Glut - of several kinds

If one had looked down to the earth from outer space on July 31, both North India and parts of North America probably showed thick strokes of black, although  for two very different reasons.

That day, India played host to the world’s worst ever black out, while elsewhere in the west, companies were setting fire to their share of natural gases, a byproduct of excessive oil drilling in certain parts of United States.*

When oil is pumped from an oil well, natural gas also is recovered. While oil is stored, natural gas is processed and the remnants, which are unusable, are ignited using gas flares.

The flares, orange in colour, evolved into thick serpentine smoke above the Americas, and on the other end of the globe, life came to a halt for about 600 million Indians.

Typical gas flares Image courtesy:Wikimedia

At the outset, the two issues have a common denominator-lack of infrastructure.

Grid failure in Agra brought life to a standstill across 21 states in India. Excessive use of electricity by states, fuelled by transmission losses and lower production, failed the grid.

There’s barely enough for the Indian states to get by. Nuclear power plants are being set up, much to the dismay of the locals and environmentalists. Precious time in the parliament is lost over debating energy issues.

Spanning wide away to the west and rewinding to about six years ago, natural gas and oil was thought to be in shortage in United States. People then learned to drill horizontally into shale formations (Shales are sedimentary rocks, rich in petroleum and natural gas), by pumping sand and water into stone structures to release the trapped fuels. This new technology helped tap oil and natural gas in the previously unexplored areas.

Availability rose, prices fell, storage houses maxed out, while flaring rose to an all time high.

According to an article by David Fessler, about 100 million cubic feet of gas gets burnt everyday at Bakken shale formations, at the northern part of United States. That’s enough to heat up 5,00,000 homes.

He also says, “Burning that much natural gas spews about two million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually. According to the Times, that’s as much as 384,000 cars, or one moderately sized coal plant, throw off.” Read the article here

Pipelines and processing plants haven’t been able to match up to the speed of extraction. Oil prices have been falling, with U.S. crude touching a three month low of about $77 per barrel.

Indians continue to pay sky high prices for fuel, thanks to the complicated pricing system, which I honestly do not have the energy or patience to understand.

I work at US timings in India; spend time getting to know their resources, while spending ours.

While we’re talking about energy, lets also talk clean energy—solar companies. Incidentally, U.S. companies are shifting away from clean technology. Chinese companies are producing them at a price the U.S. companies cannot hope to compete with.

If I sound patronizing for the American companies, you should know I have no special affinity for them. But I do care when the clean tech stocks fall, because that’s equivalent to raising a red flag to all those who would want to invest in a cleaner tomorrow.

On one hand, investors are pumping money in oil companies, which are burning gas away by the second while on the other-they’re taking money off solar companies, which could pave way for a greener tomorrow. On a third hand, if there is one, India is.. well you know what’s happening in India.

Life,world, earth, nature... thy name is paradox.

*Parts of North America and other oil fields in the world, would have (probably) shown thick black smoke since quite some time anyway

Stumpd

There were three of them.

“My favorite car is … Esteem,” a girl, the eldest of the three said.

The younger ones, a girl and a boy, watched her in awe, stumped by her brilliance.

They didn’t know how to top her choice.

Why? – asked the little girl, attempting to understand how god could give her all the good ideas.

"Because I like how it looks..!" the eldest replied.

The boy was silent.

Next day, the girl, the middle one, walked into the hall, where popular Kannada serial starring Sihi Kahi Chandru was running on TV.

"My favorite car is Esteem!"

The eldest scrunched up her face. “You cannot. It’s mine.I chose it yesterday already,”she said.

“I don’t know, I want it too,” the younger girl despaired.

The youngest boy joined in the conversation. “I want Esteem too,” he said.

Two against one. The eldest knew she had to do something.

“Why? Why is Esteem your favourite car?” she asked them.

“Because I like how it looks!” both said in unison.

“Naa ..That was my answer.Cheating!” the eldest said.

“aaa..ummm.. I know I know,..” The two young ones came up with random phrases; looked up at the sky with big round dumb eyes until they realized they truly did not know the answer.

The eldest smiled and explained “I like it because it looks is run on petrol and petrol smells so nice.”

“Ah.” Stumped again! The two kids go back.

Next day, the younger girl sees a black jeep on the road and tells her sister. “My favorite car is jeep! You can smell more petrol in jeep. Aaannd it’s black! My favorite car is the best!” she beamed proudly.

The boy, sensing new development, half falling off his cycle said, "Mine too!"

The eldest smiles. “Esteem is not my favorite anymore. I have new best favorite. You can have it if you want, "she says to the boy.

The boy, confused between jeep and Esteem, again looks up, big eyed, hoping for a solution.

The younger girl meanwhile challenges her sister. “Why? How come? No way is your car better than mine.”

The eldest smiled, contented with her smarty-pants-answer.

The boy, in shorts, meanwhile, is still figuring out what to choose.

“Pss..My favorite jeep is black in color” the little girl offers.

“Oh!” That seemed to clear up his confusion. “Okay.My favourite car is black jeep,” the boy announced. 

The two triumphantly look at their elder sister. 

The elder drops a bomb. She smiles and says. “My vehicle needs no petrol.”

“Ha ha ha..” the kids guffaw.. “You can run esteem on water? Ha.. hoge le … no chance!”

“Is it black?” the younger girl questions suspiciously.

