Bihar Floods - How to Help

The Central Government of India has sanctioned Rs. 1,000 crores (US$ 228 million) to be released from the National Calamity Contingency Fund; the European Union announced that it is sending food aid and other relief materials worth 1 million euro (US$ 1.5 million); Britain has diverted 150,000 pounds (US$ 273,000) of an existing fund to provide clean water, shelter and sanitation to 10,000 families in up to 20 camps; and the US has offered US$100,000 to the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund (which has yet to account for the funds to be used for survivors of the Tsunami in 2004) for immediate assistance to the flood victims in Bihar.

There are the usual calls to donate money to the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund or the Chief Minister’s (of Bihar) Relief Fund.  There are also urgent requests from NGOs for volunteers, food and other relief supplies, and donations.

Those in the US can make tax deductible contributions to Association for India’s Development’s (AID’s) All India Relief Fund or to Goonj, for their Rahat Floods program.

AID is a “volunteer movement committed to promoting sustainable, equitable and just development” in India.  AID will be focusing on the following in Araria, Bihar:

1. Rescue operations.
2. Providing food, medicine and shelter.
3. Fodder for animals.
4. Removal of carcasses.
5. Safe drinking water.
6. Monitoring expenditures by the State.

Goonj has been working extensively in Bihar through its grassroots partners, with a special focus on the annual floods for many years now. Anshu Gupta, the Founder/Director of Goonj has asked for the following:

Material Support Dry ration, Medicines, candles & matchbox, torch & batteries, utensils, tarpaulin, feeding bottles, buckets, ropes, bedsheets, all kind of usable clothing & footwear. ( For the list of collection centers, please log on to www.goonj.info)

Logistical Support

• Transport support to reach the material to effected areas
• Space for collection centers
• Facilities for local pickups
• Transportation of material from different cities to GOONJ processing centers in Delhi, Chennai & Mumbai
  

Needed- large quantities of –

• Rice, Chiwra, biscuits, packed eatables
• Water purifier tablets
• Basic medicines
• Sarees and children’s clothing
• Tarpaulins or thick polythene
• Bedsheets
• Export surplus/cotton cloth for making sanitary napkins
• Mosquito nets
• Stoves, cooking and water storage untensils/buckets
  

Financial support-

Donations in India- Please send cash/cheque/draft in the name of GOONJ and send it to GOONJ.., J-93, Sarita Vihar, New Delhi- 76 (Kindly send your full name & address with the contribution for receipt/accounting purpose. ( All donations to GOONJ in India are tax exempted u/s 80 G of IT act.)

Overseas donation can reach us through Cheque (in the name of GOONJ with your full particulars) or by wire transfer with an information on yasmeengoonj@gmail.com

Rotate it ( valid only for overseas donations ) through Wacovia Bank, New York swift code- 2000193008933, GOONJ, A/C No- 2591101004644
Bank- Canara Bank, H block, market Sarita Vihar, New Delhi- 76
Swift Code- CNRBINBBDFS

Contact- GOONJ

H.O Delhi-J-93, Sarita Vihar, New Delhi- 76 Tel.- 011-26972351, 41401216

E-mail- goonjinfo@gmail.com, anshugoonj24@gmail.com

GOONJ Mumbai- Mr. Rohit Singh Tel.- 9322381600, Email- rohitgoonj1@gmail.com

GOONJ Chennai- Ms. Padma Tel.- 9842665320, Email- padmagoonj@gmail.com

“Do spread the word, talk to your friends & relatives, help us to organise campaigns in the offices, residential areas and schools.”

A team led by Pervin Jehangir, Medha Patkar and Raj Kumar will be heading to Bihar soon and are looking for the following:

Immediate Relief Needs:

• Clothes: In Good condition, for adults and children of all ages, – bed sheets, woolen clothes, umbrellas, rain coats etc.
• Medicines: A list of the requirements is attached
• Financial help: Necessary. Please withhold for a very few days, until we are able to give you the account details of where the money must be sent.
• Volunteers: We would also need to have many young and active volunteers, who have the experience of working in situation of calamity (such as Tsunami,. earth quake etc).

“We will soon be leaving for Bihar with a team. Those who want to volunteer and are willing to work hard, in a situation of challenge and adjusting to whatever conditions are most welcome.”

