Go-Go Dancers a No-Go for Coup Leaders

So apparently the Thai military has restricted go-go dancers from "distracting" Thai soldiers.

""We have to maintain the seriousness of the coup," a military spokesman said."

First of all, I don't know how he said that with a straight face and I don't know how anyone could have listened to that with a straight face.

In serious matters, the coup thing is heading along so predictably. The military, supported by the urban elite of Thailand, has overthrown the democratically elected Prime Minister and imposed martial law in the countryside to silence the poor rural populace that still supports the democratically elected leader.

A civilian leader has been handpicked by the military, but the military comes out the next day to say that it is going to stay even after this civilian (read puppet) administration takes over. You wouldn't even know that this is supposedly one of the more advanced nations in Asia. It may just be another stereotypical banana republic reminiscent of San Theodoros.

Coup d'Etat & the state of les pays d'Asie

So Thailand has now gone the way of dozens of countries before. A democratically elected government has been overthrown by a military leader under the pretext of "unifying" the country and the constitution and the entire government structure will be rewritten from scratch.

From the actions in Thailand, I derive a sense of pride however, regarding the state of affairs in my own country. As those who know me know, I am a travel buff and I frequent travel forums and related things on the internet. I have grown extremely sick and tired of some Europeans and Americans who go on and on in these forums about how India is such a crappy place compared to the sleek, gleaming facilities to be found in Thailand, Singapore, and even China.

If economic status were the only measure of a country's status, then yes, I agree that India lags far behind these own countries. But if the rule of law, respect for human rights, and a stable political structure, India's robust and strong fifty-year old democracy is lightyears ahead of any other country in Asia, perhaps save for Japan and Malaysia (though Malaysia with its archaic Islamic laws has more to do on the human rights issues).

I'm just going to comment on some of the countries which have been most often compared on travel forums to India by ignorant people ...

South Korea - $20,590 per capita GDP, which is 33rd in the world. However, post WW-II, South Korea was ruled by first a series of autocratic regimes, then a weak, short-lived democracy, then a military general, and then another military general until lasting democracy was established in 1988, less than 20 years ago.

Thailand - $8,300 per capita GDP, which is 69th in the world. From 1932 onwards, Thailand was governed by a series of military dictatorships with a few periods of short democracy in between. Democracy was fully restored in 1992 and all seemed well until yesterday, when another coup d'etat just threw Thailand back into the 1980s.

Let me digress a bit. The current Thai government was overthrown by the urban elite, despite the fact that it is the legitimately elected government in the country and the prime minister still has the vote of the poor and the rural masses. Someone should tell the Thai elites that democracy extends to all citizens, not just the rich, educated ones living in their cities. I mean, yes, there are reports that Thaksin was exceedingly corrupt and seeked to manipulate government offices to gain power, but look at India. The corrupt politicians here are usually replaced in office by slightly less corrupt politicians through a democratically elected process. A coup d'etat will not solve corruption, I can guarantee the Thais that.

Singapore - $29,900 per capita GDP, which is 22nd in the world. However, Singapore since independence has been ruled by a single party and is in effect a single party state. It has been ranked by Reporters without Borders as 140 out of 167 countries in the 2005 Worldwide Press Freedom Index. It also puts people to death (possession of banned drugs can and will get you a death penalty) that it makes Texas look like a pinko-liberal paradise.

And finally, let's get back to India.

India - With a per capita GDP of only $3,344, which is 122nd in the world, yes, there is a lot of room for improvement. But India's democracy, as established in the constitution with effect from January 26, 1950, India's Republic Day, gives its citizens all the fundamental rights enjoyed by citizens of Western democracies. Except for a one year period in the mid-1970s when Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared a state of emergency citing a CIA plot to overthrow her (a very real possibility considering India's close ties to the Soviet Union as well as the CIA's penchant for overthrowing democratically elected governments that dare to disagree with Uncle Sam (pre-Shah Iran, Hugo Chavez's Venezuela, among others)), India has had uninterrupted democracy with one government respectfully stepping aside for another when ordered to do so by the people.

In addition, India has an independent Election Commission to oversee elections and curtail election fraud, something which even the United States does not have where elections largely rest under the auspices of individual states (do I need to remind anyone of Katherine Harris and the pregnant chads in the 2000 presidential election?).

A look at the Freedom Map below will reveal India's unique position among her neighbors, which vary in levels of autocracy.


