ishvar2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdyewnSog1s

John Pilger on The War You Don't See http://www.itv.com/itvplayer/video/?Filter=198443

Toby Ord is a university researcher earning not much more than the average salary. So why is he giving away £1m over his lifetime to help address global poverty? When Facebook founder and billionaire Mark Zuckerberg pledged to give away most of his wealth during his lifetime, some British commentators bemoaned the lack of philanthropy on this side of the Atlantic. But an academic at Oxford University is living off little more than £300 a month in an act of charity-giving that is arguably more impressive than those of Zuckerberg, Gates, Buffett and co. Toby Ord, 31, has in the past year given more than a third of his earnings, £10,000, to charities working in the poorest countries. He also gave away £15,000 of savings, as the start of his pledge to give away £1m over his lifetime. And he's started a campaign to recruit, Bill Gates-style, other people to give up at least 10% of their lifetime's earnings in the same way. A year on, 64 people have joined his movement Giving What We Can and pledged £14m. Given his personal sacrifice, it's difficult not to feel rather intrigued about the kind of lifestyle he can maintain while so much of his earnings is going elsewhere. And heading to Oxford to find out, there's a fleeting thought that we'll be sharing tea bags in a caravan parked on the banks of the Thames. Instead, the Ord household inhabits a rented one-bedroom flat in a beautiful sandstone house in the heart of the city. But the interior is as modest as the exterior is glorious, furnished sparingly in a style reminiscent of student digs. There is no television, through choice rather than hardship, but plenty of books and DVDs. The only signs of indulgence are the two Mac computers, for Ord and his wife, although as he points out, they are used so much that the cost works out at a few pence per hour. And he has an iPhone, which also helps him work. Giving away a tenth of one's earnings is something most people in the UK can achieve without having to make much of a sacrifice, says Ord, who was born and raised in Melbourne, Australia. "That's probably surprising because if you did a survey of 100 people, 99 would say they couldn't. "When I was earning £14,000 as a student, I found I was in the richest 4% in the world, even adjusting for how much further money goes in developing countries. "Giving away 10% of that, I found that I would still be in the top 5%. So while it can seem impossible to live on less, if your employer was to suddenly pay you less, you would get by somehow." Ord gives away much more than a tenth. A year ago, he vowed to give away everything he earned above £20,000 and his wife, Bernadette Young, a medical doctor in the NHS, set a target of £25,000. After his first year, he has lowered his personal allowance to £18,000. Ultimately, there weren't any big sacrifices, he says, and they still maintain a reasonable middle-class existence. "What's really important in our lives is spending time together, chatting with our close friends and reading beautiful books and listening to beautiful music, and we're really lucky to live in a beautiful place and there are lots of stimulating cultural activities around. With all that you can't really ask for much more. "I've also changed the way I look at the world. I don't want more stuff. If someone said to me 'Here's one thousand pounds' and I had to spend it on myself I would feel anxious about that because I just want to help people more and it would be a very frustrating time." Ord lives in a rented flat in Oxford He goes out for dinner about once a fortnight and for coffee about once a week. In the past year he spent £5,000 on rent to his employer and landlord, Balliol College. He kept £4,000 to live on and pay the bills, while still having enough to spend on a week's holiday in France and Italy, and put some away to buy a house. Incidentally, in 10 years, Ord and his wife, who have no children, will have given away a sum that equals the average price of a house in the UK, just at a time when they will hope to have bought one themselves. "When it began, I would be down in the supermarket agonising about whether to buy a more expensive cereal or not but I realise that's a road to a nervous breakdown and that it was much more sensible to work out at the start what you can live on [give away the rest in a lump sum] and then after a year readjust - can I live on less, am I pushing it too hard - instead of perpetually agonising about it." It was while he was studying for a masters degree in philosophy that Ord came across the idea of sacrificing luxuries in order to save a life. He estimated that over his own lifetime he would need about £500,000 to live comfortably, and would therefore be able to give away £1m to those people in most need. But who are they? "Some people think that the most important thing is to help the people who are the worst off. I think that's not always the case. What's really important is to help people as well as you can and often the people the worst off are easier to help, but not always. "For example, someone in the UK suffering from severe depression has possibly a worse life than people I help in Africa or South Asia but it turns out that it's really difficult to help that person, but much easier to help the person abroad. "I'm not as focused on where people are, as how much I can help them. A lot of people can switch off when they hear 'cost-effectiveness' but if you only have a certain amount of money then the real question is how much you can do with it." Using the methodology of the World Health Organisation in calculating how much a sum of money can "buy" in terms of extending the lives of those in need, he says medical interventions in developing countries can be 10,000 times more cost-effective than those in the UK. And he carefully researches which charities he thinks make the most difference. Giving away a third of your income doesn't preclude the odd luxury The £10,000 he gave away last year he says equates to 4,000 extra years of life at full health for people in those countries where those charities do their work. That's all very well and to be applauded but wouldn't it be, well, more British, to do this quietly? Not if you want to encourage others to do the same, says Ord. "It's not that amazing. I'm not that impressed by this, but I'm glad that people feel it's a good story. The median income is £18,000 so I'm not living off anything less than the median person in the UK. "It's quite possible to present this as a very positive thing. You can help people so much without impacting on your own life. We can still live a middle-class life on this kind of money." He's aware of the arguments people have against giving to charities in the developing world, such as corruption and overpopulation, and he sets out to address them on a section of his website. Echoing the philosophy of Bill Gates, who believes going public encourages other people into acts of generosity, Ord set up Giving What We Can to share ideas about "good" charities and inspire each other. The figure of a tenth originates from the Christian tithes, a tradition that many people still follow today. Some of his members give more away than that, but Ord insists he never makes those that don't feel guilty about it. "There is a strong moral obligation to give some away but I wouldn't like to say how much. We're not saying that if you don't join up you're a bad person. Toby Ord explains why he's giving away his money "There used to be conflict between what I wanted and what I thought was right and that was frustrating, but over time it was just what I thought was right." He used to feel guilty seeing poverty on television but giving away part of his wealth has liberated him, and he says it gives meaning to his life. "I've made some simple material sacrifices but sufficiently small that I don't really care about them. In terms of emotional comfort, you feel more satisfied with what you're doing with your life." The promise of a warm glow inside, no matter how many lives saved, may be a hard sell at a time of such belt-tightening and cuts, but Ord responds that the UK remains a very wealthy country, compared with many others. And his own budget-trimming doesn't extend to Christmas spending. He did his shopping early and posted the presents to relatives in Australia, which he plans to visit next year. A far greater gift awaits thousands of others. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-11950843

