Uncanny Valley

This is a hospital for sick and injured birds in Old Delhi. Indian is not a rich country, despite it being a rising star in the global economy. So the fact that there are people caring for birds when there is so much human poverty is pretty amazing. It also means that inside is not for the faint of heart. I saw some birds that looked at me upside down, because their necks were almost completely broken. Many birds were missing feathers, beaks, feet, it really was sad. I had to give them a big donation.

The hospital is on the upper floors of a building behind the Sri Digambar Jain Lal Mandir temple. Since the temple is Jainist, that means any and all leather products must be checked before entry. This was easy for me, because I’m vegan, but I still had to take off my shoes as a sign of respect.

Inside the temple is also pretty interesting. There is this whole faux-cave thing that is super air conditioned and very pleasant. Even if you aren’t dying from the heat it is worth it to relax a bit after seeing the sick birds.

A restaurant furnished with items from thieves’ markets (in Hindi that’s ‘chor bazaar,’ get it?). The food was not that great but not horrible. The decor and service were good. Perhaps worth a stop by if you’re near Delhi Gate.

The restaurant is in the Hotel Broadway, which most drivers seem to know about.

This is quite a different experience than factory tours in the U.S.. Sanganer is known for paper and printing, and our driver managed to find this place when we crossed the river from Jaipur. Note that hiring a driver in India isn’t nearly as fancy as it would be in the U.S..

In any event, we managed to get an impromptu tour that seemed to borrow a bit from when they show clients around. The manager was very hospitable in that respect to give such a thorough tour with no notice. Fortunately for us it was during the lunch break, so we were able to see more than perhaps we could normally have. We also were able to see how Indian factory workers deal with the heat, which is by napping. Also interesting is what is considered ‘men’s work’ and what is ‘women’s work.’ It did not need to hinge on difficulty: I feel it has more to do with socialising than anything.

The small factory supplies big brands like Target in the U.S., and they had a wide variety of paper products with varying textures and colours and properties. The paper is all made from scrap cotton bits from a clothing manufacturer. All paper trimmings are recycled here, and even the dye water is reused. Such mindfulness never ceases to impress me. There was not even the strong odor of many paper factories, which leads me to suspect that they use less toxic chemicals in processing. The factory does all aspects of manufacture, and was very flexible in what they could make, and all by hand.

At the end, we were led to the sample room. We got a lot of fancy paper sheets, and some nice blank books, all for about 1/20th of the U.S. price. I think they still made a profit off us though. I must say that before I walked through the doors, I had a much different expectation on how the workers would be treated and what the environmental impacts were. It makes me wonder why all the companies in the West whine so much about how everything gets in the way of profitability. I think obstinance against such mindfulness is the big obstacle more than anything.

So yea, definitely a memorable and favorable experience.

A pretty wide net cast on the topic of commodes. There are some choice exhibits in the small museum, but it is by no means complete, and it was only established in 1994. It is on the grounds of a sanitation company, Sulabh, and seems to be a consolidation of all the random things one would acquire in the industry. They have all sorts of commodes, from chairs with hidden chamberpots to jewel-encrusted ‘thrones.’ (Is ‘encrusted’ really an appropriate term in this case?).

However, don’t just visit the Sulabh campus for the museum. When I visited I was shown many interesting things with much of that Indian hospitality. There are display models of the composting outhouses the company makes, some that even produce usable methane bio-gas. There is a large public lavatory facing the street which provides gas power for the kitchen and some lighting. The loos also provide water and compost for a lush garden, which in a Delhi summer was pretty striking. I also saw the laboratory, public health clinic (wash your hands, people!), and library.

Our guide summed it up nicely: “If people adopted what is here, the water would be much cleaner.” With water becoming more and more scarce, this is something all people are going to have to think about more and more.

I am really impressed with the thoroughness of Indian industry. They look at all aspects of a product and its byproducts. Any wastes need to be accounted for, and if possible used as resources. Instead of just providing sanitation services, they provide cheap power, water, and fertilizer to villages. It shows that industry being green is hardly contradictory to profitabilty, and it almost seems that without such thoroughness a business is oly holding itself back.