Falling in love with amaltas in the mad heat of Delhi

Amaltas on a road divider in Delhi: Photo by Sanjay Gupta

 

When people say, “May heaven's choicest blessings be showered upon you”—a  popular wish, spoken frequently at weddings—they could be visualizing amaltas, also known as “the golden shower tree.” 

This yellow beauty wears multiple monikers. Indian laburnum and Cassia fistula (the botanical name) are fairly well known. Somewhat less common, but more significant from historical and health points of view, are Aragvadha (meaning disease killer) and Rajavriksha (the royal tree)—both of which find mention in Charaka Samhita, the oldest Indian treatise on Ayurveda.

There are several other names, too. But I'm particularly fond of amaltas and how easily it rolls off your tongue with a lyrical feel: amal-taas.

Different parts of this tree provide different medicinal benefits. It is said to have anti-inflammatory and laxative properties, and is useful in arthritis and skin diseases, among other ailments. Killer of diseases indeed!

For me, amaltas represents soothing drops of nectar sent from above for the benefit of parched souls. Especially for Delhiites sweating it out in the scorching days of May and June.

The signs of delicate yellow on slender, otherwise-nondescript branches of the medium-sized tree begin to appear in April. Come May and the golden shower works its magic everywhere. On trees planted along traffic dividers. In clusters across city parks. In fortunate folks’ backyards. Just about anywhere.

Take one look at the pleasant flowers twinkling invitingly and the heat that has been oppressing you relents a bit. Pause a little longer to drink their blessings and a cool reassurance percolates in your being.

In the sweltering afternoons of harsh city life, the relief that sightings of amaltas bring to me—and countless others I'm sure—is immense. The yellow petals, swaying in the wind, make your spirit soar and put the bounce back in your step.

Trees remain Nature’s most benevolent, most visible marks on a rapidly deteriorating Earth. Let’s give a shout-out to one of their most lovable manifestations.

“Love you, amaltas!”

Why Things SHOULD NOT Go Back to Normal after Covid-19

When John Galt, the brilliant protagonist of Ayn Rand’s powerful book Atlas Shrugged, resolutely said that he would “stop the motor of the world,” neither he nor his creator Rand could have imagined living in the times of novel coronavirus.

And as billions of people across the globe remain locked down in homes and shelters, the virus does seem to have turned John Galt’s fictional words to reality—albeit with different philosophical connotations.

The world’s motor is sputtering, if not completely halted.

In the middle of a lot of human misery and thousands of deaths, the lens through which people see their place in nature is casting some cathartic visions of the future.

The questions that are bubbling up in people’s minds are as varied as our existential needs. Whatever will happen to the world economy, already facing downturn in several regions? How will people be fed if there are not enough food provisions during and immediately after the pandemic, especially as agriculture and manufacturing remain in dire straits? Will people lose their minds (besides jobs) after prolonged confinement? Is this all due to some god’s curse and we are getting the disease as a punishment for our past sins?

Needless to say, as the world waits with bated breath and sanitized sneezes, a majority of denizens are raring to go back to the life of rampant travel and conspicuous consumption they have gotten so used to. Especially in the decades past World War II, as industrialization took a global strangle-hold, oil flowed freely, and factories churned out objects of desire frenetically, generation upon generation gorged on the world’s newfound prosperity. Hedonistic optimists hailed productivity gains, ever-faster computers, and shorter product life-cycles as the arrival of the Age of Abundance.

Now, with all that prosperity in retreat and a vaccine for the virus months away, the world appears headed toward gloom and doom.

But something else was also noticed—and appreciated—as the current lockdown lengthened from days into weeks. As the roads remained empty and the chimneys stopped billowing tons of carbon into the atmosphere, both birds and people cooed in unison. “Look ma, no pollution!” Pictures and videos of never-seen-before behavior of birds, beasts, and mother nature were shared enthusiastically on social media. 