The medical list includes:

Ciprofloxacin tablets and infusion

Levofloxacin tablets

Chloromyecetin capsules and injections

Ceftriaxone Injections

Chloroquine tablets and injections

Metronidazole Chloroquine tablets, suspension and infusion

Paracetamal tablets and suspension

B Complex tablets and syrup

Phensedyl DM cough syrup

Ranitidine tablets and injection

Antacids tablets and suspension

Cetrizine tablets and syrup

Ibuprofen tablets

Dexamethasone injections

Hydrocortisone injections

Deriphyllin injections

Electrol, Glucose and ORS Powder

You may contact Pervin Jehangir, Medha Patkar and Raj Kumar at the following numbers:  022-22184779, 09820636335, 07290-222464, 09424385139

Bihar: Let Them Eat Rats

“Eating of rats will serve twin purposes — it will save grains from being eaten away by rats and will simultaneously increase our grain stock,” said Vijay Prakash, an official from the state’s welfare department.

This statement, reported by Reuters and carried widely by many news agencies on 18 August 2008, seems even more absurd in the wake of the worst floods Bihar has seen in 50 years. Estimates range from 2 to 2.5 million displaced as remote villages in the poorest state in India were inundated by water when an embankment on the Kosi River burst near the India border in Nepal on 18 August.

Jitan Ram Manjhi, Bihar’s Caste and Tribal Welfare Minister, said rat meat was a healthy alternative. “We are very serious about implementing this project since the food crisis is turning serious day by day,” said Manjhi, who has eaten rats.

And if exhorting Biharis rich and poor to eat rats to mitigate low grain stocks and rising prices was not insult enough, it seems that state and central authorities are partly responsible for the breach in the Kosi River.  According to an editorial in the Hindustan Times on 27 August, under a 1954 treaty with Nepal, India is responsible for the safety and maintenance of the river’s embankments.

The pressure on the embankments of the Kosi River from heavy silt build-up was reported by Indian and Nepali water engineers in 1997, who predicted a major disaster should the embankments collapse.

Officials now report that villagers are eating uncooked rice, flour or cornmeal mixed with polluted water as they have no means of cooking the food.  No mention of rats.

Road Trip

Duffey Lake, Sea to Sky Highway, between Lillooet and Pemberton, BC

Listening to the news or hearing the weather reports on CBC radio always brings me face-to-face with my ignorance of the geography of British Columbia (and of the rest of Canada, for that matter).

“A 33-year-old man has been identified as the victim of Wednesday’s fatal shooting in Chilliwack…”

“Rain forecast for the Peace…“

“The Peace”  -  what or where is that?  Chilliwack?  (Love that name!) “Where the heck is Salmon Arm?” I ask.  Mark shrugs and says, with a guilty look on his face:  “we really need to explore BC.”

So, when a friend from Burnaby (the neighboring town to the east of Vancouver, and part of the Greater Vancouver Regional District, or Metro Vancouver) brought us two maps from AAA, one of “Greater Vancouver” and one of “Alberta/British Columbia”, we decided to drive to a conference that Mark was contemplating attending in Edmonton, Alberta (the neighboring province), stopping for reconnaissance visits to Jasper and Banff National Parks.

Our route:

Day One, 1:30pm.  We got onto the Trans Canada Highway (Hwy. 1) at Burnaby and traveled west, through the other Vancouver suburbs of Coquitlam, Surrey, Langley, and Abbotsford, and past the city of Chilliwack(!), to Hope (population 6,667).

From Hope, we veered northwest on the Coquihalla Highway (Hwy. 5), which follows the Coquihalla River, passing the “town” of Merritt to Kamloops, an ugly, industrial “city” (population 79,000 - 10 times the size of Merritt (population 7,595) and just slightly larger than Chilliwack) located in a beautiful setting surrounded by rivers (the confluence of the North and South Thompson Rivers, lakes (Kamloops Lake) and mountains.  (Most of our route followed river valleys dotted with lakes.)

From Kamloops, we headed west again on the Trans Canada Highway, passing Chase, Sorrento, Salmon Arm(!), and Sicamous (houseboat capital of Canada), stopping for the night at the beautiful  town of Revelstoke, in Mount Revelstoke National Park.

Revelstoke, Mount Revelstoke National Park, BC

Day Two.  After breakfast at the Modern Cafe in Revelstoke, we continued on the Trans Canada Highway, through Glacier National Park, passing Golden and Field (in Yoho National Park), and crossed the border into the prairie province of Alberta (”Wild Rose Country”), stopping for a look-see and late lunch at Chaya, a mom & pop Japanese noodle joint in the town of Banff, in Banff National Park.  Moving on, we passed the town of Canmore on our way to Calgary (the largest city in the province of Alberta and home of the Calgary Stampede).

