Examine what is said, not her who speaks

Wish it was the same today.

"Chirping birds are perched on
branches of huge trees,
as if playing a melody in symphony.
Beauty of lush green trees is greater than heaven,
leaf buds bring good news and blessings written on them."

This is a poet's image of — hold your breath — Ahmedabad, contained in Mirat-e-Ahmadi, a historic account. The city may be anything but green today, but 300 years ago, Ahmedabad was described as a city of gardens and orchards, which were grown by the sultans who ruled then. Particularly, the maverick sultan Muhammad Begdo who encouraged people to plant trees.

Albert de Mendeslo, a German traveller who came to Ahmedabad in 1638, wrote about the environment of the city: "There are so many other gardens around Ahmedabad and the whole city is so full of trees that it looks like one big garden. Anyone who comes to the city sees such abundance of them that he may well think he is going into a forest."
Eminent historian Ratnamanirao Jote dedicated a whole chapter to gardens of Ahmedabad during the Muhammedan era in his book 'Gujarat nu Patnagar', which he wrote in 1928.

"If somebody saw today's Ahmedabad he will surely laugh at the chapter on gardens of this city in this book, but there were plenty of gardens in this city. The feudal lords and sultans who ruled, loved gardens. We see an instance of it at Naginawadi in the middle of Kankaria lake."

Jote chronicles more than a dozen big gardens in the city like Baug-e-Nagina, Shahwadi, Baug-e-firdosh, Baug-e-Shaiban, Harade no Baug, Fatehbaug, Jeetbaug, Gulab Baug, Baug-e-tot and Shahibaug. He wrote: "Many foreign travellers saw this whole city as an orchard."

Mendeslo also wrote in his travelogue — 'Mendeslo's travels in western India' — about the environment around the Bhadra fort. "The Maidan Shah is at least 1,600 feet long and half as much broad and lined with rows of palms, intermixed with citron trees and orange trees, which is not only pleasant to the eyes but also makes walking among them more cool."

Another traveller, Thevnots, who came to Ahmedabad in 1966, described Maidan Shah as 'the kings square'. "It is a long square, with trees planted on all sides," he wrote.

Source:http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Ahmedabad/How_green_was_my_Ahmedabad/articleshow/3101015.cms

As if the terrorist attacks aren't enough to deal with, a new issue comes to the fore everyday in my country.

Seems like people have forgotten they're still living in one country.
Latest example:

They left the city to pursue their dream of higher education. But 30 students, who returned from Bangalore on Wednesday morning, have only nightmares to recount.

The students of College of Pharmacy, who shared a flat in Devanahalli near Bangalore, were threatened,
terrorised and some of them even beaten up by local residents when they tried to stop a thief who broke into their room. They managed to flee after two traumatic days and reach the city on Wednesday. Even the police and trustees of their college refused to help.

For Upendra Singh Jadeja and six other students of Bachelor of Pharmacy, June 2 was yet another day till they returned home around noon from an examination and found the door open.

"My flatmate Mayur was the first to return and was shocked to find the room ransacked. He saw two people running away through the main door and another entering a room," said Jadeja.

Mayur came out of the house and locked it from outside, trapping the thief. "We reached by then and called the landlord and informed the police. When the police arrived, family members of the ‘thief' spoke to the cops in the local language and he was allowed to go free. His family members then threatened us with dire consequences right in front of the police," said Jadeja.

Scared, they turned to trustees of their college for help. "We called our college trustee Basava Raja, who refused to come to the spot but said that he would send two professors," he added.

"Meanwhile, we even met a trustee of the college who refused to help us saying that it was a dispute that took place outside the college and they were not responsible," said Jadeja.

"We were too scared to return and hence sent other classmates to check the situation. As our classmates reached the house, they saw the family of the thief, along with the landlord, waiting with batons and sticks. The group of 15-odd friends who had gone to check the situation was chased out of the building. We never went back to the flat," said Jadeja, who returned with others by the Bangalore-Jodhpur Express.

They now plan to meet the agent who had got them admitted to the college and even promised them proper accommodation.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Ahmedabad/Ahmedabad_students_bashed_up_flee_Bangalore_in_fear/articleshow/3101006.cms