Interesting article by the man himself : http://www.theaustralian.com.au/in-depth/wikileaks/dont-shoot-messenger-for-revealing-uncomfortable-truths/story-fn775xjq-1225967241332

I wrote that one. Forget the simplistic title 'A Universe of Dust'

Life Without Emotion and Invictus - really liked these two.

A universe of dust is Revealed by harsh candlelight Stars on my tired face They whisper they saw Him Bottles of solace in this sea of separation I sweep them away with gratitude and I say: ‘Destiny may deem it unworthy to host our duet So when my blood sings A solitary song And with the crescendo The fire consumes the liquid vessel, Residual notes shall resonate - The message itself shall be delivered this time’ So when you see a universe of dust Revealed by soft sunlight The stars on your beautiful face They’ll whisper the song I longed to sing with you About oceans of love and feelings of unity Don’t sweep them away.

Oh that takes me back! I remember my brother showing me the clip of the black guy attempting to wield the unwieldy nunchuku I couldn't stop laughing! Bechara...

I love the flashy stuff. What a smashing contest!

Excellent but shocking video by Nav Kandola: (hopefully not a repost)

That's because their IP address is linked to their geographic location - so when they navigate to the BBC site, the site knows this and blocks access. Root reason is that British people pay for the license fee and people outside UK should not see BBC's content. Try this: http://www.sikhroots.com/video/tv/viewvideo/274/television-programmes/remembrance--the-sikh-story-bbc

Gur Kirpa de naal, my family have been able to get hold of an allotment. I highly recommend getting one (or some land/plot) wherever you are. We were inspired after making a small vegetable and fruit garden this spring so this felt like a natural progression. We got the plot quite recently so I thought I'd share with you all the journey as we develop it. Right now, attached are some pictures of how it looks - big, weedy and in need of some major work. The first task will be weeding and prepping the soil for the spring.

Yes it's possible. I downloaded this a while ago but haven't had a chance to test it: http://download.cnet.com/WinWSD-WebSite-Downloader/3000-2377_4-10562531.html There are other ones but this is free.

See the link at the bottom for the original story and pictures.. The Royal Engineers Museum in Chatham has held a set of Sikh chain armour for over 50 years but it is so frail it has never been on public display. The set of armour including gauntlet, helmet, breast and back plates dates from the mid 1700s. It was given to the museum in 1959 by a member of the Corps of Royal Engineers. Whilst a piece of chain armour like this is not hugely rare, it is rare to find a set so complete, with its original silks. The piece has been linked to the 'Lahore Armoury' and was almost certainly brought to the UK with boy Maharajah, Duleep Singh, and the Governor General of India, Lord Dalhousie. The armour will be restored to reflect its history The armour then became part of Lord Dalhousie's collection and when he died without an heir, it was sold at auction in Edinburgh on 7 December 1898. Conservation assessments of the armour have resulted in a cost of approximately £30,000 to restore and to display the piece and the museum is trying to raise the funds to conserve the armour and its history. Lauren Jones is the museum's Collections Care Officer: "The museum is confident the armour can be well conserved, but we are however very keen to preserve its history, a history the armour's current condition reflects. The armour will not be restored to an as-new condition; this technique would destroy part of the object's history and allure. "For all of us at the museum these are extremely exciting times; we have never carried out a project like this before, but we feel this armour is of such cultural and historic importance it warrants the very best attention we can give." http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/kent/hi/people_and_places/arts_and_culture/newsid_9037000/9037475.stm