Buses in Banff, Banff National Park, AL

From Calgary (without stopping), we took the Queen Elizabeth II Highway (Alberta Hwy. 2), passing the town of Red Deer (where Tib, in his younger days, shot his first moose), to Edmonton, where we spent the second night.  From our hotel room in downtown Edmonton (the only night we did not sleep in our rented KIA Rio), we could see the night lights of the oil refineries across the North Saskatchewan River.

Day Three, 5:30pm.  After the conference, we left Edmonton via the Yellowhead Trail (Alberta Hwy. 16), past vast stretches of forests and farmland (mostly hay) and the town of Edson to Hinton, where we stopped for our third night.  Had dinner at the cute-looking Olympia Greek Restaurant, where, alas, our meals tasted like airplane food.

Day Four. Foregoing another meal in Hinton, we entered Jasper National Park around 10am and went in search breakfast in the town of Jasper. Sadly, the sweet and savory goods at the Bear Paw Bakery did not measure up to what you can get at the bakeries we frequent in Vancouver. Got some maps of hiking trails around Jasper from the historic Jasper Information Center and decided to do a short hike to Patricia Lake, via Cottonwood Slough.  Took a quick swim in the buff in Patricia Lake before heading back to town and hitting the road.

Jasper Information Center Historic Site, Jasper, AL

Patricia Lake, Jasper National Park, Alberta

From Jasper, we took Icefields Parkway (Hwy. 93) south along the Athabasca River, stopping to see Athabasca Falls and past the Columbia Icefields, into Banff National Park.  In Banff National Park, we stopped at Bow Pass (the highest road pass in the four mountain parks) for a brief hike up to view glacier-fed Peyto Lake before stopping at the fabled Lake Louise.

Peyto Lake, Banff National Park, Alberta

From Lake Louise, we picked up the Trans Canada Highway again and headed back to Revelstoke for dinner.  Another disappointing meal, this time at Nomad Cafe, recommended for its “fresh” food.  Instead of spending another night in Revelstoke, we decided to continue driving, past towns we had already seen in the daytime, to Kamloops.  From Kamloops, we headed north on the Cariboo Highway (Hwy. 97), skirting Kamloops Lake, stopping at the intersection of the roads to the Savona Dump and the Savona Cemetary for the night.

Savona, BC

Day Five.  From Savona, we continued on the Cariboo Highway, passed dry brush and sage bushes, to just north of Cache Creek, where we picked up the Sea to Sky Highway (Hwy. 99), heading south.  Instead of stopping at Lillooet for breakfast, we pushed on to Pemberton, where we had yet another disappointing meal at the Pony Espresso. Another stop in Whistler Village, where we watched the charming and amazingly talented trial rider, Ryan Leech, give a demonstration of his skills as part of the Crankworx mountain bike festival.  Then down through Squamish and the breathtaking views of Howe Sound, through North Vancouver, across the Lions Gate Bridge, and back home by early afternoon.

All in all, a spectacular drive.  You can skip Calgary and Edmonton and go as far as the Canadian Rocky Mountain parks on the Continental Divide just past the border of British Columbia into Alberta - a network of national and provincial parks that are listed as one of the UNESCO World Heritage sites.  Most of the highways follow river valleys, from which you are rewarded with views of pristine rivers and lakes.  There are lots of well-documented sites where you can stop along the way to learn about the regional geography, flora and fauna.

Big Horn Sheep, Icefields Parkway, Alberta

We were lucky enough to see some big horn sheep and mountain goats (all without their winter coats) along the Icefields Parkway, and just missed a siting of a black bear cub near Jasper (eager and foolish tourists chased the cub away from the road).  Along the Trans Canada Highway, I saw one white-tail and one mule deer.

Mountain pine beetle damage, British Columbia

One sight that stayed with us throughout British Columbia was forest upon forest of brown trees, devasted by the infestation of mountain pine beetle.

Other points of interest?  Radio stations and their frequencies are listed as you approach towns on the Trans Canada Highway.  All garbage and recycling containers are bear-proof, and bear warnings abound. And Revelstoke, Jasper and Lake Louise have excellent public toilets located in the center of town.