So yes, we legitimately in India have the right to complain about a lot of things, and there are a lot of things that are screwed up in India. Let's never deny that. Corruption and injustice is almost all-pervasive, but let's also remind ourselves that perhaps the most important commodity of all, freedom, is there to be had by every Indian. Things could be a lot worse, India has to only look towards her neighbors for proof of that.

But when it comes to democracy (India is the world's largest liberal democracy), just as in protection of wildlife, every Indian or person of Indian descent should hold his or head held up high. There's certainly a lot to be proud about.

Part II: Ecological Awareness

First, make sure you go down and read part I before beginning this post. Now you might be asking, after detailing Americans' extravagance in the previous post, how can you say Americans have more ecological awareness? The answer is simple. Indians are efficient because they cannot afford not to be. If gas was as affordable in India as in the U.S., you would see the same size SUVs as you do over there. Everything in India currently comes down to money, what can I afford? If I can afford it, well, let's go ahead and do it then. This may have been less true in previous generations, but in my generation, I see all too often people flaunting their wealth just because they can.

Let's talk about various aspects of ecological awareness:

Electricity - In the U.S., I militantly reduced electricity usage in our house. We were four people living in 3412 Hamilton Street Floor II. I made sure that all our lights were compact fluorescent bulbs. Our living room used the most electricity of any room in the house in that we used to use about 50 watts to light it. I also ensured that I bought about 200 kilowatt-hours per month of energy from PECO Wind. Ultimately, our per-capita annual electricity consumption was about 1,800 kilowatt-hours and roughly one-third of that came from wind. I also set up a clothesline in my backyard so I wouldn't have to use the clothes drier for half the year.

Meanwhile, in my own house in India, I'm shocked at the state of affairs. I see electricity bulbs everywhere, 100 watts to light a bathroom!!! A compact fluorescent bulb would do a far more efficient job for one fifth of that. I haven't pushed a move to make the house eco-friendly since we will be moving soon, but once we do things are going to change. But getting back to the point. Now as I am typing this, I am sitting in darkness and my laptop battery is helping me put down my thoughts electronically. I am sitting in darkness because there is a power cut. We get a power cut daily in the evening for roughly one to two hours per day. The reasons for this are numerous (rampant power theft in the countryside prevents the electricity board from expanding its electricity production to meet demand, plus government ineptitude, plus people not conserving electricity when they do have it, etc).

Anyway, the point is, at the moment, we do not have enough electricity in India to meet demand. So when we don't have electricity to meet demand, forget the idea of being able to choose where your power comes from. At the moment, we're just happy to have power, regardless of where it comes from. Now to be fair, we do have plenty of renewable power in India. Much of Bangalore's power comes from the Sharavathi Hydroelectric Project and southern India has among the largest windfarms in the world. India is among the top wind power producers and is looking to expand. But the fact that I'm trying to drive home is that India is pushing for renewable energy because other sources of energy are more expensive. Coal is abundant in central India and coal plants are plentiful there, but right now, the government is looking to all sources of electricity to try and fill the supply-demand gap.

If an option was offered in India today where people have a choice of purchasing wind power or other renewable power at a slightly higher cost, I would guess that the number would be far smaller than in western countries, even the United States which is arguably the least ecologically aware of them all. This is because I just haven't seen any ecological awareness that is not connected to cost. I was especially shocked that a prominent wildlife biologist in India drives around in a Mitsubishi Pajero, which is an insanely sized SUV. I just cannot understand how people do not see the connection between their own lives and the world in general. Every single person makes a difference, but people just don't seem to realize that.

Recycling - Recycling in India is non-existent. The civic authorities do not even dispose of trash properly, let alone recycle. The only thing you can recycle well in India is old newspapers and glass bottles, which people buy back from you. But forget about plastic and cardboard. Even in Philadelphia, which had this crazy policy of not recycling plastic, there used to be some civic organizations which I used to take my plastic to get recycled. Also, every plastic package in the U.S. is neatly labeled to show the type of plastic that it is with regard to recycling. It usually generally consists of a number inside a recycling symbol. As for the proportion of people that do recycle, the number is even smaller in India. Many people do not bother saving the newspapers or glass since there is no organized collection. Sometimes a guy will come in front of your house on a bicycle, but there are no timings for that. While there are morons in the U.S. that throw away glass bottles and plastic bottles when there are recycling bins within a block, there are still plenty of people in the U.S. that consciously make an attempt to recycle. That consciousness is not there in India.

And this is true with any x number of things ...

