Sustainability - pay what you want?

Recently I was reading a news article on a restaurant and bakery chain, Panera Breads, based in the US. They have started a social enterprise which is innovative. They have started a non-profit storefront in St. Louis where customers can walk in a pick up anything they need. It is like any other store, with one difference - the prices. There are no prices mentioned. You may pay what you like.
In case you cannot pay or do not want to pay, you are asked to give time. Time for volunteering to help 'at-risk' youth of the area. It is also a test to check how much society can rally around for a cause such as this. Poor and needy can grab a bite and contribute in a soft form rather than hard cash! Is the behavious sustainable? Will there be enough revenue to continue to do this business. Time will tell, but Panera has made a good beginning and the revenue number was 20% more than a for-profit storefront in the area.

Birds - not bound!

Birds build their homes with so much of care, patience and love. There are so many different varities of homes. Structural integrity and consciousness of space that comes with those structures is a wonderful surprise, a sight to behold.

Some weeks back, a tiny 'crimson sunbird' had started building a nest. We watched it grow each day. It used a variety of material for the nest which included straws, plastic strips, a broken scale, hay, weeds, plastic twines, nylon waste. At the end of a couple of weeks, there was a beautiful home hanging by a creeper deftly crafted out of material available in abundance. What is even more strange is that these are homes so long as they hatch. Once the tiny bird is ready to fly, they abandon.

Birds differ from us in one fundamental way – they can build and yet leave a landscape as it was before – Robert Lynd




There were tiny eggs to start with. The protective female would guard it with all her might. Later, two small crimsons were born. They would wait to be fed. There would be an entire family of Crimson Sunbirds flying in and around the garden.

A Crimson Sunbird (courtesy Wikipedia)

These little chirpy creatures are full of energy and elegance. Some of them get so confused looking in the mirror that their animation is enchanting. They would peep into the mirror of the vehicle, then flip over to see where their counterpart is - they can repeat this exercise all day!




One fine morning the nest was empty and shimmering in the gentle breeze without any inhabitant. The birds could now fly, and they were gone. They were not bound by their home - their larger world was waiting to be explored. I still see a couple of them return, but never see them reach out for the nest. It is simply abandoned and I do not have the heart to remove it. The past few days hard rains have lashed the city and I can see the nest slowly withering away. It would not have happened had the birds decided to stay! But then, that is why birds are special and like Kuvempu (Kannada poet, author) says - aniketana, do not build a home!

Little Girl

There was this man sitting all by himself close to a small roadside coffee shop. There was din all around him - loud honking of many vehicles, hawkers walking past him - and he could hear nothing. Nothing mattered to him, his chin was down and he barely even looked up.

His eyes were empty. The doctors had just told him that his young daughter had some kind of cancer of the bones. She did not even have 6 months to live. Here was a desolate father whose young 14 year old would cease to be in a few months. The load was heavy on his broad shoulders!

I saw him get up. He dusted his trouser, smiled to himself and started walking! He looked around and saw the park full of children.

It sometimes is very difficult being a doctor!