#Luxury Train Travel In India Case Study

[navalvessels]

Indulge in Opulence: Luxury Train Travel in India Unveiled

Unveiling Opulence: Explore Luxury Train Travel in India, where luxury meets the rich tapestry of the Indian landscape.

[awesomeshefalimulye-blog]

5 best international destinations to visit post COVID – 19

The COVID – 19 pandemic has devastated humanity as never before. With multiple countries under strict lockdowns or restricted movements. It has caused a severe blow to the economics of many countries. Multiple businesses and industries worldwide have been badly affected (though some continue to prosper even through this pandemic). One of the worst hit is of course the tourism industry comprising of airlines, hotels and other hospitality related services such as transporters, embassies and visa related services, restaurants and many other ancillary service partners. Having said that tourism is resilient and will bounce back for sure just as it did post the SARS in 2013. The biggest question is what will one’s travel itinerary in the future look like and which regions in the world will be safe to travel in the future? Some of the factors which will perhaps determine this will be – proximity to home, airline capacity, especially to bring back home in case of any eventuality, destinations which were less impacted and/or have better health facilities and also insurance covers.

I am listing down some international destinations that maybe explored post COVID – 19 taking into account multiple factors that work in favour of these destinations. For those who are ‘travellers’ and are looking at continuing to travel once airline services resume and it is safer to travel, here goes –

Country                 Total cases        Active Cases         Deaths

New Zealand           1499                   45                         21

Taiwan                     440                     35                          7

Vietnam                   324                     61                          0

Thailand                  3031                  118                         56

Hong Kong             1056                    27                          4   

 New Zealand:

As on date New Zealand has reported 1499 active COVID – 19 cases with around 21 deaths and 93% of the infected cases have recovered successfully. New Zealand has a definite advantage over many other countries. Constituting 268,000 kms of total land area and a population of approximately 48 lakhs spread out between the North and South Island and any neighbouring inhabited island – It is not a large country and is fairly sparsely populated and yet has the comforts of being a developed country.

Ø  Known for its surreal natural beauty, few destinations can boast of so many natural wonders and experiences packed into such a small area. Snow capped peaks, rain forests, coastal glaciers, large geothermal areas in Rotorua with bubbling mud ponds and hissing streams – New Zealand has it all. Queenstown is a hotspot for adrenaline filled sports such as white-water rafting, luging, jet boat riding, skydiving, hiking, mountain biking, heli hiking, bungy jumping at the Bloukrons Bridge (one of the highest bungy jumps in the world)– the list of outdoor activities is endless.

Ø  With options of self - drive vacations as well as seat in coach holidays, one can find a wide variety of accommodations ranging from budget to luxury as well as quaint bed and breakfasts.

Ø  For the sports lovers, the cricket season in New Zealand will start from July with matches with West Indies followed by ICC T20 on Oct which could be something to plan for. Oct onwards is a good time to travel to New Zealand right through till the beginning of March, to experience summer in New Zealand.

Ø  With simplified e visa processes, correct documentation and timely application of visas, obtaining the New Zealand visa can be a breeze.  

Ø  Well connected with multiple airlines such as Singapore Airlines, Malaysian Airlines, Thai Airways, Air New Zealand and Emirates as well as low cost airlines such as Jet Star, it is a destination which can combined with a stopover in a South East Asian hub as well.

Ø  Considering the size of the country and its population, social distancing should not be a challenge when travelling through New Zealand.  

Ø  New Zealand has around 40 public hospitals spread across the country in cities and larger towns. Both public as well as private health care in the country is excellent.

Ø  All the major insurance companies offer multiple type of travel insurance products for New Zealand and are expected to offer products inclusive of COVID -19.

Ø  Best time to visit: September to November (Spring) with temperatures averaging between 13 – 20 degrees, December to February (Summer) with temperatures averaging between 19 – 25 degrees

 Taiwan:

Considering its geographical (not to mention lack of political) proximity to China, Taiwan has done an exemplary job of managing COVID 19 and its implications. While relatively unknown. Taiwan offers wondrous vistas, lively traditions and cultures. This year in 2020. Taiwan celebrates ‘the year of mountain tourism’.

Ø  Shaped like a leaf, the island covers 36,000 square kms with 23 million people living in it. Though not a very large country and while it is fairly densely populated, its immediate action and advanced deployment, sufficient availability of PPE for medical personnel and effective use of technology has helped the country tremendously in successfully handling this global pandemic far more effectively than most other countries.

Ø  Some of the popular ways of discovering Taiwan are trekking in the magnificence of the cliffs at Taroko Gorge; taking a ride on the Alishan Forest Railway and experiencing the breathtaking sunrise and sea of clouds; hiking up to the summit of Northeast Asia's highest peak, Yu Mountain (Yushan). You can also soak up the sun in Kending (Kenting), Asia's version of Hawaii; stand at the edge of Sun Moon Lake; wander through the East Rift Valley; or visit the offshore islands of Kinmen and Penghu – overall a lot of fun family activities after being confined to our homes for so long.

Ø  For true shoppers at heart, Taipei offers many night markets where you can combine a very satisfying shopping tour with a street food tour and try some amazing local fare and even a unique shrimp fishing experience.

Ø  You can enjoy a cycle tour near Sun Moon Lake as well a sample local wines and tea made from pure spring water.

Ø  Well connected with many airlines’ ex India such as Thai Airways, Singapore Airlines, Cathay Airlines and low-cost airlines like Air Asia, connectivity is easily possible from many Indian cities though fares are a little towards the expensive side.

Ø  Taiwan has emerged as a hotspot for medical tourism with sophisticated medical technology, well-trained medical professionals, strategic geographical location, stress-free VISA process and most importantly affordable cost-effective quality treatment. With a wide range of government and private hospitals spread across the country, makes it an ideal destination to travel to even as we wait for a vaccine for COVID – 19.

Ø  Popular among both business and leisure travellers, Indian nationals can now travel to Taiwan with a free visa, which can be applied online, thus simplifying visa processes.

Ø  Best time to visit Taiwan: November or the first half of April. The weather is cooler in November while in April you will get to see nature in its full bloom.

 Vietnam:

Vietnam has been another interesting statistic in so far as battling Coronavirus is concerned. With only 288 cases and no deaths till date, inspite of a relatively weak healthcare system and a low budget for combating the virus, Vietnam is a case study in how this virus can be beaten against all odds.  Effective 23rd April 2020, Vietnamese government has lifted social isolation rules and allowed opening of many non- essential services including restaurants. Domestic flights have resumed operations as well. Though Vietnam has limited and not necessarily international level medical facilities, I have still continued to include the same in my list on account of close proximity to India especially for those on a relative budget and looking for a short break. Vietnam boasts a variety of experiences for families as well as couples and can be an expensive luxury holiday or a relatively basic holiday if looking for a budget one, though airfares can be a little bit of a deterrent sometimes even if booked well in advance

Ø  Vietnam follows a very simple, inexpensive online e visa process for Indians, which is not complex and does not need to be planned weeks in advance.

Ø  One of the most underrated destinations in Asia, Vietnam is popular for its amazingly beautiful beaches some of them relatively unexplored, national parks, historical monuments and bustling nightlife. Cities as vibrant as Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh , overnight on a junk boat at the dazzling UNESCO World Heritage site of Halong Bay, hiking through Cat Ba Island, visiting and staying with locals in some of the most spectacular rural villages in North of Vietnam, visit the world’s largest cave in Pho Nha National Park, enjoy relaxing cycling expeditions in Hue or Ninh Binh as you walk around or drive past karst peaks and sail pas Tam Coc’s rice fields, meet up with local tribes in Sapa or find romance in its love market, see the recently opened Golden Hands Bridge in Da Nang and enjoy its French flavours or head on a food trail in one of the cities in Vietnam – the list of experiences is endless.

Ø  Combining a trip to neighbouring Cambodia is also a wonderful option as you will get to see the massive and most important archaeological site in South East Asia – Angkor Wat temples.

Ø  The best medical care in Vietnam is in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, though most medical concerns can be treated competently in many smaller towns and cities. ... SOS International has clinics in Vung Tau, Hanoi, and Ho Chi Minh City, providing good but expensive outpatient medical care

Ø  All major insurance companies offer multiple products that cover Vietnam.

Ø  The best time to visit Vietnam is during December through February when temperatures are milder and rain is minimal. Vietnam's long, narrow shape means that the three primary regions (north, central, and south) experience different types of seasons and weather events throughout the year.

 Thailand:

Thailand is perhaps the most ‘been there, done that’ destination in this list. Nonetheless I am including the same as I feel that the destination has great potential on account of a lot of unexplored experiences it has to offer.

Ø  Fantastic connectivity PAN India with option of more expensive full service carriers as well as budget LCC carries combined with amazingly tourist friendly and well organised seat in coach as well as private service and a wide range of accommodation options, gives one a wider price range to choose from depending on budget.

Ø  Apart from the pristine, dreamy beaches, ancient monasteries and coral reefs, food trails that are a treat for your taste buds, adventurous water sports, historical sites  and of course a flourishing night life– there is still a lot undiscovered by many Indian travellers.

Ø  Bangkok, the capital, in central Thailand, is regarded as a modern hub of various cultures, faiths and experiences. Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai to the north cater to those looking the quiet countryside and to spend time in the wild. Down south, beach destinations such as Phuket, Krabi and Koh Samui and island resorts in Khao Sok or Koh Yao Yai and many others, offer some of the best tropical experiences by the sea. On the western end, the Hua Hin region is popular for resorts where one can relax luxuriously. Finally, towards the east, Ubon Ratchathani is a spiritual and historical escape where one can immersively learn about Buddhist and Thai culture.

Ø  Generally speaking, the standard of medical care in Thailand is good. Thailand has world class international standard hospitals in the larger urban centres, with reasonably good medical facility in rural Thailand.  

Ø  Normally I do recommend Thailand as a year- round destination as the countryside is stunningly beautiful in the monsoons and though it rains, it will not disrupt your plans largely. Having said that if you are looking for a perfect weather to travel in, then November through till April is a dry season with temperatures ranging from 29 degrees to 34 degrees.

Ø  Before the COVID- 19 pandemic, Thailand was offering free e visa on arrival. Butan update is awaited on the same from the Thailand embassy. The process of obtaining visa before departure is fairly hassle free and does not take more than 3- 4 working days under ordinary circumstances.

 Hong Kong:

Considering its proximity and accessibility to China, this is another country that has done a remarkable job of managing the pandemic. One of the 1st countries to be hit by the same, Hong Kong is today one of the most ‘almost COVID – 19 free’ countries on the list. What makes this remarkable further is that the city-state has achieved this without the kind of de facto police-state curfew that India has resorted to. While people did work from home and some of the theme parks as well as attractions are closed to avoid community transmission, eventually restaurants opened, people continued to go to parks and favourite hiking routes but nearly everyone wears a mask and maintain social distancing.

Ø  Bustling streets, mouth-watering authentic cuisines, nature reserves and teetering tower blocks, old world markets amidst neon jungles, diversity in its various contradictions - Hong Kong is by far one of the most dynamic, overwhelming city I have ever has the opportunity to visit, A great pick for a family destination, Hong Kong offers a wide range of attractions for all age groups combined with all the privileges and comforts one can enjoy in any well-developed country. Apart from child friendly attractions such as Ocean Park and Disneyland, this multi culture destination also hosts many world class sports events especially rugby and horse racing.  

Ø  It is only an hour’s ferry ride from Macau, a mecca for those interested in casinos and night life and Las Vegas style hotels on ‘The Strip’ with internationally acclaimed shows. Just perfect for those who cannot make it to Las Vegas as yet!

Ø  Hong Kong is extremely well connected to many major airports in India. The airfares as well as hotels are a little on the higher side and I would recommend booking the same early.  

Ø  Critically, Hong Kong has one of the world’s best public healthcare systems, experienced at dealing with challenges such as the avian flu in 1997 to the H1N1 in 2009. 

Ø  Once again, an all year-round destination, the best time to visit Hong Kong is from October till April. For those who enjoy cultural experiences and local festivals and food, I would recommend considering a trip to Hong Kong in January & February though.

 COVID – 19 is not yet a thing of the past globally nor is it an issue we can ignore, So it is time we start working around it and figuring out solutions to stay safe when travelling. Airlines, hoteliers, transporters – everyone involved in the business of hospitality are figuring out solutions in terms of contactless travel, regular sanitisation, norms of social distancing and many other issues which are likely to come up once all of them are allowed to operate as usual. There is definitely a new ‘normal’ that we all need to adjust to while travelling in the future. In a business where human touch and conversation is all about hospitality, be it on land or in air, we may be looking at reduced human touch just to be able to stay safe and travel. So be it then!

[sagiow]

Northbound

I took a hiatus from my creative hiatus to write a little Mercy Street fanfic, on the occasion of @jomiddlemarch‘s birthday. A very happy, poetic, romantic birthday, I hope!

https://archiveofourown.org/works/14413401 

The scenery spun by, shapes barely distinguishable in the darkness, and Jedediah Foster watched it pass, as in a daze. The day’s events had yet to make their mark, but he kept them at bay: tonight, he had one more important thing to deal with than the utter falling apart with his family, the complete collapse of whatever still held them together. Mary. He had to get to Mary.

How he had managed to get aboard without a dime, he could not recall. Yet here he was, sitting in a comfortable cabin, speeding north as the evening grew; his body growing limp from the exhaustion of travel and the rhythmic motion of the wagon on the tracks, but his mind racing on, one mantra repeating endlessly: please still be alive. Please still be alive.

He took out the much-cherished drawing from his bag, carefully smoothing the creases and wrinkles, and stared at it. In that moment, the world outside vanished, the train's roar dimmed, time stood still: all he saw was her calm beauty, floating from the white page, smiling peacefully. Was she still at peace? Did she still smile? Would she smile still at his arrival? Please still be alive.

