Music That Never Ceases To Please, Inspire

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A gospel choir leads the congregation in song during a Sunday service at the National Pentecostal Church, Johannesburg, South Africa. Photo by Dieter Telemans/Panos

 

Some music inspires, and a smaller subset inspires over and over and over again.  Thanks to Aeon for this article about, possibly, why:

What is music? There’s no end to the parade of philosophers who have wondered about this, but most of us feel confident saying: ‘I know it when I hear it.’ Still, judgments of musicality are notoriously malleable. That new club tune, obnoxious at first, might become toe-tappingly likeable after a few hearings. Put the most music-apathetic individual in a household where someone is rehearsing for a contemporary music recital and they will leave whistling Ligeti. The simple act of repetition can serve as a quasi-magical agent of musicalisation. Instead of asking: ‘What is music?’ we might have an easier time asking: ‘What do we hear as music?’ And a remarkably large part of the answer appears to be: ‘I know it when I hear it again.’ Continue reading →

Himalayan Honey Harvest

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Like birds, bees are a common thread on these pages, for both their innate beauty, and their importance to life on earth. Although much of the honey on the market in the world today comes from cultivated hives, the history of gathering wild honey goes back millennium. 

For generations the Gurung tribespeople of central Nepal have assembled twice a year around cliffs filled with colonies of  the world’s largest honeybee, Apis laboriosa. This dangerous Himalayan honey-harvest was recently documented by U.K.-based travel photographer Andrew Newey, who spent two weeks capturing this dying tradition, which is under the threat of commercialization.

“For hundreds of years, the skills required to perform this dangerous task have been passed down through the generations” writes Newey, “but now both the bees and traditional honey hunters are in short supply.” Continue reading →

Kathakali – Traditional Dance Of Kerala

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Photo Credits :Ramesh Kidangoor

Photo Credits: Ramesh Kidangoor

Kathakali is the most famous dance-drama of Kerala, and originated about 1500 years ago. This classical art form is distinguished by several unique features: it’s a marvelous blend of the Tandava (masculine) and Lasya (exotic) elements of dancing; Continue reading →

Coppersmith Barbet

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Photo credits : Arid V K

Photo credits: Arid V K

The Coppersmith Barbet, Megalaima haemacephala, is a green bird with a crimson-colored forehead and breast, along with a yellow eye-ring and throat patch. It has a very distinct call, which has been likened to the sound made when a coppersmith strikes metal with his hammer. Continue reading →

A Classic Sustainable Tourism Development Story

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Himanshu Khagta. Children in Mawlynnong working to clean the village, where a reputation for tidiness has been both a blessing and a curse.

There is no such thing as “typical” when it comes to sustainable tourism development. By definition, each story is about that particular place.  But this one, courtesy of India Ink, provides a textbook case study example of sustainable tourism development being about community self-determination.  As for the notion that this comes with a built-in curse, we tend to believe that such curses are a function of and prevented by the same strategic planning, decision-making and action that blessings come from:

MAWLYNNONG, India — Anshuman Sen was barely a year out of college when, in 2005, he traveled to Meghalaya, a hilly northeastern state distant both in miles and cultural resemblance from what the locals call “mainland India.”

Mr. Sen was shooting pictures of the state’s bountiful natural wonders for Discover India, a travel magazine, when an acquaintance suggested visiting Mawlynnong, a remote village in the jungle along the border with Bangladesh that had acquired minor local renown for its fastidious cleanliness and a nearby bridge made entirely of living tree roots.

“I was only there for four or five hours,” said Mr. Sen, “but I couldn’t believe how beautiful it was, and neither could anyone at the magazine.” He had to write about it, even if he hadn’t spent a full day there. Continue reading →

Improving Governance For The Environment, One Citizen And One Pollinator At A Time

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We have been noting increasing stories about loss of pollinators in the USA and Europe, and especially notice how seriously this problem is taken in the UK. Solutions? Not so obvious.  But we are on the lookout each day for innovations in both the public and private sectors. This UK governance procedure seems a promising mechanism for getting citizens aware of, then involved finding solutions for environmental challenges such as the alarming loss of pollinators nationwide:

A consultation on the National Pollinator Strategy: for bees and other pollinators in England

Overview

Defra is seeking views on a proposed national pollinator strategy for bees and other pollinators in England.  The strategy sets out proposals to safeguard these important insects given their role in pollinating many food crops and wild plants and their contribution to our food production and the diversity of our environment… Continue reading →

Dharmadam Island – Kannur

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Photo credits : Arif Rahman

Photo credits: Arif Rahman

Dharmadam Island is a small island in Kannur district. This five-acre island is covered with coconut palms and green bushes. It is just about a hundred meters from the beautiful sandy beach of Dharmadam. Continue reading →

Women’s Empowerment In Kerala, A Success Story

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Vishnu Varma. A Kudumbashree worker involved in community farming near the Kerala village of Kadakkanad. Around 260,000 workers currently till and harvest more than 60,000 acres throughout the state.

Vishnu Varma. A Kudumbashree worker involved in community farming near the Kerala village of Kadakkanad. Around 260,000 workers currently till and harvest more than 60,000 acres throughout the state.

