September Symphonies
September has, so far, been a month full of actions and actionable dreams. We in India have had everything from the way Modi hugged the ISRO Chief to calm him to the way he hugged Trump to balm him and the world called them economic nationalists. The ‘Seva Saptah’ or week of service from September...
Poaching is a terror unleashed on wildlife
Poaching isn’t a word that exists only in political parlance around the world. Employees can be poached by corporates, ideas are often poached by unscrupulous writers, and of course lots of people love poached eggs. However, it is time to connect the word back to the world where it rightly belongs – wildlife and the...
Social media influencers and conservation
Conservation and fundoo tourists do not really go together. This is because the forests and the wildlife there, including the tiger, can do without their habitat getting overwhelmed by ecstatic shouts, irreverent whistles, and camera flashes that are anyway not doing much except creating layers of disgust in the heart of nature. Forests are places...
Lets Talk Tigers
‘We are seeds as well as parasites to the earth. We can either give or take, depending on our perception of growth,’ wrote Zephyr McIntyre and whenever we talk of the environment, the eco-system, wildlife, conservation, or even tigers, what matters more than anything else is perception. I have always believed that starting from the...
Unconventional portrayal of Human-Nature interactions
Nature, like good branding, loves simple ideas. There are no complex routes prescribed, no obfuscating insights to master, no impossible-looking flow-charts dotting the path, and no shiny slogans cover them. For instance, if research shows that one-time-use plastics are harmful for the environment, a simple resolution to not use plastics by the common man is...
There is no poetry in smog
There is no poetry in smog Over and around us Bad air surrounds us We have constructed this demon On our own For our own And think we have won. Nothing is clear Except the fear That our misdeeds may never be undone. . . . . . . Arvind Passey 07 November 2017 PS:...
The colonizers never left
The eco-system, nature, environment, and in some way, even life is no longer safe from sharp-thinking and seemingly logical and worldly-wise colonizers today. And if you think that the last ones to colonize us were the British, think again. Look around and you will be able to see the way every facet of nature is...
Germs! Germs! Germs and the best hand wash
Let us look at life from a germ’s vantage point. They’re a happy lot today. The air around us in urban and rural India is pregnant with vehicles that help them travel long distances for free. The environmentalist calls them PM 2.5 or PM 10 or PM anything else but they are not just empty...
The art of good business
The art of good business ‘I want to buy a new smartphone,’ said a friend, ‘but I’m not sure which one to go for.’ ‘Buy one that fits your needs,’ I replied. Hearing my answer this friend unfolded a piece of paper and read out some startling statistics. He said that his bank had begun...
To those who look through the spotted deer
The funny fact about most people visiting wildlife reserves is that they tend to prefer wearing bright coloured caps of all sorts, clothes that would make even the wild hog snigger and keep looking into the screens of their smartphones, saying, ‘There is no network here.’ And every time you meet a canter-full of them...
Falling to a new life
Dear leaf, why do you quiver Before you fall, touch the ground? No eyes, but yet the distance Should be clear through waves of sound Falls don’t last nor are they false No fall ever ends it all Distance done, some new begun Falls are but a beckon, call
Who holds the razor?
Sharp, incisive, sure Not knowing who or what picks it To get a job done Follows orders well Can clean up mess or make one Thinks that it can think Plods through foamy thoughts Prepares the field every day Makes it smooth and fine