This ghost haunted him, as she had since her departure, since Lisette had handed him the picture the next day. This serene Mary he doubted still existed, and would perhaps vanish before he could travel to Boston, or so he told himself these past weeks as he looked for excuses to stay away. As long as he had remained in Alexandria, he had lived with the regret of what could have been: their blossoming courtship, the growing affection between them, rekindled by her illness, only to be forcefully terminated by her exile and impending end. Regret was a heavy companion, but with distance and other occupation, he managed it somehow, never once resorting to the comfort of the needle, as he had feared. Every day the ghost grew fainter, the memory of her dimmed, and other preoccupations and prospects drove her further away. Every morning brought the possibility of a letter or telegram telling them her pain was passed, and some small part of him almost hoped to receive it, and let that page be turned once and for all, that chapter finished before it even began.

But the letter had never come, events had unraveled, and friends had provided the encouragement needed to put an end to the excuses and make that dreaded trip, and be confronted to her fate. And his, for he knew it now to be linked with hers, whatever it may be. He feared what awaited him, and his guilt-ridden mind conjured images of her body frail and wasted from her ordeal, her broken spirit barely twinkling through bright, fevered eyes. A ghost, indeed.

Regret at what could have been left him, and was replaced by remorse of what should have been. He remembered the dock: the curls clinging to her damp forehead, the darkness that rimmed her eyes, the shivers despite the heavy blanket: he should have brought her comfort. The confused mind, drifting so far away, already being ferried to the Underworld: he should have steered her back to herself, to him. The hand that had barely any strength to hold his, the pulse faint in her wrist: he never should have let it go. But he had. He had failed her.

Rationally, he knew that there was not much to be done that fateful night: defying orders to either steal her away somehow or jump ship to accompany her would have ended his military career, and ruined their good names. However, he could have done more through the proper channels as early as the next morning, yet he did not. Instead, he buried himself in the old comforts of work, science, and, despite his better judgement, the company of a former mistress. Thankfully, they had not revived their past affair, but had still managed to grow close enough that he was now wrecked with guilt. That he had just as much as entertained the possibility, while Mary was fighting for her life, now made him sick with disgust.

So there he was, racing through war-torn country, daring to hope for solace and forgiveness from the woman he had cravenly abandoned to a death sentence while he could not even bring himself to write a single letter. Please still be alive.

His own expectations at her welcome varied from bitter admonishment and reprisal in the best case, and quiet rejection in the worst. He had forsaken people in his life for much smaller slights, and did not envision any better reaction to his outright desertion and stubborn subsequent silence. She herself had not been so forgiving in health, turning a cold shoulder whenever their disagreement over race or patient care became apparent, and he could not imagine this utter insult would be met with any more lenience on her part.

And of course she would be more than right to do so. Whereas she had risked her position and reputation to help him, a mere colleague, through his morphine addiction and keep it their secret, he had done little more than any doctor would have done in treatment of her infection; as a pining suitor caring for his intented, or even just as a friend, his behavior had been downright unacceptable.

Jedidiah sighed. He fully deserved any treatment she deemed fit for him… if he made it on time. Please still be alive. That was all that mattered. If Life would grant him that one wish, he would pay it back a thousand-fold. He had to make amends. Help her heal from typhoid, of course, but that would not be enough. He must earn back her trust, her respect, and perhaps through this, one day, her love. Out of an impulse ingrained from wealth, he wanted to present her with a gift: something that would bring her joy, that would show her the true measure of his affection, and slowly make up for these weeks of neglect. But what?

He thought of the women he had loved before her: Nancy, his teenage sweetheart; Lisette; Eliza. Others who had come and gone, barely registering in the story of his life, barely remembered now. All the gifts he had bestowed upon them, in adoration, gratitude, or repentance. There had been many, the lavisher the greater the offence, and all these women had accepted them gladly, suddenly finding it much easier to forgive him in their newfound treasures, as he found it much easier to shower them in presents than to fully own up and repent for his mistakes.

Yet with Mary… this would never do. And even if it could just soothe a fraction of the abuse, he did not even know where to begin. All the typical presents he had resorted to seemed woefully inadequate for her. Their uncertain relationship complicated the matter further and made many simply inappropriate. Not to mention that at the moment, he was penniless, potentially nameless, and was coming to her an empty-handed beggar, both for her absolution and hospitality.

As he pondered this further, he realized with dismay that for all his admiration of her, his absolute infatuation while they worked together, and his nostalgic regret since her departure, he did not truly know her.

What did he know of her interests, passions and pastimes before the war, before social justice and nursing called her to action? What had made he care so for Emancipation? Was it Christian charity, or had religion nothing to do with it? How many slaves had she even met, up in snowy Boston? Was her journey to Alexandria her first view of the South?

And before still… what of her family, her home? Had she grown up in the city or the country? What made her laugh, in days of peace? What made her dream, in days of youth? Was she one for fairy tales, wishing for Prince Charming upon a white horse, appearing to whisk her away to a life or riches and luxury?

Or did she crave adventure? Her husband had been a foreigner. Had he spoken fondly of the Vaterland, of Old Europe? Had she yearned to cross the ocean to see it? To travel further still, to the deserts of Arabia, the jungles of India, the oriental mysteries of Edo?

Or perhaps she would have been a scholar? With her intellect, eloquence and dedication to her craft, she fit the profile. How long had she studied? In school, or with a tutor? Whic topics had she excelled at? Which bore her to tears or made her toss her book across the room in frustration?

Or had she been perfectly content, as a wife to a humble textile chemist, tending their home? Had they hoped and prayed for children to complete their family and accompany them into old age? Had they been blessed for a precious moment, but had this happiness cruelly taken away?

And what did she want now, before typhoid fever struck her down? What did she hope for herself, once war was over? Another chance at love and family? A second career as a teacher, or writer perhaps? Or to reinvent herself further still and take up another worthy cause, crusading on for Humanity's greater good?

Through all his interrogations, Jed caught himself thinking of Lisette, and missing her. Not as a lover, no; that was forevermore in the past. He missed her intuition and emotional acuity. Her lack of filter, of Puritan prudishness, that he had found so captivating in Paris, and that taught him so much in not only dealing with others, patients and patrons alike, but also with himself, and facing what it was he truly wanted. He knew that in the few hours that Lisette had spent with Mary, that she had probably understood her better than he had in months. Lisette would have known immediately what it was that her heart yearned for, and would have told her so: maybe not as bluntly as she had grown able to be with him, but tactfully, and directly, buffering the impact with a soft smile and encouragement. Had Mary ever expressed her desire for him to have her portrait? Did she even have to, or was it crystal clear to Lisette from the first side-glance, the first blush at the mention of his name?

What made her see behind their stern façades, behind the veil of decorum, to the truth they hid and guarded? Her talent was to draw what the eye saw, yet her gift was to imbue it with her subject’s soul, its inner message.

He gazed intently at Mary’s smiling face, so vulnerable and unguarded on the page, yet still proud. What is your message, my dearest? What is it you want more than anything?

And more importantly: am I the one who can give it to you?

As he looked into her soft eyes, so true to life, he finally saw that the answer was not fine silk, castles or diamonds. That it was not anything else money could buy. That it was not found in books or churches, on battlefields or overseas.

What she wanted, at the moment pencil had touched paper, was his presence: simply, honestly, without artifices or excuses. No more complications. No more hiding. Fully revealed to one another. Just as Lisette had drawn her.

Here I am, she welcomed him from the page. Where are you?

At the realization, Jed dropped his head. The shame of his delay in understanding her desire shred his soul, and he urged the train to speed up, or time to slow down. His lips uttered a prayer; not to God, but to the woman he now desperately begged for forgiveness, for another chance.

Please let it still be so. Please let me know you, and try to be who you believe me to be.

Please still be alive.

[metallurgia]

metamorphosis

despite growing up in a socialist housing block, i never encountered a real cockroach until my 21st birthday (not actually on the birthday, bless the lord). the first one (then ten, then maybe a hundred) was in the theater café i worked in (and afterwards quickly quit) during the last year of my ba studies.

i remember ants and even a strange scorpion like creature in our housing estate apartment, and i remember my mom screaming one time about a cockroach in the bathroom, but the event fades into the mythical twilight of childhood, and according to my father, it wasn’t even a cockroach in the end.

i internalized revulsion as a semiotic prophecy, so when the moment arrived, i was standing prepared to be taken by the horror of it.

some people say that the horrifying insect that gregor samsa transforms into by that sinister morning is actually a cockroach. i always imagined some sort of worm instead, probably because of the hungarian translation. in any case, my mother is always reminiscing that she took a collection of kafka short stories to the delivery room when i was born. while that could explain a lot of other things about how my life turned out, it doesn’t explain why i had to wake up this morning to my cat chasing a cockroach in the middle of the apartment, after i filled every corner with poison in the last days.

i came to ukraine the first time in 2012. it was on a road trip back to estonia from hungary, only one day, for the euro championship, in lviv. i fell in love immediately. it is easy with lviv, i know, but my love was more real than the usual enthusiasm i see about this city. it stayed with me for years, and eventually led me to the complete opposite end of ukraine where i live and share my home with a cat and a group of cockroaches now. we drank a lot of beer, watched the ukraine-england game on the main square, ate in some varenichnaya, and walked the streets until dawn. i couldn’t believe that such city exists, it was like the cities i imagined when my parents read me fairy tales before bedtime, perfect proportions frozen in an undefined mythical time. when we got back to the hostel (a former gothic palace of course), i went to the bathroom and made a vow in my midnight delirium with the most natural certainty: i will definitely move here one day. that moment i noticed the cockroaches running around the toilet, and my drunk, more lenient self added: there will be cockroaches for sure, but i am ready to take the whole package.

in 2015 i got married and traveled to india for honeymoon. we spent the first night in agra, as a result of some misunderstandings, tourists scamming schemes and the endless series of vis maiors which constitute the daily life of delhi. we had a luxury marital bed from mahogany, conveniently sized for a honeymoon threesome or foursome, not only a couple. soon it turned out we shared it with a hundred cockroaches. the marriage didn’t last long.

living in ukraine, i saw exactly 1 cockroach in every apartment i stayed. each time they were in the bathroom. each time i had a flatmate braver then me who dealt with the issue. when, after a series of wandering through the different corners of ukraine, i finally took the train to settle down in mariupol for a while, and the platzkart was full of cockroaches, i took it as an omen. as a therapeutic measure and an ethnographic inquiry, i delicately smuggled the topic into my local conversations, i learnt interesting things: most of the people said they didn’t see cockroaches since the 90s. the cockroach was relegated to the realm of soviet life. “my father said they disappeared because of euroremont - they didn’t like that new building material which was used for the renovations.”

then i started to hear stories that cockroaches returned to mariupol. in the year i move here, just my luck!, i thought. all that said, the info turned out to be true. they are here. i am outdoing myself every day by dealing with them, as i can’t run away this time (at least not so fast). my cat is my little comrade, pointing out each of them even if i would just close my eyes, and making me address the problem before she addresses it herself. as an etic (non-local) observation, i consider their reappearance as a sign of the seismic movements that are shaking the lands of eastern ukraine at the moment, and welcome them as the evangelists of pryazovian renaissance.

[sohamjagade]

Shobhit Rajan helmed Raiaskaran does it yet again!

A perfect blend of traditional architecture and modern sleekness, these 4 BHK luxury apartments in Andheri West at Raiaskaran's Parthenon is just another feather in the cap for Yuvraj Shobhit Rajan's team, guided by Mr. Shobhit Rajan for his invaluable experience. In their own words this team creates spaces and not mere façades of luxury.

Mumbai - known and loved for its cosmopolitan nature, people here live by the motto of "Work hard, party harder". More than a quarter of the working hours are spent on traveling to and from work which is an exhausting experience. Amidst leading such a hectic lifestyle, wouldn't it be nice to have the time to slow down? Unwinding with the family on a pleasant winter evening, sipping hot chocolate and some warm conversations going around, does it sound cozy already? How about being able to reach some of the best schools, hospitals, supermarkets and shopping centers, fine dine restaurants and MRTs with a hop, skip and jump?

Parthenon - a Raiaskaran project, beautifully brings together the vintage luxe design with cutting edge technology. A stand alone structure, its architectural design is magnificent to behold. The façade with its clean lines shows a symmetrical design. Set foot on the 250m roofed driveway and time pauses! Keeping the brief in mind, Mr. Noshir Talati of M/S Talati and Panthaky Associated, drew inspiration from the cubist movement and from the project's historical namesake. He brought into play the design principle of 'form follows function' wherein the house, meant to be a comfortable dwelling place, is given the highest priority. The entire design is based on the Raiaskaran's "Trinity Design Credo" - residents' privacy, discreet staff zones and indulging of the guests.

The 31 storey Raiaskaran Parthenon has been awarded the Most Iconic Luxury Project of the year by the prestigious ET Times Now. This illustrious construction offers 4 and 5 BHK homes that come with a wide 450 sq.ft. west-facing master deck, overlooking the Arabian sea, reminiscent of the old-style verandahs. The rooms are generously capacious, à la ancestral havelis, with cross ventilation and natural sunlight aplenty. The apartment itself takes care of most individual needs of a study/puja room, a kitchen so well equipped that it compels the chef within, optimum use of natural resources thereby making the entire property environmentally sustainable.

Raiaskaran's Parthenon is Vaastu compliant and boasts of amenities appealing to every age. Paying attention to the minutest of the details is how the entire Raiaskaran team is trained under the watchful eyes of Mr. Shobhit Rajan. Along with the regulars like the badminton court, gymnasium and banquet there's also the covered outdoor swimming pool and a children's playground. Just in case, on a lovely winter evening you feel like having a barbecue by the pool with your friends, well, Raiaskaran's Parthenon has got you covered for that too! Not to mention the separate cards room, a library, a karaoke room, an ICC sized cricket pitch and a spa room for men and women.

