The Animal School � A Parable �

Once upon a time the animals decided they must do something decisive to meet the increasing complexity of their society. They held a meeting and finally decided to organize a school. The curriculum consisted of running, swimming and flying. Since these were the basic behaviors of most animals, they decided that all the students should take all of the subjects.

The duck proved to be excellent at swimming, better in fact than his teacher. He also did well in flying, but he proved to be very poor in running. Since he was poor in this subject he was made to stay after school to practice it and even had to drop swimming in order to get more time in which to practice running. He was kept at this poorest subject until his webbed feet were so badly damaged that he became only average at swimming. But average was acceptable in the school so nobody worried about that - except the duck.

The rabbit started at the top of his class in running, but finally had a nervous breakdown because of so much make-up time in swimming - a subject he hated.

The squirrel was excellent in climbing until he developed psychological blocking in flying class when the teacher insisted he start from the ground instead of from the tops of the trees. He was kept at attempting to fly until he became muscle bound - and received a C in climbing and a D in running.

The eagle was the school�s worst discipline problem, in climbing class he beat all of the others to the top of the tree used for examination purposes in this subject, but he insisted on using his own method of getting there.

The gophers of course, stayed out of the school and fought the tax levied for education because digging was not included in the curriculum. They apprenticed their children to the badger and later joined the ground hogs and eventually started a private school offering alternative education.

Author: Unknown 

The Daisy by Hans Christian Andersens

The Daisy by Hans Christian Andersen (1838) full story

OW listen! In the country, close by the high road, stood a farmhouse; perhaps you have passed by and seen it yourself. There was a little flower garden with painted wooden palings in front of it; close by was a ditch, on its fresh green bank grew a little daisy; the sun shone as warmly and brightly upon it as on the magnificent garden flowers, and therefore it thrived well. One morning it had quite opened, and its little snow-white petals stood round the yellow centre, like the rays of the sun. It did not mind that nobody saw it in the grass, and that it was a poor despised flower; on the contrary, it was quite happy, and turned towards the sun, looking upward and listening to the song of the lark high up in the air.

The little daisy was as happy as if the day had been a great holiday, but it was only Monday. All the children were at school, and while they were sitting on the forms and learning their lessons, it sat on its thin green stalk and learnt from the sun and from its surroundings how kind God is, and it rejoiced that the song of the little lark expressed so sweetly and distinctly its own feelings. With a sort of reverence the daisy looked up to the bird that could fly and sing, but it did not feel envious. “I can see and hear,” it thought; “the sun shines upon me, and the forest kisses me. How rich I am!”
In the garden close by grew many large and magnificent flowers, and, strange to say, the less fragrance they had the haughtier and prouder they were. The peonies puffed themselves up in order to be larger than the roses, but size is not everything! The tulips had the finest colours, and they knew it well, too, for they were standing bolt upright like candles, that one might see them the better. In their pride they did not see the little daisy, which looked over to them and thought, “How rich and beautiful they are! I am sure the pretty bird will fly down and call upon them. Thank God, that I stand so near and can at least see all the splendour.” And while the daisy was still thinking, the lark came flying down, crying “Tweet,” but not to the peonies and tulips—no, into the grass to the poor daisy. Its joy was so great that it did not know what to think. The little bird hopped round it and sang, “How beautifully soft the grass is, and what a lovely little flower with its golden heart and silver dress is growing here.” The yellow centre in the daisy did indeed look like gold, while the little petals shone as brightly as silver.

How happy the daisy was! No one has the least idea. The bird kissed it with its beak, sang to it, and then rose again up to the blue sky. It was certainly more than a quarter of an hour before the daisy recovered its senses. Half ashamed, yet glad at heart, it looked over to the other flowers in the garden; surely they had witnessed its pleasure and the honour that had been done to it; they understood its joy. But the tulips stood more stiffly than ever, their faces were pointed and red, because they were vexed. The peonies were sulky; it was well that they could not speak, otherwise they would have given the daisy a good lecture. The little flower could very well see that they were ill at ease, and pitied them sincerely.

Shortly after this a girl came into the garden, with a large sharp knife. She went to the tulips and began cutting them off, one after another. “Ugh!” sighed the daisy, “that is terrible; now they are done for.”

The girl carried the tulips away. The daisy was glad that it was outside, and only a small flower—it felt very grateful. At sunset it folded its petals, and fell asleep, and dreamt all night of the sun and the little bird.

On the following morning, when the flower once more stretched forth its tender petals, like little arms, towards the air and light, the daisy recognised the bird’s voice, but what it sang sounded so sad. Indeed the poor bird had good reason to be sad, for it had been caught and put into a cage close by the open window. It sang of the happy days when it could merrily fly about, of fresh green corn in the fields, and of the time when it could soar almost up to the clouds. The poor lark was most unhappy as a prisoner in a cage. The little daisy would have liked so much to help it, but what could be done? Indeed, that was very difficult for such a small flower to find out. It entirely forgot how beautiful everything around it was, how warmly the sun was shining, and how splendidly white its own petals were. It could only think of the poor captive bird, for which it could do nothing. Then two little boys came out of the garden; one of them had a large sharp knife, like that with which the girl had cut the tulips. They came straight towards the little daisy, which could not understand what they wanted.
“Here is a fine piece of turf for the lark,” said one of the boys, and began to cut out a square round the daisy, so that it remained in the centre of the grass.

“Pluck the flower off” said the other boy, and the daisy trembled for fear, for to be pulled off meant death to it; and it wished so much to live, as it was to go with the square of turf into the poor captive lark’s cage.

“No let it stay,” said the other boy, “it looks so pretty.”
And so it stayed, and was brought into the lark’s cage. The poor bird was lamenting its lost liberty, and beating its wings against the wires; and the little daisy could not speak or utter a consoling word, much as it would have liked to do so. So the forenoon passed.

“I have no water,” said the captive lark, “they have all gone out, and forgotten to give me anything to drink. My throat is dry and burning. I feel as if I had fire and ice within me, and the air is so oppressive. Alas! I must die, and part with the warm sunshine, the fresh green meadows, and all the beauty that God has created.” And it thrust its beak into the piece of grass, to refresh itself a little. Then it noticed the little daisy, and nodded to it, and kissed it with its beak and said: “You must also fade in here, poor little flower. You and the piece of grass are all they have given me in exchange for the whole world, which I enjoyed outside. Each little blade of grass shall be a green tree for me, each of your white petals a fragrant flower. Alas! you only remind me of what I have lost.”

“I wish I could console the poor lark,” thought the daisy. It could not move one of its leaves, but the fragrance of its delicate petals streamed forth, and was much stronger than such flowers usually have: the bird noticed it, although it was dying with thirst, and in its pain tore up the green blades of grass, but did not touch the flower.

The evening came, and nobody appeared to bring the poor bird a drop of water; it opened its beautiful wings, and fluttered about in its anguish; a faint and mournful “Tweet, tweet,” was all it could utter, then it bent its little head towards the flower, and its heart broke for want and longing. The flower could not, as on the previous evening, fold up its petals and sleep; it dropped sorrowfully. The boys only came the next morning; when they saw the dead bird, they began to cry bitterly, dug a nice grave for it, and adorned it with flowers. The bird’s body was placed in a pretty red box; they wished to bury it with royal honours. While it was alive and sang they forgot it, and let it suffer want in the cage; now, they cried over it and covered it with flowers. The piece of turf, with the little daisy in it, was thrown out on the dusty highway. Nobody thought of the flower which had felt so much for the bird and had so greatly desired to comfort it.

The Daisy by Hans Christian Andersen (1838)

summary

Once there was a little daisy that grew outside a garden. The proud flowers of the garden looked down upon the daisy as nobody could see her there. But the daisy was very happy bathing in the sun.

One day, a lark came and sat on a tree. The peonies, who were very large, and the tulips, who were brightly coloured, thought that the lark would sing to them. But the lark liked the daisy’s golden centre and her silver white petals. So he came down to where the daisy was and sang sweetly to her. The other flowers of the garden started envying the little daisy.

The next day, the daisy heard the song of the lark, but this time it was a sad song. Some naughty boys had caught the lark and put him in a cage. She wished that she could help the lark but what could a little flower do.

Meanwhile, the boys came and began pulling the grass around her, they said, “This grass would be good for the lark.” They took a little piece of earth with the grass and the daisy on it and put it in the cage.

The daisy was happy to be with the lark who was weeping bitterly, “They have given me a little grass in exchange of the whole world,” he complained. The daisy tried to console the lark but the lark just wept and wept.

Soon, the daisy was thirsty and told the lark, “They have left without giving me water.”
The night passed and in the morning when the boys came to see the lark, they saw that it was dead while the daisy had withered.

Videos of samons

The Master Plan of Chandigarh

Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, Independent India’s first Prime Minister, laid down the founding principles of the new city when he said “Let this be a new town, symbolic of freedom of India unfettered by the traditions of the past….. an expressions of the nation’s faith in the future”. The city is a product of Nehru’s vision.



Le Corbusier conceived the master plan of Chandigarh as analogous to human body, with a clearly defined head (the Capitol Complex, Sector 1), heart (the City Centre Sector-17), lungs ( the leisure valley, innumerable open spaces and sector greens), the intellect (the cultural and educational institutions), the circulatory system (the network of roads, the 7Vs) and the viscera (the Industrial Area). The concept of the city is based on four major functions: living, working, care of the body and spirit and circulation. Residential sectors constitute the living part whereas the Capitol Complex, City Centre, Educational Zone (Post Graduate Institute, Punjab Engineering College, Panjab University) and the Industrial Area constitute the working part. The Leisure Valley, Gardens, Sector Greens and Open Courtyards etc. are for the care of body and spirit. The circulation system comprises of 7 different types of roads known as 7Vs. Later on, a pathway for cyclists called V8 were added to this circulation system.


