Antofagasta Region average rainfall in the Antofagasta is just per year. From the coast, east to the Chilean Coast Range, is the south-central part of the Atacama Desert, the driest desert in the world. Further to the east, it is part of the less arid Central Andean dry puna ecoregion. The surroundings of abandoned Yungay town have been named the driest place in the world. Most of the population lives on the coast in Antofagasta and Mejillones, or in Calama, Chile in the interior, the hub of the mining industry and the home of a large part of its work force. In
Tourism in the Arab world the "Fertile Crescent", "Eastern Mediterranean", "Syria (region)", "Mashriq" which is the Arabic word for "Levant". The Eastern Mediterranean Muslims, Christians, Circassians and Christian Maronite Cypriots populations speak Levantine Arabic also known as Mediterranean Arabic (شامي). These populations share not only the language, but the geographic position, cuisine, some customs, and a very long history. Geographically-speaking, the Levant boasts some of the most diverse natural features in the Arab World. The Syrian Desert, a 200,000-square-miles wide rocky and flat desert, occupies the center of the Levant and is considered a continuation of the Arabian Desert. To its east lies Mesopotamia, fertile