Manama Monologues

Wednesday, 29 February 2012

Help save the birds

I remember the first letter I wrote to the GDN some years ago when I was just out of school.

I had picked up my brother from school and on our way home, we found a pigeon run over by a car at the signal near the Sacred Heart Church.

The sight of the dead bird near an area that is home to scores of them upset me so much, I marched home horrified and in rage.

The next couple of hours found me busy poring over the telephone directory to look up animal rights organisations and writing a very angry letter to the paper.

I never sent it in, as I thought the editor would have a good laugh reading my call for bird rights and special feeding grounds and because my parents were alarmed that I had turned so militant.

Much of my earlier enthusiasm for the birds - I used to steadfastly collect fallen pigeon feathers and attach them to cards and letters - disappeared when I moved to Mumbai.

For the first few months, my roommates and I battled crows that attacked our food, buried eggs laid by pigeons in our buckets and kept vigil guarding our room from all winged creatures.

Things took a turn for the worse when I returned to city last month and was woken up at 3am everyday by an eerie bloodcurdling noise.

The 'beast' it transpired was a flock of beautiful green parrots, making a racket while they relished mangoes that ripened outside my window.

It soon grew to a point that I was teetering on the verge of hating birds forever, when a news story about a lesser crested tern, which died on a Mumbai beach earlier this year, grabbed my attention.

The bird which carried the tag of the British Trust for Ornithology was reportedly ringed on the Fasht Al Jarrim Islands, north of mainland Bahrain.

The ring was later sent to the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) and my curiosity led me to do some research on the society and this reawakened my interest in birds.

The society, among its numerous conservation efforts to protect the wildlife of India, runs 'Adopt a Rare Bird', a joint initiative of BirdLife International and the UK-based Royal Society for Protection of Birds.

From the catalogue of 12 rare birds, which include two critically endangered species, you may adopt a bird for just Rs300 (BD2.3).

Proceeds of the adoption go towards protection of the birds and you receive a framed photograph of the bird you've adopted, which makes a very nice gift.

Last week, I adopted a forest owlet (Athene blewitti), of which only 250 are estimated to be remaining in India.

BNHS central marketing head Divyesh Parikh told me that there is a growing interest among people to protect birdlife, as more than 5,000 adoptions took place last year, raising Rs150,000 (BD1,198.6).

'Adopt a Rare Bird' programme details can be found on the BNHS website www.bnhs.org and the World Wildlife Fund also runs similar initiatives.

I realised only recently that my earlier annoyance with birds was baseless as we have effectively usurped their habitats, leaving them no home and more vulnerable to extinction.

It is only right that we start giving something back.

¥ Ms Gnana is a former Bahrain resident now studying in Mumbai

'Help save the birds', Gulf Daily News, July 9, 2010, Jennifer Gnana

Rainforest off limits

I thought I had finally struck gold when my search for a wildlife conservation sanctuary led me to the Agumbe Rainforest Complex, in the southern Indian state of Karnataka.

It sounded perfect - it receives around 11,0000mm of annual rainfall, nestles high up on the Western Ghats mountain range and is also a biodiversity hotspot home to several threatened species.

A major project is underway to save the world's longest venomous snake, the King Cobra, much revered by villagers but ruthlessly killed when it gets in their way.

The research station is open for volunteers and researchers who can spend time assisting in various jobs, educational programmes and the King Cobra telemetry project.

The cost of accommodation is cheap and the facilities offered are excellent.

However, as I read through their Frequently Asked Questions, I found a strange clause prohibiting volunteers from wearing camouflaged clothing while in the rainforest.

The reason provided was that the Naxalites, Maoists who have been waging a war against the state for some time and the Anti-Naxalite Squad don the same uniform.

To avoid coming under the scanner of either group and for the villagers to know the neutral position of the volunteers, coloured clothing was advised.

All the initial bravado my friend and I felt about exploring rainforests soon evaporated.

The Naxalite movement, which first began in a village in West Bengal called Naxalbari, fight for the cause of impoverished peasants against rich landlords, through violent and bloody terror campaigns.