The general perception in India I've seen is, if you can afford it, go ahead and do it. This is whether it involves driving, using plenty of water or electricity, or just about anything. A good example would be rainwater harvesting. Some states in India are urging people to go about and harvest rainwater. This basically involves a mechanism where you engineer your roof such that rainwater flowing down would either be collected in a tank underground for non-potable use (washing clothes, flushing toilets, or even showering) or another mechanism where it would run directly underground to replenish groundwater so that your house has no effect on soil permeability.

If this was the U.S., then such a measure would have been immediately gathered by environmental organizations and "green" companies would have aggressively marketed it because there is a ready environment-conscious market. In India, that market is non-existent, and while I want to incorporate rainwater harvesting in the house we will be constructing / buying, I cannot find any web sites that offer detailed information and prices. Because of the lack of an environmentally conscious market, this brilliant idea is floundering in government plans and environmentalist web sites. An exception is the State of Tamil Nadu which has mandated that all new homes incorporate this feature.

As for environmental leadership from the government, we could certainly use a California over here.

In Gamble, Calif. Tries to Curb Greenhouse Gases

First, it's amazing what California is doing. More states should follow the lead. If Bush is not going to do anything about greenhouse gases, then individual Governors and Mayors should take the matter in their own hands. The picture showing that California will require solar panels to be a standard option for new homes once again highlights the general ecological awareness of Americans in general, and Californians in particular (the hicks in the South and those living between the Missisippi and the Sierra Nevadas are exceptions).

I watched with disgust a recent National Geographic program on Las Vegas that showed how much energy Las Vegas uses and how that energy comes, from burning coal. Therefore, it's amazing that California is giving these coal burners in the U.S. West the equivalent of the middle finger. The Rockies are among the best place to invest in wind and other renewable sources of power.

Basically, I'm not going to detail the entire article because it would make more sense for you to read it. It's also not entirely within the scope of this commentary, but do give it a read. My already high admiration for the State of California has risen even higher.

Part I: Personal Ecological Footprint

Ok, I've been meaning to write on this topic for some time now but I've been putting this off. I've collected a lot of thoughts and observations on this topic over the past few months, so it's going to be a long post. This is why I've decided to split it in parts. This way, it will be easier for people to read and will seem less choppy. This is partly based on the advice of a friend whose name I will not reveal, but let's give him a pseudoname, um ... let's call him Capstone.

Anyway, getting back to the topic, the posts will basically be on the following topics:

1. Ecological footprint of life in the U.S. vs. life in India from my own life & those of others I know, as well as general observations.
2. Ecological consciousness in general between people in the U.S. and people in India

So let's get started. Let's talk about energy use.

Commute and transportation - In India, I commute a distance of about 18 kms (~11 miles) to work, which is pretty much the other side of the city of Bangalore and is considered to be an insanely long commute. It ends up that I usually take the bus about half the time and I end up taking my scooter another 40% of the time (usually when I end up waking up late and missing the bus). I also take the car about 10% of the time, with the reason being anything from rain to me having to pick up or drop somebody.

Let's discuss my CO2 contributions. My scooter gets me about 42 kilometers per liter (~98 mpg, although I think I've managed to beat the 100 mpg mark this time around, which I can confirm when I fill up next). The car also gets respectable mileage, about 12.5 kilometers per liter (~30 mpg) in city traffic (and when I mean city traffic, I mean Indian city traffic. It takes slightly more than one hour to complete that 18 kms (that translates to an average speed of 11.65 mph)).

So I commute about 144 km per week (I work four days a week), of which about 58 km is by scooter and another 14 km by car (on average, since I take the car once in slightly more than two weeks). So per week, I use about 1.4 liters of fuel in the scooter and another 1.1 liter of fuel in the car. That comes to a total of 2.5 liters for the whole week! That's about two-thirds of a gallon for commuting to the other side of the city! Even if I never used public transportation and worked five days a week, my fuel consumption would only be only about 6.25 liters per week (or about 1.65 gallons)!!!

Compare this to my second co-op, which at about 40 km (25 miles) and 45 minutes from my house was considered a moderate commute. Even doing this "moderate commute", assuming I would work four days per week there also, I was driving 320 km (200 miles) to and from work. Even with my efficient car that got me on average around 34 mpg during that commute, I was using about 23.6 liters (~6.25 gallons) of fuel per week. That's about 9.5 times how much I am using now!

