Beginning of Winter in Switzerland and Ray of hope in India

I spent last two weeks in Vevey, Switzerland on an official training course at our International center. Winter time. Winter was yet to be in full stream. Snow was about to start. It was quite chilled &  cloudy though. Some days during noon it was sunny and beautiful.
As usual it was all fine, neat, ultra clean, good, on time, no uncertainty and wonderful colors. At times it is irritatingly silent over there. Switzerland seems to change color with season.
But how is it related to ray of hope in India. You must be wondering !
I was told by one of my colleagues who is  staying in Switzerland that he lost his debit card in a shopping mall. He next day went back to "lost & found" counter in the mall and the guy there promptly handed back the card.

Today my son (in Gurgaon) lost his high end cell phone in the autorikshaw. Some one who found it called him and handed over to nearest Metro station control room. My son went to metro station and collected it from the control room !
Is it not a reason to feel good and keep the hope going up ? I think so.
Now enjoy some pictures.

Look at our international Training Center

 Tree shedding the leaves.........

Colorful Tree. Actually It is shedding....

Silent walk on the lake side.

The castle. I am sure there are many such castles in India. But the way Swiss guys glorify even such small places also to great extent. They promote tourism in real sense. Information, train / bus tickets any info is available. Huge number of visitors throng the place. Every arrangement is made to please and comfort  the tourist. 

I did not see any names scribbled / etched  on walls of the castle. 

Bed of Flowers from Taiwan

I have lot of stuff from this visit of Taiwan. Huge flower show of the season. Here are some wonderful piece of arts from the nature.

Formosan Aboriginal village, Sun Moon lake rope way

If you visit Taiwan, visit this place. It has lot of lush greens. Lot of information on history and heritage of Taiwan. Water park, cable car and models of Taiwanese tribal origins. Many more - roller coaster, Gyro  jump....

I liked the large green patch, culture village and the cable car ride.

View of European Garden palace

Beautiful sculpture

Cable car - sun moon lake breathtaking view

Colorful native wrist bands

Colorful native wrist bands

Tribal Tradition

Fish Pond. Thousands of colorful ones

European Palace restaurant

Temple in Taiwan

This is continuation of my last one, from Taiwan. I visited some temples too. Taiwan has people with Taoism, Christianity and few other faiths. The temple I visited belonged to Taoism. I am given to understand that like Hindu faith, Taoism too has many gods, demigods and rituals. I tried to capture some. Again, even with so many people around, no garbage, no rubbish. They even burst the crackers during a temple ritual, but no litter, believe me.  I show you how they do it.

Entrance of a temple

Similar to Hindu temple and practices.

Beautiful Agarbatti stand. 

A enclosed dabba to burst the crackers. No littering. 

Beautiful carving.

Quite a colorful and decoration

Charioteer 

Embellished Agarbatti stand 

Jaya - Vijaya

Taichung - in Taiwan

I was in Taiwan on business trip last week. I had a weekend to spend. I was with my colleagues from India and Malaysia. We went around in local market, one two local temples, cable car and a huge flower show. 

The city we visited was Taichung. Two hours from Taipei. 

The city is  a neat, clean, disciplined traffic. Number of vehicles are no less. No one jumped the traffic. No visible police on the street. No vehicle stopped on pedestrian mark. No vehicle crossed over the road divider the yellow line. I really wondered. City is not known to be well developed city. I changed my opinion though. 

Look at the way we are in Delhi or most of our cities. Ok agreed - we have more vehicles on the road and just not vehicles - the buffalo, the rikshaw, bicycle, cats and dogs and men, women and children. 

                                     

But i feel quite strongly that if we simply follow the traffic rules we can be better, a lot better. 

We went to a local market, traditional local, a narrow lane, small shops, eating places on the side. Kind of chandni chowk or palika bazar of Delhi. But the place was neat clean, no rubbish on the street. Except cigarette butts. A disciplined responsible citizens make it all happen. One more thing - it was Election time there. There were bill boards in many places but not out of sync of the cities aesthetics nor looked ugly. 

City is known for glass industry. A local craftsman blowing the glass in a traditional way to make beautiful articles. 

People like to eat outside and lot of seafood and meat. Take a glance at the Octopus here.

Swachh Bharat - when ?