This dichotomy presents an opportunity disguised as a threat. The challenge is, how to crank up the industry and the economy back to normalcy without losing sight of those wonderful pictures of nature reclaiming its glory? If anything, statesmen and economists would argue, the months lost to Covid-19 need to be made up for by pressing the pedal on production and growth. “Stimulus” should be the key word, no?

Without a moment’s hesitation, I must say, “No.” Instead, let’s use the pause button we have already pressed as a real moment in our relentless economic march to reflect, reset, and restore: Reflect on our ways of achieving growth and producing tons of unnecessary or non-durable stuff, reset our needs to responsible consumption and behavior (something we are learning in lockdown but can practice in freedom as well), and restore a bit, just a wee bit, of the majesty of the natural world around us.

This, I know, will not be easy. But we must make a start somewhere—and the current moment seems apt. By pooling the best technical talent and advancements, as well as the resources of governments and philanthropic billionaires (some of whom are showing exemplary initiative and kindness of late), we must attempt, at a global scale, to live more in harmony with other beings who...Also. Breathe. This. Only. Living. Planet’s. Air. Just as we do. But who are not in a position to change our overall collective destiny through small but significant tweaks in behavior—by stopping to eat human beings for crave’s sake, for instance.

Let’s bat for all life on earth.

How to be One with Nature—Really

Each day as I drive to work or roam around the streets of Delhi I come across tens of thousands of enlightened beings. Humans have given them a simple, elegant name: trees.

No matter how crazy the traffic or hopeless the mess in the city, trees bring not only a breath of fresh air but a sense of calm and serenity.

Wasn’t it the poet Joyce Kilmer who wrote “But only God can make a tree”?

Well, this post is not about God but about nature—though for many, perhaps for me as well, the two ideas are inseparable. And the most immediate, intimate symbol I think of, whenever I think of nature, is the tree.

Recently I came across the phrase “to be one with nature” for the umpteenth time. And lo and behold, the image of a magnificent, lush, life-giving tree sprang to my mind.

But what does it really mean to be one with nature? And how do you do it, especially in a world where, increasingly, people live in concrete rather than green jungles?

First off, I thought I would say something about the origin of the phrase “to be one with nature” and sought Google’s help. Several combinations of keywords later, however, I realized that the search giant was as clueless as I—although I must thank it for the rich harvest of articles mentioning the phrase my search turned up.

Never mind the origin. Let's talk about its prevalence and effect.

I suspect most of us intuitively know what we mean when we want to be one with nature or hear someone express this wish. But have we tried describing it? And do we all experience it in the same way? What happens in that moment, really?

The most obvious, and perhaps most awesome, way to be one with nature is to go on a nature trail in a pristine forest. Where the greenery is thick and the scent of dew permeates the atmosphere. Where the sun's rays play hide and seek with the leaves. And where the sound of water gurgling in the brook next to you lulls you into a peace you never knew existed.

In such a serene backdrop, being one with nature possibly means the feeling of freshness and quiet and connectedness to everything alive around us.

Yes, I've felt it, this right-in-the-lap-of-nature kind of being one with nature.

But there have been other occasions as well, when I think I have been touched by that oneness without the luxury of being wrapped in nature’s majesty. 

I recently spent a year in Mumbai, working for a media company. There was a nice terrace, overlooking the railway lines, on the ninth floor of the office building. In my tea breaks, I would often stand there and watch black kites circling nearby. Once in a while, they would spot some prey on the ground and swoop down to catch it in their talons. But mostly, they would just swim around in the air, making spirals from high up to down below and then up again. Their motion was graceful and their outspread wings magnificent. I sometimes stood motionless, admiring their skill and poise.

A similar feeling of oneness fills me when I watch children play. Children are at their natural best when they laugh—and nothing brings me more joy than a bubbling bunch of kids laughing together. When I was in school, I often got punished for making other students sitting around me laugh. Needless to say, I never minded the scoldings.

