Garcia Marquez also illustrates magic realism with the description of his characters. In describing Melques, he says, "He is a fugitive from all plagues and catastrophes that had ever lashed mankind" . This a very difficult statement to believe, but Marquez continues: "He had survived pellagra in Persia, scurvy in the Malaysian archipelago, leprosy in Alexandria, beriberi in Japan, bubonic plague in Madagascar, an earthquake in Sicily, and a disastrous shipwreck in the Strait of Magellan" . Once again, he is able to make unbelievable ideas seem possible.