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different.
    'How different?'
    'Just - different.' I did not wish to be explicit, which was perhaps a mistake.
    If you were unversed in history, you might wonder that anyone endured all these demanding travel conditions. The fact is that, given the chance to travel, people will endure almost any amount of discomfort and danger to get to a new place. Such has been the case throughout the history of mankind.
    Also you must remember that an epoch was drawing to a close on Earth. There was no longer the promise of material abundance that once had prevailed. Not through exploration, conquest, or technological development. The human race had proved itself a cloud of locusts, refusing to curb their procreative and acquisitive habits. They had sucked most of the goodness from the globe and its waters. The easier days of the twentieth century, with individual surface travel readily available, were finished.
    So for the young, us YEAs, harsh Martian conditions were seen as a challenge and an invitation. The experience of being on Mars, of identifying with it, was seen as worth all the time spent in community work and matrix travel.
    But somehow, with me ... well, it was different. I guess I just took longer to adjust. It was something to do with my personality.
     
    We have the testimony of an early Mars visitor, Maria Gaia Augusta (age twenty-three) on video. Her report says: 'Oh, the experience must not be missed. I have ambitions to be a travel writer. I spent my YEA community service in the outback of Australia, seeding and tending new forest areas, and was glad to have a change.
    'At the back of my mind was a decision to gather material on Mars for knocking copy. I mean, Mars was to me like just a shadowy stone in the sky. I couldn't see the attraction - apart from curiosity. But when I got there - well, it was another world, quite another world. Another life, if you like.
    'You know what the surface of Mars is? Loneliness made solid, rock solid.
    'Course, there were restrictions, but they were part of the deal. I loved all the fancy-shaped domes they're setting up in Amazonis Planitia. In the desert, in fact. They put you in the mood of some Arabian Nights fantasy. You get to thinking, "Well, look at the frugal life the Arabs used to lead. I can do that." And you do.
    'I did the compulsory aerobic classes during my R&A period after we had landed, and got to enjoy them. I had been a bit overweight. Aerobics is weird in lighter gravity. Fun. I met a very sweet guy in the classes, Renato, a San Franciscan. We got along fine.
    'We enjoyed sex in that light gravity and maybe invented a few positions not in the Kama Sutra. Mars is going to be left behind in a few years' time, when we settle the moons of Jupiter. Sex will really be something out there, in real low gravity! Meantime, Mars is the best thing we got in that respect.
    'Me and Renato got on the list for a four-body expedition beyond the domes. Four-bodies were then the standard package. I know it's different now. Two-bodies were considered too dangerous, in case one body got ill or something. Not that there are all that many illnesses on Mars, but you never know.
    'We didn't go madly far, just to the Margarite Sinus, towards the equator, because of fuel restrictions, but that was enough. Of course, every little four-body had to have a scientific component - the buggy was like a small lab, complete with cameras and electrolysis equipment and I don't know what-all. Radio, of course, to keep us oriented, and listen out for dust storms. We were exploring the canyons in Margarite and we came on a great wall of rock, rubbed smooth by the wind. Me and Renato were seized with a mad idea. We slipped into suits - you have to wear suits - atmosphere there was about 10 millibars, compared to 1,000 millibars back on Earth. Any case, you couldn't breathe it. We got these paints from the buggy store, climbed outside and began to decorate the rock surface. The other couple joined in. There we