Miss Adventures

Today’s a day off from work, so I can’t complain. Nevertheless, I thought I’d “celebrate” Republic Day by following up on the BMC demolition drive. It seems that the BMC wants to delist slumdwellers from the voter rolls because, in essence, once their homes are destroyed they no longer have addresses. And, without an address, you can’t vote. Sounds pretty democratic to me…

BMC wants evicted slumdwellers delisted
[from Times of India on 1/21/05…full text follows in case link ceases to work]
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Pondicherry

If you really need to take a break from India, then Pondicherry is a good bet. Anthony and I had set our sights on this former French colony long before we came to India, but we weren’t sure how it had fared in the tsunami.

It turns out that Pondicherry has a really high sea face below which lie stacks of treacherous black rocks and tetrapods. A few people died in Pondicherry. The town had some of the lowest numbers of deaths in TN, but it certainly would have been worse had Pondy not had such a reinforced wall. Even a few weeks later, high tide looked menacing – but I suspect that is how it always is. Posters that appeared to be several months to years old warned swimmers about the Devil Sea.
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Less than three weeks after the tsunami hit, I was able to visit Tamil Nadu (TN), the Indian state that, in addition to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, suffered the most damage. Most of the people who died in TN were south of Chennai (formerly Madras) in Nagapattinam.

I was unable to visit the latter over the past weekend, but I did get the chance to see Madras, Pondicherry, and some of the coastal towns in between. And, while those towns didn’t suffer casualties as heavy as Nagapattinam, the effects of the tsunami were somewhat noticeable. More conspicuous (but not surprising given the hardships of the travel industry in DC and NY after 9/11) was the seeming lack of tourists.
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Just when I start to think that Bombay is a world-class city, ridiculousness ensues. The BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) – the org responsible for overseeing city planning – has recently gone on a rash of demolitions against illegal structures. The demolitions have included not only slums – something like 60,000 have been destroyed so far – but also local restaurants or businesses that have, say, an unlawful mezzanine or an unauthorized wall.

The destruction of the slums is horrible, and people have expressed outrage that only poor people were being targeted. So, in order to seem fair, the BMC decided to go after big money places, too. That includes restaurants, such as Colaba’s Koyla, destroyed on Tuesday, and Seijo and the Soul Dish, a very high-style, month-old restaurant in Bandra (owned by friends of friends of mine), which was destroyed yesterday.
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Several weeks and a new year since I last wrote, the tsunami has wreaked unimaginable havoc in Asia, though, luckily, not in Mumbai. Many of my friends and family, as well as many people I’ve never met before, have gotten a good lesson in geography, which has resulted in many more emails and calls than I got in the past couple of months. It’s nice to know people pay attention to the news every once in a while.

I’m also happy to see that the Tsunami Help blog, the address of which I posted on December 28, has gotten more than one million hits! The site looks really polished now, and has a wealth of information about everything related to the disaster. It’s amazing what the contributors have been able to put together in a little under two weeks.

I wasn’t affected personally, but I have been apprehensive about random blogging in its wake. A sort of survivor’s guilt. I am reminded of the headlines of the satire paper, The Onion, a week of so after 9/11: “A nation longs to worry about stupid sh** again.” So I took a little break.

However, there have been some interesting developments on this side of the subcontinent that may or may not have been a result of the tsunami. Over New Year’s weekend, Mumbai was *gasp!* a bit chilly and windy (we’re talking maybe 70 degrees), perhaps an effect of meteorlogical disturbances. And, speaking of disturbances, some strange objects have washed up on the beaches here. We were near the shore on New Year’s day, and saw that a whole pig had washed up. As this area is populated with Muslims, who don’t eat pork, and Hindus, who don’t eat meat, we were slightly concerned about where this pig came from. Even when we’ve traveled around the countryside and passed farms, we haven’t seen anything resembling a pig. Could it have come from Southern India? Thailand? Who knows.

Even more depressing was seeing dozens of pairs of flip-flops - mostly children’s sizes - on the shore. I’m hoping it was just a coincidence. Alas, it was a grim reminder.

Despite all of that, New Year’s was nice, as we had some friends visiting from out of town. The weather, as I mentioned, was right pleasant and January’s climes have been very enjoyable. I should be back in better blog form soon.

In the meantime, a quick rundown of what I’d be writing about if I thought the time was right:
1) Amitabh AND Abhishek on Karan
2) Klum and Seal?!?
3) The Hooch Train
4) India’s fascination with Bryan Adams and Richard Marx
5) The pleasures of Indo-Chinese food (definitely more on that at a later date…)

Seriously, back to the tsunami…I have really been annoyed by the fact that India has, for the most part, refused aid relief from NGOs and other countries. I can understand it’s a pride thing. But, this tripe is coming from a land that has yet to eradicate polio, and is currently facing a jaundice epidemic in cities and in villages. There’s no shame in asking for (or accepting) help, India. If you ask me (and I know no one is), there’s more shame in being stubborn.