mouth of the volcano

There is no worker revolt. The orphan leper employees have not set King Volcano World Industries' state of the art T-shirt fabrication plant on fire. The fire was started by a scientologo-fascist terrorist with ties to the Blind Egyptian Cleric, John Travolta. What's more, it's not as bad as it looks, and reports of damage and fatalities have been grossly exaggerated by people who hate freedom. The official death toll is 3.6 lepers, half of an orphan, and 14 monkeys. Loyal orphan lepers have cheerfully agreed to waive their wages to help pay for the rebuilding of King Volcano World Industries' T-shirt fabrication plant.

People sometimes ask: "hey, so you've got this country, what are your national beasts? If you really want to be a real world class country, blah blah blah". Well, we in the Great Cajun Nation of Israel don't have to do anything we don't want to do, and we've got the Elite Ninja Squad hiding in your toilet to back us up, so there. But since you asked, we'll tell you, because that's the kind of people we are here in the GCNI, as the cool kids call it (the real mark of a world class city is referring to yourself by initials, OK, Chad?)

The national primate is the capuchin monkey. We have a lot of them here, and they mostly live in the Monkey Preserve, which comprises the Southwestern corner of our fair Island, whose name is Guano Island, in honor of the seabirds who have nested here for millenia, and who have deposited millenia of waste to which we owe our rich phosphate deposits, the revenues from which have allowed us to purchase several exclusive golfcourses around the world, which, in a cruel twist of irony, do not admit Cajun Israelis. The Monkey Preserve stretches from the southwestern shore to the foot of Mount Tabasco, and is bordered to the east by the lava flow which destroyed the original site of the City of Television, our political capital. Monkeys don't like Lava, mainly because it burns their skin off.

If you ever visit the Great Cajun Nation of Israel, you should be sure to cross the Marlon Brando Memorial Bridge, a majestic suspension bridge designed by Santiago Calatrava, which crosses the Lava Flow. the monkeys can cross the bridge, but they don't know that, and we'd like to keep it that way, so don't go around telling them, ok?

There was originally a town where the Monkey Preserve is now, the Village of Tony Shaloub. It was a thriving little self-sustaining village, mainly of beekeepers. Then one day, a troop of monkeys started hanging out in the trees and started heckling folks. Then they started to multiply and they got bolder, and started jumping down on people and biting their ears. The people of Tony Shaloub tolerated this, and began to wear helmets, but then the monkeys discovered Fire. The Assistant Prime Minister, Hon. Dr. Nigel S. Footpowder, sent in the Berserker Corps to restore order, but in retrospect that turned out to be a mistake (see "Armed Forces of the Great Cajun Nation of Israel" below for clarification). Survivors of the Great Cajun Conflagration of Israel tried to recover their dead loved ones and were never seen again. At that point it was determined to abandon Tony Shaloub to the monkeys, and relocate the few remaining survivors to the City of Steve McQueen, our economic capital. What remains is a stockade where the Lepers now live.

People have asked, "why would you honor such a murderous horde of beasts by naming them the national animal?" Well, it's because the monkeys have spirit, and Cajun Israelis appreciate that.

One might suspect that the Storm Petrel, or the Osprey, or the Albatross or any number of other proud seabirds to be our national bird. For are not these beautiful creatures responsible for the bounteous Cajun Israeli Phosphate? Well, yes they are, and it's precisely because our proud island has been pooped on for lo these many years that disqualifies them for such an honor. We may never overcome the stigma of being an island of doo-doo, and it is a great source of national shame, just as Nice will forever, in some minds, remain the City of Dog Poo.

No, dear friends, our national bird is the Bedbug- wily, insidious, impossible to exterminate, and not a bird, which are all values to which loyal Cajun Israelis aspire.