The Capital complex comprises three architectural masterpieces: the "Secretariat", the "High Court" and the "Legislative Assembly", separated by large piazzas. In the heart of the Capital Complex stands the giant metallic sculpture of The Open Hand, the official emblem of Chandigarh, signifying the city's credo of "open to given, open to receive".

The city centre (Sector 17) is the heart of Chandigarh's activities. It comprises the Inter-State Bus Terminus, Parade Ground, District Courts, etc. on one hand, and vast business and shopping center on the other. The 4-storey concrete buildings house banks and offices above and showrooms/shops at the ground level with wide pedestrian concourses. The Neelam piazza in the center has fountains with light and water features. Proposal to set up an eleven storey building in Sector 17 is in the offing. Sector 34 is another newly developed commercial sector.

http://chandigarh.gov.in/

neela satyanarayan

Pradeep Sachdeva on contextual building at TERRA Talks

16 killed in Haridwar stampede Sweta Dutta: Haridwar, Wed Nov 09 2011

Sixteen people, including 14 women, were killed and over 50 injured in a stampede here on Tuesday morning during a religious ceremony that was reportedly attended by nearly two lakh people.

The Akhil Vishwa Gayatri Pariwar, the organisers of the five-day 'Mahayagya' to mark the birth centenary of Acharya Pandit Shriram Sharma, claimed the incident took place when devotees started gate-crashing at one of the exit points.

But SDM Harbir Singh said: "Prima facie it appears that suffocation in the area due to smoke emanating from the yagya fireplaces led to the stampede, but the exact cause of the incident can be confirmed only after an inquiry."

Eyewitnesses said the area was overcrowded since 4 am, an hour before the yagya was scheduled to begin.

"There was barely any breathing space," said Saraswati Devi, 65, a survivor who came to attend the ceremony from Danapur, Bihar. "As we were nearing the steps leading to a foot overbridge, people started pushing from behind. After a woman tripped and fell, others started panicking. I too fell down and became unconscious," she added.

Doctors at the base hospital said over 150 people came for treatment. "Since this is a makeshift hospital and can accommodate only 100 patients, some were referred to other city hospitals. However, the number of seriously injured would not be more than five or seven," said a doctor.

District Magistrate Senthil Pandian has ordered a magisterial probe into the incident. Pandian said most of the victims were from Jhansi, Munger and Sultanpur areas of Uttar Pradesh.

Following instructions from the district administration, the organisers today announced that the five-day ceremony would be curtailed, and would end on Wednesday.

Uttarakhand Chief Minister B C Khanduri, who visited the mishap site, announced a compensation of Rs 2 lakh for the kin of deceased. An equal amount was announced as compensation by the organisers. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also sanctioned Rs 1 lakh for the relatives of the victims and Rs 50,000 for those seriously injured.

16 People Killed in a stampede

At least 16 people, mostly women, were killed and several others injured in a stampede during a religious ceremony attended by tens of thousands of devotees near Har Ki Pauri here today.

The stampede occurred when people tried to enter the yajnashala at Chandidweep Ghat on the banks of Ganga for the centenary celebrations of acharya Pt Shriram Sharma, the founder of Shatikunj Ashram.

SDM Haridwar Harbir Singh said 16 people were killed in the stampede.

"It appears suffocation led to the stampede but the exact cause will only come out after an inquiry," he said.

As the stampede broke out, people ran helter-skelter with women and children falling on the ground.

Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal was also holding a 'yajna' at the ashram when the stampede broke out.

Police sources said nearly two lakh people from home and abroad had gathered for the ceremony, which is considered to be biggest after the Kumbh mela.

Police officials blamed ashram authorities for not involving the police and district administration in the management of the ceremony where lakhs of people had gathered during the last few days.

PM sanctions Rs 1 lakh for kin of dead

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today expressed grief over the loss of lives in the stampede in Haridwar, Uttarakhand and sanctioned Rs 1 lakh for the kin of those killed.

He also sanctioned Rs 50,000 for those seriously injured, a PMO spokesman said.

"The Prime Minister is grieved to learn about the loss of lives in the Haridwar stampede," the spokesman said.

Sonia condoles stampede deaths

Congress President Sonia Gandhi expressed grief at the tragic stampede deaths in Haridwar today and urged authorities to act immediately to provide relief to the injured.

"Sonia Gandhi expressed her deep shock and sorrow on the tragic deaths caused by the stampede in Haridwar. She also conveyed her condolences to the bereaved families and urged the authorities to act immediately in providing relief to the injured," an AICC release said. 

16 killed in stampede in Haridwar by C.K. CHANDRAMOHAN

At least 16 persons were killed and 46 injured in a stampede at a mass “yagya” of the Gayatri Parivar near Hari-Ki-Pauri on Tuesday.

The parivar was celebrating the birth centenary of its founder, Sriram Sharma Acharya, as the Gayatri Mahakumbh. “The celebrations have been called off and ‘Shanti Yagya' is being performed for the departed souls,” head of the institution Pranav Pandya said.

Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal was present when the stampede occurred.

About 50,000 people were participating in the “yagya” and the stampede seems to have been triggered by suffocation due to excessive smoke from over 1,000 havan kunds, Hariram, a participant from Gujarat, said.

“It appears that suffocation led to the stampede, but the exact cause will come out after an inquiry,” SDM Haridwar Harbir Singh said.

The dead include 14 women. Thirty-seven women and nine men were injured.

Ex gratia of Rs. 2 lakh

Uttarakhand Chief Minister B.C. Khanduri, who rushed to the spot, announced an ex gratia of Rs. 2 lakh for the kin of the dead and free treatment to the injured.

He cancelled all cultural programmes on the occasion of the State's Foundation Day on Wednesday. “Let us all observe the Foundation Day peacefully in honour of those killed in the ‘yagya',” he said.

Differing versions

PTI reports:

Eyewitnesses said the stampede occurred at 10.30 a.m. when a few people tripped while those behind continued to push forward after tens of thousands devotees gathered to go to the fireplace at the ashram to make offerings. The devotees were climbing the stairs to cross a mini-bridge ahead of the venue for “Gayatri Mahayagya,” a survivor said.

The situation soon went out of control and people ran helter-skelter with several women and children falling.

Another version was that when a sea of humanity tried to enter the “yagyasthal” to offer “aahuti,” volunteers of the ashram allegedly resorted to lathi charge that created panic. People ran for safety falling on each other creating a stampede, police sources and eye- witnesses said.

Police sources said nearly two lakh people, including many from abroad had gathered for the ceremony, which is considered to be the biggest after the “Kumbh Mela.”

Police officials blamed the Shantikunj Ashram authorities for not involving the police and district administration in the management of the ceremony.

Ambulances rushed to the scene and paramedics shifted the injured to a makeshift 10-bed hospital set up by the organisers.

“People fell on each other and the resulting stampede killed two in front of me. I don't even know if my mother, who was shouting for help, is dead or alive,” a survivor said.

The condition of at least 10 persons was stated to be critical. Most of the victims belonged to Jhansi, Munger and Sultanpur of Uttar Pradesh.

BJP president Nitin Gadkari visited the site and met some of the injured.

Governor Margaret Alva has expressed grief.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh expressed grief at the loss of lives and sanctioned Rs.1 lakh as relief for the kin of those killed.

One half One full, Neela Satyanarayana

In her beautifully written book One half One full, Neela Satyanarayana tells us how she juggled a demanding career with motherly affection to bring up a child with Down's Syndrome

The book celebrates the triumph of parental love against all odds.

Neela Satyanarayana, a senior-level bureaucrat who is currently the Principal Secretary (Forests), Government of Maharashtra has admirably juggled a demanding career along with motherly affection and care while bringing up her son Chaitanya who is suffering from Down's Syndrome. She tells the story about keeping both her professional and family life intact in her book 'One half One full'.


Neela launched her book at Crossword —ICC Trade Towers, in the presence of Dr Narendra Jadhav, Vice-Chancellor, University Of Pune. Jadhav along with the author read out excerpts while releasing the book.

Neela celebrates the triumph of parental love and endorses the sentiment that love conquers all — the disabilities and handicaps that nature inflicts upon us. Both Neela and her husband P V Satyanarayana are shocked when they find their newborn son Chaitanya afflicted with Down's Syndrome. Their elder daughter Anuradha too is shattered. Instead of succumbing, the family decides to fight back so that Chaitanya is able to feel and behave like a normal human being. This is a saga of tears, love and courage that finally ends in success.

LOVE conquers all, even the disabilities and handicaps that nature inflicts upon us or our fellow human beings. One realises this while going through the contents of this book that celebrates the triumph of parental love. The world of Neela and P.V. Satyanarayana turns turtle when they discover that their newborn son Chaitanya is afflicted with Down’s Syndrome. Their elder daughter Anuradha too gets emotionally affected. The family decides to fight back and enable the child to become as normal as is humanly possible. Read this saga of tears, love and courage ending in success – a saga that has touched the President of India too. And do try to reflect on Neela’s poser – why do normal people feel that they are full and people like Chaitanya incomplete?

One half One full, Neela Satyanarayana

In her beautifully written book One half One full, Neela Satyanarayana tells us how she juggled a demanding career with motherly affection to bring up a child with Down's Syndrome

The book celebrates the triumph of parental love against all odds.