So now, I know where Chilliwack and Salmon Arm are.

“The Peace?”  The Peace River Regional District is an area in northeastern British Columbia, closer to Alaska than it is to Vancouver.

Bike Valet

Bike Parking at Vancouver Folk Music Festival

As preparations were underway for the Vancouver Folk Music Festival that took place this past weekend in nearby Jericho Beach Park, I wondered at the rows of metal barriers set up at the entrance to the Park on West 4th Avenue.  Were they meant to funnel festival goers through ticket lines?  On the afternoon of the 18th, it all became clear - the barriers were set up for supervised bicycle parking.  How wonderful!  If last year’s travel patterns are indicative of this year’s 10,000 daily festival attendees, 32% will have walked, ridden bikes, or been passengers in automobiles. (Last year, 17% took the bus, and 51% drove.)

Celebration of Light - Canada

Yesterday, I learned of Bike Valet, a secure bicycle parking service being offered free at several festivals and special events in Vancouver this summer by BEST (Better Environmentally Sound Transport).  This year, BEST is providing Bike Valet at a total of six events and festivals in Vancouver, including at two viewing locations for the Celebration of Light, a fireworks competition that takes place in Vancouver every year.

Celebration of Light - Canada

This year’s competitors for the Celebration of Light are Canada, the U.S. and China.  Yesterday, Canada started off with a spectacular display based on the theme:  Attack, with Godzilla featuring prominently in the beginning of the show.

Archaeological Dig Next Door

Archaeological Site

Two weeks ago, I was wakened by voices that seemed to be coming from just outside my bedroom window.  Startled, and feeling a bit vulnerable, I got up to find a group of about 5-6 people in the front yard of the house next door.  I went out to investigate and the leader of the group came over to verify the boundaries of the property next door. (Our two properties are probably the only two in all of Vancouver that do not have a fence or hedge between our front lawns.) Robin, the leader, wearing a Simon Fraser University T-shirt, explained that he was heading up an archeological dig of the front lawn of the property, and introduced his crew, composed of members of several First Nations.  They had divided the lawn into quadrants and were setting up to take samples from each quadrant.

First Dig

The house, which had been in the same family for 100 years, was sold last year to a woman named Dorothy.  Apparently, she wants to tear down the existing house and build something closer to the street, in the location of the existing front yard.  Because this area was inhabited by First Nations people of the Indian Arm - the Squamish and the Musqueam, the City of Vancouver requires an archaeological survey before any building applications are accepted.

Second Site

Unfortunately for the new owner, the team, which grew to 9-10 by the end of the first week, found two sites of significance containing stone implements and other evidence of settlement. The team is now working on a report. Then comes the “long process” of negotiations with the First Nations and the City of Vancouver.

Knit 1, Purl 1

Moss Stitch

I taught myself to knit in 1981, after graduating from college and while living at home with my parents in Scarsdale until I saved enough money to move into a studio apartment in Brooklyn Heights.  It was that, or watch golf on TV, in the basement, with my parents, after work in the Finance Department of an insurance company on Wall Street.

Knitting Know-How - Pages 163 to 171

Starting with page 164 of Knitting in Vogue, which gives step-by-step instructions on how to cast on using several methods (I started with the “thumb method” and have never learned another way) to page 171, which completes the various ways of making up the finished pieces, this book started me on my way to five years of knitting obsession.  Every trip to Italy (there was always a stop in either Milan or Rome) entailed a visit to Filatura di Crosa and the purchase of bags of luscious, sophisticated, sometimes designer, yarn.

My first sweater cost me over $240 in 1981 dollars!  My friend Ellen had the exact same experience with her first sweater:  of walking into a yarn store (in my case, in Scarsdale), picking up a beautiful, soft skein of yarn (in my case, a heather colored wool/angora mix), asking the sales woman how many skeins you needed to make a sweater, taking the yarn that you have completely fallen in love with to the cash register, being shocked beyond belief that the yarn cost $200, and paying more than you have ever paid for a sweater by a LOT (in my case, several multiples) because you are too embarrassed to return the yarn and pick something cheaper. Of course, the total bill was more than that because I also bought a pair of knitting needles.  Once I had finished the pieces of the sweater, I had to go back to the store because I didn’t understand how to “block” the pieces and didn’t trust myself to “make up” the sweater.  The sales woman took pity on me and told me she would block it for me (even though they don’t normally do that) and make it up for $40.  I meekly paid that exorbitant amount, again embarrassed to take it back and try and do it myself.

