The new ABC playground*****

Drum roll please! And trumpets! And much fanfare and cheering! Am finally starting on the Australia Broadcasting Corporation playground - the new site! (The old one is featured here - ABC kids playground.) It is a huge site, with many show related features, so those you will have to explore yourself, or wait till I feature them one by one. But what is great is that someone(s) at ABC loves kids very much, so the 'playground' is especially designed for children, without reference to any of the shows. Unless of course the playground itself is a show I am unaware of? But I must admit, it is beautiful. Both the visuals and the music are quite attractive. However - and that is a bit of a downer - the site is so heavy on flash, indeed it is all flash, that it can take eons to load up, and if your net connection if faulty or gets interrupted in between, say goodbye to games here. Also, if by chance your laptop is behaving like ours and shuts down without warning whenever made to play flash based sites for longer than five minutes (with no recollection of doing so on restarting either), you'll never be able to use it. (A fact which will hopefully explain this inordinate delay!)

Starting from the ABC kids page which we don't usually use, because we jump straight to the children's playground. It has a simple layout without any cluttering. Three main links to the playground, rollercoaster (an area for older children and teens), and ABC parenting site. Three other buttons - kids tv guide, program list and Kazam, which I figure is a featured game/show which changes, but which we haven't explored further.



Click through to the playground page, and you find this -



A beautiful, colourful page with nice big pictures and bits of descriptions to help you choose. There is a bit of overlap though, eg. the games and activities button right below that treasure chest - see that? The same is also linked by the teddy bear sitting at the bottom of the page. Or the links to 'five minutes more' and 'in the night garden' in the second row as well as the third. In any case, the treasure chest is the link to the playground I spoke of earlier. Beneath that, the games and activities link will take you here -



which is a great page showing exactly what games you can expect to play with which character. As they put it, there are 'pictures to colour, party packs to make and computer goodies for you to enjoy', and you can know at a glance where you want to go. Apart from BBC (cbeebies) and Uptoten, this is the only site I have come across which has such a viewer friendly index.

If you wish to choose from the default page, you will find the third row showing all the tv shows' games, and below that the tv schedule themselves. Scroll a bit lower for the playground radio which works just dandy if you have a high bandwidth, and has a cute appearance as well as nice selection of songs to hear. See that song - 'It's starting to rain', by Justine Clark? I loved it even more than my kid!



Or you could just leave off exploring for another day and click through to the playground itself.



Now this is nearly a full window, and the graphics are well designed to be smooth, just right for viewing. The accompanying music is light and melodious. To begin with, you could try taking Ruby's tour, in which she accompanies you to various other lands, where you may play their games if you wish or continue. I suggest that you first finish the tour because there is no way to do so if you click on a game instead. When we first found this site, we chose to click on each character in turn and find out by ourselves though.



Incidentally, the graphics when loading are also very cute!



Each of the characters has three or four games, some of which are quite unique. Artie above, for instance, has this draw and dance game where whatever you draw on the canvas will dance in time to the music along with her! Which is why you see my doodle of a flower merrily dancinghanging over the sand without any canvas to support it :)

In all the games, the flag with query icon at the right lower corner will always help you with information about the game should you forget it midway. The sound icon is for switching sound on and off. The little booklet lists all the games with each of the characters, and you can change without going back to the main page at all. The only problem is that these icons, in black and white, and with a nut in their centre, aren't all that self explanatory. But the advantage is that if you use this route, it will not ask if you really want to quit the game, which it would otherwise.



I will not mention each and every game on the site: let there be some surprise awaiting you! But the games are truly designed for the pre-schoolers, easy on the finger and the mind. Here you see the 'follow the pattern' memory game, which is like most others and rewards the correct pattern with a bouncy dance. But Kurl will anyway gyrate to the music, so it is even more attractive for the little ones! And do try out their songtime for the theme music. That is addictive, that tune is!



There is music associated with many of the games here. Even Spana, when she has finished making a robot, likes to make it dance. Or at least, my tiny one does, after each robot!



And here you see Zip (the smaller figure) and Rollo on a special see-saw to catch and eat the cotton candy clouds, where you help by clicking on the right coloured button, at the right time.

