Our e-port card so far

Having become more "enlightened" citizens, we've been trying to reduce our footprint as much as possible. Here's a few things achieved, and a few more to go.

+ I cycle to work 90%+ of the time
+ We reuse the "waste" water ejected by the RO filter
+ The automatic dryer is strictly for emergencies - not switched on for ages now
+ Try and aggressively avoid "standby mode" for TV/Home theatre/chargers - still left on 30% of the time tho :(
+ Determined to do fewer kilometers on the car. Working out very well, thank you!
+ Been trying to promote cycling in our circle of influence, and beyond. Decent success.

- Cannot seem to reduce geyser usage. Love warm water, and attempts at minimizing time switched on have failed.
- Have not revived attempts towards en-mass adoption of solar heating in our apartment complex
- Have failed in attempt towards getting apartment to optimize usage of diesel for backup gensets
- The Standby Switchoff is only a partial success - needs more work
- Plastic usage is still not low. There's so much that comes packaged in plastic from the stores :(

Overall, pleased - but there's scope for improvement.

Silent Majority

They came first for the Communists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist;
And then they came for the trade unionists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist;
And then they came for the Jews, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew;
And then . . . they came for me . . . And by that time there was no one left to speak up.

Most recent trigger for the above - a biker got beaten up on the flimsy premise of his attire. The mailing list on which I read this got into a debate about the off-topic-ness of the story and reactions to it!

Overall, the spiritual leaders forgot to speak out strongly against the association of weapons with religion. The political leaders at the top got into marriages of conveniences with the terrorizers of local populations for short term "gains". We stay shut on the roads when there's a brawl, or a woman gets beaten up by some neanderthals.

None of my business. Thats what it is all boiling down to.

Your Own Little Space ? Read on...

If you've been thinking about a house, don't like living in the heart of bustle and traffic, want a good community, do not like the run-of-the-mill builder version of creating living spaces and were priced out of the market, this may be of interest to you.

What: A smallish comuunity - bet 12-25 homes (depending on costs, configurations) with potentially homes/condos/row-houses thrown in. Very green. Lots of open spaces.
Where: Off Sarjapura Road. Options exist between the area near the Railway Line and a little before Sarjapura Town. Beautiful green places, decent connectivity, emerging hotspots (hopefully a little in the future so we can have some peace and quiet)
How Much: Want to keep it in the affordable range - so maybe as much as a decently priced 3#BHK apartment.

Honestly, not all the details have been worked out. But I trust the guys who're ready to execute this. I've seen their work in the past, and saw something they're developing now only yesterday. The entire campus there needs just 7.5KW of electricity, which is completely supplied using a combination of solar and wind generation! In addtion there's a bio-mass unit, and rain water harvesting takes care of most of the water needs. And the construction style is concrete-minimum, and very energy friendly, yet pleasing.

Ok, that almost sounds like a sales pitch. Perhaps it is. The idea is to have like minded folks living in the same place, running a sustainable community without breaking the bank. If you're curious or keen, lemme know. There are 5-6 people on board already, and we could think in terms of an "expansion" of the plan in terms of the area/number of dwellings, but ideally don't want too much of built space.

Amen.

BCycle: B the change :)

Oh so cool. Will this work in Bangalore? Need someone to try this out. Whatsay ?

Engleash

Some I've noted. No its not irritating etc - just amusing how many have used these "incorrectly" and I'm guessing the latter won't even be true in another decade or so - quite like "prepone".

• loose/lose
• voila/viola
• off the mark/of the mark (and similar contexts) [ The Outlook's latest issue has this too! ]
• advice/advise [ of course used interchangeably :) ]
• consist of/comprise [ I've been corrected to "comprise of" instead of comprise, in a doc! ]

If you know more - comment maadi.

The one thats become popular already, and does get my goat :

• my bad (my bad what ?)

Then there's the very Bangalorean

• by the by

which is both a little irksome and a little cute.

[ Oh well, I'm probably just getting old :) ]

Seriously, language is a dynamic, living organism. Nothing proves it like these changes as more populations adopt one. So Messrs Wren & Martin, stop turning in your graves.

