Apt for Earth Day: how the poor have to live off the garbage!

So, first it was Foreign Policy with this photo essay on the rag pickers of Dandora, in Nairobi, which is the focus of this piece where the author notes:

Dandora is a symbol of a larger problem: Even as Kenya touts continued economic growth and cultural influence -- including proudly hosting the Nairobi Securities Exchange, the financial hub of east and central Africa, and regional headquarters for the likes of General Electric, Google, Coca-Cola, the United Nations Environmental Program, and U.N.-Habitat -- its poorest citizens have been left behind by their country's rise.

A new constitution, accelerated advances in information and communications technology, East African Community integration, and the discovery of oil have many optimistic that Kenya will continue to be the regional powerhouse economy. Nearly two thirds of Nairobi's population, though, will continue to live in the city's slums.

How tough it is for the typical person working through all that trash for a livelihood? A 42-year old mother of six says:

Working here is how I am able to feed my children. Of course it is not a usual job. Dodging pigs, used condoms, eating what I find; no, it's not good for me. But it is a job and I have to persevere.

Of course, Dandora is not unique at all.  Unfortunately, there are plenty of such places all over the world, including India, which is the focus of this LA Times report:

The children didn't notice the ravens and occasional vulture circling overhead, or the stream of black ooze that flowed nearby, or the inescapable stench of decay. They were squealing over a 4-cent ride on a small, hand-powered Ferris wheel.

The kids are growing up in New Delhi's 70-acre Ghazipur landfill, a post-apocalyptic world where hundreds of pickers climb a 100-foot-high trash pile daily, dodging and occasionally dying beneath belching bulldozers that reshape the putrid landscape.

On "trash mountain," families earn $1 to $2 a day slogging through waist-deep muck. But the residents also marry, have children on their dirt floors, pray and celebrate life's other milestones.

As I noted in this blog post, I had observed similar rag-picking everywhere in the city.  It is a tough life, as the LA Times report adds:

Pickers complain that even now they can't keep pace with rising food costs.

"I manage to make enough to feed us," said Habibullah, as a small boy walked by naked except for flip-flops. "But I can never get ahead."

The more ambitious are no longer content to wait for belching garbage trucks, so they head into neighborhoods to get higher-quality waste from residents, earning more money.

Every once in a while, when such discussions come up in classes, the wide-eyed idealistic youth find such happenings intolerable.  They want to get rid of all these.  I then ask them what alternatives might exist for the poor?  Then they begin to wonder.  I then further drive home the point with the following video commentary from Nicholas Kristof:



We have no idea how phenomenal life is when we do not have to struggle for existence that way, and we rarely pause to thank for the life we have.

Photo of the day: on "unhate"

I was simply delighted when I saw this while walking through the Benetton store at New Delhi's Connaught Place:

More here on Benetton's campaign

"Delhi was smoggy" is a dog-bites-man story

In preparing for the trip to India, I had packed a couple of long-sleeve t-shirts, two sweaters, and even a beanie, because I knew I would be traveling to places in India that would be a lot cooler than Chennai.

Perhaps even to the Himalayan foothills. Or to the hilly northeast.

I didn't go anywhere near the northeast, and not quite near the Himalayas either.  But, I did end up at places where the overnight low was nine celsius, one of the nights I was in Delhi.  A few days before I was there, and later too, the lows dipped all the way down to 5C (about 40F.)

Those of us who can afford to, well, we wear warm clothes and stay in heated rooms.  But, others who cannot?  Especially the ones who live in slums or out on the streets?

I would imagine that the guy sitting by a smoky fire to warm himself up was not an unusual sight at all.  I saw him at about five in the evening.  Thanks to living in Oregon, I have become so much used to cooler temperatures that I was walking around with a pair of jeans and a short-sleeve t-shirt on, which invited a lot of strange looks.

But, at five in the evening, it felt like the temperature was perhaps about 60F (15C) and this was quite comfy to walk around. By nine, when I stepped out, I had a second layer of a longer-sleeve t-shirt also on.

