You can propel yourself through water, by using your arms and legs

Here is some news I thought you all could use. The photo is of an ad on the back of a bus, for one of the most prominent schools in town.

You can propel yourself through water, by using your arms and legs.

Sometimes things sortof defy explanation, and I just have to show what I see.

Sam's first two teeth

For the record, here are Sam's first two teeth.

He is a happy boy, the squishiest baby we have had. As Mrs. Sorley says, "It is a fun age, they just sit around and smile at everyone, but can't get into anything yet."

The toothless wonder

Nora Grace sporting her new gap in her teeth. (her lower right). Just for the record book.

Miriam also wants to be in on what is going on

Although Miriam has had no recent additions or subtractions to her dentition, nevertheless, she had a great desire to have her teeth photographed.

Afterall, everyone else was doing it.

A Historic First for India

For the first time in Indian History, there is a State in India that has a freely elected government with a clear majority, that is a Dalit (lowcaste and outcaste) Political party.

In the state elections that recently happened here in Uttar Pradesh, the BSP won a majority, the first time in the history of India.

Note: India has several thousand political parties, so it is very unusual for any party to get more than 20 or 30 percent of the vote. Usually governance happens by getting a coalition of several Political Parties together, often with very opposite goals.

Minneapolis and Mumbai

The Economist recently did a review of cities, well worth your reading.

Two factoids jumped out at me, which your ever loyal and caring correspondent will now share with you.

Fourty percent of the tax revenue of India comes from Mumbai (Bombay). Wow. I think we can safely say the government doesn't get much revenue at all from our fair city.

In a discussion of whether cities should be governed in small portions, or with one big all powerful mayor, they gave the example of the Minneapolis Metropolitan area, which 344 local governments within it. ONce again, Wow.

190

The number of cities in Asia with more than one million people in them.

That doesn't count the scores more of such cities in Africa, Europe and the Americas.

I don't think I could even name half of them.

From The Economist, review of Cities.

I now live in the Majority, although I am now from the Minority

According to The Economist, sometime this month, the percentage of people on this Planet who live in Cities, will officially cross over from 49.99...% to 50.01... %. For the first time in history, more than half of all humans will live in cities.

I grew up in the countryside, and lived there till I was 22, when I went to Minneapolis for Medical School. In three more years, I will have lived half my life in a city.

"Wisely or not," quotes The Economist, "Homo sapiens has become Homo urbanus."

They have written a series of articles, that address a large number of issues.

They dare to address the question that haunts many of us rich folks... namely... Why do many of the people in the Urban Slums of Asia choose to live there when they could easily return to their home villages. Most people who live in the vast teeming slums of Asia, have come there recently, and could easily return to their home villages, and find food, water etc. Yet they stay in the slums for a reason. "Why do people prefer Urban Squalor to Rural Hopelessness? "

In India, many Dalits (low castes and outcastes) move to the cities to escape the harsh biggetry of the countryside, much like the serfs of Europe moved to the cities hundreds of years ago. "Stadtluft macht frei" (The City Air sets you Free), said the Germans of Prussia and The Mark.

In the past, most cities were Spiritual centers, drawing people for Spiritual purposes, in addition to its other draws. In the west (and elsewhere), this draw is loosing its shine as many people embrace secularism, but a new "Religion" has arisen to fill the void...namely Culture. The Culture of the city, and its many cultural events "are taking the place of God."

"No one wants to live in a city that is impossibly congested, suffers constant blackouts and frequent floods, chops down its trees, concretes over its parks, has aweful schools and hospitals, is devoid of any buildings of charm or character, and is governed by corrupt politicians and incompetent civil servants. Yet many people have to."

So it goes...

"So it goes" was a quote from Kurt Vonnegut (OK, I REALLY, REALLY cannot spell).

He died recently.

Does anyone else, when they read The Economist, read the Obituary first?

(You will be happy to know, that when The Economist arrives at our house, Nora Grace quickly grabs it and looks to the back, shouting, "Who died, Daddy, who died?")

Pre-Monsoon Shower Activity

We had a light shower today that cooled things off nicely. Dropped twenty-five degrees in an hour. (Granted, when your starting point is 110, it is still not that cold.)

This will happen on and off, Lord Willing for the next month or so, until the Monsoon arrives. It is called "Pre-Monsoon Shower Activity".

The Monsoon arrives in Varanasi on the 15th of June. I had not previously been aware that a Massive Weather System covering half a Hemisphere would faithfully follow the Gregorian Calendar, but who am I to question common knowledge?

Anyways, two hours after the shower, it is back up to 90 again, so this was just a brief respite. :)

But welcome none-the-less.

Still breathing

When I work at the Charitable Hospital, I try to do only clinic work, primarily because Expectations and Roles are so different between my home country and this fair city.

But it was just a matter of time before something bigger happened.

I was seeing patients in clinic today at noon, when a nurse popped in and said I should come upstairs because there was a baby who was not breathing.