The acuity with which Mr. Shobhit Rajan has realized this project reflects even in the amenities provided. No less is expected of a team that is trained under Mr. Shobhit Rajan. His love for art is displayed through the numerous paintings standing proud on the walls of Parthenon. This is a legacy passed down to his son, Mr. Yuvraj Shobhit Rajan, who has introduced some of the world's most acclaimed architects to India.

[newstfionline]

Wednesday, November 25, 2020

Vaccination to Be a ‘Necessity’ for Overseas Travel, Qantas Says (Bloomberg) Qantas Airways Ltd. plans to require future international passengers to have a Covid-19 vaccination before they fly, and said it’s likely to become a requirement at airlines across the world. A vaccination will be a “necessity” for travelers entering and leaving Australia on a Qantas flight, Chief Executive Officer Alan Joyce said in an interview with Channel 9 in Australia. “We are looking at changing our terms and conditions to say, for international travelers, we will ask people to have a vaccination before they can get on the aircraft,” Joyce said in the interview. Joyce told Channel 9 he has discussed the idea with other airlines globally. “It’s going to be a common theme across the board,” he said.

Viral screening by canines? (Nature) Around the world, canines are being trained to detect the whiff of COVID-19 infections. Dog trainers are claiming extraordinary results—in some cases, they say that dogs can detect the virus with almost perfect accuracy. Scientists involved with the efforts suggest that canines could help to control the pandemic because they can screen hundreds of people an hour in busy places such as airports or sports stadiums, and are cheaper to run than conventional testing methods such as the RNA-amplification technique PCR.

$169 bn for 29,000 lives? Study calculates cost of US shutdowns (AFP) There’s little doubt that government-ordered business shutdowns to stop the spread of Covid-19 damaged the US economy, but the exact cost has not been clear. Researchers from HEC Paris business school and Bocconi University in Milan have reached a sobering calculation: the closures beginning at the pandemic’s onset in March through May saved 29,000 lives—at a cost of $169 billion, or around $6 million per person. “Governors saved lives on the one hand, but reduced economic activity on the other,” Jean-Noel Barrot, a professor at HEC Paris and member of France’s National Assembly, told AFP. Virus cases are surging nationwide, prompting many states to again implement restrictions on businesses. “What we need to think of (are) contingency plans to avoid having to, so to speak, burn so much of our collective wealth in order to stay alive,” Barrot said.

In pandemic era’s isolation, meaning of ‘self-care’ evolves (AP) These days, with a pandemic raging, this is what life can look like: Staring at your face on Zoom for hours instead of occasionally glimpsing it in the mirror. Living out the days in loungewear. Wearing minimal makeup because no one sees much of you. Considering an investment in home exercise equipment because gyms are closed or restricted. The pandemic has forced people to spend more time with themselves than ever. Along the way, it has reshaped and broadened the way many think about and prioritize how they treat themselves—what has come to be called self-care. The pandemic-era incarnation of self-care isn’t about buying a signature outfit, wearing a trendy shade of lipstick or getting a perfect haircut. It has, for many, put the purpose and meaning of life front and center, reconfiguring priorities and needs as the virus-inflected months drift by. It’s also a way to mitigate the feeling that life is careening forward haphazardly in so many ways. That’s true for Tonya Speaks, a 43-year-old wardrobe coach from Fort Mills, South Carolina. Before the pandemic, she was always zipping to and from business meetings. Now, the mother of two teenagers exercises regularly and opts for luxurious baths at night instead of quick showers in the morning. She’s happier doing so. “Taking care of myself,” Speaks says, “is one way for me to have control.”

Trump Administration Approves Start of Formal Transition to Biden (NYT) President Trump’s government on Monday authorized President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. to begin a formal transition process after Michigan certified Mr. Biden as its winner, a strong sign that the president’s last-ditch bid to overturn the results of the election was coming to an end. Mr. Trump did not concede, and vowed to persist with efforts to change the vote, which have so far proved fruitless. But the president said on Twitter on Monday night that he accepted the decision by Emily W. Murphy, the administrator of the General Services Administration, to allow a transition to proceed. Ms. Murphy’s designation of Mr. Biden as the apparent victor provides the incoming administration with federal funds and resources and clears the way for the president-elect’s advisers to coordinate with Trump administration officials.

White House plans holiday parties as Americans urged to stay home (Reuters) The White House plans to hold indoor holiday receptions in the coming weeks despite ongoing COVID-19 outbreaks and the advice of public health professionals urging Americans to sacrifice their normal holiday gatherings to curb the spread of the virus. While the White House has said President Donald Trump and his wife Melania will remain in Washington this week, skipping their annual Thanksgiving at Trump’s private club in Florida, the first lady plans to hold a holiday reception a few days later on Nov. 30, according to an invitation obtained by ABC News. That follows a series of White House events in recent months that have been linked to a rash of outbreaks, including Trump’s own bout with the disease from late September into early October. A White House aide and four others have tested positive in recent days. Stephanie Grisham, a spokeswoman for the first lady, said the White House would provide the “safest environment possible” for the Christmas and Hanukkah celebrations with smaller guest lists than years past, masks “required and available,” social distancing encouraged and hand sanitizer provided.

Biden brings back the establishment (Washington Post) President-elect Joe Biden is expected to nominate Antony Blinken, one of his closest advisers, to be the next secretary of state. Blinken joins a slate of anticipated Biden national security nominees who are veterans of the Obama years and known quantities in the Washington political scene: Jake Sullivan as the expected White House national security adviser, Linda Thomas-Greenfield as the future U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Avril Haines as director of national intelligence, Alejandro Mayorkas as the secretary of homeland security and former secretary of state John F. Kerry as the Biden administration’s climate czar. Michele Flournoy, another former Obama administration official, is likely to be Biden’s nominee for secretary of defense. And Biden is expected to tap Janet L. Yellen, former Federal Reserve chairwoman, as treasury secretary. Haines, Flournoy and Yellen would be the first women to hold their respective roles. If Trump’s administration was designed to upset the pillars of government and global order, Biden’s appears aimed at rebuilding it with people who have held similar roles in the past.

Police forcefully remove migrants from central Paris square in ‘shocking’ scene (Euronews) Police dismantled hundreds of migrant tents in Paris’ Place de la République on Monday in a scene that France’s interior minister called “shocking”. Video posted to social media by journalists and non-profit organisations showed police strong-arming migrants and throwing people out of their tents, as they removed the makeshift camp from central Paris. French interior minister Gérard Darmanin said some of the images of police dismantling the “illegal migrant encampment” at Place de la République were “shocking”. Darmanin, who has been a staunch defender of police in the country, said that he would have the police inspector general investigate “several unacceptable actions” and to make the conclusions public within 48 hours. The event also comes as France’s National Assembly is set to vote on a security law which makes it illegal to disseminate images of police or soldiers’ faces. Article 24 of the law states that disseminating the images with the aim of damaging an officer’s “integrity” would carry a prison sentence of up to one year and a maximum fine of €45,000. The article has been heavily criticised by human rights’ activists and press freedom groups.

Russia carries out mass raids on Jehovah’s Witnesses, makes arrests (Reuters) Law enforcement authorities carried out mass raids on the Jehovah’s Witnesses across Russia on Tuesday and made a number of arrests as part of a new criminal case against the group, the Investigative Committee said. The law enforcement agency said it had opened an investigation as it suspected the Christian denomination, which Russia has labelled “extremist” and outlawed, was organising the activity of its national centre in Russia and local affiliates. Russia’s Supreme Court ordered the Jehovah’s Witnesses to disband in 2017 and some of its adherents have been jailed or hit with criminal charges in an ensuing crackdown. Jehovah’s Witnesses are a Christian denomination known for door-to-door preaching, close Bible study, and rejection of military service and blood transfusions.

Son, father farm to feed neighbors during lockdown in India (AP) The garden that Sijo Zachariah and his father planted was a desperate measure in response to the pandemic. But it became so much more: sustenance for a community, and a great inspiration for Zachariah to make a major change in his life. A 22-year-old aircraft maintenance engineer living in Dubai, Zachariah was visiting the southwest India state of Kerala for a family wedding when a lockdown was declared. “That’s when the whole thing struck me. ... What’s going to happen?” he said. “You know, how are we going to feed ourselves?” Store shelves were emptying and plant nurseries were closed, so Zachariah and his father collected seeds from whatever fruits and vegetables they could find at the grocery store and planted them on their family’s plot of land. Coconuts, jackfruit and rambutan, a lychee-like fruit, were already growing there. Using YouTube videos and techniques Zachariah’s grandfather had passed down to his father as a guide, they began a garden that eventually helped feed 20 neighboring households during the pandemic. “We started teaching others how to grow their own crops so that everyone can have some sort of crop growing in the land,” he said.

Thai police to charge protest leaders with royal insult (Reuters) Thai police on Tuesday summoned seven leaders of anti-government protests to face charges of insulting the monarchy, a day before a planned demonstration to demand that the king give up control of the royal fortune, a police source and a rights group said. It will be the first time such charges have been brought under so-called lese majeste laws relating to insults to the royal family in more than two years. Anyone found guilty faces up to 15 years in prison. Protests that began in July against Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha have increasingly turned to demands to curb the powers of King Maha Vajiralongkorn, breaking a longstanding taboo on criticising the monarchy. Among protesters’ demands is the reversal of changes that gave the king personal control over a royal fortune valued in the tens of billions of dollars.

China Says It Remains Open to the World, but Wants to Dictate Terms (NYT) After Australia dared last spring to call for an investigation into the origins of the coronavirus, China began quietly blocking one import after another from Australia—coal, wine, barley and cotton—in violation of free-trade norms. Then this month, with no clear explanation, China left $3 million worth of Australian rock lobsters dying in Shanghai customs. Australia nonetheless joined 14 Asian nations and just signed a new regional free-trade deal brokered by China. The agreement covers nearly a third of the world’s population and output, reinforcing China’s position as the dominant economic and diplomatic power in Asia. It’s globalization with Communist characteristics: The Chinese government promotes the country’s openness to the world, even as it adopts increasingly aggressive and at times punitive policies that force countries to play by its rules. With the United States and others wary of its growing dominance in areas like technology, China wants to become less dependent on the world for its own needs, while making the world as dependent as possible on China.

Lunar mission is latest milestone in China’s space ambitions (AP) China’s latest trip to the moon is another milestone in the Asian powerhouse’s slow but steady ascent to the stars. China became the third country to put a person into orbit 17 years ago and the first to land on the far side of the moon in 2019. Future ambitions include a permanent space station and putting people back on the moon more than 50 years after the U.S. did. The Chang’e 5 mission, if successful, would be the first time moon rocks and debris are brought to Earth since a 1976 Soviet mission. The four modules of the spacecraft blasted off atop a massive Long March-5Y rocket from the Wenchang launch center on Hainan island. The mission’s main task is to drill 2 meters (about 7 feet) into the moon’s surface and scoop up about 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds) of rocks and other debris. The lander will deposit them in an ascender. A return capsule will deliver them back to Earth, landing on the grasslands of the Inner Mongolia region in mid-December. “Pulling off the Chang’e 5 mission would be an impressive feat for any nation,” said Florida-based expert Stephen Clark of the publication Spaceflight Now.

Escalating violence in strategic Syrian city (Washington Post) Violence has erupted in recent weeks in a strategic Syrian city with government forces and former rebels clashing amid a wave of assassinations, revealing the difficulty President Bashar al-Assad faces in maintaining control over areas he says he has pacified. The southwestern city of Daraa is considered the cradle of the Syrian revolution because it is where the first anti-government demonstration broke out in 2011. Seven years later, after peaceful protests had turned into a devastating civil war, Russian-backed Syrian forces recaptured Daraa, raised the national flag and introduced a program of “reconciliation” with rebel fighters. But dissent continued to simmer in Daraa, even as government forces took their battle to other fronts. And the turmoil of recent weeks has become the latest challenge to Assad’s authority, which was already under pressure from a crippling economic crisis and growing dissension within the ranks of his traditional allies. These troubles in no way suggest that the civil war is turning against Assad. His military has reclaimed much of the territory that had been lost at the height of the insurgency, and rebel fighters are now bottled up in one remaining enclave in northwestern Syria. Nor is there any other obvious contender for the presidency of the country, ruled by the Assad family for 50 years.

Uganda death toll after opposition leader’s arrest up to 45 (AP) The death toll from last week’s protests over the arrest of Ugandan opposition presidential hopeful and musician Bobi Wine has risen to 45, police say, with more than 800 people arrested. Police spokesman Fred Enanga told reporters on Monday that “our hearts go to the families” of those killed. It was Uganda’s worst unrest in a decade. The election is early next year. Enanga said the arrests occurred during the two days of protests that broke out on Nov. 18 after Wine was arrested again in the eastern town of Luuka. Wine, who has been arrested many times in recent years, has captured the imagination of many Ugandans with his persistent calls for President Yoweri Museveni to retire after 36 years in power.

[laraehrlich-blog]

Original content owned & copyrighted by Green Global Travel.

Cruises have gotten a bad rap lately: One recent scientific study found that air quality on a cruise ship deck was “worse than the world’s most polluted cities.”

But not all cruise companies feature gigantic cruise ships carrying 5000+ passengers. In our eyes, small ship cruises are much better for travelers, locals, and the environment alike.

The best small ship cruise lines typically have less than 300 passengers, a lower guide-to-passenger ratio, and expert local guides. These small luxury cruise ships have become increasingly popular in recent years, offering a more intimate and immersive travel experience.