I can imagine life to be tough for those on the streets as it cools down.  Which is why this older man was sitting by a fire at five in the evening.  The morning earlier, at about eight, as I was walking through the narrow streets towards the Jama Masjid I saw many numbers of men--yes, only men--sitting in groups around fires right by the roadside, holding their palms over the flames.

Everyday life is tough when poor.

With such fires, all the auto exhaust, industrial pollution, ... should we be surprised then the Delhi sky was so smoggy that my throat was always itchy and I had to take anti-histamines?

I was reminded of the inverted "U" curve: the environmental quality seems to deteriorate as a country's economic growth and development takes off, and then begins to improve at a later stage.

So, we can only hope that India, and the poor Indians in particular, will get rich soon.

General Schwarzkopf in New Delhi. Am not kidding!

I was a seasoned graduate student during the 1991 war that was led by papa Bush.  It was the war when we became familiar with "Stormin Norman" Schwarzkopf.  For a couple of years after that, the old general was in the news and then, like all old soldiers do, he too faded away.

I had since forgotten the name Schwarzkopf.  Until my visit to New Delhi!

Yes, all the way on the other side of the planet, I am reminded of the general.  In a very strange context, which had nothing to do with America or war or anything along those lines.

It was a beauty salon sign that was the responsible agent.  Yep, beauty salon :)

I was walking around in a distant suburb of New Delhi, appreciating how well-planned this suburb was compared to most areas that are quite messy because of the incremental nature of the built environment.

There were all kinds of formal stores, and informal hawking.  People, especially youngsters, were out and about, checking on the prices and chatting all the time with one another and on their cell phones.

As I looked up, I saw a board "Schwarzkopf Professional Hair and Beauty Salon."

To some extent, I can imagine an Indian walking around with the name Schwarzkopf.  During my early years in Neyveli, there was a classmate whose name was "John Kennedy" because his father was so impressed with the American president.  There was a ball-boy/tennis assistant at our local club whose name was Franklin Roosevelt.  Maybe somebody was impressed with the general's war success that he named his son Schwarzkopf?

As I often remark in this blog and elsewhere, nothing ever surprises me in India.  Anything is possible in this complex society. 

Like even this interesting juxtaposition of an arty version of the Hindu god, Ganesh, with signs on streetlight posts in the background advertising Apple and Blackberry products.

I spotted this Ganesh in an art studio in the middle of all the commercial and touristy hullabaloo at Connaught Place.  A few steps away from a McDonald's was a stairway with a sign for an art exhibit/studio.

Intrigued, I walked up. 

This Ganesh was one of the many arty paintings and sculpture pieces that I saw there.  It was eerie that I was the only person there, other than a guy who was going over some files.  I don't think he was reviewing General Schwarzkopf's war record!  But then, I can't rule that out either :)

The Qutb Minar in Delhi reminded me of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind"

I always knew that the Qutb Minar would be a stop for me if and when I were to visit New Delhi.  A fascination for that goes back all the way to my middle school days, which is when we started learning about India's history.  Strange is life that while I have been to so many places on this pale blue dot, it has taken me decades since those middle school days to finally go to New Delhi.

The taxi driver nodded his head when I told him that Qutb Minar was my next destination.  We kept driving for much longer than I had anticipated--based on the map of Delhi that I carried with me.  And then, from afar, I spotted the sight that was so familiar from all the readings; I started clicking right through the car windshield.  "Drive by shooting" as my daughter refers to it :)

I was more excited than how my dogs were whenever they heard the sound of the dog food can being opened :)  I couldn't wait for the taxi to be parked and to rush out.

Rush out, I did.

I had no idea that the Qutb Minar complex was that extensive.  The moment I stepped past the ticket gate, I knew it was a good thing that I had an appointment already lined up, thanks to which I would have to force myself to leave by a certain time.  Else, I could have been there for hours on.

As has become my practice, I first walked around the periphery, far away from the main attraction.  I soon came to the incomplete structure--Alai Minar.  If this itself is so fantastic, then the Qutb Minar would be way, way awesome, I told myself!

Oddly enough, when I stood facing Alai Minar, it didn't trigger any imaginations of life a thousand years ago, but ... of Richard Dreyfuss creating a shape like this in the movie, "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" and, therefore, my memories of incidents from my life when I got to watch that wonderful movie in Chennai more than thirty years ago.

