空旷的四分之一 · THE EMPTY QUARTER
The Largest Emptiness on Earth — Arabia · Rub' al Khali
鲁卜哈利——意为「空旷的四分之一」——是地球上最大的连片沙漠，约 65 万平方公里的沙丘，严酷到几乎无人居住。而它的地下却藏着「空」的反面：1948 年，世界最大的油田在它边缘被发现。
历史上多数时候，空旷的四分之一是一片要绕行、而非穿越的虚空——沙丘如山般起伏，水井相隔数日路程，于是聚居只攀附在阿拉伯较湿润的外缘。后来钻头探到了黄沙所藏之物。正是这份「空」，让庞大的油藏得以形成、静卧无扰，而沙漠的边缘成了地球上最富庶的地方之一。
The Rub' al Khali — the 'Empty Quarter' — is the largest continuous sand desert on the planet, some 650,000 km² of dunes so harsh it is virtually uninhabited. Beneath it lies the opposite of emptiness: in 1948 the world's largest oilfield was found at its edge.
For most of history the Empty Quarter was a void to be skirted, not crossed — its dunes rise like hills and its wells are days apart, so settlement clung to the wetter rim of Arabia. Then drills reached what the sand was hiding. The same emptiness that kept people out had let vast oil pools form and lie undisturbed, and the desert's edge became one of the richest places on Earth.