Neela Satyanarayana, a senior-level bureaucrat who is currently the Principal Secretary (Forests), Government of Maharashtra has admirably juggled a demanding career along with motherly affection and care while bringing up her son Chaitanya who is suffering from Down's Syndrome. She tells the story about keeping both her professional and family life intact in her book 'One half One full'.


Neela launched her book at Crossword —ICC Trade Towers, in the presence of Dr Narendra Jadhav, Vice-Chancellor, University Of Pune. Jadhav along with the author read out excerpts while releasing the book.

Neela celebrates the triumph of parental love and endorses the sentiment that love conquers all — the disabilities and handicaps that nature inflicts upon us. Both Neela and her husband P V Satyanarayana are shocked when they find their newborn son Chaitanya afflicted with Down's Syndrome. Their elder daughter Anuradha too is shattered. Instead of succumbing, the family decides to fight back so that Chaitanya is able to feel and behave like a normal human being. This is a saga of tears, love and courage that finally ends in success.

LOVE conquers all, even the disabilities and handicaps that nature inflicts upon us or our fellow human beings. One realises this while going through the contents of this book that celebrates the triumph of parental love. The world of Neela and P.V. Satyanarayana turns turtle when they discover that their newborn son Chaitanya is afflicted with Down’s Syndrome. Their elder daughter Anuradha too gets emotionally affected. The family decides to fight back and enable the child to become as normal as is humanly possible. Read this saga of tears, love and courage ending in success – a saga that has touched the President of India too. And do try to reflect on Neela’s poser – why do normal people feel that they are full and people like Chaitanya incomplete?

One half One full, Neela Satyanarayana

In her beautifully written book One half One full, Neela Satyanarayana tells us how she juggled a demanding career with motherly affection to bring up a child with Down's Syndrome

The book celebrates the triumph of parental love against all odds.

Neela Satyanarayana, a senior-level bureaucrat who is currently the Principal Secretary (Forests), Government of Maharashtra has admirably juggled a demanding career along with motherly affection and care while bringing up her son Chaitanya who is suffering from Down's Syndrome. She tells the story about keeping both her professional and family life intact in her book 'One half One full'.


Neela launched her book at Crossword —ICC Trade Towers, in the presence of Dr Narendra Jadhav, Vice-Chancellor, University Of Pune. Jadhav along with the author read out excerpts while releasing the book.

Neela celebrates the triumph of parental love and endorses the sentiment that love conquers all — the disabilities and handicaps that nature inflicts upon us. Both Neela and her husband P V Satyanarayana are shocked when they find their newborn son Chaitanya afflicted with Down's Syndrome. Their elder daughter Anuradha too is shattered. Instead of succumbing, the family decides to fight back so that Chaitanya is able to feel and behave like a normal human being. This is a saga of tears, love and courage that finally ends in success.

LOVE conquers all, even the disabilities and handicaps that nature inflicts upon us or our fellow human beings. One realises this while going through the contents of this book that celebrates the triumph of parental love. The world of Neela and P.V. Satyanarayana turns turtle when they discover that their newborn son Chaitanya is afflicted with Down’s Syndrome. Their elder daughter Anuradha too gets emotionally affected. The family decides to fight back and enable the child to become as normal as is humanly possible. Read this saga of tears, love and courage ending in success – a saga that has touched the President of India too. And do try to reflect on Neela’s poser – why do normal people feel that they are full and people like Chaitanya incomplete?

One half One full, Neela Satyanarayana

In her beautifully written book One half One full, Neela Satyanarayana tells us how she juggled a demanding career with motherly affection to bring up a child with Down's Syndrome

The book celebrates the triumph of parental love against all odds.

Neela Satyanarayana, a senior-level bureaucrat who is currently the Principal Secretary (Forests), Government of Maharashtra has admirably juggled a demanding career along with motherly affection and care while bringing up her son Chaitanya who is suffering from Down's Syndrome. She tells the story about keeping both her professional and family life intact in her book 'One half One full'.


Neela launched her book at Crossword —ICC Trade Towers, in the presence of Dr Narendra Jadhav, Vice-Chancellor, University Of Pune. Jadhav along with the author read out excerpts while releasing the book.
Neela celebrates the triumph of parental love and endorses the sentiment that love conquers all — the disabilities and handicaps that nature inflicts upon us. Both Neela and her husband P V Satyanarayana are shocked when they find their newborn son Chaitanya afflicted with Down's Syndrome. Their elder daughter Anuradha too is shattered. Instead of succumbing, the family decides to fight back so that Chaitanya is able to feel and behave like a normal human being. This is a saga of tears, love and courage that finally ends in success.

A tale for many cities by Pradeep Sachdeva

In just eight years, 2020 will be upon us. By then, our cities will be either areas of more chaos or meaningfully planned. The choice is ours. We are at a crucial junction as far as urbanism goes. The need to work vigorously on our cities and improve them is urgent and critical. Their populations have surged tremendously in the last few decades . Delhi's population increased from12.8m in 2001 to 16.3m in 2011. Bangalore grew from 5.7m to 8.5m during the same period.

Our urban planners have perhaps not understood the nature of the modern city, what it takes not just to run them but to make them livable. The two key requirements of a city are: provision of basic services and social infrastructure. These need to be developed together.

So what is a city? It's a dense amalgamation of buildings and people. A city must provide equity and also be sustainable. As an architect who has been closely connected with Delhi and its planning, my wish list is more about the direction we need to take so that future generations don't end up living in chaotic dysfunctional cities.

The first requirement for a city is a pragmatic plan. Many of our cities such as Delhi and Bhubaneswar and even Port Blair in the Andamans have reasonably good master plans. Many also have City Development Plans which have been made an essential requirement to draw funds from the government's Urban Renewal Programme (JNNURM). But they should be updated frequently based on the changing needs of its people.

And let's not forget its citizens - they need to be more pro-actively involved when evolving master plans. But often, there's lack of planning and inadequate implementation systems. This applies to all essential components of a city — streets, public transport system, traffic management , affordable housing, cars and parking , drainage, water supply, sewerage and garbage. Any deficiency in these will lead to poor quality cities which won't be able to handle the pressures of increased population and changing needs.

The second requirement of a good city is good social infrastructure such as parks and places for leisure such as river and sea fronts. It needs to preserve and protect its heritage. We are a nation with a rich diversity in culture, arts and crafts and cities are great platforms for that, given the right facilities. And let's not forget good and affordable educational and healthcare facilities too.
We don't have to look far. There are enough cities worldwide which have managed to radically improve the quality of life of its citizens. Take Singapore. It has managed to limit cars and has a very efficient transport system. Shanghai has wonderful footpaths everywhere. New York is actively developing cycling facilities in large parts while Holland, Denmark and other Scandinavian countries have developed cities around a bicycling infrastructure , creating a complete culture around them which is humane and ecological. There's Tokyo , the world's most populous city, which has a metro system used by 80% of the population.

But a great sustainable and livable city doesn't emerge by accident and its development cannot be taken for granted. It requires hard work, cohesive planning and meticulous implementation. And high management skills.

Perhaps the time has come to have an Indian Urban Service, a body of highly trained professionals who will manage the city. This could be akin to the IAS, IFS, Revenue and Forest services. There's also a need for a top-notch thinktank which develops policy and goals for urbanism. These should include the best people from various areas - town planning, urban designing, transport, energy, environment , public utilities, landscape , housing, etc.

But a start has been made. JNNURM , which is some six years old, has started an ambitious development plan in many cities. The results have been encouraging. But to bring our cities to any basic level of development, many more need to be brought into its fold. More areas need to be addressed. We also need to reinvent and restructure the institutions that served us well in the past such as Town and Country Planning Organization, the DDA in Delhi and the MMRDA in Mumbai. Then, there are also research organizations such as CRRI for roads and transportation and CBRI for buildings. Reinventing them will need political will and administrative vision.

There are some glimmers of hope. I met up young Navdeep Ahuja who along with another colleague , began the innocuously named Graduates Welfare Association Fazilka. They are bringing about change with the mandate of citizens participation in governance and are facilitating the creation of physical and social infrastructure across 22 cities in Punjab. The have put in place a network of cycle rickshaws called Ecocabs which can be booked through a mobile phone. They are also developing car free zones, food and culture streets in these cities. All this is being done very efficiently and at a low cost. We need many such organizations.

However, my ideal of a city in 2020 is not a utopian dream. It is achievable. It has streets where people walk on wide footpaths shaded by leafy trees. Streets are usually one-third of a city's area and its most democratic segment. Public space dedicated to pedestrians reduces inequality and should be accorded priority when developing cities.

Adjoining the streets should be cycle lanes where bicycles and rickshaws can sail past smoothly. It'll have a great public transport system with buses, metro and taxis. Parking will be difficult and expensive so people will use public transport rather than cars. There will be parks and gardens and the air will be clean, as pollution levels will have dropped dramatically.

And then, cities will become areas of graceful living and a charmed way of life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kgz16xu22lE&feature=youtu.be

(The writer is an architect and urban planner based in New Delhi.)

A yawning divide by Vivek Atray

Some people can just never wake up early. They munch their breakfast on the way to work. They have excuses ready when they reach office late. They miss trains on a regular basis. They have never seen a sunrise or met the milkman.

Until a loved one turned over a new leaf recently, she was one such late riser. Try as she might, she couldn't help pressing the snooze button a hundred times before she finally got up. She felt terrible about this tendency but there was nothing she could do about it. Come morning, she would just not be able to shrug off the desire to sleep a while more. Only when divine intervention answered her prayers recently was she able to join the early birds' club.