The url for the first three pages, in that order - http://www.abc.net.au/abckids/, http://www.abc.net.au/children/default.htm and http://www.abc.net.au/children/playground.html

Go on, have fun!

P.S. Of all the other links not explored here, here is one that I did want to include - boardgame. It has one of the characters, Ruby, I think, as a board game pawn, which you have to move by rolling your dice. Each turn of the dice will lead to one brief game from the playground. Carry it out correctly to make the next move. However, as my firefox crashed twice when attempting to play it, I am going to just leave you with the link if you so desire - http://www.abc.net.au/children/boardgame/

A discovery and a memory

Every once in a while, some little nugget of information makes the penny drop for an Eureka moment. 'Every once in a while, some neuron finally fires in our brains and we have a huge realization.' Good old Hilary Price gets it right everytime!

Today I had one such moment of discovery.

Not being a literature major, my reading has been entirely my own, so I had not been exposed to Coleridge's Kubla Khan -

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree :
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man

Down to a sunless sea...

till I read Douglas Adams' Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency. The entire book is based on this one poem composed in 1798, with inputs from 'The Rime of the ancient mariner' as well. If you haven't read the book, I will not spoil the mystery, but suffice it to say that it is so well meshed with the plot that I still can't read this poem without remembering that story as the true meaning. Its not a poem that is easy to understand, and I often wondered how it was that Adams took so many liberties with it, insinuating meanings where surely there were none? The lines

...Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight 'twould win me,
That with music loud and long,
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome ! those caves of ice !...

translate as description of an alien spacecraft, where each movement of life is changed to music! He also depicts Coleridge as having been drugged when he wrote this poem, something which I wasn't sure could be right. Surely anyone would realize that Adams would not have written this without making sure of his facts? Or that if there has not been any uproar about the book's factual inaccuracy, then it is not, in fact, wrong? Not me. I wondered and wondered, and still could not decipher the poem, entangled as it was with Dirk Gently in my mind. So when I read this introductory note to the poem, written by Coleridge himself, it was one Eureka moment: no wonder I couldn't understand it! He was likely under the effect of opium at that time, and the whole thing was actually 'a vision in a dream' and not some fancy way of saying something else. Duh.

I daresay this little discovery of mine means nothing to you; those among you who were in the know all the time will even find it a little - dumb to say the least. But I am still bemused by it, so do pardon my indulgence today!

P.S. I would like to end by quoting another author's reinterpretation of an earlier rhyme, which makes this post kind of long, so am splitting it in two parts again today. The section on ABC is to follow :)

Here is J R R Tolkien's version of the rhyme 'The cat and the fiddle' which I really enjoy reading ever since I first found his books. What a beautiful way to explain the nonsensical verse!

The man in the moon stayed up too late

There is an inn a merry old inn
beneath an old grey hill,
And there they brew a beer so brown
That the Man in the Moon himself came down
one night to drink his fill

The ostler has a tipsy cat
that plays a five-stringed fiddle;
And up and down he draws his bow,
Now squeaking high, now purring low,
now sawing in the middle.

The landlord keeps a little dog
that is mighty fond of jokes;
When there's good cheer among the guests,
He cocks an ear at all the jests and laughs until he chokes.

They also keep a horn-ed cow
as proud as any queen;
But music turns her head like ale,
And makes her wave her tufted tail
and dance upon the green.

And O! the rows of silver dishes
and the store of silver spoons!
For Sunday there's a special pair,
And these they polish up with care
on saturday afternoons.

The Man in the Moon was drinking deep,
and the cat began to wail;
A dish and a spoon on the table danced,
The cow in the garden madly pranced,
and the little dog chased its tail.

The Man in the Moon took another mug,
and then rolled beneath his chair;
And there he dozed and dreamed of ale,
Till in the sky the stars were pale
and dawn was in the air.

Then the ostler said to his tipsy cat:
"The white horses of the Moon,
They neigh and champ their silver bits;
But their master's been and drowned his wits,
and the sun'll be rising soon!"