I soon became quite proficient, to the point that the proprietor of a boutique in the new South Street Seaport, asked me to knit custom sweaters for her. Apparently, she couldn’t find anyone who would knit argyle sweaters or vests.  I took the challenge, but quit 4 sweaters (3 argyle) later.  Knitting for someone else had taken all the creativity and pleasure out of knitting.  (My last sweater was an Irish fishermen’s sweater for a man who had a size 50 chest and one arm longer than the other.)

Baby Blanket in Moss (or Seed) Stitch

All my knitting paraphernalia and three boxes of sweaters, tank tops, vests, and cardigans are now in Vancouver. Inspired by my soon-to-be niece, I opened the big box of needles and yarn and found some fun cotton yarn that I had purchased for $1.98 a skein in 1985 from the New York Yarn Center.  I had 8 (of 16) skeins left, and figured that doubled, I could get a decent-sized baby blanket.

I had to teach myself to cast on all over again (it’s been over 20 years since I’ve picked up knitting needles!).  Luckily, one of the few boxes of books we have unpacked contained Knitting in Vogue. I decided to use a “moss” or “seed” stitch - the stitch I used for my very first ($240) sweater.

Baby Beanie in Garter Stitch

Seduced by the instant gratification of making itty-bitty things, I bought a (one!) skein of cotton yarn and got two beanies (the first one looked too big) out of it.  Unfortunately, I had to do a lot of math before making the first beanie because the gauge for the yarn I had chosen was different from the one in the pattern I had borrowed from the Vancouver Public Library.  I have no idea if these will fit any babies - how big are their heads anyway?

The Poorest in India Paid Over $220 Million in Bribes in 2007

On 28 June 2008, Transparency International India (TII) and the Centre for Media Studies (CMS) released a corruption study for the year 2007 with a focus on “BPL households”.

The study estimated that Rs. 8,830 million, in all, was paid as bribe by BPL households in the last one year, in availing 11 public services. It is estimated that the poorest households of our country paid Rs. 2,148 million to police as bribe.
From highlights of “TII-CMS India Corruption Study 2007“

India has a lot of categories for her people, particularly those in the bottom strata of society. These categories are set up, presumably, to provide certain benefits to the marginalized population. (The controversial reservations system in higher education and government jobs is one example.) There is a National Commission for Backward Classes (NCBC) that is in place “to safeguard the interest of Backward Classes”. This is the most fungible of the categories, (unlike “Scheduled Castes” (SCs) and “Scheduled Tribes” (STs)) and the NCBC has published guidelines on how to be included in “Other Backward Classes” (OBCs) as well as a central list, by state, of the names of the castes, sub-castes, synonyms, and communities that currently make up OBCs.

Cutting across all these classifications is the category “Below Poverty Line” or BPL (most likely composed of OBCs, SCs and STs). The highlights of the TII-CMS study does not define BPL, but in the 1970’s the government of India (GOI) determined that you were poor if your total income fell below the cost of providing 2,400 calories of food per day per rural citizen and 2,100 calories per day per urban citizen. (Dilip D’Souza, writing in India Together, explores what this means in A thin Indian line.) In December 2005, this translated into Rs. 368 (US$ 8.56) per person per month for rural households and Rs. 559 (US$ 13.00) for urban households. That is less than Rs. 13 (US$ 0.29) and Rs. 19 (US$ 0.43) per day, far less than the US$ 1.00 a day used by the World Bank to measure extreme poverty. Mohan Guruswamy and Ronald Joseph Abraham, of the Centre for Policy Alternatives, call the official poverty line (currently 26% of the population) the “starvation line” in their report Redefining Poverty: A New Poverty Line for a New India because this amount is just enough to consume calories, without taking into account nutrition, or any other basic needs, such as drinking water, shelter, sanitation, clothing, and access to education and health care.

These are the people who had to pay an estimated Rs. 8,830 million (over US$ 220 million) in bribes last year to get access to basic and “need-based” services, including the very services specifically set up to alleviate their poverty, such as the Public Distribution System and the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS). (Corruption in the NREGS has been highlighted by the recent murders of two social activists conducting social audits of its implementation in the state of Jharkhand.)

The services and the amount paid in bribes for access to these services, are outlined below, in the order of amount paid. This number is not higher because many people could not pay bribes or did not have “contacts” or influence to get access to services. About a third of the BPL households did not have a “BPL Card” or “ration” card.

