Dragon Footprints

A clothing brand will rain you with discounts; a nearest mall will offer you freebies and discounts. You will be enticed by the offer and lap it all in not realizing it left you bleeding. There is no free lunch anywhere, is there? But who thinks about it huh? You would rather throw obscenities to your local store who is honest with you in business but dont offer discounts. Count the pennies you save in the long run.

Anyway, so there are gifts being bestowed by The Dragon to countries in South Asia, Caribbean, Oceanic islands.......Male, Maldives, Mauritius, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Burma, Pakistan....either in kind or as infrastructure. Its sudden interest and closeness to Myanmar due to probable resurgence of democracy may have caused it a panic attack of losing a Red foothold. 

Otherwise? Build and gift a new port in Hambantotta in Lanka only to lease it for 100 odd years or so; gain a upper hand in the trade routes in Indian ocean or be friends and offer human  resources to construct modern highways. Influence Nepal and strengthen its hold on Tibet by gifting them a nice complex (I forgot what that complex was for). Forget it; one cannot value the sops provided to Pakistan its close ally. It showed its concern during the recent political turmoil in Male while India kept mum; inviting the wrath of the Male government which considered India as its ally.

The Dragon's economic might has rolled up to America's doorstep now - in the Caribbean. A $35 million cricket stadium in Bahamas to start with. The island of Dominician Republic got a school while Antigua and Barbados got a power plant and a stadium while school is on the way. It just starts. Trinidad & Tobago's PM got a new makeover to her official residence, all thanks to the Dragon.

Loans galore from companies and such lavish gifts from government in the form of roads, stadiums, schools, ports in a region where US has flexed its muscles all the while. Now Uncle Sam should have woken up already. The wings brushed every corner of the world and now at US's footsteps would definitely garner interests. The Chinese have done it right; they are not building any military ties; so no threat to security. Instead they have hit the keg deep; the right keg and the picket fence is tiny but will be strong in terms of securing economic and political support. These countries could not have counted on anyone else apart from US and Canada and maybe Europe. That will change now. They will continue to get billions of dollars of grants and loans; strengthening trade and tourism and new allies.

About long term impacts, one has to wait and watch since there is nothing like a free lunch ;-)
The Dragon will continue flying; while we turn our heads away

Crumbling and Down

So this seems to be the season of break downs, shut down and collapse.

The Kodak moment is finally over. A brand synonymous with film rolls when we had those classical cameras; which limited the number of photos one can afford to waste. It was static; not possible to delete and redo and click photos after photos because you had 16 GB of space on your memory card.

I miss those moments when we were asked to "pose" for the camera - stand still, look straight, smile and then the "Click". Move on!!! Life Rolls on just like Kodak film rolls.

When I thought moral policing was only Mutalik and gang, our Big Uncle Sam seems to be the latest to join the group! Hearing about the SOPA and PIPA? No they are not another soccer association as FIFA! (Now curse me!!) but IP protection act. So are they trying to protect intellectual property or curbing freedom of expression. Well, you know how it works! Introduce something to curb something else - DIPLOMATICALLY and say "We did it for you guys!"

Who knows folks? This may be one last post from me when I can speak my mind. Wish Rajnikanth did something about this. There is a new website from Rajnikanth which works only without Internet! Maybe we should all migrate to that.

Well, I am busy falling sick nowadays! Yeah its that time of the year when you earn some money if you fall sick. Submitting IT proofs! I need to submit medical bills to claim tax-free component of my salary. Now how will I get to save tax on 15000/- if I dont fall sick? Tell me? So I am severely falling sick within the limits of 15000/-

Hmm, I am out now!

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