Edit:

Part of the reason (the more recent trigger being the Outlook) was this thread on BikesZone, where I added:

Advice for Advise ?
Which the Verb, which the Noun,
"Stadiums" reprimanded
"Prepone" gets a frown!
Ah the English Nazis march,
Hup-one-two-three
Love Queen's Desi tho
Want to break free.

Slow down your life, and all that jazz

Nice video:

Culture-vulture and all that

Culture. Hmm, deep one.

Ok, I'm trying to find my own personal answer to this. What is culture. Is there a "definition" ? Whats the "list of things" we can arm ourselves with to respond to the Selvams and the Muthaliks of the world ?

Well, here the definition (I like Wiki's combination of the more common ones, so quoting that)

Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning "to cultivate")^[1] is difficult to define. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions.^[2] However, the word "culture" is most commonly used in three basic senses:

• excellence of taste in the fine arts and humanities
• an integrated pattern of human knowledge, belief, and behavior that depends upon the capacity for symbolic thought and social learning
• the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization or group.

Part I is something I doubt occurred to Muthalik or Selvam or their ilk when they repeated what they've heard so often from others who wanted to use it as a blunt object to beat other people on the head with, or stop from this or that.

The second/third: Wow, those are deep and complex. What's the "pattern" for India - land of extreme vegetarianism as well as cannibalism, country of the devout and the atheist - not just now but in recorded history and given an appropriate place in the texts as well, social behaviour that stresses on idealism, is pragmatic about politics and corruption, includes in its ambit both polyandry and polygamy, and proudly tells tales of ferocious gods, and more human kings who started out bloodthirsty but overnight became persistent role models for peace mongering ?

Is it the rigid rules in the Vedas that define us, or the moral strictures, or our codified caste system, thats been handed down to us as collected knowledge ? Is it the subtle sarcasm in the extremely open minded Upanishads that define our philosophy, and the tradition of tark-vitark and recorded accepted disagreements ? Was there a reason for a personal God for every Indian, while the texts simultaneously speak of "inclusive monotheism, which acknowledges a personal form of God as the Supreme God, with all other forms of God as plenary expansions or aspects of the Supreme" (source) ?

Are we trying, too often, to define our beliefs, religions, culture and traditions by what is disallowed (often for a convenient truth in a political or social power struggle), illegal and considered profane ? Are these not better defined by their positives - what they enable, what they help better/improve ? Is culture not a concept that aims to define some set of ideals that works towards a more refined, tasteful goal ? Is that served well by fear, and a demand to adhere, or else... ?

To me, India and its culture is about not just tolerating, but embracing and adopting the strange and new, respecting the different even if one doesn't necessarily understand it, and celebrating life in all its myriad forms. What its never been, certainly, is homogeneous, or a one "best" thing to do, to follow. Gods, clothes, customs, traditions, beliefs, philosophies - we have numerous cores, and even more forms of packaging of each. Like a Buddhist Lama explained to me when I wondered about the gazillion sects of what started as a simple message - different folks accept the same truth presented differently. Its the same end goal. That, to me, was Indian culture. Be what you are, be comfortable, and expect to be comfortable with your truth though there are others who have a different truth and a different take on things.

Often this exists at an individual level as well. The west and western trained minds consider it hypocrisy - our extreme politeness with folks known to us, yet some very crude/rough edges in our behaviour with strangers, our patience in certain contexts when we cannot even queue up for a bus - but its the same comfort with multiple truths and acceptance of opposing concepts that co-exist simultaneously - that defines our culture.

If there's any one thing its never been about - any one negative you want to define it in - its rigidness. India is an old, mature adult who's seen it all, and is pragmatic yet pious, comfortable with its blemishes and revels in its grace. It certainly does not seek to define itself narrowly, or through intolerancle of this set of beliefs or that. And certainly not intolerance of tongue, or attire, or faith.

[ The song from "Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani" captures it quite nicely :D ]

Will ride better

The Well-Tempered Cyclist | Momentum - The Magazine For Self Propelled People!

No more "riding past" along with pedestrians - get down and walk if one has to use that. Bangalore's riders are a new lot, and we gotta establish the rules and the riding culture here.

Lets make Bangalore Hotter

There's a power cut right now. I'm at home, and last year we'd taken a call to not start the gensets between 10am-5pm if the electricity was out.

