's true, just imagine that dude's upper body strain.
[13:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Interestingly, rather than being dedicated to a single faith, three separate religions are represented within the temple.
[13:20] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism.
[13:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's unclear whether the temple was originally constructed to be multi-denominational or whether it changed to accommodate additional faiths over time.
[13:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Even today, monks of each faith caught the temple home and practice their beliefs there.
[13:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The temple was, in a state of disrepair for centuries, however, in 1900, a collective effort was made on behalf of the Chinese people to restore it to its former glory, which is why it's opened a visitor's today.
[13:50] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Imagine convincing a group of people to spend their time in money restoring an ancient Chinese temple.
[13:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I can't even get my roommates to pitch in for pizza.
[13:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah, if you don't get out much, sometimes the building you live in can feel like the whole world.
[14:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, imagine how the residents of Whittier, Alaska, must feel because their entire city is located inside us in Gullbilda.
[14:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This unusual town began life as a large US naval base in the 1950s, but was abandoned in 1966 when it was no longer strategically useful.
[14:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In the years that followed that abandonment, what year slowly transformed into its own living ecosystem as people moved in.
[14:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It was purchased by residents in 1973 and a day as a population of approximately 214 people.
[14:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The 14-story single roof town has everything you could want from your local community, including general stores, a postal service, a hospital, a church, a laundromat, and even a hotel.
[14:49] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The school is in a separate building across from the main residence and is connected via an underground tunnel.
[14:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: While this may seem like a cruel way to deprive winning your kids of fresh air, it's actually for their protection.
[15:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Outside, Whittier can drop to just 24.8 degrees Fahrenheit in the winter.
[15:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yes, you have to make the choice between your hair big stuffy or freezing.
[15:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If a resonance wanted, they could move into the nearby Buckner building, but considering it's been abandoned since 1966, I imagine it's a not-less homey than what they're working with now.
[15:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Some folks even say it's haunted, but I had a reputable information manga would never claim that.
[15:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you want to visit your in-for-a-real journey though.
[15:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The only way to reach Whittier is through a one-lane one-track tunnel dug into the surrounding rec formation which is over 13,000 feet long.
[15:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: By day it's eroded by night it's closed on to allow trains through.
[15:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: On top of that, the nearest other town to Whittier is Anchorage, which is a 63-mile journey along the Seward Highway.
[15:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: While that may sound like a pain, it's a journey the general store proprietors need to make every week to keep their shops applied.
[16:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Suddenly, my 20-minute McDonald's run doesn't seem so bad.
[16:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Located off the coast of Colombia, you'll find a tiny, beautiful, and, uh, corrupt little getaway.
[16:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Santa Cruz de la Lote is one of the world's most densely packed islands, with a population of approximately 600 people spread throughout just two and a half acres of land.
[16:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The reference to the entire island could fit inside London's Troufflegar Square, and they'd still have room for a few of those giant lion statues.
[16:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: and a moderate pace walking from one end of the island to the other takes just two minutes.
[16:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This might be a tight fit life on the island sounds pretty nice.
[16:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The residents have elected to have no police wars dealing with crannies of community on the ground since it occurs.
[16:52] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Everyone is incredibly close-knit gathering every Wednesday from music and dancing in the town square.
[16:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: One major problem you may have blocked however is the island's lack of access to fresh water.
[17:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The honor in the middle of the ocean after all, this means the town's folk are reliant on a single seller of bottle water who has a monopoly on the basic human necessity.
[17:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Furthermore, industry and jobs are fairly limited on the island, so if you have big dreams, you're gonna have to leave eventually.
[17:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Another more macabre to escape the island is, uh, dying.
[17:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The island is so small, there's no room for a graveyard, so many bodies are shipped
[17:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's what you call the burial at sea.
[17:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Another tiny, densely populated island is that of Mangingo and Lake Victoria, Kenya.
[17:42] \[SPEAKER_00\]: According to Ugandan police, Mangingo Island houses around 500 people, which doesn't sound so bad, until you realize they're working with only half an acre of land.
