India’s Dying Beaches

I almost feel as though I am in Pondicherry.  The vicarious excitement and stress of trying to keep up with the sudden barrage of media stories and activities initiated by NDTV’s coverage of “The Death of India’s Beaches” has my adrenelin pumping as I try and support our colleagues at PondyCAN.

On 28 May, 2009, Probir Banerjee, PondyCAN’s President, was interviewed by Prannoy Roy of NDTV, fulfilling a promise Roy made months before to take up the issue of coastal erosion.  Realizing the magnitude of the problem, Roy initiated a state-by-state coverage of the issue in a series called “India’s Dying Beaches.”

Ayudha Puja in Pondicherry

Ayudha puja at Renaissance Workshop

The people of Pondicherry celebrated Ayudha Puja on 8 October 2008, the 9th day of Navaratri (30 September to 9 October this year).  Durga puja is called Ayudha puja in the southern states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh. Ayudha puja is “worship of the weapons” – which in common terms is translated into implements and tools.

Father and daughter washing a scooter

People clean their houses and wash all the implements and tools of their trade, including their vehicles.

Doorway decorated with palm and banana fronds

People decorate their homes, offices and other places of work as well as their vehicles with palm and banana leaves.  The youngest palm fronds are cut and shaped into decorations. Unfortunately, most people now also use “modern” decorations, including colored crepe paper.

Mark and I were invited to two puja celebrations – one at the carpentry and furniture refinishing workshop of a friend (where we had the best food we have had to date in Pondicherry – the carpenters/cooks were from Bihar) and the other at the Shuddham office.

Snigda Marries Bapoorau

Bapoorau and Snigda in full regalia

On the morning of 3 October 2008, Snigda married Bapoorau at the Sivakami Amman temple, off the Sivaganga tank, of the famous Nataraja temple in Chidambaram, Tamil Nadu.

Snigda, pre ceremony

Getting changed at the Sivakami Amman temple

During the ceremony; Bapoorau shows off his well-inked arms

Non-traditional mauling of the bride

By the temple tank

Toe-ringed - it's official now!

Everyday Hero – C.H. Balamohan

C.H. Balamohan

On 30 September 2008, C.H. Balamohan retired as an Assistant in the Education Department of the Government of Puducherry (GOP). After 40 years in government service, Balamohan should have been an officer – a Director or at least a Deputy Director of the department.  However, his promotions were suppressed by the GOP because of Balamohan’s work on behalf of the government employees – he only had 2 promotions in 40 years.

Balamohan is a quiet, unprepossessing person.  He suffers from diabetes, at times bed-ridden and unable to walk.  He wears khadi and carries a cloth sachel.  He gets around town on a scooter. Yet when he sees any kind of injustice, he becomes a changed man.  Put a bullhorn in front of him and he can inspire and rally thousands of people.

In 1979, Balamohan began his fight for the rights of the government employees, forming and acting as President of the Ministerial Staff Association (he was part of the Ministerial cadre in the Education Department).  From there, he went on to help form other government employee associations in the Education Department, Health Department, etc.  At his retirement, he was Honorary President of the Confederation of Pondicherry State Government Employees’ Association, consisting of 100 employee associations.

India Hot

Mark and I landed at Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai, India in the early morning of September 25, 2008.  On a hunch, I asked a Korean Airlines representative at baggage claim if there was a shuttle to the Domestic airport for our flight to Chennai, dreading the haggling with taxi drivers at 2am.  Much to my surprise, the representative gave me specific instructions on how to get to the free shuttle:  “make a right after clearing customs.”  “How long has this shuttle been in service?” I ask the people at the counter.  They gave me the “what kind of idiotic question is this” look and huffed:  “over a year.”  Well, blow me down.

Even at 2:00am, the shuttle took 20 minutes, negotiating the crowded tarmac at a slow crawl.  We arrived at the Domestic terminal to find that our flight time had been changed from 4:55am to 5:40am; there were no free seats in the terminal area; and the Cafe Coffee Day lounge did not open until 3:00am.  No matter.  We were happy to be in the terminal as opposed to in the 86 degrees F streets at 2:30am.

It wasn’t until we reached Pondicherry at around 11am that the distress of 90 degree heat and 86 percent humidity hit us.  Since then, brief showers yesterday and the day before yesterday have done nothing to cool things down or reduce the humidity.  It is now 91 degrees, but “feels like 102 degrees” according to Weather.com.  Life exists only under a fan.

I suppose our discomfort is more acute given the 4 months of cool and even cold weather we had in Vancouver this summer.  That plus the extra pounds we gained from eating extravagantly over the last 6 months.

I hope we adjust quickly or it is going to be a long two months before the weather cools in December.

Information Management System Wiki for Bihar Flood Relief and Rehabilitation

A small group of individuals who work at the Planning Commission (Gunjan Veda, Officer on Special Duty; Harsh Agarwal, Consultant; Priyanka Mukherjee, Consultant; and Ruth Zothanpuii) have put together this information mangement system wiki for Bihar flood relief and rehabilition.

It includes telephone numbers for government officials as well as helplines by district and for medical care, links for statistics, pictures, and news and analysis, as well as a list of organizations working in relief and rehabilitation, with details of their area of operation and contact people and numbers.

One important piece of information is on how NGOs can send relief materials:

Relief material from any part of the country can be booked by various NGOs/Trusts, organisations and Government Agencies comprising National Disaster Management Agency in favour of District Magistrates of Purnea, Saharsa and Katihar. It will be transported free of charge by the Indian Railways. Control Rooms for assisting in relief material transportation are functional at the Railway Board and at all zonal and divisional headquarters of Indian Railways. People interested in sending relief material can contact the General Managers of Zonal Railways and the Divisional Railway Managers

If you are an NGO working in the area and your name is not mentioned in the list of organizations involved in relief and rehabilitation, please send the following information to gunjanveda@gmail.com or g.veda@nic.in

Name of Organisation:

Contact details and web address, if any:

Contact person:

Area of operation: (names of villages/ relief camps/ districts):

Focus areas, if any (e.g. health, women, children):

Collection points:

List of materials/ services being collected:

Specifications for cash donations:

Any other information:

Single-point Resource for Bihar Flood Relief and Rehabilitation

Karmayog, a list-serve and resource based in Mumbai that connects like-minded people working to improve their worlds, has put together the most comprehensive, single-point source of information of all organizations working in rescue, relief and rehabilitation in Bihar: http://www.karmayog.org/biharfloods/

Do check this out if you are looking to help – it is more complete than my previous post.

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.