This is how we ride - Sepia Mutiny

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July 7, 2006

This is how we ride

I’ve been thinking for a while of starting a side blog where I put up an entry every day featuring another sign of the end times. This picture below isn’t quite Cats and Dogs mating but it is kind of cool (via Ashwin our News Tab). My sources in Lucknow tell me that the Rickshaw-wallahs are striking again and so the mouse had no other choice except to hitch a ride on slower moving transportation. Last we heard he was on his way to stay with his cousin in the countryside for a few days.

It could be the most spirited interspecies escape since The Rescuers. But unlike the 1977 Disney movie, this situation is anything but fun.

Photographed Friday in the northern Indian city of Lucknow…, a mouse perches on a frog in waist-deep (for a frog, anyway) floodwaters—a small sign of the early arrival of annual summer monsoon rains.

So far, more than 30 people have died in India as a result of this year’s monsoon-driven landslides and floods. Last year’s deluge killed some 1,000 people in the financial center of Mumbai (Bombay) alone. Today polluted, knee-deep waters are raising fears of a repeat disaster among the city’s roughly 17 million inhabitants.

In drought-stricken areas, too, frogs were playing the role of rescuer. [Link]

Giddy-up!

POSTED BY abhi @ 3:08 PM

18 comments

1 · BrooklynBrown on July 7, 2006 3:30 PM · Direct link

Isn't there some anecdote in The Crying Game about a rat riding a toad? Or was it a snake riding a turtle? Anyway, that's what I thought of when I saw this picture.

2 · Whose God is it anyways? on July 7, 2006 3:32 PM · Direct link

i love it. maybe instead of the end of times, it's signifying better times or trying to tell us something that we humans miss? there's also a link to a dog feeding tiger cubs on same page that ashwin linked to. then there's that snake that refuses to eat the mouse or other rodent that was given to it as food. each day i awake expecting to read that the snake has finally had enough of being the good guy and was merely taunting the poor rodent the whole time. i honestly think that would make me feel so depressed now, instead of if the snake had just eaten the rodent right away:) imagine how the rodent must feel. i wonder if it truly trusts the snake?

3 · chikdang on July 7, 2006 3:50 PM · Direct link

..or may be it portends the impending triumph of pepino the italian mouse ,over the frogs, in Sunday's final. Go ZURREEEEEES!

4 · sumiti on July 7, 2006 3:57 PM · Direct link

whose god is it anyway... i like your perspective!
here we see a case of altruism between different species... whatever happened to altruism in humans?! how and why did more selfish instincts take over?

5 · MG on July 7, 2006 4:04 PM · Direct link

>>i love it. maybe instead of the end of times, it's signifying better times or trying to tell us something that >>we humans miss? there's also a link to a dog feeding tiger cubs on same page that ashwin linked to. then >>there's that snake that refuses to eat the mouse or other rodent that was given to it as food.

or may be the rat was just trying to hump the toad..

6 · Neha on July 7, 2006 4:10 PM · Direct link

Isn't there some anecdote in The Crying Game about a rat riding a toad? Or was it a snake riding a turtle?

It was about a scorpion who asks a frog to take him across a stream. Then it stings the frog in midstream even though it meant they both would drown, "it is my nature" scorpion says. Ah, Crying Game, the life lessons you taught me have contributed immensely to my hard shell and prune heart :-)

7 · technophobicgeek on July 7, 2006 4:14 PM · Direct link

Is it just me or does the frog look extremely kindly?

8 · Abhi on July 7, 2006 4:19 PM · Direct link

Is it just me or does the frog look extremely kindly?

This just goes to show that everybody sees what they want to. To me it looked like he had gas and was waiting until the mouse got off before he made himself feel more comfortable.

9 · PoolBuy on July 7, 2006 4:20 PM · Direct link

He's in the water - why wait?

10 · Abhi on July 7, 2006 4:21 PM · Direct link

He's in the water - why wait?

Bubbles don't float downward

11 · English Bob on July 7, 2006 4:40 PM · Direct link

Ah, Crying Game, the life lessons you taught me have contributed immensely to my hard shell and prune heart

Me too. Every time a sexy black chick chats me up in a London pub I always proceed with care and double check his/her Adams apple and how deep their voice is.

12 · Whose God is it anyways? on July 7, 2006 5:04 PM · Direct link

"or may be it portends the impending triumph of pepino the italian mouse ,over the frogs, in Sunday's final. Go ZURREEEEEES!"

i hope not!

"or may be the rat was just trying to hump the toad.."

thanks for ruining my the warmth that had enveloped the cockles of my heart with your cynicism!

"here we see a case of altruism between different species... whatever happened to altruism in humans?! how and why did more selfish instincts take over?"

sumiti, i am hoping that this frog and mouse encounter is not going to end up like Homerica: The Battle of Frogs and Mice

13 · sleepy on July 7, 2006 6:17 PM · Direct link

technophobic geek,
The Frog does look very kindly, I have a whole story made up for them. See, the Frog is a kindly cop and the mouse is a young delinquent who ran away from home but realized he couldn't face the cold, wet world just yet. The frog saved him from drowning and now the mouse's mommy is on the other side of the puddle waiting to ground all the attitude out of him.
And to whoever suggested it, the mouse is NOT humping the toad. Just had to make that clear :)

14 · raised by wolves on July 7, 2006 7:33 PM · Direct link

From the page mentioned earlier about the dog nursing the tiger cubs:

It may not even be the oddest recent example of cross-species suckling. As of February, India's Namatia Ghosh, 46, was still breastfeeding the pet monkey her husband found orphaned several years ago. "He is my son," she told BBC News.

Um, yeah. I'm not too sure what to say about that.

15 · vivek on July 7, 2006 7:40 PM · Direct link

That is SO CUTE!!

16 · Saheli on July 7, 2006 9:15 PM · Direct link

To me it looked like he had gas and was waiting until the mouse got off before he made himself feel more comfortable.

That's pretty kindly.

17 · Sharanya on July 8, 2006 5:18 AM · Direct link

Aww.. :). Kinda reminds me of the legend behind why the animals are in a certain order in the Chinese zodiac. The Ox would have been first if the Rat hadn't jumped on his back and crossed the river before him, in the decisive race that determined the order.

18 · Puliogre in da USA on July 10, 2006 2:21 PM · Direct link

This looks A LOT like a mouse hump!ng a frog...

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