Some small luxury cruises focus squarely on nature and wildlife, while others focus more on the history and culture of a destination. But in general, small cruises are less about the amenities of the ship itself and more about exciting shore-based adventures.

Whether you’re taking a river cruise in READ MORE: The Importance of Community-Based Tourism

  WHY SMALL SHIP CRUISES ARE SUPERIOR

Galapagos Islands Cruise Ship – The Eric by Ecoventura

More Personal Space

With the  On a luxury cruise ship packed with several thousand people, you often feel like a nameless face among the huddled masses. But on a smaller ship with 20-50 people, you feel more like a treasured guest,  with ample room to roam.

This makes it much easier to find your own personal space away from the crowd, to have quiet time or special moments as a couple or family.

READ MORE: 0 Romantic Places for Your World Travel Bucket List

Drinking curacao on the island of Curacao

Better Personal Service

When you’re just one of the 5,000 cruisers packed into a huge floating city, it’s unreasonable to expect the attention to detail that comes with four-star service.

For travelers willing to sacrifice luxury in exchange for rock-bottom prices, the affordability and But there’s also a lot to be said for the value of the experiences you get on small boat cruises. There, all the staff (including the cruise director) knows your name and preferences, and can provide more personalized recommendations.

Having a bartender who knows you want a Blue Hawaiian with your Happy Hour appetizers may not make or break your trip. But traveling with a company who makes you feel like more than just a number-coded wristband goes a long way towards making your trip feel special.

READ MORE: The Top 0 Things to Do in Curaçao

Peruvian Amazon River Cruise excursion – swimming in the Amazon River

Connect with Like-Minded People

When you’re on a small ship with just 20-50 passengers for a week to 0 days, you tend to get to know everyone on board to some degree.

Instead of being sat at the same table with the same people night after night, on small cruises there seems to be an unspoken agreement that passengers will swap dining tables nightly.

It’s like a game of musical chairs, giving you plenty of opportunity to find out who you click with.

Inevitably, you’re bound to meet a handful of folks that share your same ideals. Especially when you take a nature/wildlife or history/culture-focused cruise, which each tends to attract a certain type of traveler.

Going on life-changing adventures with perfect strangers can create some surprisingly strong bonds. Perhaps you’ll even meet your future travel buddies!

READ MORE: Small Ship Cruising the Peruvian Amazon

Peruvian Amazon River Cruise Boat docks on the river bank

Small Ships Go Where Big Ships Can’t

You’ve heard the old saying, “Size doesn’t matter”? Well, in the case of cruise ships, it does. And in this case, bigger is very rarely better.

Small ships are simply more nimble than large ships. Unless you’re going to a mega port, big cruise ships often have to ferry their entire passenger load back and forth via small boats or Zodiac rafts.

We have great memories of our small ship cruise through the Greek Islands. Although our boat docked in When you’re cruising in places like the rivers of Europe or the READ MORE: Happy Accidents on Aegina Island, Greece

  Galapagos Islands Cruise gives you intimate experiences with Galapagos wildlife

Exclusive Experiences

One of our favorite things about travel is getting a chance to learn first-hand about the history, culture, nature, and wildlife of a destination.

While other travel bloggers may prefer to explore places on their own, we love the knowledge we gain by traveling with local experts.

 As a longtime professional writer, I’m continually asking our guides questions, taking notes, and interviewing local people. We ultimately use a lot of this information to make our posts more in-depth and authoritative.

Because the number of people on small ship cruises is limited, there is usually at least one guide for every 8 to 2 passengers. With such intimate access to an expert, you’re virtually guaranteed to have once-in-a-lifetime experiences.

READ MORE: NatGeo’s Don George on Travel Writing

  THE WORLD’S BEST SMALL SHIP CRUISES

Africa Cruises: Nile River Cruise, Seychelles Cruise, Botswana Cruise

Antarctica Cruises: Antarctica Cruise, New Zealand’s Sub-Antarctic Islands Cruise

Asia Cruises: India Cruise, Philippines islands Cruise

Caribbean Cruises: Coastal Cuba Cruise, Lesser Antilles Cruise

European Cruises: Greek Islands, European Christmas Markets Cruise, Black Sea Cruise

North America Cruises: Northwest Passage, Alaska Inside Passage Cruise

South America Cruises: Chilean Fjords Cruise, Galapagos Islands Cruise, Peruvian Amazon Cruise

South Pacific Cruises: Great Barrier Reef Cruise, Micronesia Cruise, Polynesia Cruise

CRUISES

Elephants along the Chobe River (Botswana) Image by hbieser from Pixabay

Chobe River Cruise (Botswana)

Botswana is currently on our African safari bucket list, primarily because of the country’s forward-thinking approach to READ MORE: 55 Interesting Facts About Elephants

Nile River Cruise, photo via Pixabay

NILE RIVER CRUISE

If you’re interested in ancient history, READ MORE: 20 Longest Rivers in the World

Seychelles Cruise via Pixabay License

Seychelles Cruise

Located nearly ,000 miles off the coast of mainland Africa east of important marine areas. Together, these marine reserves cover more than 8,000 square miles.

The Seychelles are collectively very small, with a total population of around 94,000 people spread across 77 square miles of land. But their natural beauty makes them a favorite on lists of the world’s most beloved islands, with some visitors describing it as like “a garden of Eden.”

Highlights include the Seychelles National Botanical Gardens, Curieuse Marine National Park, Veuve Nature Reserve, and Morne Seychellois National Park. About 42% of the archipelago is set aside for conservation, protecting wildlife such as the rare Seychelles Black Parrot, Seychelles Giant Tortoises, and some of the world’s largest seabird colonies.

A Seychelles cruise is the best way to explore the islands’ myriad attractions. These range from idyllic READ MORE: The World’s 30 Best Exotic Islands to Visit

CRUISES

Antarctic Cruise

There’s a lot of very good reasons why taking a cruise to The Antarctic peninsula is also one of the world’s best places for watching wildlife. We saw everything from pods of Orcas and READ MORE: 30 Antarctic Animals You Can See on an Antarctic Cruise

Rockhopper Penguin image by Michael Frankenstein from Pixabay

Cruising New Zealand’s Sub-Antarctic Islands

You may know that New Zealand is divided into a North and South island. But did you know that the country also boasts remote archipelagos of islands, which have been collectively named as a UNESCO World Heritage Site for their pristine wilderness and READ MORE: Ecotourism in New Zealand (Top 0 Things to Do for Nature Lovers)

CRUISES

Brahmaputra River, photo via Pixabay

Brahmaputra River Cruise (India)

The northeast Indian state of Assam, which shares its border with Bhutan and Bangladesh, has emerged in recent years as a bright spot in Asian ecotourism

.

This is thanks in large part to Kaziranga National Park, which is a protected UNESCO World Heritage Site.

A luxurious cruise down the mighty Brahmaputra River is arguably the best way to explore the region, offering amazing opportunities to see some of the region’s Elephants to Sloth Bears, the endangered South Asian River Dolphin, and thousands of bird species. In short, it’s a must-see for animal lovers! 

READ MORE: Indian Animals: A Guide to 40 Incredible Indian Wildlife Species

Philippines Islands Cruise image by Guy Goddard from Pixabay

Cruising the Philippines islands

Located in Southeast Asia near READ MORE: Top 5 Things to Do in Coron, Palawan (Philippines)

CRUISES

Cuba Mountains, photo via Pixabay

Costal Cuba Cruise

President Obama loosened the decades-long restrictions on Americans traveling to Cuba

several years ago, causing a dramatic surge of interest in traveling to the Caribbean island.

With Donald Trump actively working to reverse these improved diplomatic relations, there’s never been a better time to explore mass tourism.

Lesser Antilles Cruise

When most Americans think of the Caribbean, they tend to think of perennial sun/surf/sand hotspots such as the Bahamas, Cayman Islands, and Jamaica.

But the more remote islands of the Lesser Antilles (which form the eastern boundary of the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean) are generally less over-developed and more pristine than those crowded mass tourism destinations.

Included among the Lesser Antilles islands are Martinique, St. Lucia, Saba, Sint Eustatius, and Grenada, which has recently emerged as a haven for ecotourism. Popular activities in the region range from bird watching and snorkeling/Dominica. From the gorgeous waterfall and diving READ MORE: 20 Best Caribbean Islands to Visit

  CRUISES

The Swallow’s Nest on the Black Sea in Crimea image by Irina Rassvetnaja from Pixabay

Black Sea Cruise

As bodies of water go, the Black Sea is pretty strange. On the map, this inland sea looks more like a giant lake, connected to the Aegean Sea (and the Mediterranean) by the narrow Bosphorus Strait.

But, with 68,500 square miles of surface area and a maximum depth of 7,257 feet, the Black Sea is considerably bigger than the ancient archaeological sites.

Must-see sites you can visit while cruising the Black Sea include Instanbul’s Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque, Romania’s Danube River Delta, the Ukranian city of Odessa, and Sochi Olympic Park, the first theme park in all of Russia. 

READ MORE: 40 Fascinating Facts About Russia’s Amur Leopard

Christmas Market in Hamburg, Germany via Pixabay license

European Christmas Market Cruise

Although we’re not at all religious, our family goes bonkers for Christmas, especially anything to do with READ MORE: 75 Christmas Traditions Around the World

Greek Islands Cruise

From to the ancient history of Athens

 to Meteora’s majestic mountains, mainland Greece has plenty to offer travelers with an interest in nature, culture and history.

But for a true taste of Greek tradition, it’s hard to beat small ship cruises through the countless s are tiny (7.4 to 59 square miles) and quaint: Many mainland residents have vacation homes there, so it’s a great place to catch locals in a celebratory mood. They’re also considerably less crowded with tourists than some of the more famous islands.

The Cyclades, with around 220 islands, is the densest and most popular grouping in Aegean archipelago thanks to Delos, Mykonos, and Santorini. For ancient history, the Dodecanese Islands (especially Rhodes) and Crete are hard to beat.

READ MORE: 40 Photos Of Greece That Will Make You Want To Go

AMERICA CRUISES

Northwest Passage Cruise

The Arctic Circle is considered to be one of the planet’s last truly wild places.

The Arctic region encompasses northern Alaska and A small ship cruise of the historic Northwest Passage is arguably the best way to explore the Arctic. It offers unique opportunities to see explorer’s bucket list.

READ MORE: Polar Bears Photo Gallery

Cruising in Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska

Alaska Inside Passage Cruise

Stretching from Washington State’s Puget Sound north to the Alaska Panhandle, the Inside Passage is a coastal route in the Pacific Northwest. Popularized during the Klondike Gold Rush, the route allows ships to avoid the bad weather and often rough waters of the open ocean. 

Today, around 36,000 boats navigate portions of this route each year, from massive cruise ships and freighters to smaller AdventureSmith and Alaskan Dream Cruises. The Alaskan portion encompasses ,000 READ MORE: Visiting the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center

AMERICA CRUISES

Caguach Island, Chiloé Archipelago, photo by Robert Gould CC BY-SA 3.0

Chilean Fjords Cruise

When it comes to Chilean travel, the wine region around Santiago and the dynamic landscapes of Torres del Paine National Park in READ MORE: Exploring Grytviken, South Georgia Island

Swimming with Galapagos Penguins

Galapagos Islands Cruise

A small ship is vital if you want to really explore the The Voyage of the Beagle,  Thanks to its remote location and UNESCO/National Park protection, the wildlife of the Galapagos is plentiful.

Endemic species such as READ MORE: 30 Amazing Galapagos Island Animals

Peruvian Amazon River Cruise

Amazon rainforest

’s total area of 2,00,000 square miles. Unfortunately, that country’s unsustainable exploitation of its natural resources has damaged this once-pristine ecosystem, perhaps irreparably.

For a better taste of the Amazon rainforest’s world-famous biodiversity, you’ll want to take a READ MORE: Cruising the Peruvian Amazon

PACIFIC CRUISES

Great Barrier Reef, photo via Pixabay

Great Barrier Reef Cruise

Don’t believe the hype! Click-bait headlines claimed Australia’s Great Barrier Reef dead in 206 after a cheeky column by Rowan Jacobson appeared in Outside. But news of the demise of the place UNESCO called “the most impressive marine area in the world” was greatly exaggerated.

Yes, the reef suffered READ MORE: 0 Awesome Australian Road Trips

Manta Ray in Micronesia, photo via Pixabay

Micronesia Cruise

Spread across the western Pacific northeast of Papua New Guinea, the Federated States of Micronesia is comprised of more than 600 islands.

The country is made up of four island states– Pohnpei, Kosrae, Chuuk, and Yap– and known for its palm-shaded beaches, ancient ruins, and thriving indigenous cultures. If you want to see the best of them in one trip, a cruise is really the only way.

The islands are widely ranked among the READ MORE: 5 Rare Sharks Worth Saving

Polynesian Islands Cruise

There are so many beautiful Polynesian Islands, it would be impossible to pick just one favorite.

But, with less than 2,000 miles separating tropical hotspots such as Tahiti and Fiji, a small-ship cruise offers the perfect way to explore numerous gorgeous getaways in just a few weeks.

From pearl diving in Bora Bora and birdwatching in the Cook Islands to READ MORE: 2 Photos of Tahiti To Fuel Your Fantasies

  The post 20 Best Small Ship Cruises for Your World Travel Bucket List appeared first on Green Global Travel.

[chikucab07-blog]

Delhi to Shimla Cab Service | Start You Journey from Your Doors

The capital of the state of Himachal Pradesh is Shimla and it is a very popular hill station amongst all others in India. Due to its beauty and nature, the place is considered to be amongst the favourite tourist spots of all the people across the globe and especially for the honeymooners. If one has to visit the plane, nothing better can be a trip from the capital city Delhi to Shimla cab service to visit the place and enjoy all the beauty that Shimla has to give to its tourists.

