Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Power

I may have mentioned this here before, but the power in India goes out so frequently that people at work don't even notice when it happens. So far today it's gone out four times, but it only affects us for a few seconds since we have generators or batteries or some combination of the two. But if you're out on the street at night it can be a big pain. Last night  and I were coming home from a little shopping expedition when the power went out, and it was freaking dark. We couldn't see the sidewalk, and the only light we had came from the headlights of passing cars. This did little more than blind us. 

Well yesterday I read a little bit more about the situation in The Hindu, the paper that we have delivered ever morning. I found out that when added together, Bangalore goes over three and a half days each year without power!  For comparison, New York City only goes ten minutes a year without power. They have a rolling blackouts policy here in India (sort of like they did in California for a while a few year back) because the demand is so much greater than the supply. Pretty hardcore.

8 comments:

  1. Very interesting. I wish I could go to India and visit you. But only if I'm promised atleast one power outage.

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  2. I will go out on a limb and promise you on Nels' behalf a power outage if you hang out at MSR for two full work days, say from 11-7 PM because they seem frequent in early evening...

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  3. I pray, sir, that you are not toying with me.

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  4. It's a pretty easy guarantee to make. Not like Babe Ruth picking the location of his home run, or anything like that...

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  5. Hey I don't want to look rude but my language might be...just feel that its not fair to compare Bangalore with NY..India is still a developing country..and you know each place has its own advantages.. I have heard of some neighborhoods in DC where you may get shot while getting shot...!! well thats really less common in India..!!

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  6. I don't think there was any suggestion that NY and Bangalore are comparable or that one should expect the same ammenities from each city. Instead, NYC is a point of reference for recognizing the differences--particularly the difference in "basic" things that are taken for granted in developed nations.

    I think you're looking for offense where there isn't any.

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  7. No offense was meant.
    The article itself (from The Hindu) used New York as a point of reference. Of course there are good things and bad things about all countries, but this is one thing that is particularly different from my home country, and therefore potentially of interest to the people who normally read this blog.

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  8. That stat about Bangalore going three and a half days without power a year is total bullcrap. It's closer to two weeks or so, added up. No matter where in Bangalore you are, you'll have at least five hours of power outages every week. There, I had to get that off my chest.

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