Its in the lower 30s right now - and thats out in the sun. This being Bangalore, the breeze is still pleasant, and its perfectly tolerable indoors, unless you've grown up in the Upper Himalayas or the Arctic or at least Canada. But there are mails about the unbearable heat, asking for backup power to be restored immediately. The power cuts are shorter these days, and surely we can afford this!

Can we ? Our apartment complex uses 2x180KWh generators to keep the backup power going. At peak loads, utilization has rarely exceeded 40%. During the day its worse - with most people at office. Can we really afford to keep making Bangalore hotter, and crib about the heat, and keep running gensets longer as we strain the power supply with a larger and larger demand for energy to keep our airconditioners running perpetually?

Yes, we've got so used to keeping airconditioning running all the time at work, in the cars, that the lack of it makes it unbearable? (Honest, its in no way hot as I type this. My daughter's here too, and not even close to complaining about the heat).

What can we do ? There's been talk of trying to connect both gensets and try and reduce the diesel consumption to a minimum. But the action's been slow, and I fear will die out once the gensets are back on fulltime. There's also the aspect of redefining what "need" is and the things we "cannot live without" as a society.

We in the middle class blame the government a lot for most stuff. Lack of roads, lack of electricity supply, lack of public transport, and everything else. Often rightly so. But my observation in the recent past also leads me to believe that we're quite insensitive and focused on our short term needs, even at a huge cost to our long term benefits. The craz.y salary spiral, the real estate bubble, the growing use of cars even for basic grocery shopping, the string of excuses for not using public transport, etc - these are all symptoms of a common malaise -"let me solve that little bit of an issue and who the hell cares if the cost is huge - I didn't create the problem after all". We keep giving in too easily, to too many "necessities", at too large a cost. I really have nothing against convenience, but we could start showing some level of sensitivity towards ensuring the footprint these cause is reduced as much as possible. Monetarily, we can surely afford that.

Fair enough. Sure, I'm probably over-reacting and hyper-ventilating, but then I'm also despairing.

Edit : just noticed the Google Ads on the side for this page - both hilarious and depressing. Commerce, ah.

Whither Bangalore ?

The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Gangs attack women in ‘western attire’

Horrible - and while I'm trying hard to not be biased, such elements seem to have been emboldened under the present government. I was optimistic when the government had changed and we'd gotten rid of the Gowda family and related uncertainty - but given their silence and inaction on these kind of issues makes me less certain Bangalore will continue to be as friendly as civilized under them. Its really a fringe element of society/polity, and it'll be sad if they're allowed to terrorize and radicalize a friendly place like this.

This entire outside/insider cr@p these guys rake up, and then proceed to target lone women for, is such a fraudaulent issue. This has been my home for 13 years now, including the coffee, people, weather, and the adjust maadi comfort one gets here - and its scary to see these lumpen narrowminded allowed freedom to roam the streets and tell people where they should live, what they should wear, who they're permitted to meet and what God they can and cannot pray to. Mangalore seems to have been under this terror for a while now, and I guess they want their influence to spread. Unless the good folks of Bangalore (or even Mangalore) stand up and resist - and the report doesn not inspire confidence wrt that - we'll just let these louts take over completely.

Mr. Yeddiurappa, whose side are you on ? Loud and clear, please, for once.

The Standard of Living Problem

This was sent on the Bangalore Bikers' Club group. Someone also noticed the mention that in the 70s, 71% of passenger trips were made on bicycles! He also commented that "It was better than Copenhagen."

So Bangalore, and in fact most of the country, did have a bike culture - ? Except it was hardly a culture - but more of a lack of choice. Our species is so governed by defined and accepted "standards" that we soon got hit by technology, and all that. And as affordability/incomes improved, there was only one path that spelled "progress" and we took to our Vespas and Lambrettas like there was no tomorrow, licence raj notwithstanding.

And so on and so forth. The used Ambys, Padminis, the landscape changing 800 and Gypsy for the braver souls, and in more recent part the plethora of options with more and more features becoming 'standard' and airconditioning becoming the only visible way to battle the noxiousness this progress brought into our lives.

The argument given, usually, is that this is the "price" of development and economic progress.

Really ? Are we so dumb that there's only the whole of one of two or three models to be picked from ? Nah, we just never bothered to define our own report card and terms of progress.

