Nauru

The first country I’m going to learn about is Nauru, simply because I’d never heard of it until I looked through a list of all the countries of the world.

Nauru is an island nation in the south Pacific, and has a population of around 10.000. The capital is Yaren.

It was settled by Polynesian & Micronesian people at least 3,000 years ago, but Europeans found it in the 1760s and called it Pleasant Island. In 1900, they discovered phosphate reserves, which were the result of prehistoric sea birds pooping, and from there proceeded to mine the crap out of it. The environment is currently all wrecked because of mining, and the unemployment rate is 90%. Though Nauru had one of the highest per capita GDPs in the 1950s, the economy went down the tubes in the 1980s because phosphate reserves were depleted, so for a few years in the 2000s, the economy was based on being a tax haven and money laundering place for Australians.

Bottom line: Beautiful tropical island messed up by colonialism.

FUN FACT: The native Nauruan language is not related to any other Micronesian languages.