Recession sets new trends

 

Uhmmm! Imagine Ms. X marries Mr. Y, lives for few years, divorces later. Now she moves out to marry Mr. Z. The days roll, she finds it difficult to make ends meet, pile of bills to be paid, huge credit card statements, loss of job, kids tuition fees and other costs moving northwards, Ms. X grows weary, thinks of an alternate plan, suddenly her face lights up with an offer. The offer by, Mr. Y the old hubby to move along with them, so that he could get to live with the kids born to X&Y and in return fund the life of X&Z. X, Y &Z are happy, even the kids say proudly to folks at school, we live with our mommy and her two husbands. All the parties involved are happy with this tangle. Story ends.

Oh, I am not good at writing stories, no, not even attempted one here, but just made the names anonymous and have written the summary of an editorial from CNN.

The news item says that Ms. Nicole Thompson and her husband moves in with her x-husband due to the hardships they are facing in this economic recession.

Couple of picks from the article,

New husband says,

“We just clicked,” Thompson said. “When I tell people, ‘I’m living with my ex-wife and her husband,’ I get some really strange looks. …It’s different. It’s unusual, but it works.”

Kid says,

Seven-year-old Victoria went back to school after winter break — and after the whole team had blended under one roof — and started telling people this: ” ‘My mommy has two husbands,'” Thompson-Arce remembered. “I was like, ‘No, honey, don’t tell them that!'”

India – Take a deep breath

 

The merry days were gone. According to our registers, we have witnessed boom, prosperity and light, and now paralyzed to observe in this economic downturn, how we would keep the wheels moving as in the start of this millennia and get the mirth back on our faces.

But, there are also people, who are looking for some light and prosperity among this same crowd, which had never been witnessed or heard of. But, they are born with us; live among us and perish before us.

Malnutrition has always been our academic topic and rightfully left behind with old school days. As politicians turn blind eye to the global hard hitting problem, searching records to prove that we actually are not worse, reality amass all dust and hits across our face.

Somini Sengupta expresses that comparing the stats across the most populous states, China has sharply reduced child malnutrition, and now just 7 percent of its children under 5 are underweight, a critical gauge of malnutrition. In India, by contrast, despite robust growth and good government intentions, the comparable number is 42.5 percent. She further argues that the results showed points to the efficiency of an authoritarian state like China. India’s sluggish and sometimes corrupt bureaucracy has only haltingly put in place relatively simple solutions — iodizing salt, for instance, or making sure all children are immunized against preventable diseases — to say nothing of its progress on the harder tasks, like changing what and how parents feed their children.

The 2007 research paper puts that, Childhood anemia, a barometer of poor nutrition in a lactating mother’s breast milk, is three times higher in India than in China. 

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A World Food Program report last month noted that India remained home to more than a fourth of the world’s hungry, 230 million people in all. It also found anemia to be on the rise among rural women of childbearing age in eight states across India. Indian women are often the last to eat in their homes and often unlikely to eat well or rest during pregnancy. Ms. Menon’s institute, based in Washington, recently ranked India below two dozen sub-Saharan countries on its Global Hunger Index.

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Malnutrition

Ban Smoking (in public) ?

We have never run out of auspicious days, to launch a law. Now, we have birth day of Gandhi to re-launch ban on public smoking. FYI we are launching it for the record 3^rd time (in 2001, 2003 and 2008).

Thinking it through, you might consider, this time, the law comes in a handy and attractive package, with bandages applied all around and should be a smart upgraded version. No, not really, it is well the same law ratified by the government and passed many times before.

Union Health Minister says smoking in public is banned. One doesn’t have an idea what qualifies as public places, as it is a highly confusing statement in India, unless detailed. Said, restaurants, offices, libraries, malls, trains, buses, hospital, theatres, auditorium, stadiums, discos and pubs are public places.