During the British rule in India Shimla was considered to be the summer capital of India and is situated in the lap of the foothills of the Himalayan range and situated at a height of 2200 m above the sea level. The place still has the majestic heritage along with all kinds of mind-blowing old structures with traditional and old pattern and lamp post which are made of Anglo-Saxon tiles and iron along with beautiful colonial architecture and still retains its all old charm which has been its beauty during the earlier days.

Sightseeing:

Shimla has many things that one can enjoy with adventure like skin ice skating adventure sports and so on and winter time is the best to enjoy these sports. Apart from these adventure sports, there are many other things that one can visit in and around Shimla. To mention few of them are The Ridge, Jakhoo Hill, Mall Road, Kalka-Shimla Railway, Christ Church, Indian Institute Of Advanced Study, Summer Hill, Kufri, Annandale, The Shimla State Museum Chail, Solan, Daranghati Sanctuary, Naldehra And Shaily Peak and Archi Fort. Availing Delhi to Shimla cab service is the best option to see all the places.

Booking:

Delhi to Shimla cab service is very efficient and there is a very simple way to book these cats. Since the popularity of smartphones and easy access to the internet, the booking of these cabs has become simpler. All one needs to do is connect to the internet with the help of a computer, or a smartphone and visit their websites and book the cab as per the date and time of the journey.

Vehicle Types:

The best part of these cabs is they are available in various types from small to luxury ones and ranges from hatchbacks to SUVs. While booking a cab the person needs to select the type of cab they need as per comfortability, as well as the number of people travelling and these cab services, will provide the cab as selected. These vehicles also have the facility of choosing AC or non AC cabs and the same needs to be selected at the time of booking. Another point to be noted is that there are no charges for booking fees while booking these cats and in the case of any need for cancellation there are even no cancellation fees applicable.

Safety from Pandemic:

We all know that safety is one of the most important things that a tourist thinks of while travelling to an unknown place and especially today at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic situation safety has become even more of a concern for everyone and this is a must for all.

However, Delhi to Shimla cab service considers this as an important factor so that the tourists can avoid the rushes while travelling on a bus or train. These cabs are well maintained and sanitized so that there is no threat to a tourist and the shoppers are well mannered as well.

[hemapriya022-blog]

Why Guyana is a preferred Study Destination for Indian Medical Aspirants?

A profession both noble and lucrative, medicine for long, has remained the most sought-after field of study by Indian students aspiring to become doctors. The low availability of seats to accommodate the high demand among students competing each year through various tests and examinations in both private and government institutions is mostly the cause of Indian students looking to go overseas to pursue further education.

For decades Indian students have opted and traveled far and near to western countries such as the Americas, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. In the last two decades, an emerging trend towards non-English speaking countries such as Russia, Ukraine, China, and Kazakhstan, took in a significant number of students taking up medical programs. In such cases, Indian students choose these destinations for their low-cost nature, but they have to deal with a significant obstacle of language barrier as English is not widely spoken.

As more and more avenues open up for Indians, students have the luxury to research and compare online and through various forums to inquire about the level of education, living conditions, etc.

Why opt for Guyana?

Guyana, the northwest country of South America, is not only a gateway to the USA but also acts as the fraternal sibling to the Caribbean island nations in language and culture. With a substantial number of Indian diasporas living there for generations, it is no stranger to Indian culture and some of the commonly spoken languages across India. A nation with a low crime rate and cheaper living expenses, but rich in culture and safe surroundings – also share similar weather conditions to India. This means not only the weather but common ailments, disease patterns, and treatments are very similar to India.

Why study medicine in Guyana?

Many of the top medical study destinations like the USA, the UK, Australia, and Canada have hefty tuition fees, high living expenses, and additional entrance exams taking a toll on most overseas medical students. Because of these reasons, many Indian students are looking for countries outside the western hemisphere. Guyana provides a plethora of options when choosing it as their study destination for international students, especially Indian sub-continent and young aspirants from African countries.

Most universities and colleges in Guyana offer medical programs that are in-line with the American medical curriculum and act as a stepping stone to do clinical rotations or to practice medicine in the USA after completing the medical degree in Guyana. The curriculum and educational standards are widely recognized– enabling medical graduates from Guyana to pursue further education or practice medicine in most of the countries around the world.

All education is taught through English medium, circumventing the need to learn the native language as in most East European countries requires. Almost all the Guyanese Universities exempt students from taking additional entrance examinations, paying donations, but offer platform with clinical rotations in Guyana and the USA, with their state-of-art infrastructure and employment opportunities. Guyana also lacks in the number of doctors available – with a ratio of 1 for every 2000 patients (against the doctor–population ratio of 1:1,000 as recommended by WHO). In addition, final year students can have hands-on experience in treating locale residents in Guyana.

Medical programs in Guyana do not require English language tests like IELTS or TOEFL or any other additional entrance exams (other than NEET in India), unlike most other English-speaking countries mandate.

Affordability

The cost of living in Guyana is very close to most of the Indian cities. Some of the medical colleges/ universities in Guyana charge a nominal tuition fee, which is far lesser than most private medical colleges in India. On the other hand, Indian students opting to go to other popular destinations spend in crores for tuition fees (living expenses extra).

Choosing Texila American University to study MBBS

Founded in 2010, Texila American University, Guyana, South America, provides world-class medical education through innovative teaching techniques, training, and state-of-the-art infrastructure. With a presence in 6 countries and 28 Global Accreditations, TAU offers more than 48 educational programs, serving students from 70+ countries along with 700+ Ph.D. students. At TAU, education and research are inextricably intertwined to prepare and empower our students to become globally successful physicians.

As part of TAU’s curriculum, it provides an inbuilt training program for licensing exams like FMGE, USMLE, etc. With a high passing ratio in these international licensing exams over the years, this training program has proved to be of great value for our students.

With a team of accomplished trainers, lecturers, and medical experts – the university offers clinical training as a part of its medical program to students. TAU is also affiliated with renowned hospitals in Guyana, USA, and other countries.

Students at Texila American University are provided with a safe and comfortable living atmosphere and are treated to a variety of cuisines to accommodate students from different countries.

The university has a well-structured method of screening students, both locally and internationally, providing transparency throughout the entire process from admission to graduation and employment. Taking all these into consideration, Texila American University in Guyana is a perfect fit for Indian students looking for international exposure with world-class infrastructure at an affordable cost

source:https://blog.tauedu.org/why-guyana-is-a-preferred-study-destination-for-indian-medical-aspirants/

[jeroldlockettus]

The Most Interesting Fruit in the World (Ep. 375)

Ninety-nine percent of commercially traded bananas are just one variety: the Cavendish. (Photo: Moore/Getty)

The banana used to be a luxury good. Now it’s the most popular fruit in the U.S. and elsewhere. But the production efficiencies that made it so cheap have also made it vulnerable to a deadly fungus that may wipe out the one variety most of us eat. Scientists do have a way to save it — but will Big Banana let them?

Listen and subscribe to our podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or elsewhere. Below is a transcript of the episode, edited for readability. For more information on the people and ideas in the episode, see the links at the bottom of this post.

*      *      *

In 1876, the city of Philadelphia commemorated 100 years of American independence with a Centennial Exposition.

Virginia Scott JENKINS: Well, it was a big trade fair. It was like a World’s Fair. And there was a horticultural exhibit, and they had a banana plant with bananas growing on it.

That’s Virginia Scott Jenkins. She’s a cultural historian and the author of Bananas: An American History.

JENKINS: And they had to put a guard on it because people wanted to pick a leaf, or poke at it. Because people hadn’t seen one of these things.

The banana plant— and yes, it’s a plant, technically, not a tree; and the banana is technically a berry — anyway, this banana plant had stiff competition for attention at the centennial expo. Also on display were the right arm and flame of the Statue of Liberty, which hadn’t yet been erected in New York Harbor. There were the first public demonstrations of the typewriter and of Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone. And: an appearance by the President of the United States, Ulysses S. Grant. Still, the humble banana plant caused a stir, thanks to its novelty.

JENKINS: They’re not native to the Americas, at all.

And in North America, bananas weren’t even possible.

JENKINS: Well, they take about 18 months from sprouting to fruit, and the climate in different ecological zones in the United States, you don’t get frost-free that long.

The banana was one of the first fruits cultivated by humans; the earliest written accounts go back to 500 B.C.E., in India. The Americas didn’t get the banana ‘til much later — although exactly when and how are, like much banana history, disputed facts. But it’s safe to say that in 1876 in Philadelphia, the banana was still exotic to most Americans.

JENKINS: In the first two-thirds or three-quarters of the 19th century, bananas might come in to an East Coast port on a sailing ship, and then they’d be sold at the port. But they weren’t generally commercially available anywhere. They were a luxury item. They were very expensive. I found some very interesting menus, for very fancy occasions, that might have bananas on the menu. But they were something that most people had never seen, most people had never tasted.

Even though bananas were by then being grown in Latin America, sailing ships couldn’t travel fast enough to reliably keep the fruit from overripening. But then came steamships and railroads.

JENKINS: They would just put huge pieces of ice at each end of a freight car to try to keep the bananas cool.

And by the 1920’s, trains started getting mechanical refrigeration; in the 1930’s came refrigerated trucks. This new technology had a huge impact on food distribution generally — it made possible the modern meat industry, for instance. It also allowed for the bulk importation of bananas to the United States. The variety that Americans came to know and love was the Gros Michel, also known as “Big Mike.”

JENKINS: And it was a large banana, and it had thick skin, so it didn’t bruise easily.

There are more than 1,000 banana varieties in the world. But, Jenkins says:

JENKINS: A lot of other banana varieties don’t travel well. Either they’re small, or they have thin skins, or for one reason or another didn’t grow well.

In 1900, Americans were eating 15 million bunches of bananas a year. Just a decade later: 40 million. So it was very bad news when a fungus emerged.

JENKINS: Devastating the plantations in Latin America.

This fungus came to be called Panama Disease. It was first noticed in the late 1800’s; by the 1950’s, it was wiping out the Gros Michel.

JENKINS: What the fruit companies did was, they’d move on to another country and buy up a lot more land, and grow bananas until the disease caught up with them and they had to move on.

But the disease couldn’t be outrun. The Gros Michel was doomed.

JENKINS: So they changed to a variety called the Cavendish banana.

The Cavendish was not susceptible to the disease that wiped out the Gros Michel. So the Cavendish is the banana most of us eat today. It accounts for 99 percent of the banana export market. The last Gros Michels in the U.S. were sold in 1965. So our banana is not the same banana our elders ate.

JENKINS: Well, I’ve never had a Gros Michel. I’m not old enough, so I’m not really sure how much difference there was.

Some people who did eat the Gros Michel say it was more delicious than the Cavendish. But the Cavendish has done very well, thank you. It is the most popular fruit in both the U.S. and Europe, even though the vast majority of them must be imported. The E.U. imports around six million tons of Cavendish bananas each year, or 110 bananas per person; the U.S., about 130 bananas per person. Canada beats us both, with 150 bananas. So you can imagine there would be a lot of unhappy people if the banana we all eat were, once again, under existential threat.

Douglas SOUTHGATE: Well, the doomsday scenario is that it wipes out the international banana trade.

That’s right: Panama Disease is back, and this time it’s come for the Cavendish. Today on Freakonomics Radio: sometimes a banana is just a banana but in this case, it’s also a symbol of commerce, of political discord, of scientific dilemmas — and of course, personal taste:

Andrew BILES: My preference is bananas as they are, or, curiously enough, bananas on toast.

*      *      *

Why are bananas so popular? Let us count the ways. And — full disclosure — I say this as someone who, personally, does not love bananas. But I do recognize how appealing they are. Sorry about that. But, seriously, the peel: it’s got to be part of it. First of all: it’s bright yellow; it’s basically an advertisement for itself. Also, Virginia Scott Jenkins notes that the banana first gained popularity around the time people were just starting to learn about germs and food hygiene. One early banana importer called it “a fruit in a germ-proof wrapper.”

JENKINS: This was something that you could eat on the street and not worry about getting sick from it.

There was also a new awareness around food and nutrition.

JENKINS: People were interested in calories, and this was a good way to get more nutrition and vitamins at the same time.

Still, if you know even a little bit about economics, you’d have to think that price must also have something to do with the banana being the most popular fruit in America. And this is where it gets interesting. Picture yourself in a grocery store: you see piles and piles of apples, all different varieties. About 95 percent of the apples eaten in the U.S. are grown in the U.S.; the imports usually just plug a hole at the end of the growing season.

Now check out the pile of bananas. First thing you notice: just the one variety, the Cavendish. And every one of them has been grown, picked, washed, and boxed in another country. Then they’re shipped, still green, in a temperature-controlled environment. At their destination, they’re put in special “ripening rooms” that provide, among other amenities, the release of gases that trick the banana into thinking it’s still back home in the tropics. At a temperature of 64 degrees, a banana can be ripened in as little as four days; at 58 degrees, it’ll take seven days.

Considering all this aftercare, and the fact that they’re all imported, you might expect a banana to be much more expensive than those very American apples. And yet they’re not: bananas are typically less than half the price of apples. In fact, they’re among the cheapest fruits around. How can this be? How did an imported luxury item become a cheap American staple? Well, let’s start here:

SOUTHGATE: It’s in part a story of economies of scale.

That’s the economist Douglas Southgate, an emeritus professor at Ohio State University. He started studying bananas because:

SOUTHGATE: Well, the short answer is that my wife is from Ecuador, which happens to be the leading exporter of bananas, and has been for the last 65 years. Even though the country is no larger than the state of Colorado.

Bananas are grown in many warm countries around the world, in the eastern and western hemispheres.

SOUTHGATE: Bananas are far and away the most widely traded fruit, fruit or vegetable.