I had to force myself to keep walking.  It is crazy that life is too damn short, and some days are very, very short!

Eventually, I ended up viewing, and taking photos of, Qutb Minar from so many different angles.  Not once did I get bored with the sights.  My favorite of them all was this one:

I looked at the time in my cell phone; it was time for me to leave,  Was reminded, yet again, of Robert Frost's poem, and I, too, had to tell myself that I had miles to go.

I headed out after one final look at the structure one last time.  All good things do come to an end; such is life :(

I almost gave berth during a train ride :)

I reached the railway station at Lucknow a couple of minutes before 5:00 in the morning.  Yep, that early in the day, in order to board the train to New Delhi.

No sign of the train--the Gomti Express, which departs from Lucknow.  I double-checked the board, and I was at the correct platform after all.

I wasn't sure whom to ask either, given that I was in an alien territory. 

I walked up and down the platform, and spotted a young guy of college-going age and, perhaps, his father.  "Gomti Express platform ...?" I asked them.  They nodded yes.

Few more minutes later, the train slowly rolled in.  I entered the coach, and it was obvious that the guy sleeping all wrapped up was not a ticketed passenger.  Fortunately, my seat was across from him.

The paranoid person in me worried that I could be in the wrong coach.  So, stepped out to check for my name in the chart pasted on the outside of the coach.  There it was: "Sriram Khe."  Phew!

A guy about ten years younger than me, wearing a suit-jacket, entered the coupé.  And then a mother and daughter.  We were the four for that coupé, I thought, and wondered when the sleeping giant would be awakened.

It was time for the train to depart, but nothing happened.  Strangely, nobody else seemed to be perturbed by anything, unlike me! 

Finally, after a twenty-minute delay, the train gently moved. 

About five minutes away from the station, a ticket official, a turbaned-Sikh, came by and shook hard the Rip Van Winkle character who was snoring away.  The official asked for his ticket, and the guy seemed shocked that the train was moving, and moving quite fast.  He scampered, while the official and a few other passengers smiled away.  I wonder whatever happened to him.  Did he jump off the moving train, I know not.

Meanwhile, the daughter asked the official if there was a free lower berth for her mother, whose assignment was an upper berth. 

I offered my berth to the daughter for her mother to use.

"Thanks, but I don't want to disturb you."

I wondered if in the Indian cultural settings, I, with my bald and greying head and a grey beard, was also considered an "older" person. Age is relative to cultural contexts, I suppose.  In the US, sixty and seventy year-olds seem to rush around with a lot more energy than what I have. 

Or, was it because I so clearly come across as a foreigner?

The official worked out a solution for them.  I slept away for a long while.  In the berth that was above mine, the daughter slept even longer, almost until the very end.

As we neared New Delhi, the daughter gave me her business card and told me to contact her if I needed any help at all.  Now, that is wonderful hospitality and friendliness, right, especially to this stranger? 

I hope to meet more such friendly people in the couple more train rides that await me before this lengthy India visit comes to an end.

"America was a rich country. Not now"

Once the taxi driver sniffed out that I am from America, he did not hesitate to share with me his opinions of the country and its recent presidents. 

The driver, Tasleem, came out swinging: "America was a rich country. Not now." Before I could think of reasons, he explained that it was because of wars.  "First Afghanistan. Then Iraq."

If only the US hadn't wasted its own resources on a war in Iraq! To think of the enormous destruction to life and property in Iraq from this war alone is enough of a nightmare. 

Tasleem added about the presidents: "I didn't like Bush and Clinton. Obama makes America better."

I didn't want to ask him what his beef was with Clinton.  Bush is understandable; whoever likes Bush, eh :)

We were nearing my destination, Humayun's Tomb.  Tasleem said, "Obama also came to see Humayun's Tomb.  He was here."

I didn't know until then that Obama had been to this historic site.  I wondered what criteria his staff employed in order to decide on Humayun's Tomb.