Seriously I ask should smoking be banned in pubs. Why does one go to pubs? Meditate and offer prayers? If a passive smoker feels inconvenient about it, shouldn’t be there in the place, first? No one forces him into pubs; he has a better option of buying a can of coke and lays chips and sit in front of his plasma TV at home to chill out. They pay taxes starting every letter of alphabet to pubs to get a drink and smoke, and effectively be in their own comfort zone.

I again get a weird doubt that, Is it sensible to ask smokers, to abstain from smoking inside the buildings and go fag out in the streets, parks, beaches where India has most of its people in. Shouldn’t it really be the other way around?

Again, if the ban is to be imposed, at least for the enforcement of the law on its first week, shouldn’t you be having enough police force ensuring the implementation of law? Have you already mounted ‘Designated Smoking Areas’ and ‘No Smoke Zone; Smoking here is an offence’ board on all the walls of India. Have you already distributed receipts to the guardians of the law, who has to write it, in case of an offence by smoker?

And, do you want me to believe police would sincerely hand over the receipt and pay the money collected to the government? And, you want me to believe, he won’t instead make a quick buck by collecting half the money? And, you want me to believe, hotels and pubs won’t pay a fat cheque to police to run their business without any quandary?

Again, with the timing of this law, don’t we want our police force to stop bombings and stampedes which has turned the order of the day in every city of the country than run around every smoker and impatiently wait for him to light up the stick in his hand which he’s holding for a long time just to tease him?

Niagara – Fall with her !

Those moments in life, you kick on dust with annoyance and whirr yourself that you are leading a black and white life. The moment ticks on, only to see you return to your old school way of living again, accepting the reality. Even if you had wanted to, you are limited by your constraints.

Imagine a way, your holiday goes as set and smooth and the way you want it to roll; you pack your bags up and drive without any distress to those mindboggling mother nature at its divine best, at few hundreds of miles away. If only you could wash away all those gripe in you and rub ice on your heart for a day or two; where you stop thinking your way, and relish how altruistic nature has been to you always!

The real star ....

I had them all, a fortnight back, with couple of my buddies in town. We had planned to hit and rock New York City and pack everything up the following dawn to visit ‘The’ Niagara Falls. The Niagara, which had always been an unusual third partner in most couple’s privacy, who has visited her place.

Pradeep had informed me earlier, we shall drive our way to the Niagara. The drive through valley, mountains and the scenic landscape would be the route to the destination. We clicked loads of photographs with different color tone, scenic mode and much more, ripping through every possible techiee config in the camera. I should definitely mention here, the top-of-the-line camera Ganapathy brought; it was cool discussing the art of photography with him and checking out different location to shoot. We rocked all our way to the trip, finally finding a technique to plug iPod to the aux output of the audio system and soon the beats thumped us; with some outstanding high-range music throwing us out of our seats and setting our body sway, we drenched in even before we hit Niagara City.

We reached the falls exactly by 3 at evening, as Pradeep kept clocking the three figures on the radar consistently on drive. He split the metal out of the pedal and was accurate most of the times, whizzing past every vehicle. It was a perfect match for him to have laid his hands and legs on a SUV, as he chased the time swiftly. I wondered how quickly he got his mode switched to the American way of driving and taught a lot of tricks to me as well while on board. It was truly moments to cherish and to remember almost his thousand plus miles of driving in as less as 60 hours, which was also packed with visiting and staying in two different places. I was quite skeptical at the start as we had couple of minor violations and hiccups, but once he got his eye in, Man! He was unstoppable! But hey! Why should I stop him when he is cruising in his own style! Hitting every city as planned and finally on clear afternoon, catching up the Ms. Gorgeous, when I say, yea, it is the real, bloody, damn, fugging Gorgeous, well, the real fun filled girl if I should match up to!

Pradeep .. turning the wheels !

As we checked in exactly 3 in the evening – the exact check in time we booked online earlier, we gave a moment of ponder to the receptionist keeping her think ‘Are Indians, the most punctual on earth!’ We chuckled after all, and checked in the room. Now, we drove near the Niagara Falls, and walked in with fun all ends up.

