The Marina Beach

The Marina Beach is a beach situated along a 12 km seashore in the city of Chennai, India along the Bay of Bengal, part of the Indian Ocean. Unlike the short, rocky formations that make up the Juhu Beach in Mumbai on the west coast of India, the Marina is primarily grimy.

Although many locals claim the Marina to be the world's longest beach, there exist in fact several longer beaches, including Praia do Cassino in Brazil (which is actually the longest beach in the world stretching up to 240 km), Cox's Bazar in Bangladesh, Padre Island on the US bay Coast, Ninety Mile Beach in Australia and Ninety Mile Beach, New Zealand. A similar beach exists in Dubai, UAE. However, unlike the other beaches, it is an urban beach similar to the Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro. The width of the beach at the most widest extend is 437 meters long.

The beach begins near Fort St. George in the north to Besant Nagar in the south, a distance of about 12km. A famous characteristic of the beach is the set of stone statues that adorn the wayside area of the beach. Most statues are of Indian/local legends like Mahatma Gandhi, Kannagi, Thiruvalluvar, while others have symbolic consequence like the Statue of Labour. Also memorials for M. G. Ramachandran and C. N. Annadurai, former Chief ministers of Tamil Nadu are present on the beach. Recently, a statue of actor Sivaji Ganesan was installed.

The Marina used to be famed for its pristine beauty, jolly environment, and rich ecosystems. However, since the middle of the 20th century, the beach and water has become polluted. A production of plastic bags, human waste and other pollutants have rendered many parts of the beach unusable. In recent years, many voluntary organizations have taken up the task of cleaning up the Marina and protecting the ecosystem. Particular efforts include protection of Olive Ridley turtle nests along the Neelangarai section of the beach. Despite these problems however, a visit to the Marina is a sine qua non for any tourist coming to Chennai.

Strawberry

The common modern strawberry, of the genus Fragaria, comes from the Americas, and is a hybrid of both North and South American varieties. Interestingly, the crossbreeding was done in Europe to correct a mistake; the European horticulturists had only brought female South American plants, and were strained to cross them with the North American variety in order to get fruit and seeds. Fragaria comes from "fragans", meaning odorous, referring to the perfumed flesh of the fruit. Madam Tallien, a great figure of the French Revolution, who was nicknamed Our Lady of Thermidor, used to take steam bath full of strawberries to keep the full radiance of her skin. Fontenelle, centenarian writer and gourmet of the 18th century, considered his long life was due to the strawberries he used to eat. Strawberries were considered venomous in Argentina until the mid-nineteenth century. Strawberries have a taste that varies by cultivar, and ranges from quite sweet to pretty bitter.

Popular etymology has it that the name "straw" berry comes from gardeners' practice of mulching strawberries with straw to protect the fruits from rot. However, there is no facts that the Anglo-Saxons ever grew strawberries, and even less that they knew of this practice.

There is an unconventional theory that the name derives from the Anglo-Saxon verb for "strew" (meaning to spread around) which was streabergen (Strea means "strew" and Bergen means "berry" or "fruit") and thence to streberie, straiberie, strauberie, straubery, strauberry, and finally, "strawberry", the word which we use today. The name might have come from the fact that the fruit and various runners appear "strewn" along the ground.