So the cat on his fiddle played hey-diddle-diddle,
a jig that would wake the dead:
He squeaked and sawed and quickened the tune,
While the landlord shook the Man in the Moon
"It's after three!" he said

They rolled the man slowly up the hill
and bundled him into the moon,
While his horses galloped up in rear,
And the cow came capering like a deer,
and a dish ran up with the spoon.

Now quicker the fiddle went deedle-dum-diddle;
the dog began to roar,
The cow and the horses stood on their heads;
the guests all bounded from their beds
and danced upon the floor

With a ping and a pong the fiddle strings broke!
the cow jumped over the moon,
And the little dog laughed to see such fun,
And the Saturday dish went off at a run
With the silver Sunday spoon.

The round Moon rolled behind the hill,
as the sun raised up her head.
She hardly believed her fiery eyes;
For though it was day, to her surprise
They all went back to bed!

He also wrote another poem to explain the nursery rhyme 'The man in the moon', which I discovered just today -

Why the man in the moon came down too soon

The Man in the Moon had silver shoon
And his beard was of silver thread;
He was girt with pure gold and inaureoled
With gold about his head.
Clad in silken robe in his great white globe
He opened an ivory door
With a crystal key, and in secrecy
He stole o'er a shadowy floor;

Down a filigree stair of spidery hair
He slipped in gleaming haste,
And laughing with glee to be merry and free
He swiftly earthward raced.
He was tired of his pearls and diamond twirls;
Of his pallid minaret
Dizzy and white at its lunar height
In a world of silver set;

And adventured this peril for ruby and beryl
And emerald and sapphire,
And all lustrous gems for new diadems,
Or to blazon his pale attire.
He was lonely too with nothing to do
But to stare at the golden world,
Or to strain at the hum that would distantly come
As it gaily past him whirled;

And at plenilune in his argent moon
He had wearily longed for Fire-
Not the limpid lights of wan selenites,
But a red terrestrial pyre
With impurpurate glows of crimson and rose
And leaping orange tongue;
For great seas of blues and the passionate hues
When a dancing dawn is young;

For the meadowy ways like chrysophrase
By winding Yare and Nen.
How he longed for the mirth of the populous Earth
And the sanguine blood of men;
And coveted song and laughter long
And viands hot and wine,
Eating pearly cakes of light snowflakes
And drinking thin moonshine.

He twinkled his feet as he thought of the meat,
Of the punch and the peppery brew,
Till he tripped unaware on his slanting stair,
And fell like meteors do;
As the whickering sparks in splashing arcs
Of stars blown down like rain
From his laddery path took a foaming bath
In the ocean of Almain;

And began to think, lest he melt and stink,
What in the moon to do,
When a Yarmouth boat found him far afloat,
To the mazement of the crew
Caught in their net all shimmering wet
In a phosphorescent sheen
Of bluey whites and opal lights
And delicate liquid green

With the morning fish - 'twas his regal wish -
They packed him to Norwich town,
To get warm on gin in a Norfolk inn,
And dry his watery gown.
Though St. Peter's knell waked many a bell
In the city's ringing towers
To shout the news of his lunatic cruise
In the early morning hours,

No hearths were laid, not a breakfast made,
And no one would sell him gems;
He found ashes for fire, and his gay desire
For choruses and brave anthems
Met snores instead with all Norfolk abed,
And his round heart nearly broke,
More empty and cold than above of old,
Till he bartered his fairy cloak

With a half waked cook for a kitchen nook,
And his belt of gold for a smile,
And a priceless jewel for a bowl of gruel,
A sample cold and vile
Of the proud plum porridge of Anglian Norwich -
He arrived much too soon
For unusual guests on adventurous quests
From the Mountains of the Moon.

Someday I hope to share these gems with my children, and have a quiet chuckle about Tolkien's wonderful world...

Of cultures, and J language matching game***

Can I ask you something today? There is a question at the end of these spiraling, sliding paragraphs which is intriguing me. Tell me if any part of this story piques your imagination?

(If it seems too confusing, take a look at the post-script first!)