So its someone else's "standards" we're trying to catch up with - consumption of electricity, fuel, goods leading the march. Upsizing, a "standby" mode for everything at home, western WCs, zippy long expressways to merely get to work - all are symptoms of this affliction.

These "standards" have started to interfere with the "living" in a big way. Gotta evolve beyond the aping we've gotten into. Gotta be smarter than the species has been in the last 30-40 years or so.

Cars move cars, not people!

Amazingly good read about the inherent inefficiency of private transport, why trains work better and why cities should be defined by a 20 minute walking radius!

You might initially not find the ideas practical, or even digestible, but give it another read, and start asking "why not". For too long we've not questioned the way of life, the form of economics and the attributes of progress that have been defined for us and that we're expected to pursue and strive for.

Excerpt:

The real problem is, though, cars don’t move people, cars move cars. The average car or light truck is two tons or so: 4000-plus pounds to move 200 pounds of people. OK, everybody out of the SUVs and F-150s and into a nice, green Prius. However, the curb weight of an unladen Prius is 2765 pounds, which means a ton and a half around to get you and a bag of groceries home. Not good.

Someday a generation will wonder "How could they? Did they not pause to think, or did they have no brains or foresight?"

Ride The Bus! CBD Bangalore HOHO Service.

The BMTC has launched a Volvo service in the central business district which connects all the hotspots in 2 circular routes, at a low, convenient fare of 10/- for an all day pass! Just hop on and hop off wherever you need to go. All the major malls, intersections are covered, and you'll get to walk and discover the pleasures of Bangalore's happening zone too.

Thsi service is called the Kendriya Sarige (just ask for KS, eh ?) and you're guaranteed a bus every 5 minutes or so! Another service - the "Big10" (2 routes start today) connects the entire city using regular (10 minute frequency!) buses on the major arterial roads.

Here's a map of the routes and a list of stops on both the Blue line and the Orange line.

































I'm very very impressed with Namma BMTC and will definitely make use of Namma Bus :)

Bangalore, do try and not take the car to CBD - ride the bus instead! Saves fuel, pollution, congestion and encourages the city to think of more progressive options. Public transport options have been a chicken and egg story for a while, but BMTC has taken the first steps forward. Now its upto us to use it or lose it.

Update:

The Big10's are starting on 2 routes today - E-City and ITPL. Fromt next week, they'll start on the Sarjapura Road-Viveknagar-Brigade Road route too! Yay - it'll probably pass my office too :)

Hazards of being a bl**dy do-gooder

As is wont with the more enthusiastic bikers in Bangalore, Rohan and a bunch of others were at Lalbagh some time ago trying to spread the word and do their bit to create a mindset change towards cycling.

Look what they got from some senior citizen, and some official!



I remember a guy trying to pick a fight around the same place earlier too when we'd gone there for the first Critical Mass. Fine, you have a different point of view - but whats with the animal behaviour, morons ?

Cycling benefits illustrated

[ From the Mumbai Bikers' Picasa Pics ]

Freewheeling Bangalore

Ananth Ranganathan - Freewheeling

View more presentations or upload your own. (tags: ignitebangalore2 ignite)

I'm praying this comes to fruition, real soon. BMTC has some amazing plans too - if it all works out Bangalore would've taken a major leap forward.

Bangalore Train Commute : More info!

Glifford, who shared the train info with me earlier - responded with a lot of additional info to my earlier post about train commute options in Bangalore - so another entry is probably justified for sharing this:

Thanks Sameer for picking up on what I told you yesterday. I hope many readers of your blog try it out and actually begin using it.

I myself am planning to begin using it.

Well some more details.

Bangalore East <-> Krishnarapuram (one way) is

• Rs. 2 (lower than a platform ticket!!!) on a normal passenger train
• Rs. 24 on a Mail/Express train. Either way

way cheaper and faster than any other form of transport.

Bus fare from Krishnarajapuram <-> Kadabeesanahalli (J. P. Morgan, Prestige Tech Park) one way is

• 20 on a Volvo
• 15 on a Suvarna
• maybe 10 or cheaper on Pushpak or regular class (blue) buses.

Still works faster and cheaper than even the (motor)bike or scooter.

