Rashid's Blog: A Place for Inquisitive Souls

The prosperous and vibrant country of Uttar Pradesh holds a special place in my heart. I am now officially a resident of this high on testosterone land. In such a short span of time, the Gun Ka Achaar, the poems of Ma Behen, the misty winters of cold shoulders and the daredevils on the pot-holed race tracks have taken my heart away.

The citizens of this country are a class apart. They work tirelessly towards bringing to life what the rest of the Indians consider unachievable. There are times when I have tears of happiness in my eyes while driving as I see everyone following the following 10 commandments of driving in this amazing country with such seriousness.

Thou Shalt driveth as in America

The citizens of this great nation realized long back that the fastest way to develop the country is to flip the way they drive. Driving in…

Amazon Rainforest

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Peru Finally Declares State of Emergency Over Oil Contamination of the Amazon

River in the Peruvian Amazon. Photo by- Rhett A. Butler

Jeremy Hance, Mongabay
Waking Times

The Peruvian government has declared an environmental state of emergency after finding elevated levels of lead, barium, and chromium in the Pastaza River in the Amazon jungle, reports the Associated Press. Indigenous peoples in the area have been complaining for decades of widespread contamination from oil drilling, but this is the first time the Peruvian government has acknowledged their concerns. Currently 84 percent of the Peruvian Amazon is covered by potential oil blocs, leading to conflict with indigenous people and environmental degradation.

The Peruvian Environment Minister, Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, said that Pluspetrol, which has operated the oil bloc in question—1 AB—since 2001, would be liable for cleaning up the pollution. But the minister also…

Buried several hundred pages into a new World Economic Forum report on global tourism, past the sections on air travel infrastructure and physician density (by which they mean the number of physicians per capita, not the mass-per-cubic-meter of individual doctors), are some very interesting numbers. The WEF has compiled survey data from 140 countries estimating the attitude of each countries’ population toward foreign visitors.

The results, mapped out above, seem significant beyond just tourism. Red countries are less welcoming to foreign visitors, according to the data; blue countries are more welcoming. Click the map (or here) to enlarge the image.

The WEF gathered the data from late 2011 through late 2012 by asking respondents, “How welcome are foreign visitors in your country?” The WEF explains that the survey results are meant to help “measure the extent to which a country and society are open to tourism and foreign visitors.”

According…