As the water flows in – Halnayakahalli Lake restoration

“Happy are those who dream dreams and are ready to pay the price to make them come true.” - Leon J. Suenes

Lake filled with water

We jumped into the bandwagon a little late. Nevertheless we were on a journey with other committed individuals on the mission to “Rejuvenate Halanayakahalli Lake”.

Some sensible printing advice

Lot of offices would benefit with such a poster stuck in front of their printers!

Technology companies optimize the printing experience for their clients but when it comes to paper wastage .. phew! 

Print one side; print a book; print and forget to collect; print emails; print and discard for one time usage -- the evil inherent in printing is never considered..

Lets not make a waste of it

1. Process followed

There is no waste in nature – everything is reused, rejuvenated, recycled to the maximum. The amount of energy supplied to the earth is constant and this comes from only one source –the sun. But the amount of minerals and gases present are same – they just transform from one form to another. 

Up on a Mountain Tree at Mudumalai, Nilgiris

It was not a great month to visit reserve forests that are down south. It was hot, humid and planning a road trip was a mute acceptance to getting fried by the mighty sun. But, the occurrence of a long weekend, with no such holidays in the next few months, prompted us to plan for a vacation. On calling the Parambikulam forest lodge, we were discouraged by the booking officer’s comments that it will be too dry and hot, and will make the animal sightings limited. Upon further research, we decided to go to Masinagudi because of the shorter drive from Bangalore.

Bamboo Rustles Butterflies

Large Salmon arab

A mailer on the “bng Birds” group, prompted us to register for the Bamboo rustles camp on Butterflies. I have never experienced camping before and Al was all too excited to get out of the house again. J

Butterflies! Butterflies might be considered normal for many but for someone who is known for panicking & rushing out (with blood chilling screams.. you should check with my brother for this), this is an “experience”. When I first told my parents that I am going to learn about butterflies, their immediate response was “Why don’t you attend a workshop on Cockroaches also, to get used to them”? Sigh.. If only I was that brave. But knowing more about butterflies has definitely helped get over the fear of their presence.

Pallikaranai Marsh Bird Sanctuary

The Chennai visit this time was quite a treat – Chennai heat has not yet peaked, migratory birds were still around and my parents were on this mission to pamper us with never-ending south-indian meals and snacksJ.

Alton had made a list of birding places to visit in Chennai. From the time we started birding, every place is looked at from a different perspective. I have passed Pallikaranai almost daily while going to office at Shollinganallur, but had never stopped to look at the flying friends.

Show your support to save Bellandur Lake

This weekend was all about Water conservation. Yesterday, we had attended sessions on how to make use of rainwater and value water as a right and not a commodity. Today it was all about saving the existing water bodies.

Bellandur lake is part of the interconnected lake systems built by Kempegowda when Bangalore settlement was planned. It is also the largest of the remaining lakes of Bangalore. The tanks (or what we call as lakes) were man made storage wells created to provide abundant water to the city, which was otherwise far away from other sources such as rivers and the sea.  The tanks were cascading and built along the slopes and valleys to accumulate water and also provide the excess collection to the next tank in line.

Is water a commodity?

Our evening session on World Water Day was an eye-opener. To me, it revealed some ways in which the world works and its difficult rules. 

We reached “Bangalore Film society” situated in Banaswadi at around 4:30 pm. The facebook page had indicated that today’s screening would be a short film on water in South Africa. The film society’s office was covered in green and looked full of purpose.

Rain water Harvesting

For World Water Day 2014, we visited two different events this Saturday – one on Rain water harvesting at Wipro and the other on “Privatization of water” at Bangalore Film society.

The focus of the Wipro session was on how to savor every bit of the precious resource that we receive from the sky and different methods that help in saving water. Wipro had tied up with BIOME (a prominent environmental group in the city) to conduct the session which consisted of presentations from individuals who have implemented solutions in their community or offer consulting on the topic.

The Economics of happiness

Before we attended this event, we had mentioned this topic to a few of our friends. Most of them were bewildered on how tangentially opposite topics, “Economics” and “Happiness”, were combined and curious to know what it is going to be about.

We decided to give it a try mainly because Bhoomi college was one of the organisers of the event. We had attended the organic gardeningworkshop a few days back at Bhoomi.

Goa- Cotigao & Raia Wetlands

We have been waiting to visit Cotigao from Christmas time and we made it mandatory on this subsequent visit to Goa. We were excited about this place because it was part of the all famous Western Ghats – a haven for animals and birds and one of the bio-diversity hotspots of India. We were also expecting to see different species than the one that we would have seen at Bangalore.

