The Eco project

some of us like to believe that we are socially responsible,environmentally friendly but are stoped dead in our tracks by red tape and bureaucracy.Is this an excuse for inaction or just the cynic in us talking.I have long been a great out door person in love with flora and fauna.My contribution to climate change and global warming is to create a little green space in a balcony that can only accommodate my plants and me provided i hold my breadth.I have expanded my plant collection to the terrace and have collected all my kitchen waste to create compost for my garden to be sustainable.But having said that I have don't very little for the community and environment i live in.I have long fantasied about working as a gardener or with the world wild live association to be close to animals.All that like i mentioned remained a pipe dream.I seriously believed that this could only happen if i lived in Europe or in the hills of India.Today at 10 am which is early by my standards,i dragged myself off to a meeting of civic groups who are concerned about the environment.I met people who have been doing work in the city and good work at that despite the many hurdles that have come their way.I walked around the adyar poonga(which i didn't know existed) the once hotbed of vice and now a haven for migrating birds and fish.Mangrove trees have been planted in the salty areas,spaces to sit and enjoy the breeze and there are people who are actively involved in technology updates for the environment,audits of birds and trees and community and student groups who network for best practices.I discovered that my long lived ambition of being a gardener can happen if i volunteered to this project.I could plant trees,and learn more.I can then join like minded groups to study wild life birds etc and to explore the great outdoors within my city.I spent at least five hours in this place listening to the things that various groups have been able to achieve.I saw first hand the development that is happening and met a whole bunch of interesting people.Needless to say i came back home with my eyes wide open.There is action on the ground and i can be a part of it.So i am looking forward to the next step and hope to be part of the movement.It made me realise that i need to make time to explore the city i live in and to network with the people and projects that are truly after my own heart.Dreaming and not doing is an excuse which i cant afford to hide behind any more.Will it work?....well i am not sure but like its said nothing ventured,nothing gained right?

That green tea experience

The world is full of people tasting cheese,wine tea,luxury etc and everyone adds their own mystery to the thing on hand.I watch people describe wine in glowing terms,they talk of fruit,flowers woody and they then go into detail of the kind of fruit and flowers.Honestly while all that is fine,I wonder how much is dictated by geography.For instance,if one lives in Europe then wont they know the sent of different flowers the flavours of fruit native to that country?.If you told me the wine tasted of oak and peat i would blink simply because i have no clue what an oak smells like or peat for that matter,but tell me the wine tastes like jack fruit or mango and i would then know how to distinguish a good wine from a bad one.Cheese the same thing,the cows in France eat grass of a different quality,how am i to identify the taste,and frankly speaking i don't trust the people in my country who claim to be experts,one simply has to live in wine and cheese producing countries for a longish period to understand.So whats my point really?.Well today i tasted a green tea from china.Now the east is pretty similar in geography so i don't feel clueless.Having spent many a holiday on tea estates I can with a fair degree of knowledge talk of tea.This packed of tea was given to me by a friend who visited china.The leaves were tightly packed and looked like dried flowers.I boiled some hot water,threw in some tea leaves and let it infuse.After a few minutes I poured out the tea.The leaves by now has unwound themselves and looked more like neen leaves but the flavour was what took me by surprise.It kind of burst into multiple flavours in my mouth.Suddenly i was transported to rain drenched paddy fields,damp attics which hold unlimited potential for food and treasures,it tickled my senses and i could smell flowers.Its strange,this was my taste buds speaking but my nose seemed to be communicating with my mouth and jasmine,rose and some familiar but unknown flavours were mingling in my mouth.It was a sublime experience,this was what the wine experts talk about,here i was drinking green tea and i could see the hills,smell the damp earth and taste the air and the fragrances all just in one cup of tea.Its then that i realised how important geography was to all this mystery.Kerala and tea estates,long lost memories of childhood very similar to cultures of Chinese villages.So there is no mystery to taste ultimately its a question of experience,of countries explored and of food adventures undertaken.I went back to my green tea again after dinner and once again it was back.This is why food and drink and so much a part of who i am.It is an expression of who one is....