[17:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: About the size of four basketball courts.
[17:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Being situated in a lake, the residents of Minging-Go don't have to worry about access to fresh water, but do have to worry about political turmoil.
[18:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You see, while Minging-Go might be tiny, it makes for an excellent port and has unique access to Lake Victoria's fish.
[18:13] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This is led both Uganda and Kenya to claim ownership of Minging-Go.
[18:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: with both countries attempting to tax its poor residents.
[18:22] \[SPEAKER_00\]: For now, the island is officially Kenyan, but if I live there, I find this whole situation cluster of phobic in more ways than one.
[18:31] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Next up, about 62 miles south of Tokyo, Japan, and a night at all, ominous region of the ocean called the Devil's Sea, you'll find the small island of Miyaki,
[18:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It enjoys idyllic scenery, quiet beaches, a close-knit community of around 3,000 people, and deadly toxic gases oozing out of the earth.
[18:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Sounds lovely.
[18:55] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The locals are always wearing some creepy masks, so do you want to know why?
[18:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, Miyaki Jima just so happens to be located near a straddle volcano.
[19:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: These volcanoes are serious business, the souviest and cracker toa, which were responsible for two of the most devastating eruptions in history, were all so straddle volcanoes.
[19:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Nearby, Mount O'yam, hopped periodically releases enormous concentrations of sulfur dioxide.
[19:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: This gas is heavier than air and while small amounts can be tolerated to a degree, prolonged exposure leads to a fixiation.
[19:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Following a particularly volatile eruption in the year 2,000 around 3600 residents, which was most of the Ellen's population at the time, evacuated.
[19:43] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But then, five years later, some decided to return.
[19:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In fact, of the 3600 evacuated residents nearly 2800 decided to go back to the Poison volcano island and the Devil's Sea.
[19:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Talk about stubborn.
[19:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: As the island's gassy nature is so unpredictable and dangerous, residents of Miyaki-Gima are required to carry gas masks with them at all times, and, yes, I mean, at all times.
[20:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Whatever there's even a whiff of something stanky in the air, warning Siren start blaring all over the island.
[20:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Resonance then dawn their mass in, carry on with their lives.
[20:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: What do you think the world is gonna grind to all just because of some deadly toxic gas?
[20:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Resonance of the island live relatively normal life's farming, going to school, getting married, they just need to mask up from time to time.
[20:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you want to visit the island, you'll need to buy a gas mask too, and it's advised you take a respiratory medical exam prior to your arrival just to make sure your lungs can take it.
[20:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Considering just eating smoky barbecue sauce makes me wheeze, I think I'm gonna have to pass.
[20:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Have you ever gotten to work on it to find the elevators out and you have to climb four whole floors to get to the uffis?
[20:58] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I still have nightmares.
[21:00] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, it's a good thing I don't work at Fanging Chon.
[21:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm getting a nosebleed just by thinking about it.
[21:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Situated in mids China's ruling mountains, Feng Jing Shan or Mount Feng Jing is a distinctive formation of two tall narrow and lush green peaks.
[21:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: At the top of these peaks, sits the magnetic Feng Jing Temple.
[21:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: While the temple is a holy site for Buddhists, the date of its construction along with the exact group responsible for it and how they live there is a note.
[21:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Buddhism spread throughout the region during the Tang Dynasty around 639 C.E.
[21:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: But that doesn't really narrow the construction time frame down as then still hundreds of years.
[21:45] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Around 1100 people live in the lower area around the temple and while it's open to visitors, it's mostly occupied by caretaker moths.
[21:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you want to pay your respects, be prepared for a dizzying journey as the temple sits 8,432 feet above sea level, making it the highest point in the mountain range.
[22:07] \[SPEAKER_00\]: To get to the top, you need to traverse a trail consisting of a glute busting 8,000 steps, which would be the equivalent of climbing 381 floors in a standard building.
[22:19] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And at that height, the view is sort of fably magnificent.
[22:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's probably why the temple was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1986.
[22:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: As impressive as that is, is anyone else out of breath just thinking about it?