I remember there was rain and hailstorm a few years back in Delhi when I, along with a few other office goers, caught myself scampering for cover. I took refuge in the colonnade of Connaught Place’s inner circle. There, I saw four or five boys in their preteens making merry in the downpour—completely in the buff. But they had no awareness of their naked bodies, drenched as they were in their natural tendency to extract happiness from whatever life brought them. Impulsively, the most adventurous of them slid down the ramp around a lift built for Metro passengers. The others soon followed suit, sliding down the smooth, granite-paved surface with an abandon only children know. My heart skipped a beat and a smile appeared on my previously somber face.

Sometime in high school, when I took to the more serious pastime of reading, being one with nature had an echo in me through the beauty of the written word. It still does—when the words of an author resonate in my mind long after I’ve finished a passage or a book. Sometimes, I wonder who wouldn’t be moved to ‘oneness’ reading or hearing such beautiful prose or poetry. Sample below some of my favorites:

In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.

- Albert Camus

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:

Its loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness; but still will keep

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

 - John Keats

Siddhartha listened. He was now listening intently, completely absorbed, quite empty, taking in everything. He felt that he had now completely learned the art of listening. He'd often heard all this before, all these numerous voices in the river, but today they sounded different. He could no longer distinguish the different voices—the merry voice from the weeping voice, the childish voice from the manly voice. They all belonged to each other: the lament of those who yearn, the laughter of the wise, the cry of indignation and the groan of the dying. They're all interwoven and interlocked, entwined in a thousand ways. And all the voices, all the goals, all the yearnings, all the sorrows, all the pleasures, all the good and evil, all of them together was the world. All of them together was the stream of events, the music of life.

- Hermann Hesse

To say “I love you” one must know first how to say the “I.”

- Ayn Rand

Everything about him was old except his eyes and they were the same color as the sea and were cheerful and undefeated.

- Ernest Hemingway

And then, there are several tiny little things that can lift my spirits into that wholeness, that unity. 

Listening to a piece of soulful music is one such. When I listened to Blue Story by Deep Forest for the first time for instance, and I mean really listened and not just play it casually on my playlist, I felt a tributary of calm flow inside me that went meandering alongside its soothing notes. I felt fulfilled. Rejuvenated. Eased. The song has stayed with me ever since as a constant companion of quiet happiness.

Another is sipping tea or coffee, either in the quietude of your personal space or even amidst the white noise in a cafeteria. You sit down in comfort, holding the warm cup snugly. Then you put your face to it, smelling the aroma and letting the little clouds engulf you and mingle with your mood. And then you take the first slow, deliberate, lasting sip. The sweet warmth fills you with sheer joy. What more can one want in life?

A lot, apparently :)

That’s why most of us spend the major part of our life running after and acquiring things we may want but not necessarily need.

And sometimes, smack-dab in the middle of all that stuff, we overhear ourselves say, “What would I not give to be one with nature?”

As for me, I sit down every single day and explore what I think is possibly the best way to be one with nature—and oneself. It’s a ritual that’s been done and refined over thousands of years as practiced by novices, experts, Buddhist monks, and (true) spiritual gurus: meditation. Not only does it allow me to enter a unique realm of peace and quiet, it often uplifts my spirits high enough to feel drunk on the nectar of life.

Meditation, I feel, is a walk in the garden of spiritual delights. Call it my daily dose of being one with nature if you will. 

May the force of nature be with you.

Points to Ponder on Plastic this #WorldEnvironmentDay

I must touch it to write these lines. The bottle I drink water from is made of it. The device you are staring into has it in various parts and components. Don’t look away, for you just can’t escape its overbearing presence in our lives.

I’m reminded of plastic this World Environment Day. While a lot of attention, particularly in India, has been given to air pollution and energy conservation (which are, of course, very, very important), the country seems to have given its “plastics problem” short shrift. Not just India, the world at large is still caught up in a bind over plastics.

Is plastic an essential evil? How did we get to the situation we are in? What is the extent of damage it is causing? How can the impact be minimized? Such questions invade my mind just as a sea of plastic stuff attacks our senses from all sides.

Being a word-oriented guy, I first looked up what plastic means and who coined it.