Thanks to India Ink, and Vishnu Varma, for this article about several million women, in communities across the state where we call home, collaborating their way to empowerment:

ERNAKULAM, Kerala — In a country that has been criticized as lacking commitment to women’s rights, one program in the southwest state of Kerala has been quietly serving as an example that a government can indeed successfully empower women, both economically and socially. Continue reading →

Attukal Pongala – Temple Festival

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Photo credits : Vishnu

Photo credits: Vishnu

Attukal Pongala is the most important festival of the Attukal Bhagavathy Temple in Thiruvananthapuram, and once was entered into the World Records for the largest gathering of women at a festival in the world. It is popularly referred to as the Sabarimala of women.

Continue reading →

Birders’ Cinematic Moment

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The last time big name celebrity got attached to a cinematic treatment of birdwatching, the results were underwhelming, though not a total disaster. Just kind of embarrassing if you care about birding and would like the activity to gain more traction with a wider audience. Thanks to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for pointing us to this, and to Ben Kingsley for his participation’s likely boost to its chances for success:

We’re excited about the release of a new birding movie, A Birder’s Guide to Everything. It’s a touching story that explores broad themes of growing up and growing wiser, while following four young actors and Sir Ben Kingsley on the trail of a possibly extinct species.  Continue reading →

Community, Collaboration, And Gran Chaco Conservation

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In about 10 minutes, this National Geographic video gives a great primer on why you should care about the conservation of one of the planet’s largest intact ecosystems, with a storyline focused on community and collaboration.

South America’s Gran Chaco region spans a complex mix of land, climates, and species. National Geographic Emerging Explorer and conservation biologist Erika Cuellar shares her passion and know-how with the people who live there to protect their natural treasure from unsustainable development.

Inspiration, 51

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Photograph by James Pomerantz.

Photograph by James Pomerantz.

This post is for the team at 51, a new restaurant we are opening soon, located on the waterfront of Fort Cochin’s harbor in the history-intact, spice-trading Mattanchery neighborhood. That team is a group of men and women, chefs, support cooks, self-made cuisine historians, and other interested parties collaborating on a new concept.  It is a concept, but deftly avoiding pretension. More about fun historical convergences, good taste, and communities interacting over long stretches of time to create new food ways. Following is a restaurant review whose accompanying photo was the main draw, but so was the notion of foraging that has become so compelling to foodies of late:

It seems strange to say that the best thing at a place that specializes in juice cleanses is the porchetta, but Foragers Market and Table encapsulates the contradictory nature of the New York diet, serving quality food that feels “healthy,” and is often local and organic, but with none of that dull avocado-based asceticism. Continue reading →

Siruvani Dam – Palakkad

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Photo credits : Riaz

Photo credits: Riaz

Located in the Palakkad district of Kerala, the Siruvani Dam was built as a joint venture between the neighboring states to supply drinking water for the town of Coimbature in Tamil Nadu. The thickly forested surroundings, Siruvani Waterfall and the nearby Banan Fort make the area a rich tourist attraction.  Members of the Irular and Mudugar Tribal groups also inhabit the regions near the Siruvani Dam. Continue reading →

A Musically Satisfied Cow Is A Productive Cow

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The Ingenues, an all-girl band and vaudeville act, serenade the cows in the University of Wisconsin, Madison's dairy barn in 1930. The show was apparently part of an experiment to see whether the soothing strains of music boosted the cows' milk production. Angus B. McVicar/Wisconsin Historical Society

The Ingenues, an all-girl band and vaudeville act, serenade the cows in the University of Wisconsin, Madison’s dairy barn in 1930. The show was apparently part of an experiment to see whether the soothing strains of music boosted the cows’ milk production. Angus B. McVicar/Wisconsin Historical Society

It is not difficult to believe, but it is funny. Thanks to National Public Radio (USA) for this story about the importance of animal happiness, an idea we can all, from carnivore to vegan all everyone in between, agree is good (the video below is at least as compelling as the scientific references):

When it’s time to buckle down and focus, plenty of office workers will put on headphones to help them drown out distractions and be more productive. But can music also help dairy cows get down to business?

Some dairy farmers have long suspected that’s the case. It’s not unheard of for farmers to play relaxing jams for their herds to boost milk production, as the folks at Modern Farmer recently reported.

A tantalizing 2001 study out of the University of Leicester in the U.K. appeared to lend credence to those claims. It found that milk production went up by as much as 3 percent when cows listened to slow tunes like R.E.M.’s “Everybody Hurts” and Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bridge over Troubled Water,” rather than faster songs. Continue reading →

Community And Collaboration In Italy

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Matteo Renzi in Florence, Italy on January 4th, 2014. Photograph by Laura Lezza/Getty.

Matteo Renzi in Florence, Italy on January 4th, 2014. Photograph by Laura Lezza/Getty.

We studiously avoid politics on these pages, but we studiously make occasional exceptions like this one. After an undeservedly long stretch of time, decades that became generations, of Italy in political turmoil this may be a moment of, dare we say it, change we can believe in. Alexander Stille provides a pithy summary of why this is so on the New Yorker website.

Leave ideology out of the consideration, if possible, and observe the new Prime Minister’s focus on community and collaboration; and the bicycle; one more reason to visit Italy this year as a show of support for his vision for change and his vehicular choices:

Sixty-three governments in sixty-eight years, with twenty-seven different Prime Ministers—so why should we care that Italy has a new government, with yet another Prime Minister, Continue reading →