Posted on Jul 29, 2004
Of course, in the UK we cant imagine what flooding on the scale of a Haiti, a Nepal, a Bihar or a Bangladesh flood is actually like but increasingly flooding is a major issue here too.
Today, the UK’s environment minister, Elliot Morley, released a consultation paper outlining a new 20 year strategy to defend Britain against the effects of flooding such as that which occurred in 2000.
The Guardian reports,
Mr Morley said: “Climate change means we may well see more and worse flooding in the future…”
the consultation suggests ways to deal with the expected changes in our climate over the coming years,
Solutions range from bolstering sea and river walls to creating saltmarsh buffer zones in coastal areas and wetlands near rivers to act as flood storage areas should they burst their banks.
(That’s starting to sound like Bangladesh!)
Furthermore, recent reports in the UK suggest that there are changes occurring in what can grow and live in this country, soon hundreds of thousands of Parrots will be flocking wildly around the south of England. Exotic crops and plants are now growing in fields and gardens that wouldn’t have survived the colder winters of yesteryear. And there are certain types of bugs which shouldn’t survive those winters but now thrive in several self-sustaining colonies, again in the south.
I was at an early evening garden ‘do’ about a week ago down in London when I felt something delicately creeping along my arm. I looked down and to my surprise saw a mosquito carefully selecting a vantage point from which it could siphon off some of my blood. Now having lived in Bangladesh at various points in my life I was certainly no stranger to these pesky little vampires dining out on my sweetened bideshi heart juice but here? … in the UK!!??
Upon questioning, several Londoners revealed that this is not at all strange these days in the south of England. Well, at least there’s no risk of Malaria here… at least, I don’t think there is?!
[UPDATE: 03/08/04 - West Nile Virus detected in the British Isles for the first time - blame those darned mossies!]
[UPDATE: 04/08/04 - We had floods in the UK yesterday! and Londoners experienced today what the Dhakaites did just a week ago (but not on the same scale I must add)]
[UPDATE: 19/08/04 - However the residents of flooded out Boscastle may disagree!]
Posted on Jul 27, 2004
Rezwan, over at The 3rd World View, writes from flood ravaged Dhaka,
…Rich and poor alike are effected and they need food and water purifiers and some shelters. The day-laborers are the worst victims who seldom has proper housing facilities. Most of the flood shelters are running without any help or monitoring from the government. So far people the situation has not gone out of hand of the local people. But I wonder for how long they can sustain without proper and planned action from the government. There is an influx of flood effected destitutes across all dry parts of the city. I have personally helped a couple of them, but really that will not save them from misery. In fact collective efforts of government and NGOs as well as help from the non-effected are needed to establish more shelters equipped with food, medicine, cloth and other survival gears. Rehabilitation and repairing of the infrastructure damages would be another huge task when the water subsides…
(full article…)
But disasters (whether man-made as in Sudan or natural as in South Asia) are affecting millions of people all over the world right now, so if you’d like to help those who are being hit the hardest wherever they are then you may want to make a donation to The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, or, (if you’re in the UK), The British Red Cross.
Posted on Jul 22, 2004
[London Eye - River Thames, London]
Posted on Jul 16, 2004
[Streatham Common, London]
Posted on Jul 14, 2004
[Streatham Common, London]
Posted on Jul 3, 2004
Anyway, I’m back in the land of rubbish penalty takers and eagerly waiting for the next episode of the Saddam Show. Actually I was just watching Fox News (not that I’d recommend that to anyone but if you realise that they’re there just to wind you up it’s actually a really good laugh for about 10 minutes – about the time it takes for you to realise that they actually mean it and you have to switch over to UK Gold repeats of Dad’s Army to recover)
I digress! So anyway, Fox News was carrying a debate between some right-wing guys and some extreme right-wing guys and their topic of debate? — whether the New Iraq (you know the one where freedom reigns) should pay for the cost of their liberation !!!!
Words fail me! … But they didn’t fail the right-wing guy or the right-wing host of the debate – they pointed out to the extreme right-wing guys that to bomb the Iraqis homes, kill their civilians and then to rebuild those homes and ask the remaining civilians to pay for the rebuild was a bit smelly… even by right-wing standards. Is there a glimmer of a conscience lurking within the dark heart of Fox News – probably not – it’s an election year and there’s no point putting all your eggs in one stinky basket now is there?
And talking about phoney wars and licences to print money I spoke to a British soldier serving in Basrah yesterday on the phone.
To be precise I spoke to a nephew of mine who’s serving out there. Swealtering in 50 degree heat being shot at by irate Iraqis and having to cope with the paucity of resources available to your average British sqauddie thanks to government defence cut-backs. Anyway, my nephew wasn’t complaining – he volunteered for the Army and being shot at is an occupational hazard in that line of work. (though the question still remains why did Tony send him out there in the first place but historians will be asking that question for the next hundred years at least – hey whadyaknow! Tony did have the hand of history on his shoulder afterall)
Apparantly, the food is hot too – there’s loads of South Asian’s out there sub-contracted to do all the ity-bity civilian jobs including catering (that is when they’re not being nabbed by the head-hunters of darkest Falluja). Also I was told, you can buy almost anything you want really cheaply in the New Iraq as long as you pay in Dollars. The problem is getting things back to dear ol’ Blighty – the cost of postage is often three times the cost of the goods inside but most of the time it doesn’t matter because the stuff has a funny habit of disappearing once it gets to customs. Oh well! it is a war zone afterall and not Butlins.
Speaking of which and attesting to the great British ironic sense of humour, the military camp into which they withdraw to, when our valiant troops aren’t getting shot at for our glorious leader, has been set out as a giant Monopoly Board.
Pssst! There’s a rumour going round that there’s an Iraqi cash buyer looking for a ‘get out of jail’ card.