While the honor of coining the term “plastics” goes to Leo Baekeland (who developed—what else!— Bakelite in 1907), according to Wikipedia, the patent for the first man-made plastic was acquired for Parkesine by a gentleman called Alexander Parkes as early as 1862. The roots of the word “plastic” itself go back to the Greek “plastikos,” which means something that can be shaped or molded.

I also came across a fascinating book on the subject, curiously titled Plastic: A Toxic Love Story. The author Susan Freinkel explains the toxic part in an interview on Amazon.com:

“In researching the history of plastic, I was struck by how our relationship with it resembled a love affair gone bad. People initially were infatuated with these new materials, eager to use them in every possible way. In the ’40s, pollsters found that “cellophane” was considered one of the most beautiful words in the English language, after “mother” and “memory.” By the 1970s, when I was a teenager, plastic had acquired a much worse reputation; it was the stuff of pink flamingos, shiny suits, tacky furniture. It was synonymous with shoddy and fake. Today we’re discovering truly serious problems because of our reliance on plastic—health hazards, wasting of resources, pollution. And yet every year, the amount of plastic produced and consumed goes up. We’re trapped in an unhealthy dependence, the hallmark of a toxic relationship.”

That almost echoes my thoughts—except that some of the plastic furniture we now see has come a long way from being tacky to classy or elegant. Still, plastic has ballooned into a much bigger hazard as well as a greater dependency for those who work in the plastics industry. 

According to PlasticsEurope, a European industry association, worldwide plastics production boomed from a tiny 1.7 million tons in 1950 to about 300 million tons in 2013—the top three producers being China, North America and Europe. It further estimates that the industry gives direct employment to 1.4 million people in Europe. The employment figures hover around 900,000 for the US, as per the Plastics Industry Trade Association (SPI).

In India, a total of 4 million people are believed to be employed in the plastic conversion sector.

The multiplier effect of this mammoth industry, which consumes around 8% of petrochemicals for its production, are much wider and deeper in human society when one thinks of all the economic activity plastic generates.

There are hundreds of types of plastics that go into thousands or perhaps tens of thousands of products. The use of plastics is now so entrenched in human life that it just isn’t possible to yank it away in one go—and return to the use of metal, glass, paper and other materials that plastics have replaced or supplemented.

The problem with plastic, I think, arises because of its easy, cheap production and the habit of people throwing away a lot of plastic stuff after use. The Americans are notoriously good at it: according to a report on EcoWatch.com, they throw away 35 BILLION plastic water bottles EACH YEAR. Just think of how much plastic this hyper-consuming species of only 300 million would have thrown away in the several decades that plastic bottles, bags and other things have been available to them for throwing.  

And here comes the even sadder part: the Americans seem to have successfully globalized their “use-and-throw disease.” In India, China, Brazil, Russia, Indonesia, South Africa and scores of other heavily populated countries, convenience-prone consumers are adopting this so-called modern habit. They are amply aided in this by corrupt or inept governments and over-indulgent businesses that thrive on all things plastic.

The latest eruption of the consumerist epidemic now has a well-known and dreaded moniker: e-waste.

Not all plastic use is detrimental: it would be hard to argue against the use of plastic in surgical devices, limbs or implants, for instance. But the environmental hazards become as colossal as the piles of rubbish in landfills all over the world when you factor in plastic’s growing use in packaging, disposable goods, etc. Combine that with the triple whammy of convenience, laziness and consumerism—and Houston, we have a Huuuge problem!

I would like to end this post by an earnest call to arms for each one of us to counter the problem of plastics (and environment in general) with the proverbial 3 Rs (reuse, recycle, reduce) and do everything we can to ease—if not end—this toxic love affair with plastic.

And as you recycle my words in your mind, here are some startling stats you can use/reuse:

• There are 5.25 trillion pieces of plastic debris in the ocean out of which 269,000 tons float on the surface; four billion plastic microfibers per square kilometer litter the deep sea. [source: National Geographic]

• A report on CNN.com (and it’s an old report) quotes Greenpeace as having estimated that more than 1 million birds and 100,000 marine mammals perish each year by either eating or becoming trapped in plastic waste.

