ZZZZZZZZZZ ZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!: Steelheader.net- Steelhead, Salmon and trout fishing

Our popular conception of India is that it's 100% crowded with a mixture of IT firms and beggars. There are over 1 billion people and there's a lot of poverty still. The country was put together by the British over a 200 year time frame. Along the way they transferred English as the universal business language, English law, cricket (oh, well) and managed to forge a national identity out of the a highly diverse bunch of religions (Google "Zoroastrianism" or "Jainism")and ethnic groups (blond haired, blue-eyed Sindhi's, people of Tibetan origin from Nagaland -- Google a map of where that sucker is). In short, it's a country that defies simple description as it has some of the most extremes you'll find anywhere in the world.

About a 4 hour drive from Bangalore (where my company employs almost 200 people), you reach the banks of the Cauvery River near the city of Mysore in south central India. Seasonally, people come from all over the world to fish for the mahseer, a predatory carp that can grow to over 100lbs. Most anglers use vegetable-based baits fished on the bottom with inshore saltwater gear. Others use spoons (!) to good effect. The fishing is catch-and-release and many people swear that the mahseer is the hardest fighting freshwater fish there is. I haven't been yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

As for trout, there's quite a bit of fishing for rainbows and browns in the foothills of the Himalayas way to the north. (The Brits stocked them.)

I know everyone is just having fun in this thread, but I'll leave you with one or two thoughts that you might share with your kids:

1. Few people in the US are interested in what's actually going on in China today. Even fewer know or care what's happening in India (other than the person answering the phone has a bad accent). Yet over the next 30 years what goes on in those two countries will have a greater impact on your children's employment and income than, say, timber or fishing or Boeing will.

2. The young people of China and India are incredibly ambitious and hard working. They are learning English, accounting, engineering, etc. The best and brightest will (I hope) be allowed to move to the US on temporary assignments with their US or multinational employers. Many of them will -- if allowed -- eventually settle permanently in the US as well. This is absolutely the #1 best thing that could happen to the US over time: attract and keep the most creative minds in the world. (OK, I've strayed into immigration policy but the H1B visa situation is a joke.)

3. People in India and China are fascinated by the US and want to know as much as they can. They're genuinely curious. I visit the US monthly but don't live there. My impression is that the level of interest -- and knowledge -- about these two countries is still fairly low. That's a real shame on several counts.

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Anyway, I'm not going to India or China next week. I'm going to Australia to fish hard and hoist a couple of Castlemain's XXXX bitters in the general direction of Steve Irwin's mortal remains. What an enthusiastic goofball he was! I don't know anyone who enjoyed his job as much as Steve did, and he will be missed.

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There's two types of anglers who fish fall steelhead on the Skeena and its tribs: thems thats got a spoon tied on, and thems that thinks that they should be usin' a spoon.