Alleppey District; Malayalam translation: Brothers
From Behind the Wheel: Fraternal Mass Transit
Urban
From Behind the Wheel: Mobile Market
Thevara Ferry Road, Thevara
From Behind the Wheel: Mass Transit With Clout
Mattancherry
From Behind the Wheel: Emotional Merchandise
Cornell Tech Redefines “Industrial Complex”
Architectural firm WEISS/MANFREDI project rendering
When President Eisenhower warned of the rising power of the hyphenated industrial complex his concerns were clearly well-founded. Cornell NYC Tech, the upcoming Roosevelt Island campus of graduate high-tech education, is in the process of rehabilitating the concept of collaboration with industry with the development of its first “corporate co-location” building.
“Cornell Tech is radically rethinking how industry can collaborate with faculty, students and researchers, and corporate co-location is vital to making that a success,” Continue reading
From Behind the Wheel: Reliable Mass Transit
Documentaries : Black Out by Eva Weber, children searching for the light
Short electricity cuts punctuate the day here in Kerala. As if to remind us, for a few seconds in our daily life, that the electricity fairy can play hard to get. Generators always kick in in an instant though, and that is it. Elsewhere, in Guinea for instance, generators are not there to save the day.
Only about a fifth of Guinea’s people have access to electricity. With few families able to afford generators, school children have had to get creative to find a place to read, do their homework and study for exams. So every day during exam season, as the sun sets over Conakry, hundreds of children begin a nightly pilgrimage to the G’bessia International Airport, to petrol stations and parks in wealthier areas of the city, searching for light.
A road paved with mixed intentions
The pavement is being rebuilt on the street leading to ‘downtown’ Thekkady. Right now it looks like in many other Indian cities, which is apparently like a constant work in progress according to this article by N N Sachitanand in the New Indian Express:
Once upon a time, roadside pavements were meant for the use of pedestrians so that they could safely traverse the length of the road without being knocked down by traffic. That is why the Americans (as in the US of A) call them sidewalks. Indians have adopted and adapted to this Western concept to suit their own environment and, in the process, mangled its original purpose beyond recognition.
…or an extreme-gardening experimentation : Continue reading
Marine Drive – Cochin, Kerala
Photo credit: Ramesh Kidangoor
Marine Drive is considered one of the most beautiful parts of the city of Cochin, with a spectacular view of the backwaters and the Cochin harbour. This scenic strip is the popular hangout for many people with shopping, cinemas, restaurants, supermarkets, the rainbow bridge and a new walkway shaped like a house boat. Continue reading
From Behind the Wheel: Tamil Tightrope
Tamil Nadu; Photo Credit: Ramesh Kidangoor
From Behind the Wheel: Geek Squad Trucking
Thevara bridge
From Behind the Wheel: Parrot Futures
Photo credit: Ramesh Kidangoor; near Mysore
From Behind the Wheel: Loading Up
Photo Credit: Ramesh Kidangoor; near Mysore
From Behind the Wheel: Onion Dome
Gokarnam, Karnataka; Photo credit: Ramesh Kidangoor
From Behind the Wheel: Vested For Any Occasion
Kadavanthra, Ernakulam
From Behind the Wheel: “Hey Diddle Diddle the Cat and the Fiddle”
Ernakulam
The Great Paddy-City Migration
For those of us living and working in Rising Asia, much in this book either rings true from experience or is eye-opening about things that may be lurking just around the corner, out of sight. Kerala is a long way from Lahore, in every sense. But at least the basic notion–that the world has only in the last year or so become one in which a majority of us are urban dwellers for the first time in human history, and not long from now it will be a super-majority–can be felt in Raxa Collective’s back yard. The great migration from paddy to city is noisily happening all around us each day. What of it?
Mr. Hamid has alot to say about that, good, bad and ugly. An interview he conducted to discuss the book can be heard in this podcast. The book is likely to anger some, but it has received positive reviews, even from often-tough critics:
“Mr. Hamid reaffirms his place as one of his generation’s most inventive and gifted writers.” –Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
From Behind the Wheel: Aristocratic Alchemy
Mumbai
From Behind the Wheel: Monarchical Mass Transit
Thamarapally
From Behind the Wheel: Fruit Tower-Clock Tower
Mysore, Karnataka; Photo credit: Ramesh Kidangoor
Organikos 