Now my public transportation route is an exception. I get on in the beginning of the route and my work is one of the last few stops. The buses are part of the new Metro Bus System grid and are timed at half an hour intervals. As a result, they're fairly frequent and reliable and I also almost always get a seat for the entire hour long journey. If this wasn't the case and I had to stand in infrequent buses with packed crowds, I would probably never take public transportation. Even in such a scenario, I would only use a quarter of the gasoline I did in the U.S.

The reasons for this are manyfold. One, we don't have that insane sprawl in India (although the proposed development of Greater Bangalore is worrying me since the leaders seem to be following an American city model rather than the more efficient European one). Anyway, for the moment, an 18 km commute here is insanely long. In the U.S., that would translate to commuting between Haddonfield, NJ and Philadelphia, PA, which is practically commuting next door. If you wanted to travel from Manhattan to JFK International Airport, your distance would be about one and a half times as much as my commute. And I'm talking about northeastern cities that are relatively compact and have good public transportation systems. I don't even want to think about the sprawling cities in the Midwest and South.

But forget the South. I was listening to the Preston and Steve show thru the Magic Thinking Box (to quote Pierre Robert) on WMMR and they had this show on commutes. People were talking about how they commuted to Philadelphia from places like beyond Pottstown, PA which is 65 kilometers one way (40 miles) because they want a bigger house (don't even get me started on the energy waste in those houses). Even Mani will be commuting about 65 kilometers one way (40 miles) to his work place in the middle of nowhere (Eatontown, NJ). At least he has a reason for commuting far, since he wants to live in civilization. At least he has promised me that he will make every endeavor to find people to carpool with and he's bought my car which with his driving style is giving him about 15 kilometers per liter (~36 mpg). And he has also said that he will try to compensate by taking public transportation (which involves getting to the train station, taking a train, and then walking about 2 miles) to his office at least once a week.

Second, with gasoline prices here at Rs. 55.15 per liter (~$4.52 per gallon, even more so when you consider affordability since Rs. 55 is a lot more unafforable than $4.50), people are forced to economize. Motorcycles and scooters here give a minimum of 40 kilometers per liter (94.5 mpg). Some of the new motorbikes such as the Bajaj Discover are marketed to give as much as 100 kilometers per liter in ideal test conditions, which means they'll give at least 75 kilometers per liter (177 mpg) in road conditions.

Even when it comes to cars, smaller cars are the norm in India. Our car, a 60 hp Maruti Zen (slightly smaller than a Chevy Geo) is considered a respectable small car. A Hyundai Accent in India is considered a midsize car, while in the U.S. it possesses the lowly tag of a subcompact. The Indian market is similar to the European market where blatant extravagance is discouraged. This is the major reason why I feel the need for better fuel economy standards to be mandated in the U.S. I also strongly favor the quadrupling of the gas tax gradually over the next few years (no, Mani, market forces will not tackle this job effectively). If we can get gas in the U.S. to cost around $4.50 per gallon, people will be forced to buy smaller cars. We can also use that money to build efficient European-style public transportation systems.

These are two reasons why my ecological footprint with regard to commuting is a tiny fraction of what it would be in the U.S. But forget energy use. Let's talk about water use. The city of Bangalore uses about the same amount of water daily as the city of Philadelphia, about 800 million liters per day (211 million gallons per day). Now take into account that Bangalore's population is slightly more than four times that of Philadelphia's population. Even assuming the vast amounts of people in the lower economic classes who would compensate, even the average middle class person's water usage in Bangalore is lesser. In Philadelphia, using crazy amounts of water isn't really a big deal since the water is taken from the Delaware and Schuykill Rivers which are well fed, and returned to the same rivers after treatment. It's a rainy climate in the northeast, so there's really no such thing as a water shortage. In the Northeast, water is plentiful (Bangalore, on the other hand is in a region that is supposed to receive 900 mm of rain annually, but which is dependent on the monsoons which are highly erratic. Water is piped from the Kaveri River over 140 kms away, up an elevational gradient of 400 meters (~1,300 feet)).

However, it really is shocking that people take the same water habits that they had in the northeast to desert places like Phoenix and Las Vegas, or even southern California. I remember that someone we know bought some furniture from someone in Philly. It was raining very heavily that April sunday, and the lady who was selling the furniture told me how she was moving back to Las Vegas to her boyfriend's place and they would be happy there because it was always sunny and they had a really big swimming pool. I bit my tongue to stop myself from saying how disturbing that was. A big pool in a desert climate!!! What are people thinking? It's not just that. Go to Google Maps and take a satellite look at Phoenix. Move around the city and see how many pools people have in their backyards. Never mind that they're completely destroying their groundwater reserves. The city of Las Vegas has pretty much acquired the rights to about 60% of the underwater reserves in the whole state of Nevada. Does anybody give a thought to what's going to happen 50 or 100 years down the line with this reckless lifestyle?