Another relative has no plans of joining this league though. She is rather unabashed about waking up past noon on a daily basis. To be fair, her husband is a media personality who typically arrives home from work past midnight. That does indeed give them sufficient justification to stay longer in slumber-land each morning. This practice does lead to certain oddities though. He goes for his 'morning' walk at 1 pm, heatwaves and appalled onlookers notwithstanding. They once returned from a night out only to meet the neighbour's son who was off on an early morning jog!

Early risers clearly have the edge in life. By the time most of us wake up, they've been through their morning rituals, enjoyed their walk, had their tea and read the daily news. They're also likely to have made long distance calls before dawn to those similarly inclined. Thus, by the time the sun warms up they're likely to have discussed all varieties of 'men, matters, and affairs' with a dozen people.

The upshot of these varying tendencies is that such extreme contrasts often exist in the same household. Weeks pass before the younger lot (typically late risers) and the older lot (normally early birds) come face to face. It's almost as if they live in different time zones and different countries.

All over the country, things are likely to be pretty much the same in this respect, one would think. If the man of the house, any house, decides to take a day off from work, he'd probably find his son emerging from his room at about 10 am and that too in a 'rubbing-eyes' mode. After fooling around for a while the lad would probably dash off to college in a rush whilst simultaneously zipping up his jeans and sending text messages on his phone. His father would undoubtedly be left shaking his head and burying himself deeper into his newspaper.

Some lucky families have come to a perfect understanding though. My sister, a teacher, and her husband, a doctor, wake up at 4 am each day in order to be done with their daily chores and to spend quality time together before their frantic schedules begin. She cooks all the meals for the day before the sun rises and is done with all her household work by 6 am!

Word has evidently gotten around about their ways. It is learnt that the garbage man turns up at their house every day at five in the morning. And when the good doctor had to undergo a small surgery himself, his operation was actually listed for 5.30 am, an unheard of hour for such an intricate activity. One only hopes that the operating team had gone to bed nice and early the previous night!

One thing's for sure. Five o'clock in the evening is probably the only time of day when one can hope to invite such contrasting creatures together for a celebration. At any other hour, one type or the other would probably be found yawning away to glory!

A tale for many cities by Pradeep Sachdeva

In just eight years, 2020 will be upon us. By then, our cities will be either areas of more chaos or meaningfully planned. The choice is ours. We are at a crucial junction as far as urbanism goes. The need to work vigorously on our cities and improve them is urgent and critical. Their populations have surged tremendously in the last few decades . Delhi's population increased from12.8m in 2001 to 16.3m in 2011. Bangalore grew from 5.7m to 8.5m during the same period.

Our urban planners have perhaps not understood the nature of the modern city, what it takes not just to run them but to make them livable. The two key requirements of a city are: provision of basic services and social infrastructure. These need to be developed together.

So what is a city? It's a dense amalgamation of buildings and people. A city must provide equity and also be sustainable. As an architect who has been closely connected with Delhi and its planning, my wish list is more about the direction we need to take so that future generations don't end up living in chaotic dysfunctional cities.

The first requirement for a city is a pragmatic plan. Many of our cities such as Delhi and Bhubaneswar and even Port Blair in the Andamans have reasonably good master plans. Many also have City Development Plans which have been made an essential requirement to draw funds from the government's Urban Renewal Programme (JNNURM). But they should be updated frequently based on the changing needs of its people.

And let's not forget its citizens - they need to be more pro-actively involved when evolving master plans. But often, there's lack of planning and inadequate implementation systems. This applies to all essential components of a city — streets, public transport system, traffic management , affordable housing, cars and parking , drainage, water supply, sewerage and garbage. Any deficiency in these will lead to poor quality cities which won't be able to handle the pressures of increased population and changing needs.

The second requirement of a good city is good social infrastructure such as parks and places for leisure such as river and sea fronts. It needs to preserve and protect its heritage. We are a nation with a rich diversity in culture, arts and crafts and cities are great platforms for that, given the right facilities. And let's not forget good and affordable educational and healthcare facilities too.
We don't have to look far. There are enough cities worldwide which have managed to radically improve the quality of life of its citizens. Take Singapore. It has managed to limit cars and has a very efficient transport system. Shanghai has wonderful footpaths everywhere. New York is actively developing cycling facilities in large parts while Holland, Denmark and other Scandinavian countries have developed cities around a bicycling infrastructure , creating a complete culture around them which is humane and ecological. There's Tokyo , the world's most populous city, which has a metro system used by 80% of the population.

But a great sustainable and livable city doesn't emerge by accident and its development cannot be taken for granted. It requires hard work, cohesive planning and meticulous implementation. And high management skills.

Perhaps the time has come to have an Indian Urban Service, a body of highly trained professionals who will manage the city. This could be akin to the IAS, IFS, Revenue and Forest services. There's also a need for a top-notch thinktank which develops policy and goals for urbanism. These should include the best people from various areas - town planning, urban designing, transport, energy, environment , public utilities, landscape , housing, etc.

But a start has been made. JNNURM , which is some six years old, has started an ambitious development plan in many cities. The results have been encouraging. But to bring our cities to any basic level of development, many more need to be brought into its fold. More areas need to be addressed. We also need to reinvent and restructure the institutions that served us well in the past such as Town and Country Planning Organization, the DDA in Delhi and the MMRDA in Mumbai. Then, there are also research organizations such as CRRI for roads and transportation and CBRI for buildings. Reinventing them will need political will and administrative vision.

There are some glimmers of hope. I met up young Navdeep Ahuja who along with another colleague , began the innocuously named Graduates Welfare Association Fazilka. They are bringing about change with the mandate of citizens participation in governance and are facilitating the creation of physical and social infrastructure across 22 cities in Punjab. The have put in place a network of cycle rickshaws called Ecocabs which can be booked through a mobile phone. They are also developing car free zones, food and culture streets in these cities. All this is being done very efficiently and at a low cost. We need many such organizations.

However, my ideal of a city in 2020 is not a utopian dream. It is achievable. It has streets where people walk on wide footpaths shaded by leafy trees. Streets are usually one-third of a city's area and its most democratic segment. Public space dedicated to pedestrians reduces inequality and should be accorded priority when developing cities.

Adjoining the streets should be cycle lanes where bicycles and rickshaws can sail past smoothly. It'll have a great public transport system with buses, metro and taxis. Parking will be difficult and expensive so people will use public transport rather than cars. There will be parks and gardens and the air will be clean, as pollution levels will have dropped dramatically.

And then, cities will become areas of graceful living and a charmed way of life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kgz16xu22lE&feature=youtu.be

(The writer is an architect and urban planner based in New Delhi.)

A tale for many cities by Pradeep Sachdeva

In just eight years, 2020 will be upon us. By then, our cities will be either areas of more chaos or meaningfully planned. The choice is ours. We are at a crucial junction as far as urbanism goes. The need to work vigorously on our cities and improve them is urgent and critical. Their populations have surged tremendously in the last few decades . Delhi's population increased from12.8m in 2001 to 16.3m in 2011. Bangalore grew from 5.7m to 8.5m during the same period.

Our urban planners have perhaps not understood the nature of the modern city, what it takes not just to run them but to make them livable. The two key requirements of a city are: provision of basic services and social infrastructure. These need to be developed together.

So what is a city? It's a dense amalgamation of buildings and people. A city must provide equity and also be sustainable. As an architect who has been closely connected with Delhi and its planning, my wish list is more about the direction we need to take so that future generations don't end up living in chaotic dysfunctional cities.

The first requirement for a city is a pragmatic plan. Many of our cities such as Delhi and Bhubaneswar and even Port Blair in the Andamans have reasonably good master plans. Many also have City Development Plans which have been made an essential requirement to draw funds from the government's Urban Renewal Programme (JNNURM). But they should be updated frequently based on the changing needs of its people.

And let's not forget its citizens - they need to be more pro-actively involved when evolving master plans. But often, there's lack of planning and inadequate implementation systems. This applies to all essential components of a city — streets, public transport system, traffic management , affordable housing, cars and parking , drainage, water supply, sewerage and garbage. Any deficiency in these will lead to poor quality cities which won't be able to handle the pressures of increased population and changing needs.

The second requirement of a good city is good social infrastructure such as parks and places for leisure such as river and sea fronts. It needs to preserve and protect its heritage. We are a nation with a rich diversity in culture, arts and crafts and cities are great platforms for that, given the right facilities. And let's not forget good and affordable educational and healthcare facilities too.
We don't have to look far. There are enough cities worldwide which have managed to radically improve the quality of life of its citizens. Take Singapore. It has managed to limit cars and has a very efficient transport system. Shanghai has wonderful footpaths everywhere. New York is actively developing cycling facilities in large parts while Holland, Denmark and other Scandinavian countries have developed cities around a bicycling infrastructure , creating a complete culture around them which is humane and ecological. There's Tokyo , the world's most populous city, which has a metro system used by 80% of the population.

But a great sustainable and livable city doesn't emerge by accident and its development cannot be taken for granted. It requires hard work, cohesive planning and meticulous implementation. And high management skills.

Perhaps the time has come to have an Indian Urban Service, a body of highly trained professionals who will manage the city. This could be akin to the IAS, IFS, Revenue and Forest services. There's also a need for a top-notch thinktank which develops policy and goals for urbanism. These should include the best people from various areas - town planning, urban designing, transport, energy, environment , public utilities, landscape , housing, etc.

But a start has been made. JNNURM , which is some six years old, has started an ambitious development plan in many cities. The results have been encouraging. But to bring our cities to any basic level of development, many more need to be brought into its fold. More areas need to be addressed. We also need to reinvent and restructure the institutions that served us well in the past such as Town and Country Planning Organization, the DDA in Delhi and the MMRDA in Mumbai. Then, there are also research organizations such as CRRI for roads and transportation and CBRI for buildings. Reinventing them will need political will and administrative vision.

