Hiphop Grandmom's tag

Hiphop Grandmom tagged me.

My oldest memory:
Going to nursery school in Bombay; being taken after school to an older cousin’s house, where I drew on their wall and was scolded for it.

Ten years ago:
My husband’s 50th birthday and when I told my husband that our now son-in-law wanted to marry our daughter.

My first thought this morning:
It’s a holiday and so I have more than an hour to spend online.

If you built a time capsule, what would it contain:
An 33rpm LP record—to show what that looked like, a newspaper (Nov. 5th 2008), an old book, a picture of our present picture tube PC and a couple of magazines—one news mag, one showing gadgets of today and one woman’s mag.

This year:
Has been full of events and has gone by at a crazy pace. The financial meltdown has been a big topic of discussion, as also the election. It’s an ok year.

14 years from now:
I hope that I am as ambulatory and healthy—mentally and physically—as I am today.

Now to tag 3 people--Mrs. T, Mallika and Dot?

'You've got to be carefully taught'

I heard that the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical 'South Pacific' (based on James Michener's book) has been revived recently. The New York Times gave the revival a good review.
We had the LP of the Broadway show at home and were familiar with all the songs long before the movie came to India in '64/'65. I knew and loved all the songs. The subtle anti-war and not so subtle anti-racist attitudes in the movie resonated with me.
Then I got to watch the movie again when my mother got a DVD of the original movie. Somehow I never thought that it would be revived now, because the issues seemed to be from so long ago and so was really surprised to hear about the revival. I have heard some of the songs on online radio.
After my post on Bigotry and some of the comments, particularly Usha's comment, this song from 'South Pacific' came to mind---

You've got to be taught
To hate and fear
You've got to be taught
From year to Year
It's got to be drummed
in your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught

You've got to be taught
To be Afraid
Of people whose eyes
are oddly made
And people whose skin
Is a different shade
You've got to be carefully taught

You've got to be taught
Before it's too late
Before you are 6 or 7 or 8
To hate all the people
your relatives hate
You've got to be carefully taught.

Well, still relevant I think.

Been Away

Been out of the loop for a bit; was baby-sitting my grandson over in his home town, as his parents had both to be out of town. So my husband and I were with him for around 4 days. But as I didn't get much computer time then, I find I am totally behind in my blogging world :) There have been so many posts, while I was gone, that I still haven't done reading. I found that I have been tagged with 2 different tags too, both of which I will do.

'Yes we can'

A young Indian friend wondered why so many of us in this country were getting so excited about this time's US election. The answer that came to me was "A beacon of hope".
For people like me, there were several events that I never thought would take place in my lifetime. But this is one of three events which, to me, signal hope and the feeling that goodness can prevail. The first of the three events was the breaking of the Berlin Wall, then the dismantling of apartheid in South Africa and now this--that the US can elect a president without race getting in the way. Every time I think about it, it brings tears to my eyes.
Whether we like it or not, US values/attitudes/prevailing ethics, do have an impact on the rest of the world. In the last so many years--particularly from the Reagan era--there seems to have been a sharp rise of materialism, which permeated the whole world. I am not saying that the US is responsible for what the rest of us did; but somehow the message being conveyed, was that materialism was the only way to go. Barack Obama's election seems to bring back a warm fellow feeling for other people, a concern for each other, which is an essential in attempting to reverse the damage Man has done to Mother Earth, in his pursuit of this selfish materialism. Increased concern for others also brings hope for kindness to all people, irrespective of whether they believe in the same religion as you do or not.
Cheers to the American people.

Waiting....

I have butterflies in my tummy, want to watch all the live coverage, but at the same time feel nervous. I know the US is not the country I live in, but even so, feel so deeply involved in this election--as I think so much of the rest of the world is. I cannot bring myself to go to bed--at 12.16 a.m. our time--because I'm reading different news sites. I cannot wait for tomorrow morning--Indian time--to know the results.

All creatures great and small

This is one of the smallest butterflies in my garden and on a really small flower.

Now for the creepy looking thing below....
It's a pupa that we saw on a mango leaf at school.




Can you see how the web around the erstwhile caterpillar is the exact same green of the mango leaf? What really excited me was the fact that there is a rib along the middle that is just like the rib of the mango leaf. The teacher who was showing the kids different leaves, didn't even notice it, till she touched the leaf and felt it was something soft, it was so beautifully camouflaged. Most pupae hide under leaves. But this is so blends into the background, that it can afford to be on top of the leaf.

Change--again!

As you can see, I've taken down the pink page. I've been enjoying tweaking my blog--in fact having a blast at it. I wanted to do my own thing with a local picture. So the background is a photo from our own backwaters, taken by a niece and saved on my computer. Hope you like it.