Pradeep had a firsthand look at the falls, and were waiting for me and Ganapathy with disappointment, as we were grabbing snack and burger to fill our real hunger. He texted his bro saying we are disappointed.

Standing at the American falls side, we missed to have a look at the Canadian side of the falls which exactly is the abode of Gods! We took a ride up to the abode, in the ‘Maid of the Mist’ tour with doubt.

Little did we know the real rush through the spine, blood and every named part, are to be felt in the next few moments, when the boat started wading through the river. The gushes of fall kept ringing in my ears; where the Niagara River reaches the crest, and cascades downwards at say 50 miles per hour, at the intersection of America and Canada; truly a site to behold and the moment to savor! Now, having entered ‘The’ Horseshoe there was a tranquility that embraced the soul, spirit and mind of one self.

Canadian falls in the background ...

We had an enlightened feeling inside the horseshoe and to give you a glimpse, the horseshoe, known locally, is the River Niagara falling in delight covering herself up on three sides and admitting only you in. Well, If only you could imagine the thrill of being surrounded by falls on three sides and effectively on the other side too with the enormous amount of river fall splashing all over, making its own wall of water, closing the fourth side too. Serene!

Pradeep, texted back, saying ‘She was not at all disappointing’.

The date!

Enough I had notions, uncertainties and marvel on her. Now, I have reached close to her, next, what? Sheesh, I can’t touch her yet, fine, it’s after all a moment for I have waited all along, let me wait a little more.

Finally the moment closed in; yes I touched her on an overcast night. Millions have touched her, but yet she has preserved her sanctity; remained fresh and waiting for me. Others, who had a feel of her, say once you touch her, she embraces, she entertains and she casts a magic wand on you and she does everything you long for. Let’s see what has she got up her sleeve tonight? Gotham, they call her. The Big Apple, they call her. They say she never sleeps. Yes, she is the New York City.

It had always been my dream to rove in metropolis and cosmopolitan cities of the world. Walk slipshod on the sidewalks of the famed streets, cranking heavy metal through my can, full of music pounding my ear drums on a sunny day. Swig in tequila shots, puff a King size fag, and there I am!

New York City is a single case study of a broader phenomenon, urbanization, which has marked the period of modernity and effected shocking changes around the world.

NY Skyline - Spend an evening watching it!

Having stepped out of the car at West 31^st Street, I walked up straight in to the mid-town Manhattan, the economic and cultural heart of the city; dominated by skyscrapers. Grabbed a cappuccino at the next café and headed to the West 42^nd street. It had an atmosphere you will instantly fall for and accompanied by a noise of the city which filled bass in my ears, the sound which had an immense calm in it. I could notice immigrants of diverse ethnicity, creed and race wandering around getting a taste of this city. The entire city is well connected by hundreds of miles of subway rail track, trains cruising underneath. The manhole on the roads emitting smoke, from underground city beneath, was a sight I bemused at.

The incredible thing is that New York looks even better up-close, in person. New York seems to have engendered by its image on the big screen, someone once said that to grasp it “you should not …begin with the city and move inwards to the screen; rather you should begin with the screen and move outwards to the city”; a perfect synonym.

NY City's Sheen

It’s much like movies. It was fun, visiting the Madame Tussauds, the home for celebrity wax figures. You will wonder how this magic of wax artistry could look this real. You can rub shoulders with the Hollywood’s finest, legendary sportsmen, political biggies and all-time pop stars. It’s a star studded morning for me, to talk about my Caribbean knowledge to Johnny Depp, stirring equation along with Albert Einstein, join a fast with Gandhi, play guitar with Jimi Hendrix, hug Jennifer Aniston, hand a blow to Mike Tyson, crack jokes with Chaplin, discuss the next Indiana Jones with Steven Spielberg, join along with Bill Gates cursing Google and last but not least advise on foreign policies to George W. Bush. It was huge sets well classified. Yes, as you might think now, I almost got close to breaking one, but god saved. An hour of looking around the fantasy, I got out now to the real world.