• If you think that Americans make up for their throwaway habits with a lot of recycling, think again: In the US, ONLY 9% of plastic (2.8 million tons) was recycled in 2012, according to the US Environment Protection Agency; the rest was discarded. Americans depend mostly on China and Hong Kong to absorb their plastic waste, and some is sent to Canada and Mexico as well (Aren’t neighbors supposed to help?!)

• The total natural capital cost of plastic used in the consumer goods industry is estimated to be more than $75 billion per year. The cost comes from a range of environmental impacts including those on oceans and the loss of valuable resources when plastic waste is sent to landfill rather than being recycled. [source: UNEP]

• No “statistics” are available on this, but it is a well-observed fact that millions of cows and other animals get sick or die of chewing or ingesting polythene bags along with rotten food lying in garbage mounds all over India. So much for the noise on taking care of cows or the Clean India campaign, where the government has recently sunk in stinking amounts of money on advertising.

Appeal: Don’t stand still on plastics, pollution and the environment—do something about it.

Time for India to Take a Close, Hard Look at e-Waste

My first recollection of waste recycling is that of disheveled kids roaming the streets of Delhi. They have large plastic bags and whenever they spot a discarded but “valuable” item—a plastic bottle, a rusted iron rod or the like—they toss it into the bag and move forward in search for more.

At that time I was amused by what I saw (I knew they would sell their stuff to the local kabadiwala, the scrap dealer, for a paltry sum.)

Now, several years later, amusement about a curious aspect of waste collection has turned into a loathing for how the entire “waste situation” looks. As I came to know about the trash piling up in landfills, about chemicals from discarded objects leaching into soil and water (often winding their way into the bloodstream of humans and other animals, with toxic effects), and about the devastatingly fast-growing proportion of e-waste in the overall junk, my disgust only intensified.

An estimated 40-50 million tons of all kinds of electronic waste (from computers and phones to TVs and washing machines) is generated globally each year. In India, it is around 1 million tons, but growing faster than many developed countries.

What is more appalling is that much of this e-waste—a whopping 85-90%—is either dumped or handled hazardously. And while advanced economies such as the U.S. regularly consume and discard the bulk of electronics, the trash ends up in third-world countries of Asia and Africa.

But there is a glimmer of hope. A growing awareness and sense of responsibility at government, corporate and individual levels is driving home the need to deal with all that e-waste in an environmentally friendly manner.

In India a right step in that direction was taken in 2011 in the shape of the e-Waste Management and Handling Act. A key part of this regulation is the EPR (extended producer responsibility) clause, which puts the onus of responsibly warehousing or disposing of the e-waste on manufacturers.

Another green development is that several watchdogs, recyclers and e-waste services firms are cropping up in the country.

However, all this is still a small start to a very large and complex problem. For one, recycling should not be equated with passing on the collected e-waste to the unorganized sector (which often employs women and children to retrieve metals and components from the devices through burning or manual dismantling).

In addition, both the government and the corporate sectors should make efforts to grow awareness about the regulation and product take-back programs—and there should be a proper mechanism to monitor such programs and provision for punitive measures, if necessary.

Managing e-waste well is more than a matter of health for all those directly affected by toxicity of the materials: it is a big question mark over the survival of the whole planet.

The Green Machine

I remember my initiation into the idea of green living through, ironically, cars—one of those inventions that contribute significantly to pollution (though I must admit I drive one to work everyday like hundreds of millions).

The cars I'm talking about, however, didn't look like your regular street machines but something straight off the pages of a sci-fi thriller. These “concept cars” invariably looked very curvy, used lots of sheet glass and were often accompanied by smiling beauties (not sure if the girls were there to turn your attention away from the fact that such solar or non-fossil fuel powered cars were not going to be a reality for the next 10-20 years).

After more than two decades since those memories, it's heartening that electric and hybrid cars are gradually being introduced in the market.

The click-click world of computing is in a similar situation right now, though things here seem to have moved relatively faster than for automobiles.