There are some glimmers of hope. I met up young Navdeep Ahuja who along with another colleague , began the innocuously named Graduates Welfare Association Fazilka. They are bringing about change with the mandate of citizens participation in governance and are facilitating the creation of physical and social infrastructure across 22 cities in Punjab. The have put in place a network of cycle rickshaws called Ecocabs which can be booked through a mobile phone. They are also developing car free zones, food and culture streets in these cities. All this is being done very efficiently and at a low cost. We need many such organizations.

However, my ideal of a city in 2020 is not a utopian dream. It is achievable. It has streets where people walk on wide footpaths shaded by leafy trees. Streets are usually one-third of a city's area and its most democratic segment. Public space dedicated to pedestrians reduces inequality and should be accorded priority when developing cities.

Adjoining the streets should be cycle lanes where bicycles and rickshaws can sail past smoothly. It'll have a great public transport system with buses, metro and taxis. Parking will be difficult and expensive so people will use public transport rather than cars. There will be parks and gardens and the air will be clean, as pollution levels will have dropped dramatically.

And then, cities will become areas of graceful living and a charmed way of life.

(The writer is an architect and urban planner based in New Delhi.)

A tale for many cities by Pradeep Sachdeva

In just eight years, 2020 will be upon us. By then, our cities will be either areas of more chaos or meaningfully planned. The choice is ours. We are at a crucial junction as far as urbanism goes. The need to work vigorously on our cities and improve them is urgent and critical. Their populations have surged tremendously in the last few decades . Delhi's population increased from12.8m in 2001 to 16.3m in 2011. Bangalore grew from 5.7m to 8.5m during the same period.

Our urban planners have perhaps not understood the nature of the modern city, what it takes not just to run them but to make them livable. The two key requirements of a city are: provision of basic services and social infrastructure. These need to be developed together.

So what is a city? It's a dense amalgamation of buildings and people. A city must provide equity and also be sustainable. As an architect who has been closely connected with Delhi and its planning, my wish list is more about the direction we need to take so that future generations don't end up living in chaotic dysfunctional cities.

The first requirement for a city is a pragmatic plan. Many of our cities such as Delhi and Bhubaneswar and even Port Blair in the Andamans have reasonably good master plans. Many also have City Development Plans which have been made an essential requirement to draw funds from the government's Urban Renewal Programme (JNNURM). But they should be updated frequently based on the changing needs of its people.

And let's not forget its citizens - they need to be more pro-actively involved when evolving master plans. But often, there's lack of planning and inadequate implementation systems. This applies to all essential components of a city — streets, public transport system, traffic management , affordable housing, cars and parking , drainage, water supply, sewerage and garbage. Any deficiency in these will lead to poor quality cities which won't be able to handle the pressures of increased population and changing needs.

The second requirement of a good city is good social infrastructure such as parks and places for leisure such as river and sea fronts. It needs to preserve and protect its heritage. We are a nation with a rich diversity in culture, arts and crafts and cities are great platforms for that, given the right facilities. And let's not forget good and affordable educational and healthcare facilities too.
We don't have to look far. There are enough cities worldwide which have managed to radically improve the quality of life of its citizens. Take Singapore. It has managed to limit cars and has a very efficient transport system. Shanghai has wonderful footpaths everywhere. New York is actively developing cycling facilities in large parts while Holland, Denmark and other Scandinavian countries have developed cities around a bicycling infrastructure , creating a complete culture around them which is humane and ecological. There's Tokyo , the world's most populous city, which has a metro system used by 80% of the population.

But a great sustainable and livable city doesn't emerge by accident and its development cannot be taken for granted. It requires hard work, cohesive planning and meticulous implementation. And high management skills.

Perhaps the time has come to have an Indian Urban Service, a body of highly trained professionals who will manage the city. This could be akin to the IAS, IFS, Revenue and Forest services. There's also a need for a top-notch thinktank which develops policy and goals for urbanism. These should include the best people from various areas - town planning, urban designing, transport, energy, environment , public utilities, landscape , housing, etc.

But a start has been made. JNNURM , which is some six years old, has started an ambitious development plan in many cities. The results have been encouraging. But to bring our cities to any basic level of development, many more need to be brought into its fold. More areas need to be addressed. We also need to reinvent and restructure the institutions that served us well in the past such as Town and Country Planning Organization, the DDA in Delhi and the MMRDA in Mumbai. Then, there are also research organizations such as CRRI for roads and transportation and CBRI for buildings. Reinventing them will need political will and administrative vision.

There are some glimmers of hope. I met up young Navdeep Ahuja who along with another colleague , began the innocuously named Graduates Welfare Association Fazilka. They are bringing about change with the mandate of citizens participation in governance and are facilitating the creation of physical and social infrastructure across 22 cities in Punjab. The have put in place a network of cycle rickshaws called Ecocabs which can be booked through a mobile phone. They are also developing car free zones, food and culture streets in these cities. All this is being done very efficiently and at a low cost. We need many such organizations.

However, my ideal of a city in 2020 is not a utopian dream. It is achievable. It has streets where people walk on wide footpaths shaded by leafy trees. Streets are usually one-third of a city's area and its most democratic segment. Public space dedicated to pedestrians reduces inequality and should be accorded priority when developing cities.

Adjoining the streets should be cycle lanes where bicycles and rickshaws can sail past smoothly. It'll have a great public transport system with buses, metro and taxis. Parking will be difficult and expensive so people will use public transport rather than cars. There will be parks and gardens and the air will be clean, as pollution levels will have dropped dramatically.

And then, cities will become areas of graceful living and a charmed way of life.

(The writer is an architect and urban planner based in New Delhi.)

A tale for many cities by Pradeep Sachdeva

In just eight years, 2020 will be upon us. By then, our cities will be either areas of more chaos or meaningfully planned. The choice is ours. We are at a crucial junction as far as urbanism goes. The need to work vigorously on our cities and improve them is urgent and critical. Their populations have surged tremendously in the last few decades . Delhi's population increased from12.8m in 2001 to 16.3m in 2011. Bangalore grew from 5.7m to 8.5m during the same period.

Our urban planners have perhaps not understood the nature of the modern city, what it takes not just to run them but to make them livable. The two key requirements of a city are: provision of basic services and social infrastructure. These need to be developed together.

So what is a city? It's a dense amalgamation of buildings and people. A city must provide equity and also be sustainable. As an architect who has been closely connected with Delhi and its planning, my wish list is more about the direction we need to take so that future generations don't end up living in chaotic dysfunctional cities.

The first requirement for a city is a pragmatic plan. Many of our cities such as Delhi and Bhubaneswar and even Port Blair in the Andamans have reasonably good master plans. Many also have City Development Plans which have been made an essential requirement to draw funds from the government's Urban Renewal Programme (JNNURM). But they should be updated frequently based on the changing needs of its people.

And let's not forget its citizens - they need to be more pro-actively involved when evolving master plans. But often, there's lack of planning and inadequate implementation systems. This applies to all essential components of a city — streets, public transport system, traffic management , affordable housing, cars and parking , drainage, water supply, sewerage and garbage. Any deficiency in these will lead to poor quality cities which won't be able to handle the pressures of increased population and changing needs.

The second requirement of a good city is good social infrastructure such as parks and places for leisure such as river and sea fronts. It needs to preserve and protect its heritage. We are a nation with a rich diversity in culture, arts and crafts and cities are great platforms for that, given the right facilities. And let's not forget good and affordable educational and healthcare facilities too.
We don't have to look far. There are enough cities worldwide which have managed to radically improve the quality of life of its citizens. Take Singapore. It has managed to limit cars and has a very efficient transport system. Shanghai has wonderful footpaths everywhere. New York is actively developing cycling facilities in large parts while Holland, Denmark and other Scandinavian countries have developed cities around a bicycling infrastructure , creating a complete culture around them which is humane and ecological. There's Tokyo , the world's most populous city, which has a metro system used by 80% of the population.

But a great sustainable and livable city doesn't emerge by accident and its development cannot be taken for granted. It requires hard work, cohesive planning and meticulous implementation. And high management skills.

Perhaps the time has come to have an Indian Urban Service, a body of highly trained professionals who will manage the city. This could be akin to the IAS, IFS, Revenue and Forest services. There's also a need for a top-notch thinktank which develops policy and goals for urbanism. These should include the best people from various areas - town planning, urban designing, transport, energy, environment , public utilities, landscape , housing, etc.

But a start has been made. JNNURM , which is some six years old, has started an ambitious development plan in many cities. The results have been encouraging. But to bring our cities to any basic level of development, many more need to be brought into its fold. More areas need to be addressed. We also need to reinvent and restructure the institutions that served us well in the past such as Town and Country Planning Organization, the DDA in Delhi and the MMRDA in Mumbai. Then, there are also research organizations such as CRRI for roads and transportation and CBRI for buildings. Reinventing them will need political will and administrative vision.

There are some glimmers of hope. I met up young Navdeep Ahuja who along with another colleague , began the innocuously named Graduates Welfare Association Fazilka. They are bringing about change with the mandate of citizens participation in governance and are facilitating the creation of physical and social infrastructure across 22 cities in Punjab. The have put in place a network of cycle rickshaws called Ecocabs which can be booked through a mobile phone. They are also developing car free zones, food and culture streets in these cities. All this is being done very efficiently and at a low cost. We need many such organizations.

However, my ideal of a city in 2020 is not a utopian dream. It is achievable. It has streets where people walk on wide footpaths shaded by leafy trees. Streets are usually one-third of a city's area and its most democratic segment. Public space dedicated to pedestrians reduces inequality and should be accorded priority when developing cities.