Team work@Madame Tussauds

Walked through the intersection of celebrated streets of Fifth Avenue and West 34^th Street to the Empire State Building and followed stairs. Surprised to see a security check on! Yes, thorough security checks and then had to wait up for another hour to go to the top floor. Well to have finally gotten there up, whoa, I had no words to describe! It was a panorama that got etched in my heart. Having a look around the radiant New York City landscape, I could feel for real everything, see people shop ‘til they drop in the luxury shopping zone of Fifth and Madison Avenues, feel People rocking in the Hard Rock Café, smell the money being made day and night on the Wall Street, discover the orient in China Town, The Broadway Theater that screened AR Rahman’s musical, Times Square, Madison Square Garden, the high profile U.S open live, the NYPD patrolling the city, the headquarters of world’s greatest of brands. All of this grandeur shoe-horned into only a 50 Sq. km goes on to portray the stature of this city.

Snap from the Empire State risking my lovely phone

I was looking at an evanescent, yet lingering New York. An hour of wham-bam serious clicking of photographs and all my shooting skills were out on the floor! Some video recordings followed too! I could spot the Chrysler Building, GE, Statue of Liberty, Brooklyn Bridge, Central Park, Rockefeller Center and all other places of the city and its suburbs. A pigeon sat to the outer edge at the vicinity, and all were spot on shooting pictures of it. Yet it would not look scared but proud, leaving an everlasting wish in us, if only we could be at its place. I could imagine an illusory moment holding the edge of the building from the other side and looking down the ground from fifteen hundred feet. Huah! It sent shiver down my spine.

I left the place ecstatic, and was cooling the heels off for couple of hours in the Jersey City. Picked a PATH train to West 34^th street and was biting a Mac chicken for dinner at McD. Walked in to the Times Square. Times Square with its multicolored stuttering invocation of ebullience looked day light even at midnight. Perhaps, a moment that reminds you are in the city that never sleeps. It is a costliest place on earth to put on display, a digital billboard. NASDAQ with its huge sign, nearly 100 feet high, is known to be paying more than $2 million a year to lease the space.

Pigeon flying high! Whoa, If only I could be there!

You can travel the world just by walking a few blocks within the Times Square area and visiting some of the many fabulous shopping stores, multi cuisine restaurants, musical venue, and big brand corporate offices.

It is a busy intersection of culture and entertainment capturing visitors’ mind to it. Billboards around include Toshiba, Coca Cola, Budweiser, McDonald s, Chevrolet and many others. Times Square acts the head quarters of Morgan Stanley, Ernst and Young, Lehman Brothers, Bain and Company, Thomson Reuters, MTV Networks and dozens more.

The commercial buildings are Macy’s, M&M Store and the hotels include Renaissance, Sheraton, Marriott and the great Hard Rock Café opposite to NASDAQ signs.

Whether you want to call it spontaneity or chaos, there are a million different New York moments that can catch you off-guard and sweep you off your feet.

Times Square at midnight, a pace of life to match!

Constant bustling streets, and tall skyscrapers around, and the complex subway system, no matter how grandiose or beautiful New York’s sights are, their combined scale may seem even overwhelming.

Whether it is the Frank Sinatra’s track ‘new york, new york, I wanna wake up in a city that never sleeps’ or the AR Rahman’s score ‘New York nagaram urangum boathu’ You will walk the feeling all over, in the Manhattan island of the New York City.

It’s not difficult to fall in love with New York. You just have to watch a Woody Allen Film, “Sex and the City” or “Gossip Girl” to see how the city is as much an actor as the others. It has an aura, attitude, sex appeal and grit.

You are the New York City!

A Blood Sucking Canal

In the earlier post, I discussed about the affidavit filed in Supreme Court supporting the Sethu Samudram Canal Project. Congress immediately sensing the political slip-up withdrew the petition the next day. But the smoke after all did not exhaust the same day.