Most of those in IT would identify the green-colored “Energy Star” logo that appeared while the computer booted up. It is believed that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was one of the first to launch efforts to recognize energy-efficiency in tech equipment when it announced the Star as a voluntary labeling program in 1992.

Today, there are thousands of such programs and efforts worldwide to cut down on energy use by ICT equipment—most notably in large data centers that have become massive guzzlers of electricity.

The rising energy prices, coupled with a growing environmental consciousness, have resulted in a multi-billion-dollar “green equipment” market. Even in India, which is always considered price-sensitive and therefore reluctant to shell out 15-20% more for the green tag, many CIOs and other decision makers have begun to “talk green,” if not “buy green.”

But they should look beyond the initial cost and think of RoI from green IT in the longer term. Fortunately, several businesses are in an expansion or migratory stage and can thus take help from the independent data centers that have come up recently in India and which tout great green credentials. Or they can tweak their purchasing processes to include some  green elements as well.

I know it's easier said than done. But it has to be said—and, eventually, it will be done more than we thought possible. Policies and laws on e-waste and energy use will catch up in India, but there's no reason why the avant-garde businesses should wait to go green.

The green run, after all, is going to be a marathon.

Why Green is More about Habit than Tech

There is an abundance of literature on what constitutes green technology and how manufacturers and consumers can adopt cleaner, greener alternatives to power-guzzling products.

So, for a change I will not talk about ‘green technologies’ here.

On the contrary, I’m going to talk about things that may not sit well with how the entire ecosystem of industry and consumers operates in a fast-globalizing – but hot and crowded – world.

In the current scheme of things, manufacturers-sellers talk about faster times to market, constant product upgrades and creation of new niches or segments. Consumers, armed with all the new wealth being generated (especially in the developing world), are ‘going shopping’ with a vengeance. The result: an ongoing, accelerating cycle of ‘buy more, sell more, buy some more, and throw away a lot’.

I remember growing up as a typical middle-class child in pre-liberalized India. There wasn’t much to buy in the first place. We didn’t have large disposable incomes to splurge. And we were happy with what we could get, use and, more importantly, reuse. Books and clothes were handed down from older children to the younger ones. Fridges, TVs and other contraptions used to last generations. And there were few unnecessary gewgaws around us.

Today people buy ‘all kinds of stuff’. In all kinds of places. At all kinds of prices. For all kinds of purposes. And quite often, for no purpose at all – they grab it just on a whim or because it was on sale or because they couldn’t say no to the salesperson. The reason is not important – not in an alarming number of cases.

And what happens to the ‘stuff’ that is bought? It’s hardly used. Or goes phut all too soon. Or becomes out-of-fashion or obsolete. Or makes you feel bored with it because there’s a spanking new one on the market. Ultimately, much of the stuff is thrown away prematurely, remains underused or was never needed in the first place!

Like I said before, all this will not easily go down the gullets of marketers, salesmen and consumers determined to, well, promote sales and consumption. Their obvious objection: What happens to the industry’s growth and consumers’ prosperity? What happens to G-D-P? (I don’t know; something happening to GDP is important but so is something happening to the environment. Perhaps more.)

In my opinion, green is more about habit than technology. The habit of producing goods that last longer. The habit of selling customers what they really need. The habit of optimally ‘consuming’ things and not throwing them away or refusing to get them repaired and extend their life.

For the sake of the environment and our future generations and their secured well-being, are we prepared to change our habits to green? GDP and technology will follow.

An Encounter with a Polar Bearer

No, there’s no spelling mistake in the headline and I’m not going to talk about any chance sighting of the great white beautiful resident of Arctic regions. (Given that chance, however, I would talk about it, too.)

This is a post about a man, his childhood dream, his perseverance to realize it and, finally, his global mission to keep one of the world’s biggest and remotest pieces of wilderness, Antarctica, out of the clutches of the wildest and weirdest of species – homo sapiens.

When Robert Swan was 11 years old, he saw a video about Antarctica. From then on, he knew he had to go see it – no matter what. Around the age of 22, he began raising money for his trip ($5 million to be precise), thinking it would take two, maybe three, months to do so. He was quite confident of his abilities of persuasion. And persuade he did, but it took him a little longer than he had imagined – seven full years. During this time, recalls Swan, he even drove a taxi to support himself and often got laughed at for his crazy ideas. But never once did he let go of his childhood dream.