Andrew BILES: Basically, there are 135 countries that grow bananas, and there are 145 million tons of bananas produced every year. That’s about 800 billion bananas.

And that’s Andrew Biles, who until recently worked at Chiquita, one of the world’s largest banana companies. His title at Chiquita was C.E.O. of bananas and pineapples — seriously, that’s the title. As for the bananas:

BILES: In the world, it’s the fourth most-important crop after rice, wheat, and corn. The economic value generated by the banana industry is some $52 billion. And there are some 400 million people that rely on bananas for a staple food or a staple source of income. There are many countries if they did not have bananas, they would go short of food.

The Cavendish banana accounts for just under 50 percent of global banana production but, again, almost 100 percent of exported bananas. And Ecuador alone accounts for more than a quarter of all Cavendish exports.

SOUTHGATE: If you produce something in very, very large numbers, then you bring down the per-unit or average cost.

For the early American banana companies, the transition from luxury fruit to mass import was a strategic move.

SOUTHGATE: The key to the strategy or to understanding the strategy was to realize that they made more money from having a smaller margin on a much larger volume than they would have had continuing to treat bananas as a luxury item.

And how did they accomplish this? Consider the history of Chiquita.

BILES: Chiquita started way back in the 1800’s and was a company that first went public, believe it or not, in 1903.

Back then, it was known as the United Fruit Company. And United Fruit happened to have:

SOUTHGATE: United Fruit happened to have the largest fleet of ships in the Western Hemisphere. Only the U.S. Navy had a larger fleet of ships.

In fact, the Navy would requisition some United ships during World War II. But in peacetime:

SOUTHGATE: Well, they used those fleets to move bananas to the United States very, very efficiently. And as is always the case, or practically always the case, the major beneficiaries of this efficiency were in fact consumers. Prices were slashed, and within a few years, bananas were no longer a luxury item. They were instead a fruit of poor people. The first food that a lot of poor babies ate after weaning were mashed bananas, in the days before canned baby food.

It would be hard to overstate here the role of the United Fruit Company.

BILES: What we have here is a company that did develop over time a significant business and actually created a banana industry.

SOUTHGATE: It was called the Octopus because it had a near-monopoly on production. United Fruit definitely had its tentacles wrapped around this industry.

Most of United’s bananas were grown in the Spanish-speaking countries to our south:

SOUTHGATE: Costa Rica, Honduras and other Central American nations happen to be an ideal setting for raising bananas for the U.S. market.

Ideal because of the climate, yes. But also because land and labor were both very, very cheap. So: American consumers were winning; United Fruit was really winning; and what about those Central American countries? Keep in mind they were largely undeveloped at the time.

SOUTHGATE: Foreign companies, led by United Fruit, were willing to make the investment to clear land, put in infrastructure and so forth to start producing bananas on a massive scale for the U.S. market. But only if they were awarded vast tracts of land and largely exempted from taxation. So that gave them the dominant position. That’s what led to “banana republics.”

Yes, before it was a clothing store, “banana republic” meant something very different — essentially, a fragile country whose economy and, often, political leadership, were propped up by an export crop. And when a banana republic acted against the interests of their banana overlords, things could get ugly. Consider the case of Guatemala in the early 1950’s. President Jacobo Arbenz, a former army colonel, was pursuing a land-reform program that would have reclaimed property from the banana companies.

SOUTHGATE: And this angered United Fruit. United Fruit definitely wanted to see Arbenz go.

United Fruit lobbied the U.S. Congress to act against Guatemala — and Arbenz was ultimately ousted in a coup led by the C.I.A.

SOUTHGATE: Drawing a simple line of causation — United Fruit, U.S. Government overthrow of Guatemala — doesn’t capture all of what was going on. The U.S. government had other reasons why it was alarmed at some of what Arbenz was doing, apart from the land reform.

Specifically: the American government was worried that Guatemala was sliding toward communism, and an alliance with the Soviet Union. This was a common theme of the Cold War era; we’re not talking only Guatemala here. In any case, the U.S. overthrow of Guatemala led to destabilization and decades of bloody civil war. United Fruit, meanwhile, continued to tangle with the governments in other banana republics — and, ultimately, the U.S. Government as well, which accused United Fruit of monopolistic behavior.

SOUTHGATE: They controlled production and also had an extensive, deep network for distributing bananas from U.S. ports inland. So United Fruit was very much the banana business.

In 1967, United Fruit agreed to reorganize and sell off some of its strategic assets. The Octopus was shrinking. The next blow came from Ecuador.

SOUTHGATE: That was the most important development that ended the Octopus’s time. Ecuador does not fit at all into the standard banana-republic narrative.

Land in Ecuador was owned by independent farmers, so it wasn’t susceptible to the political and economic exploitation that had worked elsewhere.

SOUTHGATE: By the time the major companies were taking a serious look in Ecuador, most of the good farmland, the prime farmland, was already owned by Ecuadorians. That meant that there were never going to be any extensive concessions and grants of tax exemptions, all those sorts of things.

In the late 1940s, Ecuador’s president, Galo Plaza, invested heavily in infrastructure and pest control that benefited the local banana growers.

SOUTHGATE: Here was this important source of supply that came online in a very big way, very quickly, after World War II, and it was a source of supply that was impossible for United Fruit to control. We learned from Ecuador something that’s more typical about the role of local entrepreneurs in agricultural trade and development, the contributions that they can make.

Today, no one company comes close to dominating the international banana trade like United Fruit once did. The three biggest banana companies — Dole, Del Monte, and Chiquita, United’s successor — they share around 40 percent of the global export market. So there’s more competition than there used to be — which, economists would tell you, helps keep prices down. But there’s an even more powerful explanation for why bananas are so cheap: standardization.

BILES: So the advantage of having the Cavendish is that it is really a monoculture, that you can actually grow it consistently.

Andrew Biles again, formerly of Chiquita.

BILES: You know that it’s going to take eight to nine months to come to fruition. And you know how that banana is going to function when it’s transported in a refrigerated cargo. You know how it’s going to perform in the ripening rooms in the country of destination, and you know how it’s going to perform and hold up on the retail shelf.

And it’s not just that nearly every banana grown for export is a Cavendish; it’s that every Cavendish banana is genetically the same as the next Cavendish. From a business perspective, that’s ideal — the ultimate in quality control. From an agricultural perspective, however:

BILES: There’s no diversity, so there’s that, each plant is the same, each plant has the same resistance to disease as it spreads.

As you’ll recall, the Gros Michel banana was wiped out years ago by Panama Disease — or, technically, Fusarium wilt. It’s caused by a fungus that infects the plant’s roots and eventually kills the whole plant — and leaves the soil unfit for future banana growth. The strain of Panama Disease that killed off the Gros Michel was known as TR1, or Tropical Race 1. Now there’s a strain called TR4 that’s attacking the Cavendish.

BILES: So, indeed, it’s fallen victim to almost the same disease as the Gros Michel. So what we see is TR4 start apparently in Indonesia, it spread in the Philippines, it’s devastated crops there as farmers move to the Mekong Delta or to Myanmar.

And the banana industry is very worried that TR4 will make it to Latin America.

BILES: If you look at the map, it’s a disease that seems to be spreading west.

*      *      *

It may sound like a made-up name, but Humpty Doo is a real place — a small town in the Northern Territory of Australia. It’s hot, wet, and fairly rugged.

James DALE: When we first went onto the plantation, the plantation manager said, “You got to be a bit careful working around here. A girl was taken by a crocodile a couple of months ago.” We also have a real problem with wild buffalo. But we’ve managed to work there without losing any of our staff.

That’s James Dale. He’s a plant scientist.

DALE: I work at Queensland University of Technology, in Brisbane, in Australia. I work on bananas.

Dale’s first job out of grad school was working on a banana disease.

DALE: And it was a disease called bunchy top, and it had a long history in Australia.

Bunchy top was caused by a virus that scientists couldn’t find a way to control.

DALE: When the concept of genetic modification came along, and that was sort of, the late 1980’s, we said, “Wow, this is going to be absolutely perfect for bananas.” And the reason for that is that the bananas that we eat are primarily sterile.

Wild banana seeds are very hard, and so the Cavendish, like other banana varieties that people eat, has essentially been bred into a seedless, sterile condition.

DALE: So crops that don’t have any seeds are extremely difficult to breed conventionally. So the idea of being able to genetically modify them — that is, to add additional genes to Cavendish, for instance, which we are interested in, seemed really, really attractive.

Attractive and, for the global banana trade, important. Because the Cavendish, like the Gros Michel before it, has rare attributes.

DALE: They’re robust. They travel long distances. And there really isn’t anything else on the horizon that could now go and replace Cavendish. There is nothing that you could pull out and say, “This is going to do what Cavendish did after the last outbreak.”

The new strain of Panama Disease emerged in the 1990s.

DALE: And around about 2000, we decided that this disease, Tropical Race 4, was going to be a huge problem, so we set out to look for genes that provide resistance to the disease.

As part of this research, Dale had a former Ph.D. student out collecting wild bananas.

DALE: And this scientist was in Malaysia, and happened to see this patch of bananas, which were growing where everything else had died from Tropical Race 4. So she and her colleagues collected seeds of those bananas and they sent them back to Australia.

James Dale and his team began studying these bananas.

DALE: We said, “Okay, let’s go and look in the DNA of those resistant ones, and see if we can find the gene that would provide resistance.” And we came up with a number of candidates, genes that seemed to be working in the resistant seedlings, but not in the susceptible seedlings. And one of those looked really promising to us. So we took that gene. And by a process known as agrobacterium-mediated transformation, we put it into — another terminology — embryogenic cells, or embryogenic cell suspensions. And these are — we make these cells from Cavendish. They have the ability to regenerate an entire plant from a single cell.

And this leads us back to Humpty Doo, Australia, which had been a fertile site for banana production.

DALE: But because of the Tropical Race 4, it’s been wiped out.

Which made Humpty Doo the perfect place to hold the world’s first experiment to see whether genetically modified Cavendish bananas could survive Panama Disease. Remember: once Panama Disease has struck, the soil remains contaminated with the fungus.

DALE: So we put this gene into these single cells and grew bananas back.

In 2012, they began field trials that would last a few years, planting both genetically modified and non-G.M. bananas in the Humpty Doo soil. What’d they find?

DALE: So what we found is — and we found a number of things — we found that the non-G.M. bananas were between 100 percent and around two-thirds of them were either dead or infected after three years. So the disease was having a pretty big impact.

Okay, that’s important to know — that Panama Disease was still in the soil. Which meant if a genetically-modified plant survived, it was surviving Panama Disease. So how did the genetically modified plants do? Dale and his team planted six different lines of G.M. Cavendish plants.

DALE: One of those, line three, the gene we put in was R.G.A. 2, so R.G.A. 2, line 3 — appeared to be completely immune. At the end of three years, none of the plants were infected at all. So essentially, what we’ve done is, we’ve taken a gene from a wild banana that is resistant to Tropical Race 4, and we’ve taken that one banana gene and we’ve gone and put it into Cavendish. And by doing that, we have generated resistance to the disease.

This was amazing banana news. R.G.A. 2, line 3 was a clear winner. Some of the other genetic modifications did well too.

DALE: Three of the other lines had relatively high levels of resistance, where there was 20 percent or less plants either infected or dead. Which was, to us, an incredible outcome. Rarely do you get that sort of percentage success in the sorts of things we do. So we were pretty excited about that.

And there was something else to be excited about.

DALE: The other really important thing we found was that the gene that we put in, this R.G.A. 2 gene, not only occurs in these wild bananas, but it also occurs in Cavendish. It just doesn’t work very well. That’s actually really, really important, because there’s a new technology known as gene editing. It’s different to gene modifications. Gene editing is where you can go into the D.N.A. and just tweak genes that are already there. So it’s very, very close to, sort of, natural processes. So that’s where we’re now starting to figure out how we can tweak the gene in Cavendish to make them resistant without actually adding any new genes at all.

This type of gene editing is made possible by something known as CRISPR— which, as I’m sure you know, stands for “clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats.” We spoke with one of CRISPR’s inventors, the biochemist Jennifer Doudna, back in 2017, for an episode called “Evolution, Accelerated.”

Jennifer DOUDNA: At its core, the CRISPR gene-editing technology is now giving human beings the opportunity to change the course of evolution. And human beings have been affecting evolution for a long time. But now there’s a technology that allows very specific changes to be made to DNA that gives us a new level of control.

DALE: CRISPR is terrific, so yes, we are using CRISPR at the moment.

So this would seem to be super-amazing banana news. There are potentially two ways to save the Cavendish from Panama Disease: by using CRISPR to tweak its genetic code or by introducing new, resistant genes from other bananas. Either way, the banana industry must be thrilled by the solutions that James Dale is proposing. Right? We asked Andrew Biles, former C.E.O. of bananas (and pineapples) at Chiquita:

BILES: James Dale, he is working on more of a GM approach, okay. That, of course, is not so acceptable societally. So some people will say, “yes, I don’t mind genetic modification.” Others will say they do.

Indeed, a sizeable fraction of consumers, in the U.S. and especially in Europe, consider genetically modified crops to be risky, despite assurances to the contrary from scientists like James Dale.

DALE: And that’s where we’ve failed. We really haven’t got the message across. This is one of the most incredibly highly-regulated technologies in the world. So the sorts of things that we go through to demonstrate safety is amazing.

The objection to G.M.O. crops is also curious in light of the fact that traditional plant breeding — without which many, many fewer of us would be alive — is itself a form of genetic modification. Jennifer Doudna again.

DOUDNA: It’s important for people to appreciate that, first of all, that humans have been modifying plants for a long time genetically —

DUBNER: Thank goodness.