I wandered through the outer areas of the tomb complex, which were in various states of disrepair.  The Mughal Empire was a rich and powerful entity once, and now the remnants don't adequately convey the might and grandeur that was once the realm of the Mughals.  I hoped that the US was still far away from losing its premier status in the world, and that the end is nowhere on the horizon.

At a spot among the ruins, I set the camera on auto-timer, and got myself a visual proof of my presence amidst the ruins.

And then I finally walked up to Humayun's Tomb itself.  It was magnificent. 

Cycle-rickshaws: hiring them means dealing with ethical issues :(

I had made reservations to stay at Hotel Ginger, which was right by the New Delhi train station.  From my two previous experiences with Ginger at two other cities, I was confident that I could count on a clean and spacious room, with clean bathrooms.  All for a price that the budget traveler that I am can afford.

The hotel website said it was a 200 meter walk from the station to the hotel.  I told my friend "S" about it. She was familiar with the hotel, and had a suggestion: "as you exit the station, get a cycle-rickshaw.  He might ask for about 30 rupees.  It will be better than you walking, because you won't be able to drag your suitcase through all that dirt."

It was a wonderful and practical suggestion, I thought.

Until ...

... I had to face the situation at 2:30 in the afternoon after I was swept out of the station by the exiting crowds.

I couldn't think of sitting there while another human pedaled away.  When machines power an autorickshaw or a car, it feels different from when a human powers the transport.

"Holy crap!" I thought to myself.

Meanwhile, my brain also recognizes the numbers of cycle-rickshaws there.  Their livelihood, and perhaps their families' welfare, depends on people like me using their services.

If only I had a 1-800-ethicist to call to sort this out!

Finally, I decided to look strictly from the driver's perspective.  Like somebody digging ditches with his muscle power in order to earn his parathas, a cycle-rickshaw driver trades his muscle power for earnings.  In my job, I try to use my brain power to earn my salary.  So, what if I focused only on the dignity of the labor involved and the laborer?

I approached a driver.  Pointing to the hotel, I told him in my awful Hindi, "humko woh Hotel Ginger jaana.  Kitne rupiah?"

He replied "Ththeese."

"S" was so right on the dot with her thirty rupees.

A little uncomfortably I sat on the seat, and he pedaled away.

When we reached the hotel, he stopped outside the gate.  I figured that the hotel didn't want cycle-rickshaws inside the property, and I didn't want to force any issue there.  I got down and paid him 30 rupees.

Later in the evening, when I was walking back after spending a delightfully refreshing couple of hours at the energetic Connaught Place, cycle-rickshaw drivers tried to get me to ride with them.  One after another approached me.  I kept walking.

And then I remembered another instance from a few years ago when I was traveling with my parents.  As we got off the train, dad looked around for a porter.  I told him that I would easily carry the bags.  Dad said it was his way of helping them out--the porters needed to earn money, he said.  So, we ended up hiring one.

I thought that I needed to spend the little bit of money I had, which will mean a lot to the rickshaw-wallahs.  When the next guy approached me, I told him "Hotel Ginger, station ke paas."  He wanted 50 rupees.

I sat while he pedaled away., and decided that I would ignore my own issues with hiring cycle-rickshaws!  Or, perhaps what I ended up doing is the right way after all.

Am a foreigner in a familarly strange land

How much a stranger am I in India?

Here is an example: In Delhi, I stepped out one morning with the intention of hiring an autorickshaw in order to get to a place that was not an easy walk.  A cab driver approached me.  I got into my defensive mode, as usual.

"You want a taxi, sir?"

"No, thanks" I said, because I was not in the mood to spend that much more for a taxi compared to what it might cost me for an auto.

But, he persisted.  The way he spoke and behaved, I was convinced he can be trusted.

I hired him.

As we started driving, he introduced himself as Tasleem, and gave me his business card.  "You can also email me, sir, if you want to go anywhere" he added.  Imagine that; email has become so mundane!  How awesome!

Throughout the drive, I didn't breathe a word about coming from America.  Yet, of course, he knew.  We talked about America later on.  As we neared the destination, Tasleem said with all earnestness, "from here, when you hire an auto, sir, walk a little bit away and then hire.  Right here at this tourist place, there are cheats."  And a little bit more such advice.