In late sixties, a girl child was born in Poland. Was she born to a chorus of glad welcome, calm acceptance or resigned indifference? Was it a big city apartment, a townhouse, or a farmstead that she was taken to from the hospital? Where did her grandparents come from, which village did they trace their history to? Her father left the country when she was seven, to earn. Her mother, a year later. For the next three years, they could not visit while she stayed with her grandparents. Was she staying with them before as well? Were they nice? Strict? Orthodox, traditional or modern? Loving and generous or miserly? So much is conjecture, so much a case history can not tell us. We can only assume, fill in the blanks with our own imagination.

An imagination that is restricted by experience.

When we are told that she took care of an older disabled cousin, how can we know what it was like unless we know already what it means to live with someone suffering from severe cerebral palsy? To live, and to take care of such a person? And even then we can not say. Was she too skinny to hold him up properly, or buxom and strong? What was it like, those years long back, spent in low beamed smoke darkened narrow corridors, or in open cold fields, or comfortable though cramped rooms with warm amber hued walls and robin blue ceiling? I have not been to Poland, have no Polish friends. What smells wafted from the kitchen, which were the rhymes chanted by children? Was there music, were there nosy helpful neighbours, a posse of bustling relatives? What was her life like, those days, so far from me in time and space and understanding? She was proud of the work she did, caring for her cousin. The doctor questioned, wondered if she had not wanted to get away, whether her current symptoms may actually have an origin in that time when she had felt abandoned, overworked. Was that truly how she had felt, back then, at the age of eight? Did she have friends to envy, other children to emulate or compare herself with? Or, was it matter of fact, just as picking cotton under unrelenting white skies was for slave children a century back in America? Or, as taking care of four younger siblings may be, for the little girl in a village in Bihar, today? A reality from which there is no specific yearning to escape, for no alternative is known. Only a general, diffuse unhappiness within the only life one has seen.

Three years later, she got her father back, for a brief duration of time. He left again, this time for Greece, where he re-married, had another daughter. Where her mother was, the history doesn't tell us, but presumably she was back as well. When the father returned with his new family, mother and daughter were allowed to leave for the distant shores of promising future, the United States of America, in return for giving up any claims on their home and belongings. What was it like, this separation? The terms of this exchange seem patently unfair to us, yet, they were accepted, perhaps gladly? What was the kind of life that mother and daughter left, in return for this displacement, this relocation to a new culture? When they reached, were they able to talk in English, did they have any friends or relations to go to? In those teenage years, did she have any friends? Was she able to adjust to school easily, was she accepted? How did her mother feel, leaving her country alone, with a child, a growing daughter to provide for? How many hours did she need to work, how much of silent abuse did she take, for the sake of a future? Or are we looking at the wrong end of the social spectrum; did she just move in with relatives, and have it real easy? Surely not - surely if both parents need to leave the country to earn, there is an element of fiscal uncertainty involved?

Slowly, a picture builds up in my mind; a picture of bleakness and craving for the good things, for an easy, loving life. How much of it is true, who can tell? For the words, only partly sanitized in medical detachment, come from someone who is trained to listen, dissect, question, expose, tease and fit into criteria, syndromes, disease. The compassion is, and perhaps must, be subservient to scientific coolness. But man is man, even when a psychiatrist, and there is excitement when you find a hidden clue; laughter at some unexpected turn; triumph on uncovering a diagnosis. So much is subjective even so, dependent on the observer's state of mind. The analyses may be faultless, yet false, for it is not easy always to know where the patient is coming from... Ms. A, the girl grown up, dropped out of college, married her sweetheart when pregnant. Six years later, there is trouble in marriage as well, and the husband may be required to leave the country any time. So much fact can be American, the common thread the investigator and she share, understand. But what of all that went into the making of this person, not just her own years but those of generations behind and around her? And of the doctor? Which culture led him to this meeting? What makes him think that "we need to ask if Ms. A slept with her mother nightly until she was 18 years of age to reassure herself that both she and her mother were safe and connected" ?

For is that so significant? Perhaps it is, for a people who are able to place a month old baby in a solitary crib in another room, and sleep. But for another culture? I do not know how it is Poland; can't pretend to have any glimmering of Polish customs. I can however, find no reason for this fact to be accorded any importance whatsoever. What more natural than to share a room when your quarters are cramped, when there is little money to waste on heating the rest of the apartment, if that is what it was? What else, with no family member to live under the same roof with? Just the two of them together against the rest of the world, unfriendly if not hostile? The loneliness of those displaced goes beyond the need for connections. Longing for a word in familiar tones, a gesture of old friendship, or even the crowds from far away 'home' is enough to bond strangers together. Why not mother and daughter? It is not that I am not able to appreciate what the doctor questions. It is just that were I was he, I would have found no reason to even note this as important, for I would have understood it as completely natural...