[22:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Now, I've heard of a small town being called the Pits.
[22:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, this next town with a giant hole in the middle is quite literally the PIT.
[22:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: A Russian PIT to be specific.
[22:47] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The story of how it came to be takes us back to 1955 in the heart of what was then the Soviet Union.
[22:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: 3.
[22:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Soviet geologists were out here hunting for Kimberlite, which is a blue-tenged rock that sometimes contains trace amounts of diamonds.
[23:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Instead of a few rocks, they discovered one of the largest natural diamond deposits in the Soviet Union.
[23:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: news quickly spread of the Diamond Ridge soil which led to a small settlement called Meernie forming in the area that eventually grew into an entire town.
[23:18] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The giant hole in the center of the town is the result of the Diamond Mine expanding outwards over the years.
[23:24] \[SPEAKER_00\]: By the 1960s, Meernie was producing 10 million carrots or
[23:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Unfortunately, this diamond mine dried up in 2011 leaving the locals with a great big hold-and-evigate.
[23:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's the second largest man-made hole in the world measuring in at a staggering 1,722 feet deep and 3,900 feet wide.
[23:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That makes it three Washington monuments deep in 11 football fields wide.
[23:56] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's one serious thing.
[23:59] \[SPEAKER_00\]: In fact, the Mereney hole is so big that there's actually somewhere it's a flight risk.
[24:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's because if a hole is deep enough and the Mereney mine is certainly deep enough, the Earth begins to warm the air inside it.
[24:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: As warm air rises, the hot earthy air displaces the cooler air above the hole.
[24:17] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's theorized this air movement could potentially interfere with or even suck small aircraft like helicopters into the hole, but it's never been proven.
[24:26] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So remember kids next time you think your town sucks, just remember me and me.
[24:32] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And lastly, Centralia Pennsylvania is a humble little town nestled amidst the state's great hills.
[24:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It's quite serene, but it's most interesting quirk is that it's constantly on fire.
[24:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: It all started back in 1962 when Centralia was an unremarkable town with a trash problem.
[24:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Residents were using a band in mine pits as garbage dumps and trash was still boiling up.
[24:57] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The city council proposed for moving all this garbage by burning it.
[25:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Unfortunately, this trash fire burned down into an abandoned coal mine.
[25:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: As it turns out, Centralia was built atop an enormous deposit of natural coal seams, which the spreading fire ignited, and has been burning ever since.
[25:16] \[SPEAKER_00\]: If you're thinking, hey, the fires underground, no big deal, you're dead or wrong.
[25:21] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Also, you should never be in charge of health and safety in any form.
[25:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: The underground fire is still burning to the extent that smoke literally seaps out of the ground, which contains high levels of carbon monoxide, and odorless gas that's deadly to humans.
[25:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: As you can imagine being above a fiery Hellscape did not prove advantageous for Centralia's infrastructure or its residents.
[25:46] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Rhodes and buildings sink into the ground around right collapsing as the years rolled by more people moved away.
[25:53] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Eventually, Barricades were placed around the town to discourage anyone from visiting or driving through Centralia, as entire sections of roads sometimes vanish into smoky seagulls.
[26:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Estonishingly, however, not everyone has abandoned Centralia.
[26:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: When the fire began in 1962, the town boasted a population of some 3,000 people.
[26:14] \[SPEAKER_00\]: As of the most recent census, just five people remain living in Centralia making it almost but not a complete ghost town.
[26:23] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So why do these people stay?
[26:25] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Maybe they enjoy the isolation or just do old and stubborn delete.
[26:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Maybe the census accidentally pulled a bunch of ghosts.
[26:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Whatever the reason though, it seems Centralia will eventually become a shell of its former self.
[26:38] \[SPEAKER_00\]: before disappearing into the ground entirely.
[26:41] \[SPEAKER_00\]: So, not exactly a seller's market.
[26:44] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Well, there you have it, a collection of truly crazy places to live.
[26:48] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Could you ever call any of them home?
[26:51] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Thanks for listening, and I'll see you next time.

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