Rahul's Pictures

Rahul, our to-be-seven son, is our current center of gravity. And its high and causes great instability to our family system! But we can't do without him! Here are two pictures of Rahul taken by a friend who teaches at the Hyderabad Central University. These were taken on the campus (which explains the greenery in one of the photos).

More on New Orleans and Mumbai

Received this comparison in mail today. Pretty interesting.


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Subject: [x-wti] NEW ORLEANS AND MUMBAI

I couldn't' stop making this comparison..

inches of rain in new orleans due to hurricane katrina... 18
inches of rain in mumbai (July 27th).... 37.1

population of new orleans... 484,674
population of mumbai.... 12,622,500

deaths in new orleans within 48 hours of katrina...100
deaths in mumbai within 48hours of rain.. 37.

number of people to be evacuated in new orleans... entire city..wohh
number of people evacuated in mumbai...10,000

Cases of shooting and violence in new orleans...Countless
Cases of shooting and violence in mumbai.. NONE

Time taken for US army to reach new orleans... 48hours
Time taken for Indian army and navy to reach mumbai...12hours

status 48hours later...new orleans is still waiting for relief, armyand electricty
status 48hours later...mumbai is back on its feet and is business is asusual

USA...world's most developed nation
India...JUST A DEVELOPING NATION..

oopss...did i get the last fact wrong??? Or am I just being proud of being an INDIAN?

Katrina and Mumbai

• It surely must be pretty agonizing for people in New Orleans. To gather human courage and get the thick-skin necessary to tackle such crises (BUT NOT THE APATHY that plagues us here), community leaders from the US must be invited to spend a few weeks in Orissa during the cyclone months. They will stop worrying about things like inability take a bath, not having cornflakes for breakfast or not changing underwear for one week. And start worrying about the real value of life.
• In the context of the noise raised about insufficient weather prediction by India Meteorological Deptt -- is anyone now asking why the US met deptt did not issue adequate warning or the local govenment did not evacuate people before Hurricane Katrina tore through the coast line? Weather prediction is not an exact science yet, even with supercomputer-driven models that can see one week into the future.
• Meanwhile one is reading how the poor are suffering in New Orleans. Well, where are they not?
• And CNN new readers are getting very worried that people haven't had a hot shower for three days now. I must agree. That is something that has been troubling me too.
• Americans in general do get pretty rankled when their Barbie Doll House is disturbed.
• Read the lead story in Alex Cockburn's CounterPunch, http://www.counterpunch.org .