And there again I perhaps would have erred. For, like I said, I know not where she came from...

This post has been in the making this last two days, and I have been preparing to feature ABC, part II finally, but chance wins. The evening snack time was short today, and we both were cranky from lack of sleep. In no mood for games which would go on and on, I browsed through the bookmarks for something short and newish, and chanced upon something I had saved as language match game. Turns out that it was a link to a site called 'Jewish Education & Entertainment', which I thought would fit in with the theme of different cultures, different thoughts. So here we are!



The site is flash based, so I could not have given only a link to one game which we played. But it doesn't take any time to load, and is pretty simple really. It is the brainchild of Jacob Richman, who states that he wanted to create a "Jewish oriented site that would be educational, fun, simple to use and friendly." As far as I can make out, it is intended for Jewish children (and adults) who are trying to learn English as well. I expect it can be used by teachers and parents talking of the Jewish festivals and culture as well. As right now, I am not in that phase at all, with my sole interest having been in the matching game, I must beg our pardon if the rest of the site doesn't prove to be helpful or accurate.



The language matching game gives an option of learning or playing. When you choose learn, you are given a set of cards with an image and the name written in Hebrew and English, which is read aloud when you click on the card. You can choose the language to read it in, and the set of cards, for example, vegetables, fruits, tools etc. On choosing to play, you are given the additional choice of easy, medium or difficult games.



After that, it is a standard card matching memory game.The number of sets and the game level choices make it a great game for teaching toddlers and pre-schoolers. The illustrations are clear and easily identifiable for the most part. The naming of each object as its card is turned is an added advantage, both in terms of remembering where it was and in identifying the object.



The hangman game is likewise either in Hebrew or English, but the words are all Jewish themes, eg. Jewish months as in the example above, which I chose at random, and got right quite by accident!



The colouring book has Jewish themed pages only, which would have been quite useful had the quality of the illustrations been better. However, colouring is colouring, and it is enjoyable. I have avoided it for now, because I don't feel equipped to answer questions like 'what is happening here mama?' till I do some more research.

Briefly the other links - 'Hebrew sign maker' allows you to print out Hebrew characters even if you don't have a special keyboard, through their online one; 'My Hebrew songbook' refused to open for me today; 'In memory of' told me of the Jewish custom to read special verses at a grave, according to name of the deceased. You can find those verses here if you enter the name and sex. The databases and the trivia quiz I have not explored. The word search game is the usual one where you have to find words in a jumble of letters; the geography game has a learning component where you can read a para each about different cities/places, and then you are quizzed about these when you play.

The url - http://www.j.co.il/index.asp

P.S. And now for the background, and explanation:

New York, 2005. A Polish origin woman in mid twenties was brought in the casualty, after she called up saying she was afraid she'd hurt her six year old son if she stayed home with him. She was admitted.

New York, 2008. Grand rounds at the hospital. Case presented: Diagnosing PTSD: Does It Help Us Heal? The doctor who presented the case had been treating her for about a year. He presented the history, discussed his diagnosis of post traumatic stress disorder relating to child birth as the precipitating trauma, and was advised, in turn, by others.

New Delhi, 2009. Published article is read by yours truly. One sentence catches my attention, leads to musing, wondering how much difficult it is to really understand another being, when so little a thing may be accorded no significance in one culture, and be viewed with horror in another. Result, above. :)

What do you think? It would be interesting to know your take on this - do write in!

