They blew up Bangalore!

In case you haven't heard, there were seven small explosions in Bangalore today. Two people are dead, and 20 are injured, though these numbers are certainly 100% falsified (the government will keep the real, higher number out of the papers, to avoid scaring the MNC presence). I am safe and completely unharmed. But standing on my porch this evening, I was subject to a fascinating cacophony of sounds - the wail of fire trucks clashing against the Muslim call to prayer from mosques across the city. Although this is a Hindu city, it has a large Muslim population.

Terrorism has certainly worked its magic here. The majority of the day at work was spent watching the news roll in. The first three timed bombs went off just before 2pm, and afterwards, everyone was focused with rapt attention. The fourth and fifth bombs went off almost simultaneously. The sixth and seventh bombs went off some hours later, leaving everyone to imagine - is this the end, or just the beginning? When will the bombs end? Everyone is afraid - not terrified, given that only 22 people were directly hurt, but it's on everyone's mind. The phone lines were jammed all day, so some people are just checking in their families around now. And that's the point of terrorism really - not to hurt everyone, but to affect a large population. Check that box - even I've canceled my evening plans and will camp out at home. Is that a rational response? Are they really likely to bomb a bar? The probability is infinitely small, yet somehow large enough for me to have zero interest in venturing out.

I feel pretty safe in Bangalore and always have, but bombings are scary. You can't "out think" an explosion like you could a potential mugger, and it's hard to anticipate where the next bomb might be planted. Two of the bombs were within a couple miles of my office. One of them went off near where we had a department team lunch yesterday. This will certainly be on my mind for a while. In any case, I don't want anyone to worry about me - I'm ok, I'm safe, no sweat.