Ripples In A Teacup

Lucky me, May 8 is a holiday in France to mark Victory Day, the day on which the Allies formally accepted Nazi Germany's surrender in 1945, consequently ending World War II in Europe. Accent Francais , where I am doing an intensive French course, took us students to Nîmes by coach and I had a lovely time. Nîmes, pronounced in French as “Neem” with a very short à at the end, is around 60 kilometers north-east of Montpellier, where I am based. Nîmes used to be an important European city during the time of the Roman Empire and has a number of buildings that look Roman. Nîmes is even referred to as the "French Rome". As usual, I took a few snaps and treated myself to an ice cream!

Last Saturday, I once again rented a bicycle for the day and cycled to La Grande Motte, approximately around 22 kilometres from Montpellier.  The cycling track from Montpellier to La Grande-Motte has two tracks, one asphalt/tar and the other mud, except in certain sections where it is only mud.  I largely stuck with the asphalt path. La Grande-Motte is a smallish town by the sea. It’s a port as well and I read somewhere on the internet that it was built in the 1960s and 1970s.  La Grande-Motte is known for its architecture with a number of prominent buildings shaped like pyramids.  However, I didn’t spend much time admiring the architecture, instead, I relaxed on the beach. Here are a few more snaps from  La Grande-Motte.

There’s so much talk of green and clean energy, one gets the feeling that there is no harm in harnessing the sun and wind and tidal waves to generate electricity and run more cars and planes and ships and spaceships. No! People, we need to consume less as a whole. Even if we have solar-powered electric saws, we should not cut down trees unnecessarily. Sitting in Montpellier, which seems uninhabited by Indian standards, it is easy to not panic or worry about over-consumption. There is a lot less pollution than in India and roads are generally deserted (by Indian standards). However, we DO KNOW that climate change is for real. Sea levels are rising and seasons and climatic patterns have gone for a toss. We need to panic! Reduction of consumption has to be both per capita as well as gross. Gross reduction can be achieved only if we reduce the world’s population. India has already overtaken China as the world’s most populous country. Many countries are worried about the reduction in th