Last week, 26 policemen from the paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) were killed and eight others injured in an ambush attack by the Naxalites, in the state of Chhatisgarh.

The attack came after 75 CRPF personnel were killed in April by the Naxalites in the same state and a month after 148 civilians perished when a train was blown up by the insurgents in West Bengal.

The Naxalites thrive in the heavily forested regions, which provide them ideal cover and with help from tribals who are sympathetic to their cause.

The tribals favour the Maoists, having long been denied their rights to the forests' produce under government restrictions while, on the other hand, big companies are freely allowed to profit from the mines in the same region.

This makes an entire region of the country, with heavy Naxalite presence, a dangerous area termed the 'Red Corridor'.

My friend wisely said that even if we abandoned the idea of visiting Agumbe, we wouldn't be far from danger should we choose to visit any another rainforest.

It is commonly acknowledged that both the insurgents as well as the armed forces have committed violent excesses.

Meanwhile, as the fighting goes on, the natural heritage of a country is being held hostage.

¥ Ms Gnana is a former Bahrain resident now studying in Mumbai

'Rainforest off limits', Gulf Daily News, July 2, 2010, Jennifer Gnana

Taxi! Not a chance as strike bites...

The lives of urban commuters in Mumbai have been thrown into disarray, following a strike by taxi and auto rickshaw drivers. The strike was called by union leaders to force the government to increase the basic fares, following an increase in the price of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG).

Last Monday, I joined the long line of people waiting for buses as there were few taxis in sight and the few that I stopped, flatly refused to go anywhere.

It is the first time I have really paid attention to how much I have come to depend on the taxis for almost all routine activities.

I had to turn back after going half way down to the grocery shop as I realised that there would be no taxis to help me lug all my purchases to the hostel.

There has been much said against the taxi drivers - their lack of basic etiquette, the swearing, the way they flout traffic rules and their reckless driving on dangerous roads.

However, as I stood under the blazing sun, stuck almost in the middle of nowhere and wondering the best way to go home before the skies started pouring, I found that I actually missed them.

I've had both pleasant and unpleasant experiences in my dealings with taxi drivers.

One of them, on discovering I didn't know numbers in Hindi, tried to fleece me by quoting an exorbitant fare.

Another, after the routine questions of 'Which country are you from?', 'What are you doing in India?', 'Why can't you speak Hindi?' took it upon himself to ensure I learnt phrases in Hindi before I left his vehicle.

Once, after being dropped off at the Gateway of India, a taxi driver told me that though it was crucial I learnt the city's language, he admitted that it was time they changed and that he had tried to pick up some English from me.

My political science teacher would tell our class that taxi drivers were the best source if you wanted to gauge public opinion.

A Bahraini taxi driver once talked me through everything from why the flyover in Isa Town wasn't complete to why taxi fares in India are very cheap ("They use old cars and counterfeit parts, you pay more here because we use genuine ones.") and asked me to write a story on their lives.

Once on my way to the Mumbai international airport, I commented on the tall buildings and flyovers that had come up in North Mumbai.

The taxi driver informed me that if only I bothered turning to my left, I would still see the slums and the grand buildings existed only where politicians lived.

These are perhaps the most eco-friendly days the city has seen in a long time, with more than 80,000 taxis and 100,000 auto rickshaws off the road.

Life, however, has come to a standstill and with the monsoons in the city it is very cumbersome to travel on foot or use public transport.

Hopefully they'll be back on the roads next week, but it's surprising how this band of often overlooked men, trying to reassert their worth in society, has gripped the entire city.

¥ Ms Gnana is a former Bahrain resident now studying in Mumbai

'Taxi! Not a chance as strike bites... ', Gulf Daily News, June 25, 2010, Jennifer Gnana

A Travesty of Justice

While the world is still mopping up the spill caused by the explosion at the oil rig off the coast of Mexico and debating how best justice is meted out, a local court in a central Indian state has sentenced perpetrators of the world's worst industrial disaster - after more than 25 years.

In December 1984, inhabitants of Bhopal, in Madhya Pradesh, woke up to a lethal air poisoned with methyl isocyanate, which leaked from a nearby pesticide plant.