A lousy day and Tao Nyeu stories**

Today is a day I'd rather have crossed the road and whistled to the shop shutters to avoid. Tiny little things pile up, nag innocently. Little jars of paint brought as a reward (not bought - they came with the jam), their promised session still awaiting the completion of a new apron. The apron and sundry other clothes to be repaired overflowing from the stuffy bag I hid them once in. The bag all but hidden in three days worth of partially folded laundry. Piles of ironed clothes awaiting entry into the dhobi book, so they can make space for folding the rest of these... plus more of these endless chores. And then, because I stayed up so late at night, a splitting headache. I wish I could borrow some optimism from this Coffee-stained clarity -

"I’m learning that all you can do with a day so determined to be a failure is to let it. Roll around in its messiness and stupidity like a pile of fall leaves and have a blast scattering them to the wind... Once I get over my unreasonable expectations, such as productivity and basic hygiene, failure days can be kind of fun. And the best news? Hours away is a brand new day that, chances are, has already learned to behave itself."

What a lovely way of looking at a failure day!

Talking of looking, you may have seen Tao Nyeu's book Wonder Bear featured in a few blogs by now. If you don't have it, and are not likely to get it soon either, at least you can look at it online at her site, simply titled tao nyeu. The site is designed to be a portfolio site, but it is amazingly generous in sharing the entire book rather than giving mere glimpses of it. That may change in the future thought, which is why I am featuring this site today instead of a 'gamey' one.



The menu on the left has her stories - Missing Moustache, Balloon Journey, The Street of Crocodiles -



Wonder Bear -


Laundry -


and single illustrations. A site worth going to if only for one's own visual pleasure rather than a child's! I especially liked the cute bunnies getting cleaned in the washing machine. It is the sort of story that children like best - whimsical, just this side of unbelievabale, and allowing and encouraging endless innovations to embellish at bedtime. Do check it out!

The url - http://www.tao-illustration.com/

P.S. This has to be one of the lowest of lows - I have no post script to add today! So, here is a real pj that I got smsed recently, for those who can understand: What is the opposite of achaar? You know, the spicy pickle stuff we love to eat aloo parathas with? Yes, yes, the very same, now come on! - - - - - -

Ok, since you give up, it is onions. The reasoning will be in hidden in a comment so you have to make some effort to read it :)

Questions! And Crickweb****

How much difference a little child's minor illness can make to an entire family's daily life, even if it is just a bit of viral cold! All schedules disrupted, planned activities abandoned, 'me' time gone, blog posts missed... Let us therefore move back to track, with apologies assumed to be stated and accepted, shall we?

When I started this blog, I had expected that as I cataloged and classified my site collection, I would be using them more efficiently and frequently. But I find that the reverse is true. Our computer time has gone down; many meal times are accompanied by movie cds or books, and definitely the sites I showcase are not being utilized to the full. It may be coincidental, or it may be due to the fact that I invariably have other tabs open to 'follow' other blogs, and so wish to avoid heavy flash usage which might crash the laptop. But there has to be some other more satisfactory explanation. What do you think?

In keeping with this theme of underutilization, therefore I am today talking about a site which we have probably never opened a second time after its discovery. Crickweb is a lovely site developed by V2V Training Ltd. of UK, a joint venture of Dan and David Bunker. A tip right in the beginning - if you are using IE 7, you may have some trouble with their pages: check out the FAQ section for advice. Also the ads on the left are pretty prominent, and can't be left alone with children even though they seem to be content appropriate :)

Crickweb was designed to be an educational aid for teachers and parents in UK, and has interactive activities for foundation stage, key stages 1 and 2 according to the British system, covering "Maths, English, Science, History, Geography, R.E., D.T., I.C.T, French and Spanish." The one area I have explored is early years (screenshot above), which is for primary school kids. The index page gives a brief description as well as instructions to play. Clicking on the thumbnail or name causes the game to open in a new tab/window.

The game window size is satisfactorily large, but the height could be reduced just a wee bit to avoid having to scroll up and down on a smaller screen (mine is 17 inch - I think! Too late at night to go measuring it up now!). The games are well conceived, so even if the cartoon quality is not quite Antzy, or even Tom and Jerryish, they are still capable of holding your child's attention. Some games, such as counting the number of balloons (shown here), are fairly simple, while others, like the number game below this one, which is about matching the number names to numerals, are for slightly older children.





Some games are self correcting. For instance, a correct answer is highlighted in green above. Others are open ended, such as the simple weighing game below -

There are, of course, other games, and even some of the older group activities can be used for young ones with due modifications. But that is for you to personalize. As a teaching resource, it is a truly excellent site.