DOUDNA: — for literally thousands of years. Exactly — thank goodness. And you realize, “Wow, I’m glad there’s plant breeding.” But the way that that’s been done traditionally is to use chemicals or even radiation to introduce genetic changes into seeds, and then plant breeders will select for plants that have traits that they want. The opportunity here with gene-editing in plants is to be able to make changes precisely. Not to drag along traits that you don’t want.

DALE: Really, the difference between what we’re doing, and conventional breeding is that they moved thousands of genes at one time, from one banana to another. We’re just moving one or two.

It’s worth noting nearly every technological advance is greeted with skepticism by at least a small segment of any population. And such skepticism may be magnified when it comes to something you’re going to put in your mouth.

SOUTHGATE: A great example for me is pasteurized milk.

The economist Douglas Southgate again.

SOUTHGATE: In the United States and other countries, lots of kids used to die from drinking raw milk — raw milk that had been exposed to flies or whatever. Pasteurization came along, that entire source of mortality went away, and yet there were people who swore up and down that they were never going to consume pasteurized milk. They claimed it didn’t have the same nutritional properties, didn’t taste the same, it was in one way or another undesirable.

There are still some raw-milk advocates; but most people, Southgate says:

SOUTHGATE: Most people ended up drinking pasteurized milk and I just have a hunch that if we produce a substitute for the Cavendish, or if we improve the Cavendish by moving in a gene from some other banana people will have a tough time telling the difference, and the product will win acceptance.

But big companies like Chiquita — or, to be fair, most big companies, in any industry, period — they’re pretty risk-averse. Honestly, they can’t afford to not be. But there’s another reason James Dale isn’t surprised at Chiquita’s resistance to his banana proposals.

DALE: The big banana companies, unfortunately, have had a history of not being terribly innovative. They are much more reactive. They don’t run big research and development divisions. Yeah, we talk to them, they take more of a “let’s just see what’s going to happen” reaction.

So how does Chiquita see a path forward for the endangered Cavendish banana?

BILES: We believe the path towards this is actually through improving breeding techniques. We feel that the logical first place for us as a leading branded premium quality banana to go is to try and go down, in a very sophisticated, in a very organized, in a very thorough way, the plant-breeding route.

And James Dale’s response to that?

DALE: There are some exceptionally good breeding programs going on in the world, but you don’t end up with Cavendish. You end up with something different to Cavendish. If we want to replace Cavendish with something probably very, very different, we’ll probably get that from the conventional breeding programs.

So if you want to have the Cavendish in the future?

DALE: Hey, if you want to have Cavendish in twenty years’ time, they’re probably going to be genetically modified, or they’re probably gonna be gene-edited.

That makes it sound as if the Cavendish as we know it may well be headed for extinction, depending on the banana companies’ decisions and the public’s response to genetic modification. So for the billions of people who eat trillions of bananas, a great many of them Cavendish, how panicked should they be?

BILES: We in the industry would say there’s no need to panic. The world is not going to run out of bananas.

But what about the Cavendish banana?

BILES: Okay, what we’re going to have to probably confront is actually having more varieties of bananas available in the future. As we protect the farming of bananas, we’re going to have to get used to how we can actually grow and commercialize and do the logistics for different bananas.

The prospect of exporting several different kinds of bananas would be an adjustment for the industry, of course. For consumers, less standardization might mean higher prices — but the prospect of finding several varieties of banana in a grocery store would hardly be unsettling, considering how many varieties of apples and grapes and citrus fruits are available. But in a world with so many options in most realms, there has been something nice, something unifying, about all of us eating the same banana. No matter how you eat it — straight out of the peel; cut up on cereal, if you’re feeling a little bit more ambitious. As you’ll recall, the banana historian Virginia Scott Jenkins told us about researching earlier banana recipes.

JENKINS: I found some very interesting menus, for very fancy occasions, that might have bananas on the menu.

Jenkins has a rather interesting banana recipe of her own, passed on from her mother.

JENKINS: You take a peeled banana, you put mustard on it. You wrap it in a slice of ham, and then you bake it in a cream sauce. And I’ve tried it on two husbands and neither of them could eat it. They thought that was just nasty.

*      *      *

Freakonomics Radio is produced by Stitcher and Dubner Productions. This episode was produced by Greg Rosalsky and Matt Hickey. Our staff also includes Alison Craiglow, Greg Rippin, Harry Huggins, Zack Lapinski, and Corinne Wallace. Our theme song is “Mr. Fortune,” by the Hitchhikers; all the other music was composed by Luis Guerra.You can subscribe to Freakonomics Radio on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here’s where you can learn more about the people and ideas in this episode:

SOURCES

Virginia Scott Jenkins, cultural historian and author.

Douglas Southgate, emeritus professor in the Department of Agricultural, Environmental, and Development Economics at Ohio State University.

Andrew Biles, former C.E.O. of bananas and pineapples at Chiquita.

James Dale, professor of Agricultural Biotechnology at Queensland University of Technology.

Jennifer Doudna, professor in the Department of Chemistry and the Department of Molecular and Cell Biology at the University of California, Berkeley.

RESOURCES

Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World by Dan Koeppel.

Bananas: An American History by Virginia Scott Jenkins.

The post The Most Interesting Fruit in the World (Ep. 375) appeared first on Freakonomics.

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Gynecology Hospital | Cogent Care| ElaWoman

Cogent Care

Our medical doctors Dr. Alok Banka Otorhinolaryngologist who has extra than 14 years of experience and Dr. Reshu Saraogi Gynecologist, who has extra than 10 years of enjoy are pretty informed, professional, compassionate and could be there for you when you want them the maximum. We are supplying superior technologies, latest infrastructures, specialized interdisciplinary care and an remarkable simplicity for meeting every patient’s health needs. We are dedicated for your properly-being. Providing worldwide get right of entry to to superior healthcare and we are one of the best Gynecology Hospital.

We include excessive precision technologies for providing you with a international elegance healthcare revel in. Our top notch clinical information is matched through our dedication to personalized care. Finally, people who have skilled us tell us that we're very moral, upfront and sincere in our approach. Creating a compassionate and supportive surroundings for patients and their caregivers is of maximum importance to us. Our patient-first method has earned us the goodwill sufferers. We connected the highest significance to ethical practices which is evident in our professional behavior, honesty, agree with, and confidentiality.

Cogent Care has an understanding offers a extensive variety of offerings covering all components of ENT illnesses of the nostril, ear, sinuses, throat, tonsil and the desires of women via all the stages of life, beginning from pre-theory planning and being pregnant to menopause and beyond. At every stage, we provide personalised care throughout a complete variety of gynecological services.

Woodland Hospitals

Established in 1946, Woodlands Hospital, the flagship of Eastern India started out as a secondary care unit and step by step developed as a Tertiary Care Unit through the years. In our 70 years of journey, we've got touched the lives of hundreds of thousands of sufferers of Kolkata, Eastern India and other neighbouring countries.  Since its inception we're committed to provide maximum preferred of hospital therapy which suits the global benchmark with intense sensitivity to patient needs and privacy and we are one of the best Gynecology Hospital.

To position Woodlands because the most depended on and famous healthcare issuer of desire in Eastern India. To be a affected person centric company offering our sufferers an experience packed with care and empathy which exceeds their expectancies. Woodlands Hospital, Kolkata, is hooked up with the reason of imparting international standards of healthcare. We are further committed to reap affected person centric care, medical excellence and safety of sufferers, their loved ones and workforce with the resource of trained medical, non-medical and paramedical professionals.

QUALITY & SERVICE

Each day in a clinic, team of workers individuals undertake complex responsibilities being concerned for sufferers. Woodlands affected person safety efforts goal to make sure that each one of those steps paintings collectively to supply tremendous, compassionate care to all sufferers throughout our fitness device.

We assist patients to regain and hold their level of feature and independently manipulate their health care desires. With a coordinated approach that stresses customized care, the team works closely with the medical doctor, the affected person and own family contributors to plan, review progress and make changes to the plan of care. We have initiated ongoing professional medical services once they return home to lessen clinic readmission.

By continuously operating to improve efficiencies, making use of the today's generation and partnering with place companies, we provide better patient studies, reducing the value of health care and assist improve the fitness of our community. As the health care landscape changes, we maintain to consciousness on imparting fantastic take care of the maximum complex cases and adapting to meet new demanding situations.

Surelife Hospital

It is our proud privilege to tell you that our clinic is one of the quality and largest centre dedicated best for girls fitness in imperative India. We have precise medical institution which caters from adolescent younger girls to reproductive and menopausal females --specifically the advanced check tube toddler centre with facility for donor and surrogate, Urogynecology for prolapse and urinary incontinence, UNDERWATER DELIVERY system, wire blood & cord tissue banking, sperm banking and so forth we are one of the best Gynecology Hospital.  

We are specifically known in vidarbha to carry all facilities underneath one roof with maximum spacious and luxury live and lively environment. Our goal is to offer holistic women care at our very own surelife hospital. A journey has being 8 years lower back and with fantastic assist & blessing from our nicely wishers and patients, we encouraged to attain more modern top. “Change & Development are primary capabilities of lifestyles. The secret of nature’s success is that it affords all its creations with the equipment, generation and opportunity to attain their desires.”

The health facility is set up with a entire method to women care based totally on exceptional, reliability & agree with. Our profession engulfs a gamut of improvements and so we are right here to are seeking for your blessing. Having this quote rooted deep in mind, on March 23, 2012, we took small preliminary steps and therefore ushered a brand new sunrise in the area of assisted reproductive technology and Laparoscopic Surgery.

We have top notch crew of Infertility Specialist, Laparoscopic Surgeons, docs, nurses and skilled start attendant, we work tough having 24 emergency services. We set a benchmark in nice care, ethical practice, and affordable prices. Ours is a well known laparoscopic training for those in our career that proves our level of know-how in the field. We provide utmost care at less costly cost. We are 20 bedded health center with facility for all that variety from popular ward to great deluxe room. We feel proud to launch the primary below water shipping system referred to as hydro beginning in Nagpur. This is a unique method to patient for ache loose and clean everyday shipping which satisfies every member of the family’s expectation. We believe sufferers want some thing past relief from their signs ( care, agree with and happiness).

Saraogi Hospital and IRIS IVF Center

Saraogi Maternity and General Hospital become mounted in 1980 with the objective of presenting world - class obstetric and gynaecological health care to all. Under the steering of our chairman – Professor Dr. Rajendra .M. Saraogi, we have had the fortune of treating & enhancing the first-rate of existence of numerous ladies over the last 34 years & delivering endless infants.Our paintings philosophy revolves around customized fitness care, with improved emphasis on physician - affected person relationship. We accept as true with in guiding & accompanying you at every step of the way through all of your gynaecological and obstetric requirements.

Gynaecology and Fertility Clinic

A qualified medical practitioner, Gynae And Fertility Clinic in Sector 7c, Chandigarh is one among the celebrated Gynaecologist & Obstetrician Doctors, having practiced the scientific specialization for decades. This scientific practitioner's health center was mounted in 2004 and considering that then, it has drawn ratings of sufferers no longer best from in and around the neighbourhood however additionally from the neighbouring areas as nicely.

This medical expert is proficient in figuring out, diagnosing and treating the various health troubles and troubles related to the medical discipline. This doctor has the requisite know-how and the know-how not just to cope with a diverse set of fitness ailments and situations however additionally to save you them. As a skilled clinical professional, this health practitioner is likewise familiar with the modern day advancements in the associated discipline of medication. The health facility of this health practitioner is at House No 1616 Near Petrol Pump Sector 7c, Chandigarh - 160019.

The travel to this hospital is a as a substitute handy one as diverse modes of conveyance are without problems to be had. In order to get greater records and to schedule an appointment with this doctor, This listing is also listed in Gynaecologist & Obstetrician Doctors, Test Tube Baby Centres, Infertility Doctors For Female, Fertility Centres, Sexologist Doctors For Female, Infertility Clinics, Fertility Doctors, Surrogacy Doctors.