The DMK supremo MK, a well known atheist, aired his views that Ram does not exist and it is just a fictional character as any other cast in stories he writes. He also questioned the wisdom behind the alleged construction of the bridge by Ram, and asked from which engineering college he has graduated through. He did not stop with that either and went a notch up to say Ram is a drunkard too.

There, the smoke was lit in a grand manner and fuelled regularly by him and others. The BJP chief Advani said he appreciates MK being an atheist, but at the same time people at the helm of affairs do not impose their personal opinions on the masses and asked him to withdraw the statement. But MK was quick to reply saying there is no room withdrawing the statement and invited Advani for one-on-one debate on Ramayana.

Now, the issue which all along been regional has spun its wheels all over the nation and lit itself up as one of the most sensitive controversy in New Delhi capable of twitching the throne. MK said, it had been a century plus years dream of the Tamil to have the canal built up and make way to the economical progress. He has said it would be a dream-come-true for the fishermen in the coastal areas and they would immensely benefit out of the project. But the truth holds otherwise.

According to these reports, it is the very fishermen whom they talked about want this project to be scrapped. Then which Tamils dream is it to realize this project? Is it the Tamils of the politician’s family? It also talks about the environmental disaster it would turn out to be, if implemented. Also, the private ships which are expected to pass through the canal has not showed absolutely any interest to use the canal, as it is not a viable option for them to use it and would be better-off without such canal. It’s also reported that as sand continuously move in the Palk straits it is impossible to dig a canal out there. Also, a report stating that widening of Ram-Sethu would amplify Tsunami.

Excerpts from interview with O Fernandez, the co-convenor of CAN and director of the Human Rights Advocacy and Research Foundation.

The Union minister for shipping says that the canal is the 135-year-old dream of the Tamils…

We ask: which Tamils? When the fishing people are opposed to it, you must listen to them. Forget the scientific experts; these fishermen are saying from their experience that when there is a particular volume of noise and a particular amount of sand churning, the movement of the fish gets affected. If there is a canal, the fishing community will not be able to access the sea. So, we are asking, which Tamil are you listening to? Are you listening to the Tamil living on the coast? The government should have undertaken some environmental studies before clearing the project. Because no studies were conducted, no foreign dredging vessel is willing to take part in the project. Now you are depending on the Dredging Corporation of India, which is very easy. Rs 533 crore is being spent on the project. Where is all this money going? The project is not viable scientifically or economically. It is environmentally disastrous. It is disastrous for the livelihood of the lakhs of fishermen living along the coast.

Two years ago, you said you had the support of scientists, environmentalists and the local residents. But when the government went ahead with the dredging, you people couldn’t stop it…

That?s because the dredging ship is protected by the Coast Guard and the Navy and they have been ordered to shoot at sight. So, the fishing people cannot go anywhere near the dredging site. Otherwise, we would have gone and sat on the vessels. Once in Nagapattinam, 500 boats were ready.

You told me then that fishermen would go out in their catamarans and stop the dredging?

But there were shoot at sight orders, and if they went within 3 to 5 kms of the deredging ship, they would be shot at.

Here is a report, which sums up neatly in its subject line itself about this old-school thought of digging up a canal which serves anyone no purpose. It beautifully illustrates the economic incompetency of this project’s scope and the least attraction to the private ship companies which comes through west. Here is an excerpt from the column.

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The Suez and Panama Canals save ships thousands of miles, and that makes them profitable. Sethusamundaram is not remotely comparable. It is designed for small ships (the project documents talk of 20,000 DWT), whereas the Panama Canal takes ships of up to 65,000 DWT and Suez takes ships up to 150,000 DWT.

Global shipping is shifting to ever-larger vessels. Bulk carriers and tankers often exceed 200,000 DWT, and those under 60,000 DWT are being phased out as uneconomic. Old general cargo vessels have been replaced by container ships, which started small but now exceed 35,000 DWT, and may soon touch 75,000 DWT. Such vessels cannot use the canal.