So would you take this to conclude that Indians are far more ecologically responsible compared to Americans? Well, yes and no. India's ecological footprint is much smaller, obviously as I've detailed above. But this is not through choice and knowledge, but rather through compulsion. Ecological awareness is far more advanced in the U.S., and you can't even compare it with India. Confused? Read Part II.

Crikey!

Yes, crikey indeed. Steve Irwin, more popularly known as Crocodile Hunter perished a few days ago when he got too close to a stingray he was filming and it swung its tail in self-defense, the barb at the tip of its tail piercing straight through his heart. It was an unusual way to die. Stingrays are usually very docile and from what I've heard from news reports, he is the third person to have died from a sting ray attack (perhaps in Australia only) for more than a century. For a man that handled crocodiles and venomous snakes with ease, this seemed almost a joke played by nature.

Steve Irwin was an ardent conservationist, inspired by his parents who were conservationists before him, and his dream was that his children follow in his footsteps, which they very well may. Founder of the Australia Zoo, he fought for conservation at every turn and it was largely due to his efforts that the Australian government shelved a proposal that would have allowed legal, safari-style hunting of crocodiles.

He is every conservationist's hero, because he was able to take the science and education out of scientific journals and university classes and present wildlife education in a way that made the ordinary layman care. He was an indispensable ally to conservation in the public arena. Which is why the following article has infuriated me beyond belief.

'The animal world got its revenge'

This has to be among the most trashy, despicable articles ever written. Germaine Greer goes beyond outrageous in this opinion column. Here are some of her assertions and my reply.

"What seems to have happened on Batt Reef is that Irwin and a cameraman went off in a little dinghy to see what they could find. What they found were stingrays. You can just imagine Irwin yelling: "Just look at these beauties. Crikey! With those barbs a stingray can kill a horse." (Yes, Steve, but a stingray doesn't want to kill a horse. It eats crustaceans, for God's sake.)"

Well, yes, that is the point of a documentary isn't it. See that's the reason why Irwin is popular, and Germaine Greer's feminist novels gather dust (and perhaps insect feces as well) on library bookshelves around the world. Which leads me to the next point.

"What Irwin never seemed to understand was that animals need space. The one lesson any conservationist must labour to drive home is that habitat loss is the principal cause of species loss. There was no habitat, no matter how fragile or finely balanced, that Irwin hesitated to barge into, trumpeting his wonder and amazement to the skies. There was not an animal he was not prepared to manhandle. Every creature he brandished at the camera was in distress. Every snake badgered by Irwin was at a huge disadvantage, with only a single possible reaction to its terrifying situation, which was to strike."

You see, if you don't go into an animal's habitat and film it, the world is never going to know about it. They certainly aren't going to waste hard earned money on Greer's books, if she ever bothered to put anything useful in them. It's all well and good to sit in a London office and state emphatically that wildlife habitat is for wildlife and should be left undisturbed.

Unfortunately, this is the real world (and Greer accuses Irwin of self-delusion!) and things don't work that way. Your ordinary poacher or livestock grazer or drunk rifle-toating entertainment seeker isn't going to respect the boundaries that you drew in your head or on paper. In order for wildlife conservation to have an effect, you need to have real protection on the ground, which involves entering habitat in itself. Further, to get the funds to have that protection, you need to convince people about the cause of wildlife, which Steve Irwin dedicated his life to. While the wildlife may theoretically be a lot happier without human intrusion, without Steve Irwin entering their habitat and promoting their cause to humanity, there wouldn't be any wildlife. Just ask Australia's crocodiles, which were given a new lease on life as I said before due to Irwin's immense popular appeal and efforts.

Ultimately, this is just once again proof that things always don't turn out right in this world. I'm sure the vast majority of humanity would have exchanged Germaine Greer's life a hundreds times over in order to have Steve Irwin back. The Crocodile Hunter did so much for the world, and I am sure his legacy will live on. As for Greer, she is a sad, pathetic failure in life who would be worth more in nutrition if she fed herself to a crocodile today than she would ever amount to in the rest of her life.