We need some search engine optimisation - I barely know about it but i'll do some reading and get back to this. Anyone who is a bit more knowledgeable on these matters please contribute

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-10776957

No worries Veer Ji. Assuming you have installed it? If so you should be able to right click the zip file and a menu should appear which gives you the option to use 7zip to extract the zip file to a location. PM me if you need more of a step by step. I'm derailing a beautiful topic!

Install this (win, mac and linux versions available) http://www.7-zip.org/download.html

Aphids, as well as what they can become i.e greenflies and blackflies, can do serious damage to growing plants. Check new leaf growths especially peppers (all varieties) and aubergines. Tomatoes are particularly susceptible to blackfly. As above add alliums (onions, garlic) to deter them, and pray for ladybirds. Also Aphids also hate marigolds! For trees, aphids are a more of a cosmetic eyesore but won't do much damage. Nonetheless, be careful with feeds for fruits tree. We have a plum tree in the back garden over the last 4-5 years produces massive crop of wonderfully sweet organic plums. This year, we decided to add some organic liquid fertiliser to help produce even better fruit, but somehow we had an massive invasion of aphids on all the terminal leaves of the tree. Apparently, the mistake is that we should have used a slow release fertiliser. Organic ones tend to be slow release but this liquid one probabaly wasn't and gave the tree a massive nitrogen boost which aphids detect and need to build their bodies. Plus they breed like anything. After water blasting the tree proved ineffectual we decided to clip the leaves with the aphids on. As we were clipping the tree we saw quite a few ladybirds and of course they were left alone as we know they are natural predator of the aphid. We stuck the clippings in our compost bin and a matter of hours all the aphids escaped through the bottom and all decided to spend the rest of their lives walking all over the bin and looking quite lost. Over the next week these weird insects turned up, I found out these are the ladybird larvae. They totally decimated the aphid population on the bin. http://www.flickr.com/photos/linny/4776978403/ So if you see these guys, let nature do it's magic and enjoy. It's amazing that this quite rough looking insect becomes the tank that is the ladybird. Curiously, ants play a part in this insect battle - http://www.pbase.com/antjes/lady_bug

May help: http://support.scribd.com/entries/23552

http://www.ashesandsnow.org/

LOL - love it!

FYI this guy's views are extreme: http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/04/21/jonathan-kay-on-ontario-khalsa-darbar-radical-sikh-separatism-and-the-mcguinty-government-s-250k-gift.aspx He's a one-man army on here as hinduconf

Bathinda, India (CNN) -- The northwest state of Punjab is popularly known as the breadbasket of India. But many local farmers say that decades of using chemicals and pesticides, encouraged by the government, has caused health problems including cancer. It's a point of view borne out by research. A 2008 study by the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health found that the incidence of cancer in the area was nearly double that of a similar sized town 200 kilometers away, citing "involvement in cultivation, pesticide use, alcohol consumption and smoking" It's not clear what's causing the cancer, but the study also noted that the drinking water contained several heavy metals. India is one of the largest producers of pesticides in the world, much of it for local consumption. But now there's a new awareness. There's a big change sweeping across the fields of rural India. Tens of thousands of farmers are giving up on chemical farming and going back to a traditional ancient way of farming which is organic. Environmentalists estimate that India has around 300,000 organic farms. Farmers are learning different skills and adjusting their mindset, says Upendra Dutt, who organizes training sessions in organic agriculture. Farming isn't just about chasing profits anymore. "Eating an organic apple is not only good for you, it's good for the environment. --Anuj Katyal Farmer Nirmal Singh has stopped using synthetic fertilizers and pesticides on his fields in favor of organic ones made from cow dung. "My input costs are lower. I don't have to spend money on buying chemicals," Singh says, "plus, it's healthier." At harvest time, his yield is lower, but the selling price is higher. Organic wheat goes for three times as much money as wheat grown using chemicals. With the growing demand both is India and abroad for organic products, it makes business sense as well. Test your knowledge of organic food Anuj Katyal's company exports organic basmati rice to 15 countries where customers don't mind paying a premium for the organic label. India's organic farming sector accounts for only a sliver of the global $50 billion market for organic products but the potential is huge. "We tell people eating an organic apple is not only good for you, it's good for the environment and will help the farmer grow another organic one," Katyal said. See the video here http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/05/03/india.organic.boom/