Police - Rs. 2,148 million (US$ 53.7 million).

Housing - Rs. 1,566 million (US$ 39.15 million).

Land Records/Registration - Rs. 1.234 million (US$ 30.85 million).

Electricity - Rs. 1,040 million (US$ 26 million).

Hospital - Rs. 870 million (US$ 21.75 million).

Banking - Rs. 831.7 million (US$ 20.8 million).

Public Distribution System - Rs. 458 million (US$ 11.45 million).  The Public Distribution System is a social security measure to distribute subsidized food grains and fuel to BPL households through “ration” shops.

Water supply - Rs. 240 million (US$ 6 million).

Forest - Rs. 240 million (US$ 6 million).  Forest services are primarily used by Scheduled Tribes who live in and around designated National Forests. (When a forest is declared a protected habitat, STs who live in the forest are removed and charged a fee to enter the forest in order to maintain their forest-based livelihood or to gather fuelwood.)

Education (up to Standard XII) - Rs. 120 million (US$ 3 million).

NREGS - Rs. 70 million (US$ 1.75 million). The National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme guarantees one able-bodied member of a family 100 days of work at the prevailing agricultural rate or, if fixed by the Government, a minimum rate of Rs. 60 per day.  BPL households have had to pay bribes to register, get a “job card”, get selected, and get paid!

These numbers do not take into account the travel costs and lost wages of visiting an office more than three times and dealing with the absence or non-availability of staff, lengthy procedures and multiple form-filling.

The TII-CMS study recommends a four-pronged drive to reduce corruption:

1. Simplification of procedures.
2. Streamlining of information flows with the help of IT tools and e-governance initiatives.
3. Reorientation of front-end staff to the sensitivities of dealing with the BPL households.
4. Additional civil society activism.

I’m not holding my breath.  Besides a couple of headline grabbing, simplistic summaries of this report, I haven’t read any reports of outrage.  It’s business as usual.

Happy Canada Day

Canada Day Fireworks off West Vancouver

Lingering smoke from soy honey marinated barbeque

Haze from California fires abet the night as gray overwhelms blue

Glimpses of gold from an illegal fire shine through camouflage of bodies

Identical fireworks over Coal Harbor and West Vancouver from Spanish Banks beach

Summer Treat

Coffee granita with vanilla bean ice cream

Summer has finally arrived in Vancouver. We have now had a week of sunshine, with weather in the 80’s (Fahrenheit). Radio weather announcers pinch themselves and utter un-jinxing spells before they say: “And the forecast for the weekend… do I dare say it… is sunny.” And the little weather icon, which shows the sun, partially covered by a cloud with raindrops falling from the cloud, keeps moving to the day after tomorrow every day.

After an afternoon walking around Gastown with two friends from the San Francisco Bay Area, I was inspired to make coffee granita based on this ‘wikiHow‘. The addition of a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream made for a perfect summer dessert.

Salmonberries

We have been (and are still) anxiously awaiting the blackberry harvest here in Vancouver.  We have some big plans for those blackberries - gobbling them up as we pick them, over ice cream, cobbler… can’t wait…

Then, two weeks ago, our friend Ellen Bermingham reported a mother and two kids picking berries in Pacific Spirit Regional Park during her afternoon run.  What were they doing?  It is way too early for blackberries.

On Saturday, we saw what looked like yellow raspberries while hiking in Capilano River Regional Park with Tim Ryan and Rissa.  And yesterday, Mark saw several groups picking what turned out to be salmonberries on his mountain bike ride through Pacific Spirit Park.  Aha!  Salmonberries (rubus spectabilis).  Who knew?

Today, we grabbed what containers we had and hopped on my scooter to go berry picking.  A mother and two kids (perhaps the same ones that Ellen saw?) were already at one spot close to the road.  We forged on further ahead, wading into thorny thickets yet untouched.  We found both the yellow and red fruit - enough to fill the three containers that we had brought, hoping that we had at least 6 squashed cups worth.

The flavors are very delicate - the yellow different from the red.  The juice runs clear.  There is no discernible smell.  (Mark describes the smell as “forest”.)

We emptied out all the jam and mustard jars we had, sterilized them, decided on a fruit to sugar ratio, boiled the fruit with sugar and pectin, filled the jars, boiled them once more to create a vacuum seal and viola - our first attempt at jam.