Shouldn't We All Be Fishing on Stilts?

This week, I got inspired by how people make a living in Sri Lanka fully in tune with nature. After reading about all the fighting between the country's army and the LTTE and the thousands of people having to flee their homes, this was a nice reminder that Sri Lanka normally is a beautiful and peaceful country.

In any case, the fishermen in the south, mainly in the southwestern district of Galle, sit on 2-m high stilts about 20 m away from the coast. On a platform that is hardly bigger than a palm, during the monsoon and for hours. Why? Because this is the only way without disturbing the fish. Nets and bathing tourists disturb them and then they might move to a different part of the reef, not to return for years maybe.

Amazing, isn't it? Though the fishermen have more their livelihood in mind than they are environmentally conscious, the story is a perfect example of how being in balance with nature can be so simple and so beautiful. Sure, it's a tough job for hardly any money, but so can be the 9 to 5 rat race...

The story's making the rounds on the internet right now, so you might have seen the pics but only my version has the background on why, when and how stilt fishing started in southwestern Sri Lanka.

Enjoy!

P.S. The beautiful picture was taken by Mark Panszky.

Writer's Advantage No. 4: Writing for Self-Interest or Fun

With Easter safely behind us, it's time for another writer's advantage blog, which should be no. 4. One major advantage of being a writer is that you get to write about topics that are fun, feed a personal interest, or both. This happens more often if a writer has established him- or herself and can pick and choose the topics.

Or, for writers just starting out, if they combine blogs and commercial writing, they'll get to write about what they like while also keeping economic interests in mind. Down the road, the quantitiy and quality of fun posts should lead to more that are also commercially attractive.

That's not to say that commercial writing cannot be fun, it often is, yet follows more stringent guidelines.

Recently, I've researched a few environmental topics that were fun and educational:

1. Rice terraces in South Asia and China - amazing, millenia old landscape art (see picture)

2. Ice diving - a popular extreme sport that's gaining ground

3. Lava lakes - bubbling cauldrons of hot lava at the top of volcanoes

4. The Russian Antarctic station - stunning picture of an amazing landscape

Happy reading!

P.S. There is a drawback when writing purely for one - it is very easy to get carried away and stray from the topic.

Eternal Flames

This week, I have a confession to make - I am an 80's fan! It's not so much the 80's fashion and movies I'm crazy about, but definitely the music. Some songs just transport me back 25 years instantly!

That being so, I thought I'll combine business and pleasure and write an article about the Top 20 Eighties songs. Yeah, right! I should've known that's impossible as there are just too many good songs out there.

To make a long story short, I ended up writing Top 20s (or even Top 30s) for each year of the 80's! And it was fun, especially because I added hit movies, TV shows and world events that were happening each year. Transported me right back and frankly, I don't think I've quite come back yet.

So, browse at your own risk, the same might happen to you!

Here's a list of the best 80's songs by year:

1980 - 1982: Funkytown is where it's at

1983: Sweet Dreams are made of this...

1984: Are you a Karma Chameleon?

1985: Take on me, Material Girl!

1986: Took my breath away

1987: Notoriously Bad

1988: Wanna do the Loco-motion?

1989: Like a prayer