Adjoining the streets should be cycle lanes where bicycles and rickshaws can sail past smoothly. It'll have a great public transport system with buses, metro and taxis. Parking will be difficult and expensive so people will use public transport rather than cars. There will be parks and gardens and the air will be clean, as pollution levels will have dropped dramatically.

And then, cities will become areas of graceful living and a charmed way of life.

(The writer is an architect and urban planner based in New Delhi.)

A tale for many cities by Pradeep Sachdeva

In just eight years, 2020 will be upon us. By then, our cities will be either areas of more chaos or meaningfully planned. The choice is ours. We are at a crucial junction as far as urbanism goes. The need to work vigorously on our cities and improve them is urgent and critical. Their populations have surged tremendously in the last few decades . Delhi's population increased from12.8m in 2001 to 16.3m in 2011. Bangalore grew from 5.7m to 8.5m during the same period.

Our urban planners have perhaps not understood the nature of the modern city, what it takes not just to run them but to make them livable. The two key requirements of a city are: provision of basic services and social infrastructure. These need to be developed together.

So what is a city? It's a dense amalgamation of buildings and people. A city must provide equity and also be sustainable. As an architect who has been closely connected with Delhi and its planning, my wish list is more about the direction we need to take so that future generations don't end up living in chaotic dysfunctional cities.

The first requirement for a city is a pragmatic plan. Many of our cities such as Delhi and Bhubaneswar and even Port Blair in the Andamans have reasonably good master plans. Many also have City Development Plans which have been made an essential requirement to draw funds from the government's Urban Renewal Programme (JNNURM). But they should be updated frequently based on the changing needs of its people.

And let's not forget its citizens - they need to be more pro-actively involved when evolving master plans. But often, there's lack of planning and inadequate implementation systems. This applies to all essential components of a city — streets, public transport system, traffic management , affordable housing, cars and parking , drainage, water supply, sewerage and garbage. Any deficiency in these will lead to poor quality cities which won't be able to handle the pressures of increased population and changing needs.

The second requirement of a good city is good social infrastructure such as parks and places for leisure such as river and sea fronts. It needs to preserve and protect its heritage. We are a nation with a rich diversity in culture, arts and crafts and cities are great platforms for that, given the right facilities. And let's not forget good and affordable educational and healthcare facilities too.
We don't have to look far. There are enough cities worldwide which have managed to radically improve the quality of life of its citizens. Take Singapore. It has managed to limit cars and has a very efficient transport system. Shanghai has wonderful footpaths everywhere. New York is actively developing cycling facilities in large parts while Holland, Denmark and other Scandinavian countries have developed cities around a bicycling infrastructure , creating a complete culture around them which is humane and ecological. There's Tokyo , the world's most populous city, which has a metro system used by 80% of the population.

But a great sustainable and livable city doesn't emerge by accident and its development cannot be taken for granted. It requires hard work, cohesive planning and meticulous implementation. And high management skills.

Perhaps the time has come to have an Indian Urban Service, a body of highly trained professionals who will manage the city. This could be akin to the IAS, IFS, Revenue and Forest services. There's also a need for a top-notch thinktank which develops policy and goals for urbanism. These should include the best people from various areas - town planning, urban designing, transport, energy, environment , public utilities, landscape , housing, etc.

But a start has been made. JNNURM , which is some six years old, has started an ambitious development plan in many cities. The results have been encouraging. But to bring our cities to any basic level of development, many more need to be brought into its fold. More areas need to be addressed. We also need to reinvent and restructure the institutions that served us well in the past such as Town and Country Planning Organization, the DDA in Delhi and the MMRDA in Mumbai. Then, there are also research organizations such as CRRI for roads and transportation and CBRI for buildings. Reinventing them will need political will and administrative vision.

There are some glimmers of hope. I met up young Navdeep Ahuja who along with another colleague , began the innocuously named Graduates Welfare Association Fazilka. They are bringing about change with the mandate of citizens participation in governance and are facilitating the creation of physical and social infrastructure across 22 cities in Punjab. The have put in place a network of cycle rickshaws called Ecocabs which can be booked through a mobile phone. They are also developing car free zones, food and culture streets in these cities. All this is being done very efficiently and at a low cost. We need many such organizations.

However, my ideal of a city in 2020 is not a utopian dream. It is achievable. It has streets where people walk on wide footpaths shaded by leafy trees. Streets are usually one-third of a city's area and its most democratic segment. Public space dedicated to pedestrians reduces inequality and should be accorded priority when developing cities.

Adjoining the streets should be cycle lanes where bicycles and rickshaws can sail past smoothly. It'll have a great public transport system with buses, metro and taxis. Parking will be difficult and expensive so people will use public transport rather than cars. There will be parks and gardens and the air will be clean, as pollution levels will have dropped dramatically.

And then, cities will become areas of graceful living and a charmed way of life.

(The writer is an architect and urban planner based in New Delhi.)

Towards Ideal villages

Jhamrun Mahali in Washim district is set to become a model village in Maharashtra's drought-prone, poverty-stricken Vidarbha region. By June, this village, along with 37 others modelled along the lines of the ‘ideal village' Hiware Bazaar, will be completely self-sustainable and thus ready to be called ‘Adarsh gaon' under the State government's Adarsh Gaon Yojana (AGY).

“How long are we going to be talk about Ralegan Siddhi and Hiware Bazaar? Why should we be satisfied with just two ‘ideal villages'? The success of our villages will be when a better village is created,” Mr. Popatrao Pawar, Sarpanch of Hiware Bazaar since 1989, told The Hindu. Mr. Pawar is now the executive director of the AGY, and selected other villages under this scheme. Social crusader Anna Hazare, whose efforts for his village Ralegan Siddhi were an inspiration for Hiware Bazaar, is the adviser for this programme.

A sum of Rs.8 crore has been given to these villages, 13 of which are from the Vidarbha region, known for its high number of farmer suicides. Kohlitola, a village from the Naxal-hit Gondia district has also made it to the list. The funding continues for three years for development works in the village.

Complete revival

A drought-prone village with only about 400mm of rainfall every year, Hiware Bazaar has seen a complete revival in the last two decades. Watershed development was adopted to fight the acute water crisis that the village was reeling under. The increased water levels resulted in a better yield, and more grass for animals to graze. This helped the village to make its way out of poverty by adopting cash crops and marketing its dairy products. This accomplishment has come from utilising the government schemes to suit the village requirements. The village came under the State's AGY in 1994, and since then, has been scripting its own success story.

The story of Hiware Bazaar that began in 1989 will repeat itself in these 38 villages in the years to come.

But being named an ‘Adarsh Gaon' is far from easy.Villages had to give a proposal after which a committee headed by Mr. Pawar inspected the villages. “The villages had to show dedication in the struggle to fight mediocrity. They had to follow all the conditions of becoming an ‘Adarsh gaon'. We chose villages with a revolutionary spark,” Mr. Pawar says.

Villages need to follow strict rules. The process begins with effective water management through the watershed technique and water auditing, taking responsibility of the village's natural resources- planting trees and stopping grazing, contributing labour for the village work, and then expanding to bring about behavioural changes in the people for harbouring social change. Hiware Bazaar is free of any kind of addiction and there are no liquor or tobacco shops in the village. Vasectomy has been made compulsory, as is the pre-marital HIV test.

The ‘Adarsh Gaon' model prides itself of being based on the joint decisions made by the Gram Sabha, where all the villagers are present. Even while selecting the new villages under the scheme, Mr. Pawar made sure that the decision to become an ideal village was taken by the entire village together.

The greatest victory for Hiware Bazaar so far has been the reverse migration that the village has witnessed since 1989. As many as 93 families have come back to the village, “from the slums in Mumbai and Pune” Mr. Pawar says. The village of 216 families was completely below poverty line (BPL) in 1989; now it has only three BPL families.

Speaking to The Hindu, Gulab Gaikwad, from one of the three BPL families, said: “We used to beg for a living and now I am working at the gram panchayats, whereas the other two families work as labour. It is because of our hard work that we will get out of the situation, like the rest of this village.” Speaking about the ‘rebirth of the 38 villages', Mr. Pawar says: “Vidarbha was our priority as the people are reeling under the pressure of land for agriculture. Farmers' suicides have become a norm, and people are becoming complacent because of all the ‘Vidarbha packages' which are obviously not helping. It is time for the villages to wake up and do something themselves.” One of the conditions of the AGY is also that a village cannot accept any government funding without adding some of their own funds to it. After the success of the projects that the villages take up, the funds have to be returned.

Among the other villages selected is Yavatmal's Pandhar Kavda. Yavatmal was the worst affected district with the highest number of farmer suicides. “The women of this village have decided that they will undertake the challenge of not accepting the Vidarbha package and rebuild the village on their own. They have promised that the funds that we have given to initiate the process will be returned to us,” Mr. Pawar said.

Sukru Naik Tanda, an adivasi village in Nanded district, is also part of the scheme. “The idea is to go beyond just water management, and create villages that are worth living,” Mr. Pawar says.

Financial empowerment is also a part of the plan. Hiware Bazaar is a model in this sense too. According to Mr. Avinash Bhatamreka, the branch manager of the Bank of Maharashtra in the village, there are about 80 loan accounts in the village, amounting to Rs.1 crore. “There are no defaulters and so far all the instalments have been paid on time,” he said. In a village economy where ‘sahukars' (traditional money-lenders) are the cause of much distress, banking is one of the many perks of being an ‘Adarsh Gaon'.