Running up the stairs with her, I found a newborn lying on a metal trolley, blue, floppy with no heartbeat and not breathing. Well, that's no good.

I immediately began CPR, and got a pretty healthy heartbeat after a minute or two, as well as seeing the little boy begin to pink up nicely.

But he just wouldn't breath on his own. By history, he had had his cord wrapped around his neck. I wasn't able to get anyone to tell me exactly when he had been born or how many minutes he had been laying there. (His mother, laying nearby, clearly had just given birth.)

After about 15 minutes, he did begin breathing spontaneously, and a "Junior Doctor" (the local name for the Resident type folks who run some of the Hospitals) got an IV in (Strong Work!). The patients regular Paediatrician came after about half an hour, and I was more than happy to hand over the job to him. The baby was still breathing adequately, and his heartbeat was fine, but clearly wasn't out of the woods yet.

Hmmm, nothing makes me hungrier than running a "Code". Overall, this was a good thing for me to do, because it helped me to see a little better how the System works (Yes, there is a System!). When I know better how the System works, I can better help improve it. Normal Newborn Protocols seems to be one area.

Wanna help?

The Mufti and I meet yet again

We had the annual Nursing School graduation not long ago, and the Mufti of Banaras showed up to bless the event.

The Mufti is the spiritual leader of the Muslims of Varanasi (Banaras is another name for Varanasi), and we have met on a few occasions before.

He is younger than I am, and even more publicity shy, which is kindof funny considering the bulk of his job is to show up at special occasions and give a short speech to bless the occasion.

He is good at that part of his job, not sure how trained he is otherwise... presumably quite well.

Nurses Graduation

So why was the photo above (of the Mufti) rather blurry?
Well because of all of the candles in this photo.
Each of the nursing students and graduating nurses got a candle. The room was small and crowded and poorly ventilated. The candles were wrapped in red celophane which added to the smokeyness.
End result? An hour later the room was like a 1950's Doctors Convention (back then all the Doctors smoked in America, nowadays, they all do in India).

Give me Oil in My Lamp

So the Nurses had their annual graduation for the Nursing School. It was fairly uneventful for the most part: nice things were said about various people (most of whom deserved to have nice things said about them), and speeches were made about how needed these Nurses are (not that the Hospital will hire any of them; they hire their Nurses from the South).

At one point when all the Nurses were lining up to have Nursing Pins pinned on them, some of the other nurses (see picture below) began to sing, in a rich, thick accent belying their lack of native English, "Give Me Oil in My Lamp."

Huh? Where did that come from?

One of two of them are Christian, but I am wondering how the rest got roped into singing the song. Granted, it is not particullarly Christian song, and they modified the verses to make them even more generic ("Give me Service in my Heart, keep me helping, helping, helping..."), but "Huh?'

Mucho Kudos to you...

The last post ended with the phrase, "So it goes".

Big bonus points to the one who can correctly point out why that pop culture phrase is so relavent this week.

"I Didn't Clean My Shoes For a Week!!"

Well, assuming a foreigner visits America, what is the first thing he will tell his family on his return his home, assuming his home is our fair city?

My Urdu tutors youngest brother is a computer guy, works in India for some American outfit. They brought him to Chicago for a month of training. The fellow was the talk of the neighborhood here in Varanasi.

He seemed to enjoy himself, and the biggest thing that got talked about on his return was how clean America is.

In Varanasi, I clean my shoes before I put them on in the morning (it doesn't make sense to clean them in the evening, since they would just get covered in dirt while sitting through the night). By the time I get to work a half hour later, they are grey with dust, and I have a rag tied around my bike just for the purpose of wiping off my shoes one more time.

Well, Northern Illinois was not like that. And the whole family was amazed to hear that he went a whole week without wiping the dust from his shoes.

So it goes.

It helps when most of them are named "Emily"

Nora Grace had a blast last month when I was getting my Continueing Medical Education up to date in Thailand. There were loads of other little girls (and boys) to play with, and oodles of space to run, and plenty of things to do. She didn't watch TV for two weeks and didn't miss it a bit.

On arrival, she did not know (or if she did, she didn't remember) any of the other children. She was greatly assisted in remembering names by the fact that most of the other five year old girls were named Emily.

Three doctors daughters in India

This photo is of three five year old girls, all of them Doctors daughters, and all living in India. Cozette (she goes by "Cozy", isn't that great?) on the left is from midwest, and Abby on the right is from the South.

Do they ever stop talking?

Still figuring things out

I am going to try very hard to respond to comments made on my blog from here on out, and I will attempt to do that in the comment section.

Us old folks (41 tomorrow, thank you very much), need a little extra time to figure out what comes so easily to some.

oh yeah, why we are here

Just a little reminder why we are here.

We have a genuine desire to see the weavers of this fair city improve their situation.

At left is a typical room full of these weavers doing finishing touches on silk saris, which they make.

"Sweatshop" doesnt really apply to the term, since the original term meant that was a place where people sweated, but people didn't elsewhere.

Here, at this time of year, everyone sweats all the time.