Kathmandu Is No Longer Just A Bob Seger Song
Until about a month ago, all I knew about Kathmandu is it was a song by Bob Seger. Really great tune...especially the live version on his album Live Bullet. But I had no idea where it was and didn't really care. I just knew Bob wanted to go there and that was fine by me.
Then it became personal.
Google has this program called Google Analytics. A lot of businesses use it to check their marketing campaigns. Bloggers use to check their readership. You can find out not only the number of readers but where they are, what they're reading and the source that took them to your blog. There's even a feature where you can see who is reading something at a particular moment. Real Time! It's cool stuff
One day I noticed someone from some remote section of Nepal was reading a piece I did on The Beatles. No idea why but I really liked that. A few days later I found a couple of people from Kathmandu reading something else. Since then I checked where my blog was being read on a daily basis and there is always a few from Nepal. My blog has been read in over 190 countries and I'm pretty much over the amazement of that but there was something about Nepal that just intrigued me.
So when I heard about the earthquake, my first thoughts were I wonder of my readers are okay?
I lived in Southern California for close to fifteen years. I've been through my share of earthquakes. I'm pretty good at knowing what kind of damage there will be based on the numbers. When I heard 7.9 I knew there was going to be a lot of damage and loss of life. Even that personal knowledge didn't prepare me for the pictures we've seen this last weekend.
The death toll is now over 4,000. Another 7,000 are injured. Yet I can't help but wonder about those four or five readers.
Like I said earlier....it became personal.
Usually I use this space to plus a different piece and ask for subscribers. Not today. Every report I've seen says the best way to help is to give money so supplies can be purchased and delivered. This is the link to the Red Cross website. You can make donations that go directly to Nepal Earthquake Relief there or you can find dozens of other sites by Googling Nepal Earthquake.