Mr. Pawar is hopeful that the process will not stop with just these villages. Twelve more villages have also been selected in the second phase of the scheme. “The aim is to make 50 villages ‘Adarsh' every year,” he states.

How does a nobody become somebody?

If, like me, you come from a family of non-achievers who were poor by western standards (Mother was unemployed, Step-Dad earned around £18,000 a year) and had never had a family member go to university (I was the first, and only the second to stay in education until 18), how can you overcome this and rise to actually matter? I am an intelligent person and excellent at my job, but the upper echelons (and even mid-levels) in my company are filled through cronyism and nepotism. The CEO fills the best jobs with his university classmates. The question applies to all fields of life, not only work. How can someone like me rise from the gutter to make what they are worth and realise their full potential?

First thing's first: Stop thinking you are a nobody.  This is by far your biggest obstacle. You are somebody. You always have been, you always will be. Measuring your self worth with things like family background, academic credentials, salary, and socio/economic status will always make you feel like you're "in the gutter."  You are more than that.  Believe it.  That said:

Recognize that you are self sufficient.  You have already achieved far more than the trust-fund babies that currently occupy the top positions at the company where you work. True, you are not making as much as them right now.  But there is a lot to be said for the muscle and skills you developed by having to work your way up and get to where you've gotten now.  You have this, they don't. They never will.  Nepotism and cronyism are great when the going's good, but it requires them to rely on other people for their success.

Network and make contacts. Be confident in your abilities, and others will see what you see in yourself. If you are intelligent and well-spoken, a smart, savvy person will see past superficial status markers (you mention in your question details) after the first five minutes. Keep in touch and continue to update him/her every so often when you do something good (which you will, because you are a hard worker).  If someone doesn't pay attention to you because they don't know your Mommy and Daddy and your kids don't play together, they're not worth your time: don't get insulted, move on.

Develop relationships with people you can trust. If you can find a mentor in someone who is in a higher position than you and recognizes your potential, do so-- he/she will be important in either a) guiding you up the ladder in the company you're currently at, or b) showing you what it takes to rise up at another company, or to create your own!

Continue to work hard and look ahead. Don't let the fact that you didn't start at the top of ladder, with a six-figure salary (all because the CEO's your father's old pal from Princeton and drinks whiskey with him every other Saturday at their favorite country club), distract you.  Life isn't fair-- but don't let that deter you.  Keep going.

Be kind to yourself.  Accept that you will make mistakes and that success will take time. It's trite, but I'll say it: Rome wasn't built in a day. Pace yourself.

There are over 7 Billion people alive on earth right now. Let's only discuss numbers in terms of one generation otherwise it gets too much for my little brain.

How many 'Somebodies' are there that you can think of? I do not mean Justin Bieber I mean people who have really accomplished something, and the recognition which goes with it.

Let's say that if you tried all day long you may end up with a list with a thousand names on it, now confer with a friend, perhaps you can make 2000 somebodies if you really try and include Jeff from the pub who sings karaoke like a boss.

This means that for every Somebody, there are 3500,000 regular people.

Now I have a sobering thought for you

Everyone is a somebody.....to somebody.

Stop trying to be amazing, stop worrying that you are nobody, lift up your head and ask instead, what can I offer the world?

Do what you love, and remember that you are already an interesting and worthwhile person, whether anyone in particular notices.

You will discover that there are people who notice you, who think you are pretty damn special, and together, you can have a special life, and if you live and die without that special existence ever being on the cover of a magazine, then who gives a fuck.

If you are only interested in being known, then pull your dick out on the bus, that will get you in the papers.

Be Somebody Not A Nobody

What would you rather be a somebody or a nobody? I think most people really have a desire to be a somebody, and a somebody that is liked and admired by others. The question is do you really know how to be a somebody, or do you really want to remain in the shadows of life?

Sometimes, it is difficult to know just what to do to actually be a somebody that people would want to know, trust, and respect. But, there are a few simple ways that one can have his or her presence felt in a good way.

One way is to be known as a person who always sees the good in every situation. This is a person who knows that life always will throw curve balls no matter how much you try and prevent it from happening. But, this is the kind of person who takes everything in stride and always looks for a solution to the issue. This kind of person is known as a doer not a complainer or one prone to use excuses to stop them in their tracks.

If you are a doer, you will be a somebody, a person that people will come to, will count on, and a person to be admired for their ability to move forward no matter what is going on.

A somebody is also a person who does not wait to be asked to do something whether this might be in a work situation or otherwise. This kind of person is the first to respond by saying that they can take on whatever needs to be done. This is the kind of person who makes things happen and does it well. If you are this kind of somebody, you will certainly be noticed and respected.

If you are a somebody, friends that could use a little help will call you. If you are this kind of person, you do not mind in the least of giving up your time or energy to come to a friend's assistance. You will be valued because you not only say you care but you actually demonstrate it time and time again.

Being a somebody puts you out in front of life not behind it. You are able to decide what is important and what is not. You do not seek wealth for the sake of wealth but know how to use wealth, if you have it, to help the most people most often.

Many people who want to be a somebody, cast a faint shadow in false pretense pretending to care when they really don't, or pretend to argue for what is right and just but are the first ones who will do whatever is necessary to come out ahead. These are the same kinds of people who pretend to be a friend but are the first ones to find an excuse not to help you, or say they are far too busy right now but call them another time. This person is a nobody not a somebody; a somebody is genuine and means what they say and follow through with the appropriate action.

You do not have to go out of your way to be different than you already are if you have within you the strength of character, a genuine person who really cares for others and shows it in all they do and how they behave. You do not have to be perfect either to be a somebody for each of us has our own faults but we try and correct these as we can, as best we can.

You can be a somebody if you want - you do not have to pretend.

To be a Somebody, Remain a Nobody by K S Ram

Prominent among the urges that inspire and drive a person in life, is the urge to be a somebody. It is quite human, especially in the early stages of life, to want to do something to win laurels and admiration of all around. There's a pitfall though — the very process of becoming a somebody may subtly reduce you to a nobody.

American poet Emily Dickinson who lived in obscurity, has an interesting poem on this theme. "I'm nobody!" she declares, with apparent pride. "Who are you?/ Are you nobody, too?" Why should anybody be happy about being nobody? The poem explains: "How dreary to be somebody!/ How public, like a frog/ To tell your name the livelong day/ To an admiring bog!"

The word 'bog' is significant. When you become a somebody, you invite adulation: this then begins to bog you down. The moment you think you have arrived, you begin to stagnate, or, worse, your downslide begins. An endless list of writers, artists, sportsmen, politicians... fit this pattern of personal history.

To sustain your development in absolute terms, to become a true somebody, it is important to remain a temporal nobody. Even if destiny makes you a temporal somebody, you should be able to see yourself as merely an agent of a superior power; no more. This requires an exercise of will. You have to constantly watch out and talk to yourself morning and evening. Rahim, the Hindi poet, was a pious man, always keen to help the needy. He made no noise about it, but his fame kept spreading. When praised by people, Rahim would shrink back in discomfort. He wrote a couplet on this. "Denewala aur hai, bhejat woh din-rain./ Log bharam hum par karen, neeche howat nain" — "The Giver is someone else; He showers His gifts through day and night./ People mistake and extol me. My eyes, abashed, are lowered!"

In more recent times, Gandhiji, perhaps, is one who assiduously brushed aside adulation to remain a free 'nobody'. At the Congress session when he, the star of the session, stunned everybody by cleaning up the latrines, his act was calculated to purge Congress workers of their false sense of status, and so to return the movement to its down- to-earth roots. The point of guarding against becoming a self-defeating somebody applies to the upbringing of children as well. Doting parents often stunt the natural growth of their children through excessive adula-tion. Commonplace acts and utterances of the child are praised and quoted beyond reason. Talent that otherwise might have flowered under proper training, is lauded to the extent of killing it.

John Stuart Mill's education and training began very early. At an age when many kids can barely lisp a few words, he had learnt enough Greek and Latin to read the classics in the original. Before he was five he had read more than what many scho-lars normally read in their career. Did this make the child John feel heady? No! Because, he tells us, his father (who was also his tutor) always made him believe that there was nothing extraordinary about his achievement: that he was doing only what anybody is capable of doing. Mill was made to believe that other boys of his age had, in fact, grossly underestimated their capabilities and were wasting their early years striving for too little.

The sequence of somebody-nobody holds true, in a way, in respect of institutions and nations as well. C Northcote Parkinson, enunciating one of his famous laws, has tried to read this pattern in the case of great empires worldwide. He connects the raising of imposing palaces to the beginning of the empire's decline.