It claimed 4,000 lives, although estimates based on hospital and rehabilitation records show that about 20,000 people died and more than 600,000 suffered bodily damage.

Union Carbide chairman Warren Anderson was allowed to fly back to the US, never to return, after spending just three hours in detention.

The two-year sentence delivered last week excluded Anderson, but implicated seven Indian executives from Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL), as the company is known at present.

They were immediately granted bail, while Anderson was declared to have absconded after the court issued warrants for his arrest and extradition.

While the paltry sentence and the delay is a travesty of justice, what is most disturbing is the contempt with which the victims were treated.

Poisoning the unsuspecting populace demands more stringent punishment, more in line with the decades in jail serious criminals may expect.

It has always galled me that when the prices of commodities have risen very sharply in India due to inflation, the fines for criminal offences on the other hand, have remained unaffected.

Recently, a former Director General of Police from the state of Haryana, charged with sexually molesting a teenager and abetting her suicide, was fined just Rs1,000 (BD8) and jailed for six months.

The Bhopal sentences, albeit after a quarter of a century, amounted to some show of justice, is an insult to those who perished and those who lost loved ones.

The truth is there has been no justice granted to those who survived maimed, blinded and paralysed for life.

No court of justice and no country that calls itself a democracy can consider big corporate houses as above the law and deny its own citizens the justice they are rightfully due.

The victims of the Bhopal gas tragedy have received an average of Rs12,410 (BD100) each as compensation.

Many of the victims continue to live wretched existences in slums adjoining the walls of the dilapidated factory grounds waiting for promised compensation payments.

Moreover, they should be given access to free healthcare for the various nervous and malignant diseases they have developed since the disaster.

Those responsible for industrial accidents should be tried with the same amount of media attention, immediacy and strict procedure of law as war criminals and dictators.

¥ Ms Gnana is a former Bahrain resident now studying in Mumbai

'A travesty of justice', Gulf Daily News, June 18, 2010, Jennifer Gnana

The World Cup of Joy

For a whole month starting from today, the world will be morphing into party mode to welcome the FIFA World Cup 2010. Regardless of which country you're from or the language you speak, the 'beautiful game' unites people across all barriers.

However, for citizens of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, whose team faces Brazil in Johannesburg's Ellis Park on June 15, there will be little to look forward to, as live transmission of the match is banned thanks to the Communist state's autocratic media control.

Football history, however, proves that as long as you have enthusiasm for the sport, politics and boundaries matter but little.

Though I enjoy football, I watch with real fervour only when there's a major tournament on.

The last major one that really impressed me was the Asian Cup 2007, in which the Iraqi national football team emerged the winners, against all odds.

Having followed the tournament from the very beginning, I saw how the team savoured every victory, which is saying something for a team that underwent torture and death threats for a poor performance under Uday Hussein, who later met his death in a gun fight with US troops.

The players arrived in Southeast Asia for the tournament, which was held with the recent loss of family members in the conflict at home hanging over their heads.

Even before they faced Saudi Arabia in the finals, the celebration of their victory over South Korea in the semi-finals was marred by a suicide bombing in a Baghdad street, which killed 50 people.

After Iraq lifted the cup, I turned to Al Baghdadia TV to see reporters crying on air as they announced their country had won the tournament.

For a day, it didn't matter which sect the players were from as for the 90 minutes of the match, the guns were silent in Baghdad and people experienced something that felt like peace.

South Africa this year becomes the first African nation to host the World Cup.

Commentators agree that this year will be different, as companies seeking to slash expenses owing to the recession have left the places usually taken by corporate guests to be filled in by lots of true football supporters, which include many ordinary South Africans.

I haven't yet decided which team I'll be supporting.

It was France for the last World Cup, but without Zidane I don't think I'll find Les Bleus worth supporting.

As I support Real Madrid and their wonderful goalkeeper Iker Casillas, I think I might shift my loyalties this time to Spain.

I have always been a supporter of underdogs in most tournaments, ever since my favourites Greece lifted the Euro Cup in 2004.

I do hope that South Africa's Bafana Bafana (which means 'the boys' in the Nguni language) put up a good show, both as hosts and as the national team.