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[optimisticprincepainter]

Several Indian banks are among the first to adopt to financial technology (Fintech). Axis bank`s thought factory, ICICI Bank`s innovation labs and YES bank`s YES Fintech are some initiatives by financial services providers to embrace the rapid technological innovations in this sector. CitiGPS`s study on digital disruption in banking shows that core revenue could dip by upto 30% unless banks place early and winning bets in fintech. It is appropriate that banks also understand the presence of non-traditional players in the future financial services industry. Telecom companies and pure-play fintech companies have disrupted the mobile payments space in India. The success of these disruptors is tied to increasing consumer expectations. A BCG- Google study on digital payment in India suggests that consumers tend to have a great digital experience and expect similar performance from their other service providers. In this scenario, the marketing departments of banks are willing to adopt these new tools. Writing in the seminar magazine, Mr Rajiv Anand suggests that banks innovate using non-intrusive methods of collecting data. He also suggests that Artificial intelligence and machine learning will play an increasingly important role in bank marketing and service efforts. Artificial intelligence and machine learning are still testing grounds and use cases are still being built in banking. A financial time study has suggested that there are unrealistic expectations built into the computation of return on investment. However, customer facing AI seems to be providing results. One of the immediate use cases for AI is in the area of market segmentation. Segmentation is the task of dividing up a market into mutually exclusive parts. The underlying premise being that different groups of consumers will react in a different manner to marketing stimuli. For example, a consumer with a moderate bank balance would be induced to take a personal loan or credit cards. However, a consumer with a high bank balance and large number of transactions could be interested in a high-end investment portfolio or a car loan for a luxurious BMW. Banks already have databases of consumer financial transactions, collected using the core banking systems (CBS) like Finacle. Additionally, banks also collect information from borrowers in their loan management systems.Banks in India use the data collected to run loyalty programs on the credit card and savings accounts using a single view of the consumers’ transactions. Banco Santander is able to effectively cross-sell to its customer base. Authors Gullen and Tschoegl find that the only two appropriate competitive tools with banks is to use marketing to enhance their brand awareness, segment the market and cross-sell their products. The other tool is to use technology to reduce costs and support marketing. Today, banks hold data on the consumer from their inner records. These records exclude other data which could be more relevant to capture the customers actual behaviour. While traditional credit rating systems are able to capture frauds, loan delinquency post fact, today’s technology provides real time tracking of customers. Recent research suggests that developing countries like India could be better of using social media scoring to assess credit worthiness of loan customers. A hybrid approach of using both traditional and social media information has also been suggested.These developments suggest that banks have to invest in technology that captures both the traditional transactional data as well as the external social media data. Such a database would have tremendous marketing potential. Today`s banks would at best use a predictive algorithm to predict a customer’s likelihood to take a vacation. However, we know that customers make vacation plans online by discussing with their friends and family on social media. An intelligent database which captures this data will inform the relationship manager of potential customer needs. A personal loan to cover the costs, or a forex card and travel insurance are easily marketable when customer needs are known in advance. Such intelligent market segmentation is the need of the hour, machine learning is an important tool to enable this. Machine learning is the process of training a computer to learn by recognizing patterns in a data set. Unlike manual manipulations, using present database alerts, the machine learning tool looks up customer social media handles to create an ongoing series of profiles for the customer. This dynamic segmentation is the need of the hour. Dynamic segmentation involves using transactional data, social media data and digital marketing campaign data. Customers react differently to the same digital marketing campaigns. Tracking this data and incorporating in the database would improve the success of future marketing campaigns. Customers increasingly want to be targeted with specific and tailor-made offers. The arrival of new technology that analyses the customer data, both external and internal holds the key to the customer delight. SIFY : 10th. July,18

ADOPTION OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) IN INDIAN BANKS : Several Indian banks are among the first to adopt to financial technology (Fintech). Axis bank`s thought factory, ICICI Bank`s innovation labs and YES bank`s YES Fintech are some initiatives by financial services providers to embrace the rapid technological innovations in this sector.

[nvrspl-blog]

Next Vision: Is Bullet Train a necessity over basic education and healthcare facilities in India?

Ever since the announcement of Bullet Train route construction was made, this debate has been raging the social media and otherwise packed discussions among Indian people. The much hyped Mumbai - Ahmedabad route was unveiled this year by PM Modi. He and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe have laid the foundation for the high-speed train network. Looking at the bigger picture, this seems to be a sign of productivity, development and more power to the public in India. Japan is a model where bullet train technology is a success and people use it day in and day out as the main mode of conveyance. On the other hand, there are several countries where Bullet Train hasn't made it a hit with the public or the country simply didn't opt for it in the first place. The reasons might be different but let us give it a second thought that which country doesn't want a technology like high-speed train network to be a part of its map. Keeping this view in mind, there might be concrete reasons behind not going for this ambitious project in their country yet, despite being developed! For example: US hasn't opted for Bullet Trains despite being the first country to have the oldest high-speed subway train network. US knows that the amount of resources and money which it would invest in Bullet Train is not worth it when their existing train network is geared towards long-haul commercial freight traffic. It already serves the needs of public conveyance very well to the satisfaction of the commuters on a daily basis. For long distances also, it is more cost-effective to board a flight. Second reason is that in US there is a car-culture and there is a large chunk of population which prefers to travel by car whether inter-state or intra-state. Public conveyance is popular in big cities like New York the most. Third reason being the density of population and ratio of commuters from area to area which is not compatible with the requirement of a Bullet Train in US. Hence, US has weighed pros and cons and still is called a developed nation without having a Bullet Train. The US case study, therefore, proves that Bullet Train is not a benchmark for development.

People supporting the vision of present government, will say that how is Japan using the same technology so efficiently. The answer lies in the population density and affordability of the people commuting by Bullet Train there. The Bullet Train has been made accessible and affordable to the public at large and hence, people use it. Second reason is that there is less of car-culture and people are used to using public conveyance and transport more than private ones. Same is the case in Europe where people are used to public transport. In fact, there people are more comfortable on bicycles and other public transport system rather than cars. As for developing countries, they can't even dream of it before they fix their basic public facilities. A bullet train in developing countries would only mean another luxury transport system which is more of commercial entity from which government can make long time earning from one time investment. It is needless to say that in India also the condition is the same. Metro rails are more manageable and affordable hence, they are a success in metros. Out own railway system needs a serious over-haul and existing rails can be boosted into speed trains, tracks can be strengthened to avoid rail accidents. Today, when existing Indian railways system is in shambles and there are so many accidents, the internal condition of coaches is not at all up to the mark despite charging a significantly high sum of money from the commuters; investing such a large amount of money in an experimental ambitious project like Bullet Train doesn't seem a good idea to many.

Many people have also come up with a simple argument that when India lacks behind in basic education and healthcare facilities why is so much of investment being made in execution of a project from which the common man cannot benefit at all. Instead of that, the same amount could have been utilized in improving the basic state of affairs in the nation, and not just investing, but making sure that change happens at the ground level. Some concrete management of all the existing good visions of the present government is required otherwise, all will remain nothing more than just dreams. The amount of difference which could have been made till now would have been visible by now if the policies would have been implemented the way they should and if the projects would have fought red-tapism and corruption in present government's internal system. The Bullet Train is anyway up and above the basic dreams like Swachch Bharat, Beti Bachao Beti Padhao, Jan-Dhan Yojana and Demonetization to curb corruption and black money etc. because it requires much more time, money, management, tight-fist execution and maintenance.

Next Vision Research Solutions Pvt. Ltd. has put up the public opinion poll question on its distinct market survey app called Nishkarsh, where people have given their mixed response on the question: Do we really need Bullet Train ahead of basic education and healthcare facilities in India? 41% of the smart phone using Indian people have voted in favour of Bullet Train as they think of it as the benchmark of  development. However, 51% of the people think strongly that India doesn't need Bullet Train as of now and we must concentrate on strengthening the basic education and healthcare facilities till the time when the positive change becomes visible there. 8% of the people couldn't make up their mind on the question. Well, if we take those 8% in the segment which is not supporting the idea of an over-ambitious project like Bullet Train then the figure climbs up to 59%. Hence, it is observed that majority of people think that right now the time is not ripe enough to go for a Bullet Train in India.

Next Vision is a market research company who delivers fast, authentic and accurate research solutions for corporate, businesses, professionals and needless to say that they have an expert hand in public opinion polls and exit polls which cater to the political scenario of the country. They take in to account both quantitative and qualitative research methods. When it comes to political public opinion polls, Next Vision works with lakhs of respondents pan state and pan India, leaving almost no constituency, hence, the results are accurate and the most authentic. To ensure the viability of results, respondents are connected to the survey payment system through their Adhaar card. A unique feature of picture upload of the recently bought product in question also ensures authenticity of business surveys. Next Vision puts up a question of national importance on their public poll panel on Nishkarsh. People voice their respective opinions here without any influence or fear. To know more, please visit www.nvrspl.com.

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Discuss the development trends in the global hotel industry and its growth across the years

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 Marketing Management

 Case Studies

CASE STUDY (20 Marks)

Eureka Forbes successfully introduced and sold for many years few models of vacuum cleaners through door–to door marketing. During the initial few years Eureka Forbes vacuum cleaners were not available at any dealer channel. These were sold only by direct marketing. Some experts attribute the success of Eureka Forbes to two factors: one, implementation of an effective sales management system & two, elimination of channel conflict by adopting only door to door selling even at a stage when durables were sold only through dealers. Scene1 It has been a common experience that well advertised & well organized trade fairs generate huge sales. Experts believe that people visit such trade fairs with a frame of mind that is favorably predisposed to making purchase decisions. Deriving a cue from the trade fairs, way back in 1980, a small & upstart computer manufacturer arranged “Road Shows” in metros & mini metros. It was a period when foreign computer vendors were asked to leave India; indigenous makes of computers were few; perception of people about computers were – highly expensive, complex to use, needed trained manpower to operate that was scarce & performance of the hardware was unreliable. Those were the early days of computer marketing when there were no dealers & manufacturers had to sell through their own sales team. Scene2 In the year 1999 Compaq Corp declared that its objective for the year is to become the Internet leader in the InfoTech industry. But for some strange reasons the rival company Dell took the lead in sale of PC’s over the Internet. They take just over three days to deliver a built to specs PC ordered via the net in the USA. Compaq, in the meanwhile, has behaved all muddled up in its Internet plan. The company made a tentative start, but recently announced that it has stopped selling its computers to internet only retailers worldwide. Such a move had a drastic effect on major players such as Siberian Outpost & Shopping.com, which derive much of their revenue from the sale of Compaq PC’s through their websites. On the other hand Compaq plans to purchase Shopping.com and merge it with the Alta Vista search engine on the net. Compaq also declared that its move to stop retailing on the net is not permanent & it will reexamine this policy after three months. So what exactly prompted Compaq to move away from what is apparently the direction in which all others are headed? Industry watchers say that Compaq’s regular stores were being hurt through online sales. Many online retailers sell items at just above the procurement cost, since they maintain low inventories and have hardly any overheads to take care of. This was turning out to be the competition to Compaq’s brick and mortar retailers, who cannot simply match those prices because of slow operations and high overheads. As against this Dell, who sold only through direct marketing, could derive immense advantage from Internet retailing. This was supplemented by a highly rated online customer support service.

 Answer the following question.

 Q1. Explain channel conflicts. What lesson do you learn about selection of channel from the above scenes?

 Q2. Compare the merits & demerits of selling by company’s own sales team, Dealer Channel & Direct Marketing?

 CASE STUDY (20 Marks)

Nike, one of the leading brands of athletic footwear, apparel, equipment and accessories is Oregon, US based company. It company’s50% of the revenue comes from international sales and it registers it presence in more than 160 countries. Nike owns 400 retail outlets which operate domestically as well as internationally. Over the past few years Nike’s subsidiaries have been performing well and as a part of the company’s growth strategy and to maintain its position in the market Nike started concentrating on its subsidiary business in the year 2006. With the acquisition of the Starter the company also envisaged to setup itself in the value retail. The case analyses the impact of Nike’s subsidiary brand on its core brand.

 Answer the following question.

 Q1. Discuss the segmentation, targeting and positioning strategies of core brands and subsidiary brands.

 Q2. Give an overview of the case.

 CASE STUDY (20 Marks)

Kaggi’s Food Co (KFC) is a large producer & seller of edible oils, flour, pulses, spices & some other food items. Over past ten years KFC could establish itself well with popular brand names for its produce. Oil brand “Sunrise” from KFC is very popular as low fat, healthy cooking medium. KFC has three mills, one each in Meerut, Dehradun & Lucknow. To avail tax benefit only spices are procured from small manufacturers who carry out their operations under strict supervision of KFC quality team. All other items are manufactured in company’s own mills. SO far entire produce of KFC is sold easily in northern region of seven states through loyal set of distributors & retailers. For past three years KFC has started feeling the pressure of competition, more in oil & flour brands. Apart from bundling free soap, detergent, pet jar etc., competitors have increased distributor & retailer margins on volume off take. The young and professional management team of KFC is confident of achieving targets and enjoying the scene. KFC mills are not very modern ; nevertheless, they are maintained well. Breakdowns and production stoppages are very rare. KFC has recently bought a large salt manufacturing facility in a coastal town. This mill produces good quality common salt on contract basis for two different brands. The previous owner found this arrangement very neat with assured and quick turn over even though the profit margin is low. KFC did not wish to change the arrangement immediately, but thought building own brand for salt will not be difficult. It will increase profit margin also. Added attraction is that branded salt can easily be sold through existing channel. Market for branded salt is already over crowed. There are many national and local brands. The leading brand TATA is there for over 30years. There are other big national brands with deep pockets for promotion such as Nirma, Tseries, Dandi, Catch etc. Each brand is trying to take a particular but different position. While common planks are crystal clear, white & free flow, the special positions are iodized, triple refined, from the house of TATA etc. Prices & packing are almost same. Only Dandi & Catch are costlier. Catch sells in dispensable container of 400 gms also

 Answer the following question.

 Q1. What core product is Kaggi’s Food selling when it sells edible oils?

 Q2. Carry out a SWOT analysis for Kaggi’s Food.

 Q3. Suggest some differentiators to build up competitive advantages for KFC’s brand of salt

 Q4. What will you suggest to ensure trial & feedback from customers of salt during launch?

 CASE STUDY (20 Marks)

From luxury to budget to nofrills and boutique... the major hotel giants are moving ahead with innovative concepts, and the outcome – a never before choice for business as well as leisure travelers. Forging ahead amid stiff competition and industry growth nearing maturity, hoteliers are constantly thinking of new value innovations. One such innovation gave birth to the nofrills concept, based on a typical Japanese capsule hotel along with considerable inspiration from low cost airlines and first class accommodation

on air flight. Particularly visible in popular regions of the US and Europe, they set a unique and distinct competitive position in the market. However, in an industry where customers identify their lifestyle with the hotel brands, known for luxury and comfort, how would nofrills budget hotels appeal to the customers? Given their strategic pricing, can these hotels earn sustainable profits amid competition from high end as well as low end hotel segments?

 Answer the following question.

 Q1. Discuss the development trends in the global hotel industry and its growth across the years.

 Q2. Explain various operational aspects of hotel industry and their implications on the performance of the hotel companies.

 Q3. Comment on Japanese capsule hotels, their characteristic features, and services offered.

 Q4. Evaluate the success of these new concept hotels and identify their growth potential.

 Assignment Solutions, Case study Answer sheets

Project Report and Thesis contact

aravind.banakar@gmail.com

www.mbacasestudyanswers.com

ARAVIND – 09901366442 – 09902787224

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[flutweeker-blog]

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