Two Billion Dollar Dream

Introduction of the text:

The name of Michael Dell must be familiar to many young peoples, especially to those who are determined to go in for business. Born in 1965, this wizard boy is able to turn himself into a multibillion-dollar tycoon in a matter of a few years. How does he do it? This text gives us a glimpse of the special qualities of this boy, which have contributed to his dramatic success.
Dell’s success story begins with a brilliant idea. This idea may seem like commonsense today, but Del is the first to hit upon that idea. This is the first secret of his success: to be the first. Success usually belongs to the person who dares to be the first, to be creative and original, and Dell is always bursting with new ideas. Another thing is his ambition. Dell is highly motivated. Even when a teenager he already vows to compete with IBM. It is this goal that gives him the strength and courage to strive so hard. Equally important is his tenacity. He works hard. He never gives up. His success is the result of his toil and sweat. The next point is perhaps his thirst for knowledge. It is true that Dell did not finish school. But that does not mean that he has had no education or that he can succeed without education. He actually studies harder and with a clearer focus. Therefore it would be wrong to conclude from Dell’s story that school education is irrelevant, although it does seem that serious reform has to be carried out to allow a genius to develop his special interests.
The secret of Dell’s success
A.       To be the first:
he is the first one to hit upon a brilliant idea, commonsense though. Success usually belongs to the person who dares to be the first, to be creative and original.
B.    Ambitious and highly moltivated:
Even when a teenager he already vows to compete with IBM. It is this goal that that gives him the strength and courage to strive so hard.
C.       His tenacity:
He works hard, and never gives up. His success is the result of his toil and sweat.
D.       His thirst for knowledge:
It is true that Dell did not finish school. But that does not mean that he has had no education or that he can succeed without education. He actually studies harder and with a clearer focus.
Genre of Writing: success story
1. Typical Form of Success Story
  One incident/episode occurred in the childhood.
  This incident began to change the person’s idea.
  He became successful by hard working and good luck.
  He donated charity back to the society.
2. … from teenager to a tycoon: repetition of the first sound or letter of a succession of words.
Alliteration (首韵): repetition of the same sound, as a consonant or cluster, at the beginning of two or more stressed syllables; the commencement of two or more words of a word group with the same letter.
  come clean  全盘招供
  from stem to stern  从船头到船尾
  live and learn 活到老学到老
  a bolt from the blue 晴天霹雳，意外事件
  bag and baggage 完全彻底
  safe and sound 安全无恙
  toss and turn 辗转反侧
Text Theme
  The boy was able to turn himself into a multibillion-dollar tycoon in a matter of a few years.
  His success demonstrates the qualities that  have contributed to the dramatic success.
  The success is the result of his toil and sweat.
Structure of the text
Part 1 (paras.1-3 ):
The author begins the text with an episode to show some qualities for success.
Part 2 (paras.4-28 ):
He boosted into a firm in start-up process and his transitional period.
Part 3 (paras.29-33  ):
The author shows us Dell’s private life, charitable work and Dell’s ideas.
Text Analysis
Part 1 (paras. 1—3)
Question 1: What is the episode in his childhood?
In spite of being teased for not using fishing pole, Dell used a trotline (fishing device to which several hooks could be attached) to get more fish than others had caught all together.
Question 2: What qualities did Dell have?
  “Dell sat on the beach, painstakingly putting trotline…”
     qualities he shows: careful, ready to do sth. with great effort
  He uses trotline different from other common fishing poles
     qualities he shows: creative, intelligent, trying to experience new ideas and willing to take risks
  He kept working when the family told him “you are wasting time” and teased him
     qualities he shows: determined, tenacious and persevering
Part 2 (paras. 4—28)
a) High school year (paras. 8—9)
Question:  What did he do to earn $18,000?
He sold subscriptions to the Houston Post.
How did he make it?
He identified his potential consumers             the newlyweds
He reached them                       By copying names and addresses                                                                                                                                            
                                  of newlyweds and storing into computer
Dell made customers buy it                Special service by sending                                                                    
                                       a personalized letter, and offering
                                       a free two-week subscription.
b) University year (paras.10—19): How did Dell start business?
1st stage (paras. 10—11):
He identified the market’s need and boosted into firm.
  Consumers wanted low-cost computer custom-made to their needs.
  Dealers wanted to sell more computers from their excess inventory.
  Dell bought dealers’ surplus stock at cheap price and added features to machines—souped-up models.
Question 1: How did he boost into a firm?
  advertisement: placing the local advertisement.
  marketing skills:1.5% off retail price to customers.
  Targets:focusing on the businesses, doctors’offices and law firms.
Question 2: What are the qualities he demonstrated?
  a good sense of marketing
  sensitivity to advertisement
2nd stage (paras. 12—19)
Question 1: What happened during thanksgiving break in his first college year?
   His parents asked him to continue his study.
Question 2: What happened over spring recess?
   Dell and his parents made a deal. They agreed that Dell dropped out of school.
Result: Dell started selling computers with a vengeance.
a) After univesity years
1st  stage (paras. 20—23): start-up process
Question 1: How did Dell run the business?
  He rented a one-room office on a monthly lease.
  He hired his first employee handling finance and administration.
  He sketched advertisement on the back of pizza box.
  He specialized in customized computers.
Question 2: How did he keep the business efficient?
  He moved to larger quarters and hired more staff.
  He delivered goods at cheaper prices by UPS trucks.
  He offered unique features that customers need.
  He kept inventory and overhead low.
2nd  stage (para. 24): Transition
Question 1: What happened to him after he had established the firm?
His manager left the company.
Question 2: How did he handle the crisis?
He learned the accounting basics himself, which later proved invaluable in his career.
Question 3: What were the qualities he demonstrated?
  Positive attitude, ready to overcome difficulties.
  Optimistic attitude towards the difficulties.
3rd stage (paras. 25—26) Success
 Question: What did he do in order to outcompete his rivals?
marketing strategies:                      purposes:

  money-back guarantee         to win the trust from the customers
  next-day on-site service        to show the commitment to the service
  24-hour-a-day toll-free line     to reduce time in after-sales service and                         keep close relation with customers
3rd stage (paras. 27—28):  Landmark:
    Dell quit dealing in souped-up version of other companies’ products, and started designing, assembling and marketing his own.
The scale of his business:
  5,500 employees
  over $2 billion revenue
  subsidiaries in 16 countries
  personal fortune betw. $250 million and $ 300 million
Part 3 (paras. 29—33)
  Dell’s personal life: He led a quiet and normal life.
  He encouraged people to try to achieve their dreams.
a maze of: a large number of things arranged in a complicated and confusing way 混乱的一堆  e.g.
A maze of narrow alleys leads down to the sea.迂回曲折的小径通往海边。
The building is a maze of corridors. 这座建筑的长廊交错，象迷宫一样。
to call it a day: to decide to stop working because you have down enough or because you are tired, etc. 收工，结束一天的工作。E.g.
I’m tired and hungry. Let’s call it a day.
After 40years in politics he thinks it’s time to call it a day.
To call it quits(for the day): to agree to stop doing sth. 同意停止做e.g.
Let’s do one more exercise, and we’ll call it quits for today.
youngster& youth
youngster: a young man 年轻人
youth: the period of time; the young people as a group 青春；青年人  
reel in/ out: (= spool)  to wind sth on /off a reel 在卷轴上缠绕e.g.
The boy began to reel in the line slowly when he wanted to stop flying the kite.
Reel + adv / prep 蹒跚，摇晃；旋转 e.g.
when she woke up, she found the room reeling.
be imbued with/by: to be filled with or inspired by certain feeling.使充满；灌输e.g.
The Egyptian poor are deeply imbued with the teachings of Islam. 埃及穷人深受伊斯兰教义的影响。
Young people are usually imbued with strong patriotic feelings.
Saleswoman came asking to speak to “Mr. Michael Dell” about his getting a high school equivalency diploma. Obviously the 8-year-old boy had asked this saleswoman about the possibility of buying high school equivalency diploma, not knowing of course that the diploma is not for sales. Dell’s parents naturally were surprised; therefore he had to “explain” to them. （Notice that this little anecdote is not supposed to reflect Dell’s dishonesty. It is meant to show that he was unusual even as a little boy. He couldn’t wait to complete his education.）
With a vengeance: (infml.) even to a greater degree than is normal, expected, or desired变本加厉地；过度地；猛烈地 e.g.
He tried to quit smoking---only for two weeks. Then he started smoking again, with a vengeance.
In some areas, TB（Tuberculosis）is back, and with a vengeance.
The music started up again with a vengeance.
 heap up: to put a lot of things on top of each other in an untidy way （杂乱地）堆积；堆放
to come/go to grips with: to understand and deal with a difficult problem or situation
了解并应付（难题或局面）e.g.
It’s high time we came to grips with the drug problem.
The first thing they decided to come to grips with was their financial reform.
I have never really got to grips with this new technology.
specialize in: be a specialist in 专门研究，专攻 e.g.
She is a literature major, and specializes in women literature.
I don’t think that it’s a good idea to try to specialize in anything now. we should try to be well-grounded in all the major fields first.
 to keep pace with: to move or change as fast as the increasing demand/ or as someone/ sth. else 与…并驾齐驱; 齐头并进; 跟上  e.g.
We must keep pace with the changing times.
    It’s getting more and more difficult to keep pace with the rapid development of science and technology.
 pan out: happen or develop in a particular way (以某种方式)发生, 进展 e.g.
    If I don't pan out as an actor I can still go back to school. (Saul Bellow)如果我不能胜任做一名医生，我仍能够回到学校 (索尔•贝洛)
It depends how things pan out. 那得看事情结果怎样了
edge out: To surpass or beat by a small margin 排挤掉：以微弱优势超过或胜过e.g.
The downhill racer edged her opponent out on the middle stretch.下坡滑雪赛的选手将她的对手慢慢挤出中央跑道.
Edge out the opposing team by one point.
on edge: to be nervous, especially because you are expecting something unpleasant to happen紧张的：高度紧张或不安的；易怒的；惴惴不安；烦躁的 e.g.
I have been on edge ever since I got her letter.
Mary is terribly on edge now that the examinations are approaching.
be credited to: attribute to; owe to把…归功于; 是某事发生的原因e.g.
The victory was largely credited to his wonderful generalship.
    She credited her progress to her classmate’s help.
    You can’t credit the good harvest to favorable weather conditions only.
    Much of their success can be credited to Wilson --- an expert.
soup sth. up: (infml) to improve sth. by making it bigger, more attractive, or more exciting 使增大, 使更有吸引力, 使更刺激 e.g.
    Software programs to soup up the office E-mail