V.P Singh, The Prime Minister

Amidst the terrorist attack on Mumbai and the death and destruction, former Prime Minister V.P Singh's passing away was a small news item, mostly ignored by the media. But the legacy and the change he brought about in Indian politics are trully historic.

After decades and decades of corrupt family dominated politics and the  failure of the first non- congress government to complete their term, the people of India had lost hope of ever being able to 

break free from the strangle hold of the Gandhi family. Even the boyish and silly governing style of Rajiv Gandhi was being put up by the people who saw no other option before them.

Then V.P Singh happened. His  fight to bring into pubic view the corruption in the government, the bofors kickbacks helped galvanise the masses reeling under a government whose Prime Minister spend more time on luxurious vacation with his Italian in-laws than on actual governing. The elections in 1989 brought down the "Hamme Dekhna Hai, Hum Dekhage" Rajiv Gandhi and forever ensured that Congress would never again be able to rule India
alone. It also broke the strangle hold the Gandhi family had on Indian masses. Though V. P Singh was unable to complete his term, after his rule and Rajiv Gandhi's asassination, Narasimha Rao became PM by a small majority inspite of the so called sympathy votes, the assasination brought. If the asassination had not taken place no one would have got a majority that year. 

Narasimha Rao changed India, openned up India and we started on the path to progress. BJP came to power later and everyone loved Vajpayee. India was trully free this time. Now even baby faced playboy Rahul Gandhi is unable to create any ripples in Indian politics. For all this
we have V.P Singh to thank.

May God Bless him and Long live his illustrous name.

The week

The economic downturn has hit Dubai hard if rumours are to be believed. Every day one hears a new rumour and as most of these come without any real proof and clarification, everyone hopes these are just that, Rumours and idle gossip.The lastest is that 30% of Emirates Airlines have been sold to Ethihad Airlines. If it is true it is shocking, but one can hardly believe it as the third terminal built only for emirates has just openned and surely all of us somehow trust in the immense capabilities of Sheikh Mohammed to create and deliver miracles even in the most difficult of times.
Another rumour I heard was that nearly 200 employees of a big MNC oil company were terminated. All the terminated staff were in the senior posts and they found pink slips on the desks when they arrived in the morning. All of them were told to leave in one hour, a lot of them went into shock and were screaming refusing to leave and were escorted out by security staff of the company. This is true because the person who informed me works in the company and was fortunate enough not to be terminated.
Then this week we watched the movie "Twenty 20", the tickets had to be booked one week in advance, due to rush and the late show was also housefull. The movie had a good plot, but I think the main attraction was to see, how they had done the casting as all big stars incliding superstars Mammootty and Mohanlal were acting in the movie. The casting was superb, as all stars had good parts and every fan came out feeling statisfied that his star had a good part.
Yesterday we end to bed hearing the news of the attack on Mumbai landmarks by terrorists and woke up with the situation still not resolved. A change in the central government might be the real solution we need to put an end to these attacks. The central government is too busy promoting playboy Rahul Gandhi to pay any attention to the real problems faced by the country.

Jadaf Garhoud plant souk has shifted to...........

Weeks and weeks into the start of the annual planting season, we were still unable to locate the new area to which the old nursery's in Jadaf had moved. All thos who went in search of the new location in the Dragon mart and international city area came back lost and angry. Everyone was upset, and it seemed like this year there would be no planting of the flowering annuals. So yesterday we decided to find this area and set off and as was expexted we got lost. then we thought maybe we should go back to Jadaf and look for clues. At jadaf, the place looked sad and forlorn, the green area was all a wast sandy wasteland. Cars were making rounds and everyone looking for plants to buy. One lone old mas sat there with a few plants, Marigold mostly and we asked him, and he said" Dragon mart area, just go there, You will see it." But we knew we had tried and needed exact area details. Then a man who was buying plants from the old man told us how to get there.
So here goes.
To get to the new location.....
Once you reach the Dragon mart from Dubai, continue going staight till you reach a big roundabout, turn right here. The road is named Dubai academic city road, then you come to a smaller roundabout where you turn left and this area is warsan, here on your right, the nurseries and located. They are actually in a bigger area than Jadaf. Petunia are all laid out and ready for buying. 
A huge lot of Chrysanthemums are also there. 
Dianthus is also available now.
This area is near the sewage treatment plant and you can see hundreds and hundreds of tankers carrying sewage waiting to unload their sewage load at the plant.

Dubai balcony garden

A dusty evening and a drizzle during the night the Dubai weather is back to being warm and humid. The tomato seeds have all germinated and tiny little plats are all clustered together. Hope I see some tomatoes this year. The Vinca plants are colorful and full of blooms. As a Mallu missing home too much, I bring over a lot of seeds from Kerala and this year’s amaranths are doing well, though it has not yet flowered. Inducing flowers is the biggest problem I have been having here, with gardening in Dubai. As long as I stick to nursery bought plants, I am fine, but to grow them from seeds, flowering is a problem. Well I intend to crack that problem.

Winter gardening

This year has been hotter than usual. The summer vacation spent in Kerala destroyed most of the plants but now everything is doing well again. The annul flowering season has started and in October we bought verbenia, dianthus and vinca plants from Jadaf. They are doing very well. The weather has not really cooled down but mornings and evenings are nice and pleasant. Today a dust storm seems to be brewing. A new Bougainvillea is looking great. I also got a beautiful curry leaf plant, which has started putting out new leaves. My cousin in Al Ain has a garden full of French beans and I have planted some in pots too but each day brings more and more leaves, it hasnot flowered and no beans yet. I planted left over tomato seeds from last year but they are not doing well. Last year the plants did well but not even one tomato was formed.
The nursery at Jadaf has been moved to the international city and dragon mart area. No one knows the location yet so, this year no one has been able to plant the petunias yet.