Regardless of the outcome, there will, at least for a month, be something more to look forward to in the papers than reports of national disasters or terror attacks.

I don't think even Kim Jong-il's iron-fisted reign will put a damper on the spirit of football lovers in North Korea, for football, more than anything, gives everybody a reason to celebrate!

¥ Ms Gnana is a former Bahrain resident now studying in Mumbai.

'The World Cup of Joy', Gulf Daily News, June 11, 2010, Jennifer Gnana

When teenage daredevil fades

I always measured my life in terms of which grade in school I was in or for the last one year which university semester.

Birthdays for me meant nothing for years and presents were quickly forgotten before the week was over.

Turning 19 last week, however, has made me re-think my usual indifference to the day I was born.

I researched a little on what I was entitled to do when I turned 19 and found there was nothing much as the year is sandwiched between two major milestones, turning 18 and 21.

Last year was something to look forward to as I got my right to vote and get a driving licence.

However, elections and holidays have gone past and with no permanent address in India, I couldn't vote and haven't yet learned to drive.

It bothered me a little but as I thought about it, I found there was no need to hurry at all.

This would be my last teenage year and as much as I would like to be an adult, I will soon be bidding farewell to a very special part of my life.

I've quit researching what new rights I will be entitled to and switched to checking out things I missed out as a teenager.

Re-reading my collection of the Harry Potter series that fascinated me when I was young and may not have the same effect a few years from now is a top priority.

Going through my massive collection of magazines and checking out the five years worth of newspaper clippings to see what interested me as a child will be yet another.

It will also be the year to sort out the huge poem collection that I have, those I collected from schoolmates when we started a poetry club in the final year of school.

It's been two years now and those who had written them would have left school and our grand plans to bring out a book are far from workable.

However, going through all the little things my friends and I tried to accomplish, the posters we put on the corridors during school events - some of which I still have - I realised what I will miss most about being a teenager is the feeling everything in world can be done if you put your heart to it.

I still share the same feeling and haven't lost much of the enthusiasm but the daredevil way I took to responsibility is slowly fading away.

I'm warming up to this new phase but if I could have my way, I would much rather join Peter Pan and his mates in Neverland where I can't be asked to grow up.

¥ Jennifer Gnana is a former Bahrain resident, now studying in Mumbai. Her family still lives here.

'When teenage daredevil fades', Gulf Daily News, June 4, 2010, Jennifer Gnana

Learning to ride the waves

FOR someone whose only swimming experience so far is being pushed into a pool in Hawar, I balked when my editor suggested I attend the surf school at the Wahooo! water park.

It felt more like I had lead weights in my stomach than butterflies when I saw the roaring Flow Rider, which was incidentally running only on half its speed!

I decided that I was going to float down the Lazy River first and talk to some of the other students, but little did I know that I would be persuaded to change my mind.

Seeing so many others (including one of them a mum!) much older and brave enough to take the ultimate plunge convinced me to go for it.

I came across Naikita, my instructor, as someone you could really bank on to help you ride the waves.

Handling the surfboard, which I thought would be rocket science, was made simple as she explained how with every twitch you can have a different wave experience.

My first try was frightening because I thought I was drowning towards the end, but the feel of the current was good and I plucked up the courage to go for it a second time.

Although I lost the board both times I didn't really have to hold on to dear life as the water wasn't very deep and the force of the waves brings you ashore anyway.

Moreover, the place is manned by lifeguards trained by the UK Royal Life Saving Society (RLSS) to help if things go wrong.

The water maintained at tropical temperatures throughout made the surfing experience all the more pleasurable.

After 15 minutes of being soaked, I got to dry myself in a body dryer, which looked like something out of a Star Trek movie.

Although I really have no love for water or water sports for that matter, my mini-adventure and the passion I saw exuberated by the students really inspired me to take up surfing sometime in the future.

Special thanks to Wahooo! operations manager Tom Scheffer, assistant operations manager Susan Clark, Naikita and other surfers for making the experience a little less scary.

'Learning to ride the waves', Gulf Daily News, March 21, 2010, Jennifer Gnana