There are also some games which are not educational in content - click on the games section in the top menu for more fun games like this parachuting baby below :) As it involves simple mouse movement, it is excellent for toddlers just beginning to handle the mouse. The tiny little cough when clouds get in the way is too cute for kids to want to avoid though!



Normally I skip mentioning the links pages, because dedicated site surfers would find it themselves anyway, and for the others, it is simply too much information. But you must take a look at the link section here, for there are games with thumbnails, same as the rest of the site, so it is so easy to decide on which link to click. Some of these linked sites we have already covered (BBC, Uptoten, Spot) while others will be covered in due course of time. In the meantime, explore and have fun!

The url - http://www.crickweb.co.uk/

P.S. I have been wondering about who said that it was easy to love the world - it was your neighbour that was the problem? Why should it be so? Why are our souls moved by adversity at a distance, but when it is the neighbour, the colleague, the relative, the employee, there are sundry other considerations which prevent us from being as compassionate as we may be? Why do we judge those near us; judge and are judged, for why else would we blog away about our deepest feelings, yet shirk from using our real names lest those we know read it?

I know no answers yet, nor have I given sufficient thought to tease and analyze this, so I leave you with two links to the reason why I asked them instead - Nino's mum at The Nino Effect talking of the the sisterhood of the traveling word, and Mercedes at Desert Candy talking about her mom's recently diagnosed brain cancer. I wish I could talk about these posts, but I can't. You will just have to read them yourself.

P.P.S. Thanks to Desert Candy, I now know how to put up an index of all sites covered - in another blog of course! Someday soon, I will do it!

Winter tidbits and Argosy medical animation****

Winter is warmer this year. The loads of heavy winter clothing I had amassed in anticipation are going to need a new home next year, little used. Yet, it is still winter. The sun has gone south for these months, as always. Mornings are dewy cool still when the last of school buses have left, the office goers dispersed to destination. Sweaters and thick dresses and warm inners hang heavy on clotheslines, slowly drying in the brief pale afternoons. The smell of smoke is in the air, smoke and roasting peanuts and sweet potatoes. Evenings begin to leak the sound of laughing children much sooner than before, emptying even as street lamps begin to come on. Sitting in the little patch of sun I can find, I still crave for sarson ka saag with makke di roti, dripping in butter, for cracking peanuts and shelling hara channa, for gazhak and revri...

If you have been to the Visible body project, you may have explored and reached the parent site of the company which has developed it - Argosy medical animation. If you haven't, or if you have problems in running the visible body software because of its large size, or because you have a Mac, try it today. Of course it is not a kiddie site; it is a professional site meant particularly to showcase the range and scope of their animations to prospective clients. But that doesn't mean we can't use it!



Don't be put off by the complex appearance of the home page. It looks very technical, and agreed, the site is so, but there is stuff which is useful for children, even preschoolers! The index page has a menu on the left sidebar, from which I advise you to click on the animation by system.



Then choose your system, and hover on the little snapshot of the animation to read a description below. Once you find what you like, click through to see it. Simple! Featured here is the beating heart, showing the cut section complete with muscles, valves and the nerve impulses (see that flash of light there?), and the sound of heart beats to accompany. A very brief animation: it had my two year old asking for more. But ever since the concept of heart 'beating' has been established firmly :)



The one below outlines the process of hearing, with a commentary to explain:



Quite a few of these animations were prepared for patient education, so are useful and simple to understand. Some are truly technical, of no use to anyone but the medical specialty involved. Which is not to say that your teenager may not need to use it for a school project :) I am therefore refraining from pointing you to those I think are best, because my judgement at this time is naturally aligned with a young child. As with most of life's questions, answers have to be tailored according to the age and comprehending power of the listener, so your choices will be different. The videos/animations are varying in length, but for the most part, brief, almost too brief. (If only childbirth was as quick as is shown here!) But the accuracy and level of detail is spectacular, as one would expect from a company of this repute. Do try it! Its a wonderful resource.