I appreciated his helpfulness.  It was also yet another pointer on how much people easily figure out that I am a foreigner.

Especially in places like Delhi, where I was so bloody clueless with my very little Hindi.  I had vastly underestimated the pervasiveness of Hindi in Delhi.

I had an easier time in Quito than in Delhi; the irony is that compared to the few words of Spanish I know, it is almost as if I am expert in Hindi.  Yet, being a tourist was way easier in Quito.  Go figure!

My friend, "S," seemed to be worried sick about me loitering the streets of Delhi.  She called everyday to make sure I was ok, and had suggestions for me.  Similarly, when I didn't call my parents one evening, the following morning dad called and asked "why didn't you call last evening?  I was a little worried."

Perhaps they knew all too well that I will be a fumbling foreigner who would be severely handicapped by the lack of Hindi.

The heights of the lack of Hindi was when I wanted to get an autorickshaw to go to the Red Fort.  I walked up to a driver and said "Red Fort."

He looked at me with a quizzical expression, and asked me "लाल something?"  I recognized only लाल (meaning red) in what he said.  I nodded my head and we proceeded.  I still cannot understand why a touristy Red Fort is not as familiar in its English name as लाल क़िला is.   

That auto driver made it crystal clear that I am a foreigner in a land that is familiar and yet very, very, unfamiliar to me.

I never would have imagined that I will be so much implementing Freeman Dyson's advice to be a stranger during a sabbatical from work :)

Looking back, I can all the more appreciate "S" and "U" telling me, in separate instances, to simply keep my mouth shut and let them do the talking for me too.  Now, that is friendship when they know exactly how to deal with idiots like me.  Thank you, "S" and "U" ...

On India's Commonwealth Games: the nasty sneers

I have blogged earlier about my opposition to the Games--the same reasons why I "boycotted" the Asian Games back when I had just about started my undergrad program; I don't recall watching even a single event on TV.  I did love the "swagatham" song of the games though.  And the reason is that such an expense ought to be a much lower priority than the more urgent ones. Like the hundreds of millions who are poor.  Or the reports of child labor in the construction activities.

But, it is a democratic government that is spending the money and will be punished or rewarded at the next elections. At the end of the day, these resource allocation decisions are India's internal matters.

It is strange that most of the governments and athletes from the richer and whiter countries did not worry about whether they ought to encourage India spending such large sums.  (though, investments like with the new airport or metro will payoff.)

They didn't worry either about the possible security issues that the event might trigger--for the athletes as well as for all in Delhi--Indians and otherwise.

They didn't even worry when reports were trickling in that the projects were well behind schedule.

But, now, they raise their voices about .... bathroom conditions?

Spiked says it much better than I can:

one does not need to be a supporter of the Indian government – and spiked is not – to see that the British critics want it all ways. They complain about the ‘obscenity’ of spending millions on shiny modern sports stadiums in the midst of the poverty of the city slums. Yet they scream like children with a spider in the bath when they discover that the facilities for ‘our’ athletes might not be up to luxury standards, ignoring the fact that the most ‘uninhabitable’ corner of the athletes’ village will have better facilities than the places that countless Indians inhabit every day.

I sympathize with my high school friend who has been pretty much on a "fuck you" mode in his Facebook postings in response to the hysterical yelling and screaming by the British and the Kiwis, and his fellow-Indians too ... I bet he will light up the cigarettes in the pack all at once if he reads what Spiked notes:

As Prince Philip famously remarked of a dodgy old fuse box during a visit to a factory in, er, Scotland: ‘It looks as if it was put in by an Indian!’

Ouch!  Does the Prince not know by now what is humor and what isn't?

