Gardening and living!

Posted on September 25, 2013 by Sandeep Bhalla

Gardening as a subject and as a hobby happens to be least popular. May be too plebeian. It also requires a regular commitment. Living in apartments amidst an ocean of polluting fumes, eclipsed in the nave of concrete jungle, we often do not miss the plants. Last year when I was in Bombay on several occasions, another congested and populous city, I realised how hideously un-green that city is. Air filled with sea moisture and obnoxious smells typical of closed places. Back in Delhi, I was glad that it looked like a big garden with roads. The pollution here seemed non-existent notwithstanding the fact that 20% of the city population has symptoms of asthma, at one time or another.
Coming back to gardening, it is awful that schools that waste so much time on science projects, laboratory experiments and cramming benefits of trees for environment besides moral science, show nothing about gardening. Continue reading →

Rain Rain go away, poor people had enough today!

Posted on February 5, 2013 by Sandeep Bhalla

It is raining cats and dogs since yesterday night. Rain stops for a while but restarts again. The outpour becomes torrential and then it subsides to stop altogether. From where it starts all over again. By noon the rain stopped altogether. However the damage has been done. Whole day traffic was a mess. but now it is all quite.

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Maha Kumbh 2013: A holy dip in sewer!

Posted on January 14, 2013 by Sandeep Bhalla

14th January 2013 is the day of Makar Sankranti, which is a harvest festival just like Lohri. Incidentally it falls on this day every year. This is perhaps because it is calculated as per Solar Cycle which is the basis of Christian Calender as well. Astronomically it means that Sun has moved to Capricorn Zodiac. Makar means Capricorn and Sankrant means movement in which two zodiacs of Capricorn and Cancer shall be joined by Sun for a moment, while passing through the one to another. Every 12 years, on this day, largest congregation of human kind takes place on river banks of rivers Ganga (British called her Ganges) (her because she is a goddess) and Godawari at four places. Allahabad is the most prominent place for Kumbh as the Maha Kumbh (Great Kumbh) after every 144th years takes place here alone. Allahabad is intersection (called Sangam which means amalgamation) of three rivers namely Ganga, Yamuna & Saraswati. On this occasion people take a holy dip in the waters of Ganga and purify themselves from their past sins This bathing is considered holy according to Hindu Mythology.

According to Mr. Jairam Ramesh the then, Minister for sanitation and drinking water:
(Source: http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_rivers-in-india-are-sewers-jairam-ramesh_1594304)

Rivers are not rivers in India. Rivers have become sewers. The 500-km stretch of Ganga between Kannuaj and Varanasi is just sewer.

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Happy Lohri 2013: Warmest Lohri Day in years

Posted on January 13, 2013 by Sandeep Bhalla

Deceptive winter

Winter which descended with a bang on Christmas 2012, seems to have stealth its way out with a spoof. For last five days, here in New Delhi, temperature is consistently rising. Today it is comparable to Sydney, Australia. It is said that temperature all over Asia is unusually high as part of environmental upheaval. First there was absence of dust storm in New Delhi, during summer. Then there was unusual heavy rain on Dashahra/Vijaydashmi Day. It never rains in Oct-Nov but this year it did. Now this warm Lohiri. Any way:

HAPPY LOHIRI 2013.

Whatever the temperature, the bonfire would be lit and enjoyed even if we have to pull out half sleeve shirts and knickers from the closet or to postpone it from early evening to early night. Life goes on.

BlackBerry WeatherTrax from JaredCo has problems!

Posted on January 7, 2013 by Sandeep Bhalla

Unlike Android, BlackBerry has no native program for Weather Check. Jared and Company provides a free program called ‘WeatherTrax’ . However it has a problem giving weather. It appears that it gets confused between the minimum temperature and current temperature, some times. See the snapshots below: It may be noted that low temperature is higher than the current temperature on both occasions. In first snapshot low was 11 and current was 6. Similarly in the second, the low was 8 but current was 3 degrees Celsius. This is apparently some anomaly which needs to be fixed.

For the record, fog and cold weather has certainly hit hard, the life in New Delhi. While everything is normal the weather is not. Fog greets at all the places. Visibility is OK after sunrise rather at 8.00 AM onwards. This is a picture taken at about 10.45 AM:

The sunlight could be seen today at 11.00 AM. This picture (like the above one) was shot from Blackberry 9220 just when sun rays hit the ground:

BTW traffic on this road is always thin. It is not because of fog. Elsewhere it is the usual chaos.

Winter has frozen my thoughts.

New Delhi without Dust-storm.

Sandeep Bhalla's Blog

Relativity of truth is more complex than light.

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