One Out Of Seven Billion

"In the midst of all the handwringing over population explosion in the country, the Indian government might miss preparing for a global record-setting event — the birth of the baby that would take the population of planet earth to the seven billion mark."

(The Times Of India, January 24, 2011)

Chad and I were walking our dog this evening around the embassies here in New Delhi. We do this every weeknight as it keeps our labrador, Jyoti, very happy and it gives us some uninterrupted time when we can catch up on our day and how life has been treating us. As is frequently the case, Chad was filling me in on the day's news stories. Today he caught me up on the growing world population, as if walking out in India wasn't enough insight into the crowdedness of our planet. I don't read the news very often, as I have Chad's news service that keeps me up to speed on everything I need to know (and his retelling of news stories is far more entertaining than reading it for myself). So, for those of you without your own news-agregator-spouse sitting next to you, I will give you the highlights from the article:

• The 7th billion earthling will most likely be born in October or November.
• In India, 51 babies are born each minute.
• Just one state in India (Uttar Pradesh) has more births per minute than any other country except China.
• Almost one fifth of the babies born in the world are born in India.

In other news - the kind not covered by the Times of India - Chad and I had our second meeting with the IVF doctor and the surrogacy specialist this past Saturday. We are officially starting our journey to having a baby. Yep, we're hoping for just one little guy (or gal) out of seven billion. Just one!