The url - http://www.argosymedical.com/index.html

P.S. Trying to dredge a suitable winter poem to finish the post, and failing to find any at this ungodly hour, I turn to the internet. Isn't this cute -

January

January sparkles.
January's bold.
January huffs and puffs.
January's cold.

So, instead of an elegant poem, let me leave you with these elegant fruit bowls, as in bowls made from fruit by artist Margaret Dorfman. I am truly fida on them! If only I could learn how to make them myself...

Click on the photo to reach Susan Lumoto's Daily Art Muse, or go to the Gallery of functional arts here or here for more.

Obama and Brum***

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"It is the firefighter’s courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent’s willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate."
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Attributed to Barack Hussein Obama, current president of USA. Excerpted from inaugural speech.

The US presidential election last year brought hope, and a hint of the true magnificence of democracy, to millions around the world still quagmired in poverty, corruption, autocracy or worse. So may a poor wage labourer pause when quarrying coal and look at the distant jet, so high, so mighty, so proudly fine. With envy, greed, longing, but also, inspiration and hope that such things are. That it is possible for men to attain such heights. That it is possible for a people to choose their leader in such a way; that politicians can talk knowledgeably and skillfully of what they can do rather than flicking mud alone; that each and every vote can make a difference.

It is therefore natural that Obama's first speech as president will be dissected to its very osteoblasts by pundits and the junta alike. May I be allowed to join my voice to the cacophony as well? Thank you. The rest follows after the break.

Brum, the little, intelligent and independent car has a number of fans around the world, not all of whom are children. However, if your kids love Brum, this is the official website to visit, complete with the Big Town to explore.



The site is totally flash based, so be prepared to wait a little bit while it loads the first time around. In the meantime, enjoy a visual of the little car racing towards the Big Town. As seen from its rear. Once loaded, the game window occupies something like half of the screen, and is in the form of a map which adds a lot of visual interest for those following the tv series. Click on the little dots in the small navigational aid above to read about them, and click on the actual buildings in the map to visit. Most of the links are informational, or to do with watching their art gallery or sending an ecard. Two, however, are games.



Brum's airport adventure is something of an interactive story which requires nothing more than clicking on Brum to toot his horn, and on the flashing circles below to change the frame. There are two games, marked by Brum's photo. One, shown below, involves clicking on the crooks or the stolen suitcase as they pop up behind the luggage. The other requires clicking on various flashing signs to make Brum - er, intimidate the crooks. Both are timed, and become faster towards the end I think.



The other game is a car chase in the snowy slopes of some ski resort, which involves side to side mouse movements to avoid obstacles and pick up the money dropped by baddies running on ahead. It is also timed, and beware, it is harder than it sounds!



The site is owned and run by Ragdoll Ltd., UK, who also produce the tv series. The url - http://www.brum.tv/intro.html

And if you should want to get a very simple make-Brum-jump game for toddlers or pre-schoolers, visit the Ragdoll site itself, and click on Brum from amongst the photos in the top left corner. Then, click on the silhouette. Or, for a single page to colour online, click on the yellow pencil. There are similar very simple games there for each of the tv programs produced by Ragdoll, so be sure to explore some more! (Incidentally, the games seem to have the trademark simplicity and strategies of the Red Fish people. I do know that they have designed some of the Teletubbies and Boobah games, so I wonder...)

P.S. Cbeebies also has a single Brum game which should be mentioned here. It too is a kind of car race, but without the crooks, and much slower in pace. The car has to be steered clear of obstacles using arrow keys and when it obligingly stops in front of a money bag, press the space bar to pick up the booty. An easier game for the younger kids :)



P.P.S. So, back to Obama. Two observations.

One, when there is a team of speech writers, as is the norm with presidents and even presidential candidates, should one be attributing the quote to one man, or many?

Two, there seems to me that this speech is far too redolent in rhetoric to be sincere, or true. I suppose the inaugration ceremony, in itself a rather emotional celebration, calls for a touch of the cliche to stir heartstrings. But somehow I get the feeling that there is more grandiloquence than called for. It seems to be simple, but it is a contrived simplicity, the language somehow alien to the author, the sort of oversimplification one would use in trying to explain the mechanism of a quantum clock to a third grader. Maybe it sounded different to those who were there?