Oil Tanks India

Economist book of the year in 2008) catalogues the adventures of the crew of the Ibis, a slave ship turned able vessel in the opium wars. Mr Ghosh's book has a grand Dickensian feel, encompassing men and women from different walks of life, speaking in different accents and dialects. The places are carefully drawn in dusty Indian technicolour, the characters are so lovingly rendered that when you re-encounter them it feels as though you are meeting old friends.

Economist book of the year in 2008) catalogues the adventures of the crew of the Ibis, a slave ship turned able vessel in the opium wars. Mr Ghosh's book has a grand Dickensian feel, encompassing men and women from different walks of life, speaking in different accents and dialects. The places are carefully drawn in dusty Indian technicolour, the characters are so lovingly rendered that when you re-encounter them it feels as though you are meeting old friends. "Sea of Poppies" is an adventure story, but it is also a book about opium, as the title implies. Though there are references to the seedy dockside haunts in London and Canton that confirm standard perceptions of opium use in the 19th-century, Mr Ghosh also sketches the farming, production and trade of the drug. The images of poverty, violence, corruption and addiction are startling, and also woefully familiar .

Named for the hero of Shakespeare's "The Tempest", an expert in the power of books and the arts, this blog features literary insight and cultural commentary from our correspondents, and includes our coverage of the art market.

Transporting fiction - The Economist (blog)

India's GAIL to continue spot LNG purchases over next few quarters - Platts

David Mitchell is weaving his way around a circuit of yurts erected for the Edinburgh Book Festival, to get to his seat for an afternoon event, but his journey is a puttering one, punctuated by a convivial form of crowd-mobbing.

A ticket attendant stops him excitably to discuss a scene from Star Trek 7 which he mentioned in his talk earlier that day (and mistakenly credited to Star Trek 6, he is told); a middle-aged woman quizzes him about the childbirth scene in his latest, historical novel, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet (Sceptre) that left her book-club so discombobulated; a man interjects with a story of how his wife reads Cloud Atlas (2004) every year and "she finds something new each time"; a fellow-author wants his book signed; another wants to shake his hand.

Mitchell's fans are evidently not a shy, retiring bunch and he receives them variously with an earnest summary of 18th-century obstetrics, an admission of defeat on the intricacies of Kling-on culture and more generally, a mild air of surprise.

This level of attention is not what he's used to, he confesses, after finding retreat behind the back of the writers yurt. In the eight years he lived in Hiroshima, where he wrote his first, instantly successful novel, Ghostwritten (1999), he wasn't stopped on the street once. Japan does not have a huge fiction market, he explains.

David Mitchell: 'Readers enable me to continue to do what I love. Prizes won't ... - Independent

The proposal of Union Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh to provide additional funding to the Bombay Natural History Society and the Salim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History, Coimbatore, is to be welcomed for the strong impetus it can give to research on ecology. Both these institutions have built a good foundation for original, peer-reviewed work on the environment. In fact, BNHS will soon prepare a rapid assessment report on the ecological impact of the oil spill from the ship collision off Mumbai, and follow it up with a detailed report. It has undertaken vital work on reviving the fortunes of India's vanishing vultures, an achievement that has won it the support of the international ornithological community. In the aftermath of the spill, the 125-year-old non-governmental organisation has a key role to play in determining the long-term effects of oil pollution on coastal ecology. There is early evidence of conspicuous harm befalling mangroves in Vashi, near Mumbai, apart from the less-noticed species such as fiddler crabs and mudskippers and, of course, birds. The big challenge before the scientific community is to study the impact of the oil on the entire marine ecosystem, including the community structure of plants and animals along the western coast. It is a region that has witnessed a rising trend of oil pollution.

Disasters in the oil industry and shipping accidents are now a global phenomenon. In the recent Gulf of Mexico catastrophe, scientists are researching, among other things, the outcome of releasing a large volume of dispersants in deep waters. The Mumbai incident has sent a large volume of oil into the inter-tidal zone and mangroves. Yet, in both places, it is nature's resilience that will ultimately solve the pollution problem. The data on this ‘nature cure' phenomenon need to be gathered to enrich coastal ecology studies in India. A similar approach, pursued in Alaska during the two decades following the Exxon Valdez spill, provided valuable insights. With liberal funding, research can be taken up to expand the knowledge base in several Indian States, including Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Orissa, and Kerala. The scientific literature here is far from comprehensive; it needs augmentation by systematic studies. In the beautiful Lakshadweep islands, the supportive policies of the administration have helped scientists produce detailed research findings on the coral reef ecosystem (the reefs escaped major damage recently, when a ship ran aground but had its oil tanks emptied quickly). The Mumbai spill must be turned into an opportunity for scientific study of what oil pollution does to coasts.

Oil on the coast - The Hindu

Opponents of an Islamic community center and mosque planned to be built near ground zero say it would desecrate hallowed ground. But suspicion has greeted proposed mosque projects in places less hallowed than ground zero - in Murfreesboro, Tennessee; Sheboygan, Wisconsin; Temecula, California; and elsewhere.

Of course Islam is a religion but the problem is that THAT religion has a sad tendency to spawn most of the worlds terrorists and ALL of the worlds suicide bombers.

Islam is a religion, not a terror ideology - CNN (blog)