This was 20 kms from home – we decided we will leave at 6 am so as to reach there for the birds “active” time. Even before alarms rang, our lovely Cock was Up and CrooingJ. Hes pretty smart and dint want to us to miss on anything for the day.

How Pretty is your cream?

To all the Ladies out there…. And the Men who can influence your ladies J

Everyone wants to look their best. Especially us humans. We take a lot of effort to show-case an attractive image. We spend considerable time in grooming ourselves and hopping in and out of stores to pick the best outfits and footwear. Mere grooming is not enough – we need to visit salons that burst with synthetic smell, boast of transformations of ordinary people into super-models who look slick and artificial. If all that is not enough, to keep the continuous “care” going on, we plunder the hyper-markets in search of the all-powerful beauty product that will make us radiate beauty in all directions.

Lalbagh visit - Bng Birders group

We started 'birding' in the beginning of the year 2014. Most of our trips have been just the two of us or with another bunch of people as inexperienced as us. On such occasions, we would carry our Grimmet book and head out to identify the birds. But most of the times the birds are quite far away and the camera doesn’t capture them in detail. Other times you only get a glimpse of the bird and that is too short a time for identifying it.

The world of plants @ Home

Our tryst with container gardening started with the huge balcony that came with our new house. We already had a few pots which happily fitted into their new home. This balcony has most of the features that plants will look forward to- west facing with ample sunlight till 6 pm in the evening, protection from too much rain, adjacent to a lovely home and good caretakersJ.

The search for the stainless steel bottle

I have been apprehensive of using plastic lunch boxes and water bottles for everyday use. BPA, carcinogenic – there are too many issues with plastic. I have been on the lookout for a replacement that is easy to use.

These were the alternatives

1.       Stainless thermo steel – available for Milton, pigeion, Cello

2.       Stainless steel – BPA free – available at Green Kart

3.       Aluminium – BPA free

When choosing the bottle, I wanted to avoid plastics completely – but no luck till date. Most of the lids are made out of plastic. Also some aluminum bottles might leech more BPA than plastics. So I decided to purchase a stainless steel with a BPA free lid.

On searching online, you get various brands such as Milton, pigeon, cello but most of them are thermo steel and hence would be heavy to carry. First we wanted to try a simple one and see if was convenient.

I found the one I liked on MyGreenKart. I have ordered the H20 bottle and waiting for it to be delivered.

Here is the link to the site: http://www.mygreenkart.com/

They claim to make the planet happier with every purchase. Their product list is fairly comprehensive but not all of them are green. That does make me wonder if all of us really understand what is Green and natural? Some products that I thought should not be there were – Lotus herbals products, SLS & paraben shampoos that are loaded with chemicals - Neither good for you nor the environment.

Neralu – The tree Festival

It was time for the first Tree festival of Bengaluru – Neralu. Neralu (Nezal in Tamil) means ‘Shade’ – an apt name for a celebration of trees at Cubbon Park that provides comfort day after day to many health enthusiasts and vendors during their walks and work.

Here is the website with detailed information:  http://www.neralu.in/

Lalbagh Flower show

Great Tit

First time flower showJ. I have heard about this event so many times that I dint want to miss it this time. An additional bonus was the fact that “the geek gardener” shop was demonstrating some hydroponics and selling gardening material at the premises. So gardening +bird watching pulled us to this place on Saturday morning.

We did notice some new birds (from our perspective J).

Wipro Earthian 2013

I got an invite to attend the Earthian function at Wipro. Earthian is an educational and sustainability initiative by Wipro that promotes green thinking  at schools and colleges across India. This is done through a competition that involves activities and paper presentations based on sustainability theme.

Ranganathittu 2014

Peacocks

Visited RT first time with a keen interest on birds. Our Kumarakom trip had aroused curiosity and interest about birds.

We reached near the sanctuary at about 9 am.  As we took the right turn from the main Mysore road towards the sanctuary we heard some peacock calls. Curious to see them, we alighted from the car and walked towards the filed in the direction of the calls. This is what we saw!

Kumarakom Bird Santuary

This write-up is more for us to remember what we did in Kumarakom. Otherwise, we forget in a few weeks how exactly we spent our time travelling and if it was worth it.
It also gives some details about our stay and the people we met - for house boats and bird watching.

Cochin Trip

This write-up is more for us to remember what we did in Cochin. Otherwise, we forget in a few weeks how exactly we spent our time travelling and if it was worth it.