Breaking the pattern
Posted on 04. Oct, 2010 by Leela Raina in India
tianjin
buildings
On my way to Tianjin I noticed a peculiar pattern of housing across the mainland and in the business centre of China, Tianjin as well. High rise buildings mostly with floors and floors of apartments followed a consistent pattern. The windows, the air conditioner and even the hoods for the balcony would be exactly the same. The only thing that could distinguish one part of the city from the other was the style of these high rise buildings or housing societies.
I could not also but help making parallels between New Delhi and Beijing , its the same mad rush hour with cars honking and speeding away. Like Delhi it also has some areas- rural and then other districts of the town that are completely urbanised.
At the negotiations today you could gauge from the report backs from the Swiss and Mexican government that there was considerable movement on finance and consensus building measures for the delivery of the finance but there seemed to be discourse within the G77 and China since Egypt who took the floor emphasized on the fact that any kind of segregation among the developing economies would impede the growth of the negotiations whereas Grenada emphasized that making a segregation is required and bolder mitigation actions from both developed and developing countries are expected.
same buildings
This is an issue that has been coming up over and over again, something that takes a different shape everytime but follows the same pattern . But will the pattern be broken and how long will it take? Christiana also mentioned in her speech that ,’ Now, is the time’. Especially for those on behalf of whom they negotiate!
In introspect, from the past COP and intersessional , I have been following a pattern myself, where I feel that the Indian Negotiators don’t take me seriously since I am young. After all what would a 21 year old girl know about finance? Everyone including the civil society colleagues think , oh god that superficial knowledge is going to lead nowhere. This is where I need to step down and break my own pattern. I don’t want to be seen as the young girl who had all the access to her negotiators but never took full advantage of it? I don’t want to be the one pointed out to as someone who is technically not sound and has no backing.
In the morning and roughly after every hour or two I bumped into one of my negotiators from the team , mostly Rashmi Sir who has finally agreed to give me updates,but I wonder whether he really gives out any information to me or whether all in the team are being just there usual diplomatic sweet talk selves. Although today when I met Jagdish Sir browsing some booths and suggested him a side event and gave him the details of the importance it had for India, you could see the change in his behaviour and body language instantly , I was taken seriously. So do I assume the rest of the conversation before that was useless?
negotiators
From tomorrow I will make sure that I ask the hard questions but tone down on the fun ones. I am still in a bit of a dilemma , would you help me out by telling me what would you rather get hooked on to?
I understand where the perception comes from since I write blogs and do try and make them funny or try and make them comprehensible for the common public. That’s the objective , not knowing and critiquing the policies. I understand there are people who would want more of policy and technically rich literature here about the legal outcome or what the agenda for the BASIC meeting is , but the idea is that I understand and convert all of that into language that is comprehensive for someone who is clicking on such a page for the first time. Sometimes I wish I were older or more serious , but then I realise that everyone is unique and has a special role to play and maybe you all could help me identify that.
some more apartments
I am fully competent that you’ll ask the tough questions Leela. Go show them your stuff!
Hard questions are what interest me. I think that your skills with using metaphors and fun in your writing could make some of these issues accessible to a wider audience!
Well, breaking the pattern doesn’t mean you ignore what makes your writing special. I can refer to a hundred other websites if I need to critically understand finances and other complex aspects of the negotiations but I come here to get a sense of how things are progressing and what the negotiators are upto! Only suggestion for you is to develop hyper-linking in your posts! There are hardly any and you can skip the technical details by linking them to sites where people who are interested can browse them at leisure. Atleast refer to your previous posts wherever applicable! Waiting to read more :)
Sorry, the above comment was from me (chaitanya). I accidentally typed Leela assuming I was addressing you ala an email !
@ peter - thank you peter and
@ leela- thanks for your suggestions, will definitely take note of that.
Probably the best thing would be to ask the tough questions as much as possible,ppl who are older than us or are senior to us(especially profs and friends who come up to u nd ask you to help with their computers, tired of telling ppl that not all Indian ppl are programmers..)tend to treat the youth lightly, when all they ask are general questions, it is always good to surprise them with a few curveballs, while adding a few funny ones here and there…but keeping it more to the tough ones, blogs and negotiations are markedly different, the blog should be comprehensible to everyone, but if everyone keeps diluting and not asking the tough questions, just for the sake of being comprehensible, then I guess one tends to miss out on what the crux of the matter is. You are a great example of what the youth can do, if they put their minds to it, keep up the good work and ask the tough questions, I am pretty sure you will do just fine…
Just an opinion, after all I am only part f the youth, don’t take me too seriously..
Hey Leela!!!
You go ahead and ask the tough questions! The negotiators have had enough joking around, and they will joke around more anyway. But don’t get caught in all the “fine, grownup” details of the financial world. Fund exchanges are really, very simple. Doing good does not have to be made profitable first; that is a common excuse to do nothing. Doing good just has to be made popular by the media. And what do we have Government for? To popularize GOOD.
So ask them, and ask yourself, if things aren’t just a little too abstracted away from the REAL, and the EASY questions of RIGHT and WRONG.
That is, after all, why we Youth are so important. We want the meat of the matter: the justice; the egalitarianism, the stuff that makes EVERYONE want to work together to solve the problem that we have created… because we are ALL in this TOGETHER.
Go for it girl! Make us proud!
Leela, I think you have something unique going with the metaphorical and very tongue-in-cheek style of yours. That comes easily only to someone who comprhends well enough what’s going on with the whole negotiations and climate politics. Keep that coming, but yeah using hyperlinks would add authenticity and strengthen your point. Ask all the tough Q’s and btw I think you can drop the ‘Sir’ on the blog at least :)
Ask the tough questions lady — and yeah get formal with them, not the ‘Sir’ way — although Indian babu’s insist
yes cut out the sir business/ doesn’t exist except in 1857!