The final words from Spiked:

Yet something else makes me want these games to be a success for India. There is a new orthodoxy abroad which preaches that staging major sporting events can benefit the peoples of developing nations and help to unite the world. This is pious nonsense, as the experience of the recent World Cup in South Africa has demonstrated once more. But the alternative sanctimonious prejudice of our age is, if anything, even worse. This one preaches that there is something ‘arrogant’ or ‘obscene’ about a developing nation such as India daring to attempt grand projects such as the Delhi games, rather than concentrating its efforts on the poorest. Thus the critics protest loudly about the ‘resettlement’ of thousands of shanty town-dwellers to make way for the stadium – the sort of slum clearance that always accompanies major urban redevelopment – and ignore the new airport, subway lines, roads and railway bridges that the bloated budget for the games has brought to the city. The message to India is: know your place. But the backlash in India against the international Delhi-bashing suggests there is as little chance of that happening as of Prince Charles winning a medal next week.

Delhi, globalization, and ..... the Ramayana? and Freud?

‘You know about the Oedipus complex? Freud said this was the universal condition of young men: they unconsciously want to kill their fathers and sleep with their mothers. That’s the source of revolutionary energy – you kill your father symbolically by rejecting all his values and finding new ones. But I don’t think this applies to Indian men. I would analyse Indian men in terms of what I call the Rama complex. In the epic poem Ramayana, Rama gives up the throne that is rightfully his and submits himself to enormous suffering in order to conform to the will of his father. Indian men don’t wish to kill their fathers, they wish to become them; they wish to empty themselves out of everything that has not come from their fathers.’

That was from an essay in Granta.
I thought it was about time I re-visited Granta; I do that every once in a while.  I don't understand why I do that though.  Because, rarely do I find essays or fiction that resonate with me.  The poems there are, well, like the essays--way too pretentious.
Well, I know why I visit Granta--occasionally I come across a piece like the one on Pondicherry.  And because I still carry a torch for the kind of issues that are normally addressed only by the lefty-left and the greenies.
Anyway, back to this quote and the essay itself ... I wonder if any of the "Indian" readers have anything to say about the quote, and the entire essay too .... anybody? :-)  

Elementary school. Torture. Girl dies :-(

Torture--no, not the "enhanced interrogation" and other techniques used by Cheney, et al.
This is from a different part of the world. Not of a terrorist. An eleven year old girl tortured to death because she could not recite the English alphabet :-( The following is an editorial from The Hindu:

Teaching without torture

It is now widely accepted round the world that the deliberate humiliation of children, either through corporal punishment or otherwise, is antithetical to learning as well as the well-being of children. The heart-rending death of 11-year-old Delhi schoolgirl Shanno Khan following brutal punishment by her teacher for failing to recite the full English alphabet string is a stark reminder of the torture that sometimes goes on in the name of pedagogy in several Indian schools. Shanno, according to her older sister, was made to stand in a murga position [a common form of punishment where the victim is forced to hold her or his ears with hands passed under the legs] for over two hours in the hot sun and even placed seven bricks on her back. When the girl asked for water, the teacher kicked her and her head hit a wall and she began to bleed from the nose. Shanno lost consciousness on returning home, and died two days later in hospital after slipping into a coma. This may seem an extreme case of punishment gone horribly wrong but it does highlight a fairly widespread practice in Indian schools.

In 2000 the Supreme Court of India banned corporal punishment for children and directed the state to ensure that they received education in an environment of freedom and dignity, free from fear. In the same year, the Delhi High Court struck down the provision for corporal punishment in the Delhi School Education Rules, noting that such punishment went against a child’s dignity and was not in tune with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which India was a signatory. The National Policy on Education states that corporal punishment would be firmly excluded from the educational systems. Following incidents of suicide by students terrorised by teachers, States such as Goa and Tamil Nadu outlawed corporal punishment. The rule providing for such punishment in Tamil Nadu was replaced by a section that recommended that children should be given an opportunity to learn from their errors through corrective measures such as imposition and suspension from class. However, enforcement is weak and instances of corporal punishment continue to be reported from across India. In fact, many schools practise a variety of methods of physical and emotional punishment. Occasionally, when teachers find mild forms of punishment ineffective, they resort to third degree methods of the kind that caused Shanno’s death. It is time authorities as well as parents and the public mobilised to make it absolutely clear that corporal punishment or any form of deliberate infliction of pain and humiliation on schoolchildren, supposedly for their own good, would not be tolerated any longer.

Wondering what "murga" punishment is? Here is an explanation from Wikipedia.