So, Sethusamundaram will be unsuitable for the large vessels of the 21st century. It is a 150-year old idea for 150-year old ships. That may be its epitaph.

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So, with all these inabilities, the least scope for future usage, a disaster for marine environment, the ship carriers opting not to use it, the only purpose for which the canal is being planned, the fishermen who badly wants to stop the project but couldn’t due to shoot-at-sight orders at 3-5km near the project construction site are few parameters, at best it could easily be summed up to one key word, a political motive, than being useful for anyone else.

On financial note, the tax payer’s money Rs. 533 crore is believed to have been spent thus far in a project which would get outdated even before it is updated.  And that tax payer is none but you, me and the people around.

High-Profile Case; Witness Summoned!

Witness Summoned! You know whom?

It’s none other than the Honorable Gentleman; the God himself, he has been muddled into a high profile case, questioning whether he has ever existed or in existence now. The central government filed an affidavit in Supreme Court questioning the authenticity of the mythological text Ramayana or other characters described in it. Here is the link to the column .

Excerpts
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Wednesday’s affidavit filed jointly by Central government, ASI, and other government agencies virtually puts a question mark against authenticity of the epic called Ramayana and even questions whether the incidents mentioned in it including the battle between Lord Ram and Ravana ever took place.
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And ….. Whether Lord Ram ever existed!

In a string of superfluous deeds carried out by Indian Governments in its last six decades, adds another feather to its cap, with the case mentioned above!

I suppose their actual purpose is to mull over the bridge-like-formation, whether it is man-made or not. I seriously don’t have a clue, why on earth they file an affidavit questioning the existence of Ram. Its better they could have restricted their discussion to the bridge than touching upon sensitive topics such as the existence of Ram and others in Ramayana.

Why, the central government with its own reckless attitude jumps way ahead in the context and puts a question mark on the authenticity of the religion? They could have talked lengths and breadths on the bridge’s formation rather than tabling Ramayana under suspicion.

On the other side, I genuinely wish, any scientists from any nation could they prove the main characters of any other religion ever existed on earth? [Ruchir has an interesting take on the subject here] .

Congress, holding its flag of pseudo-secularism in India upright for ages, has hardly done justice when it comes to secular interests of the country. It’s an irony, given that India a homeland of Hindus, its own government appeals in court questioning its religion and the God.

I seriously doubt, whether the same would hold true of Central Government, if the religion in question is other than Hinduism. Then our very own people, who had questioned the existence of Ram, would bend on their knees apologizing to minority people.

After all having clung on to atheism as its ideology all these years, the Tamil Nadu government would not waste this golden opportunity to demolish the structure, which is considered a world heritage. After having suggested six alternate routes for navigation of ships bypassing Ram-Sethu, the government is hell-bent on demolishing the structure. This, at best explains the political wield behind it rather than finding a resolution for it.

Who is an outright speaker than Adam Levine?

If you thought with the subject line, I am throwing up a trivia, not really.  The answer would be none better than him. Adam Levine rolling up his sleeves, informed world about the performance of his former lover in bed, or rather her indoor skills as Telegraph quotes here.

The former lover in this context is Russian tennis player Maria Sharapova. She was quoted, to have been laying like a dead frog in bed and asked her boyfriend to shut mouth too, as it ruined her concentration!

Adam Levine, the vocalist and guitarist, of the album Maroon 5, is one of my favorite who’d done She will be Loved and Harder to Breathe. But, never know the jerk he is, disgracing relationships and who would go on record quoting a point or two in air!

Oh atleast I made it now !

Happy Independence Day, India !

Wishing all the best for your future endeavors!

Thrice Abandoned

A 13-day old baby, suspected to have contracted HIV disease has been passed hands thrice so far.

Amidst concerns, the fact remains she is vulnerable to HIV and has not quite caught one. Now, a final test for confirmation has been planned.

Hope at least the fourth place turns out safe shelter to her.