“No.”

The boy turns away disinterested. What is not black isn’t interesting, he decides. But still hangs around for the eldest's answer.

“Then?”

“I don’t need petrol.. I can run my vehicle on air!” she proudly announces.

With no hint of a prank on her face, the two kids make a horrified there’s-something-in-the-world-I-don’t-know expression. The defiant girl looks up at her and asks, “What is this vekcle (she couldn’t pronounce or know what a vehicle was back then)

“I can ride it without a license. I don’t need to spend money on petrol, can your “black” jeep do that?,” eldest prodded.

The boy comes back to join his sister in her dumbfounded expressions. They look at each other gloomily and look down.

“My favorite vehicle is a Cycle!” she happily says.

Realization dawns.

 Another day, another challenge, we will win, the kids think.

Besides eating-pooping-sleeping, the younglings had to now think of newer ways to beat their sister. Phew, life’s hard; the girl thinks and goes to sleep, skipping her usual poop routine at bed time. “I have to think. I will not do extra work I won't poop,” she declares to herself and drifts away to sleep. 

Looking at Aradhane from the periphery

This new avatar as a journalist has me questioning a lot of things I previously took for granted, things that I thought was fairly basic and fundamental.

For example, consider the aradhane. 

Yesterday, Aug. 5, 2012, was the third day of the Raghavendra Swamy aradhane. And I visited three mutts (a temple of a different kind)- I insisted on visiting one of them, something I would never ever do previously- just so I could understand the logic behind grandeur of it all. More on that later.

Let me give you a little bit of intro- This was 341^st aradhane(anniversary of his cremation in Mantralaya).  All mutts celebrate the festival with pomp and show; most of the mutts I’ve visited over the past also serve a free meal (read elaborate lunch).

The number of devotees that throng mutts is enormous.

On a personal note, I have never been excited by religious events. At best, I can call myself secular. I’m happy to live my set of opinions on god and religion. However, I do like them for one reason, it gives people, a reason to celebrate and be merry. I look at the faces of people and enjoy, while all the religious folks bathe themselves in the customs and traditions of it all.

The aradhane is, to a large extent, a carnival for the elderly. Just like I sit with friends and compare notes before the exams, the elderly (atleast in my family) compare notes on the sweets served, the bhajans sung, and the benefits volunteers receive across different mutts. And the fervor is even more pronounced in my family- not just because we( excluding me)  are sworn devotees .. but also because we happen to be direct descendants of Rayaru(aka Raghavendra swamy). Yeah, blue blood and all..Go figure! The middle name Beegamudre should point you in the right direction.

On Aug. 12, I sat through 10 minutes of comparing notes on food and the niceties of the event in my cousin's home.“Oh, nam matha(mutt) dalli haygreeva kanri.. Fruit salad oo hakidru,” mom beamed proudly, as if it was her family function. “Also...” (I tried to translate this for the benefit of non-Kannadigas... sorry... I cannot..! It’s impossible!)

Unfortunately, she was interrupted by another family member, who was busy recalling some funny incident that involved an aachar (priest) and a volunteer.

Before that could end, another started on how nice the previous day was, which was cut short by who they met in the event... It was at this point I decided to sneak away and troll on Facebook. Much simpler you see.

Anyway, in one of the three mutts I happened to visit, an achaar was narrating a purana( a story--specifically glorifying rayaru).

“Who, here is poorer than he was at that time.”

My reaction- errmm..Duh! Several millions! What with all the inflation and all! And back then, when rayaru existed, the economy was much better that it is now. People dealt with gold, like they buy rice now!

I became a bitch for facts when I became a journalist.

Sure, he was poor. He went on to inspire people and do great things. No one’s contesting that- but making a statement as blatantly misinformed as that, I thought was thoroughly off putting.

He made several other statements.

“Who here, faced more difficulties than he did?” and several rhetoric questions basically aimed at glorifying him. I have nothing against the glorification. But delivering such a misinformed lecture to everyone –I wouldn’t recommend him!

 I was even more mesmerized with the crowd’s reaction. Every single syllable out of the priest’s mouth the devotees gulped down. I walked out of the hall after thoroughly rolling my eyes at the ignorance of everyone around.

In the main hall, people were busy praying- getting prasada in plastic cups, dropping wads of cash into the hundi( the bigger, religious version of piggy bank) and I stood in the middle of the crowd wondering how much plastic, water, and electricity went into this three-day fest.

 I quickly brushed the thought aside because I knew, there are several events around the world, which consume far more resources and waste more than half of it every single say. At least this event gave hope and renewed faith in people’s lives, gave them an anchor to align their lives around, no matter how exaggerated the claims made by the aachar were.

That afternoon, I was left alone by my family, amongst a sea of devotees to eat food.

Surrounded by two ladies, well past their seventies, eating the most traditional food I could get my hands on, on the most holiest (supposedly) of days, I got invited to hang out at a pub in the evening.

I gave myself the most tactical face palm, involuntarily guffawed, much to the annoyance of the pious aunties..and realized how random and warped my life is.

PS-- A request to all the devotees... read--extensively! Question what the priest says. Reaffirm your faiths with facts! He is not your encyclopedia.. Religion is much more than bowing your head to the elderly and trusting the priest to dictate your way of life. Discover.. Because religion and life are more colorful than one can imagine!