Swan was in Delhi recently to address a motley audience gathered for a talk organized by 9.9 Media. The rather smallish room was bustling with people who had come to listen to Robert Swan. And the big draw? Not that he’s decorated with an OBE (Order of the British Empire) but the fact that he is the first person in history to walk to both the North and South poles.

As Swan began his story with impeccable humor, masterful narration and exemplary humility, the audience was all ears. There was a sense of adventure and achievement in the air, even though listening to the tale about walking the white wilderness in an air-conditioned hall was no match to actually doing it in extreme subzero temperatures while lugging hundreds of pounds of survival supplies.

It was in 1984 that Swan embarked on his first polar expedition, titled ‘In the Footsteps of Scott’, to the South Pole. (The title is in honor of Robert Falcon Scott (1868-1912), a Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions.) He and two fellow travelers, Roger Mear and Gareth Wood, completed the first ‘unassisted’ 900-mile walk (without any dogs, radios or other means of communication) to the South Pole on January 11, 1986.

Ever since, not only has Swan undertaken several expeditions to both the poles but also managed to evolve his childhood dream into a noble mission – and, in the process, inspire and motivate business folk, corporations, young people and anyone who would care to save what Swan calls ‘the last remaining piece of wilderness that nobody owns,’ the Antarctica.

He knew he just had to do something about the polar regions when, walking to the North pole, the color of his eyes changed and the skin began to peel off his face – thanks to a hole in the Ozone under which Swan and his team happened to walk for several days. Swan learnt of the reason for his condition when he came back, and decided he must spread awareness about ‘climate change’ (his preferred term to ‘global warming’, which he says tends to confuse people).

Initially, Swan talked to people about the effects of climate change but it did not receive the attention he had expected. “People don’t accept or appreciate negativity easily and are often turned off by alarmist talk,” he says. So he started lecturing on team-building, motivation, success and other positive aspects of his journeys. And the results, too, were positive, as more and more people came forward to help his larger goal of saving Antarctica and attracting investment in clean, green technologies.

Toward the end of his talk, Swan flashes a number before the audience: 2041. Besides being the name of his company and the address of his website (www.2041.com), 2041 is the year when the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty expires. As per this treaty, no mining is allowed on Antarctica. But come this year and things could change.

It is the mission of 2041 and Robert Swan that things change for the better and Antarctica remains what it is – pristine, unexploited, unowned, unfought-over-for by corporate or political squatters-spoilers…

I do hope this mission is achieved much before the deadline and, for once at least, ‘our story’ – as Swan calls the whole enterprise – has a happy never-ending.

Rain...

Rain for my soul
For the parched dust and dry wind and heated minds
For replenishing life-giving water
For rejuvenating the hope that lives on...

Rain for everyone
For those who know not its real significance
And for those who pretend to know
For all who love to get soaked in its fullness, its true bounty
As well as for those who cringe at the drippy disturbance...

Rain for recession
Not only of the economy but of the completeness of life around us
Rain for the restoration of bits and pieces of nature
That must coalesce together to give humans more cause for celebration...

Did You Switch Off Your Lights Today?

Ever since the year 1972, the world has been 'marking' June 5 as the World Environment Day (as declared by the United Nations). One wonders why it took such a long time to reach a general consensus on the criticality of global warming and environmental degradation - and get the skeptics to at least acknowledge that global warming exists.

It's been over 30 years since the setting aside of a day for the environment - but it's only very recently, less than five years, that some serious concerted effort is beginning to happen (energy-saving bulbs, for instance). In all those years we missed, it's possible that we already reached a point-of-no-return from where the ill-effects of greenhouse gas emissions WHILE continuing to pursue a globalized growth model espoused by the US of A (imitating might be a better word here than pursuing) cannot be reversed. Still, we must keep trying...