And finally, how do you plan your journey? This is what I do. Some time before leaving, I just check the current train status on:

http://www.trainenquiry.com/PassingThroughTrains_Display.aspx?sel_val=KJM+&queryDisplay=KRISHNARAJAPURM,+KJM+&time=24&name=&code=
(for Krishnarajapuram)
or for others search here: http://www.trainenquiry.com/PassingThroughTrains.aspx

Then plan accordingly considering about 20 mins for a bus ride from my office to KJM. Simple!

Maybe you should update the post with your links. And yes!

These trains are regular up-country trains. Not local trains. But nothing stops us from using them as such as long as we pay the fare and it stops where we want (Mail/Express have reserved compartments which you may choose to use, but not legal).

And yes, IT (or new economy) guys/gals are not the only ones who use it. Many sales people (the credit card types) and courier boys regularly travel to Whitefield station. This is from the conversations I managed to eavesdrop when sitting in these sparsely filled compartments!

Thanks Gliff! Hope to see the utilization of this mode of transport go up!

The NDTV blogger tamasha

Why NDTV lost my respect | Inside the mind and heart of Venkatesh Sridhar

Well, they lost mine too. While I did buy media-on-overdrive arguments earlier, I had also rationalized their behaviour as "they have a job to do". With this, they lost it completely - NDTV and Barkha have sunk to Sardesai-levels (yeah thats my personal benchmark of how terrible journos can be.)

The Fuel Efficiency of A Bicycle

Copenhagenize.com - The Copenhagen Bike Culture Blog: The Most Efficient Machine Ever Invented

Reasonably high, wouldn't you say ? Some other nice quotes and references in there as well. As you might have guessed by now, I'm a regular on the Copenhagenize blog by now. Of course, I hope we can do a Bangalore-ing of that as well :D

Bangalore has a local train option!!!

Was chatting with a pal of mine who works on the Outer Ring Road (ORR) - his office is right behind the JP Morgan building. This guy lives in Fraser Town, and has started driving recently (a biker all his adult life so far - rides a Pulsar and a scooterette as well) and started feeling the stress that accompanies driving in the city.

What he told me totally took me by surprise - apparently he tried out a train from Bangalore East - which is close to his home - to Krishnarajapuram and then took a BMTC bus to his office. Saved money, time and huge amounts of stress! Even more surprising - it seems a lot of folks who work on the OMR (Old Madras Road) and live anywhere along the railway line - Cantonment, Bangalore East, Byapanahalli, etc - take this option regularly with the last leg on foot/bus. Fare to KJM - 2/- :) Time : 10 mins flat!

Found an appropriate map with the tracks and localities marked along that route.

I guess it can actually work for a whole lot of people who travel to the OMR/ORR/Whitefield area, and we're not even talking about extra expenditure on a Metro etc.

One "downside" he mentioned is that one needs to plan a little in advance, there's a train approximately on the hour! Hey thats not bad at all. even in a car or on a motorcycle we end up trying to factor in traffic conditions and plan leaving home at certain hours to beat the rush. Whichever mode of transport you use, there's a little bit of working around its mechanics and optimization one learns in a week or so.

I'm thrilled that existing railway infrastructure is being used by commuters, and that many cars are effectively being kept off the roads. The trains are quite empty though at least a few dozen people use them already - so go ahead and try this option as well. At least from KJM there are buses along the ORR every couple of minutes. I'm nor certain but Whitefield Station may work well too for that area, or KJM might have buses going there.

Now all we need is a few pull-push services on the same tracks including connections to other parts of B'lore railways network, and integrated ticketing with the BMTC. Tall order, given that a central and a city organization will need to collaborate on this, but from the positive action I've heard about from BMTC's end, it's definitely not impossible :)'

[ Addendum : while I'm dreaming, a bike park-rent station at KJM/Whitefield would rock for the office goers in that area. Train + ride. Maybe even a cycle-carriage on the train itself, someday ? ]

[ Even more : followed the tracks around Bangalore even more. Its all connected! The univ - BSK - City - Malleshwaram - Yeswantpur - Hebbal - East/Cantt - OMR - Whitefield - Banaswadi - Bellandur - Sarjapura Road - Chandapura. Oh the possibilities! 5-6 3 rake trains going around continuously will solve a lot of pain. Just ensure good bus connections and it'll cover a lot of this city. ]