As a consumer in a developing nation, I try to switch off the lights when possible, avoid polythene bags and do other little tricks to reduce my carbon footprint - but listening to politicians or celebs mouthing green promises without any backing of policy decisions makes me go sick in the stomach. To cite an example, it's one thing to ask people to "say no to polythene carrybags" - and quite another for the politicos to resist the lobby (and quite possibly, palm-greasing) of those who stand to gain from making and selling these toxic things. (Regarding the question of rehabilitating those whose livelihoods depend on the polythene business, it must be the government's responsibility - aided by tax money from you and me - to wean them away to some alternative businesses or work.)

Left to their own devices, consumers will not compromise the convenience that a lazy non-green lifestyle entails.

Rain, Rain, Don't Go Away!

Unlike the poem most of us read in the childhood, in which little Johnny asks Rain to go away because he wants to play, I wish that rain would rather stay a bit longer - and splash us all with cool droplets. At least for the parched denizens of Delhi, that would seem to be a pretty desirable thing in the middle of May. Besides, each time it rains, it reminds me of my daughter Saundhi (the name means 'the sweet smell the earth gives off when touched by the first few drops of rain').

But then, it hardly rains in Delhi now. I remember how 10 or 12 years back (another age?), Delhi used to get a decent drenching every monsoon. But for the past few years, the rainy season is just touch-and-go -- it teases more than it eases (the heat). Fortunately, there was some intermittent rain last summer, which made it more bearable than most years.

How I wish for those long spells of rain, when you could enjoy and appreciate the lush green beauty of the city! Just sitting in the balcony and seeing nature's regenerative wet miracle all around you was so refreshing...made even better by an endless supply of pakoras (spicy fried snacks).

Alas...Who stole our rain?

G Ate; Others, Please Wait!

As the G8 Summit of the world’s richest countries is on in Hokkaido, Japan, I’m thinking of the growing disparities and despairs of the world – the current so-called boom in India and other developing economies notwithstanding. Today, many point out that global warming and green initiatives have become bigger issues than terrorism. Leaders of the world are worrying less about third world war and more about the “devastating growth” in third-world countries (which are second-world, by the way?)

Recently there were some interesting articles in Economist and Newsweek on the future of energy and the greenness – or lack of it – on the only orb we got here. For all the hype and the hoopla, apparently less than 1% of the current energy is supplied by renewables. On the lines of GDP, thinkers are coming up with calculation of EPI (Environmental Performance Index) for various countries. The only ones who seem to fare well on the index, apparently, are sparsely populated nations of Europe.

Making all sorts of calculations and coming up with theoretical models keeps economists and scientists busy – but does it really help solve the problems? It may or it may not. But IMHO, it often certainly does create complications – like those we saw with the misplaced corn-ethanol frenzy and carbon-trading. Shifting resources or carbon emissions elsewhere is something like sweeping your house clean but depositing the pile of garbage on your neighbors’, or, sometimes, “distant relatives’”. Only, the fumes from the garbage now reach far and wide – causing weather nightmares everywhere.

While people at the top (those with the power to make policy decisions that can have country-, region-, or globe-specific impact) lunch and munch together – not to much avail – the consumers and citizens of the world are getting increasingly confused about “their tiny bit” in bringing down their carbon “footprint”. According to an essay ‘I’m So Tired of Being Green’ by Susan Greenberg (what a surname! – no offense) in Newsweek, there’s an entire branch of eco-psychology growing out of people’s eco-anxieties.

It’s OK for people of rich countries – who have been devouring resources and gallivanting around the world for several decades – to now feel a pinch of conscience at their profligate ways. But who will nudge the minds of hundreds of millions of developing-country consumers who have barely begun to guzzle gas, munch meat and throng ‘1,000 places to see before they die’?
All these tree-uprooting, carbon-sooting and vehicle-scooting years the rich have left a deadly trail of environmental destruction and economically-induced cult of consumerism – which the poor and upcoming are only too happy to emulate. Do the paunchy leaders of different countries have the stomach to ask these billions to wait? And even if they do, will they wait?