If you don’t live in India, or have lived in some other industrialising/developing countries in the recent past, you probably haven’t seen mentions of Air Quality Index (AQI) a lot in the news cycles.

If you don’t know AQI, it measures the quality of air through the presence of pollutants, specially the ones that harm humans and animal both in short term exposure as well as the long term. Like PM_2.5 particulate matter, that lead to respiratory diseases.

On the AQI^-US scale, 0-50 is good, 51-100 is moderate, and has other levels defined up to 300+, which is hazardous. The scale goes up to 500, beyond which, I assume it must have been unimaginable for the US EPA that no government action will be taken.

In delhi, in November 2025, the AQI went up to 999, according to the Chinese AQI metric, which has a scale of up to 999. It was just part of the regular yearly cycle.

My week in Delhi has been better than that, but 300+ is still hazardous by both metrics. I haven’t worn as much FFP2 masks since Covid19’s second wave.

In other news, Ramadan is going on, so while the air quality might have taken me by surprise, the people who have endured 999 don’t seem to bat an eye. From what I saw, 1 out of 50 people may be wearing masks outside right now.

I live in a Muslim majority area in Delhi, the markets are crrrowded right now during Ramadan. Specially at night, when the air quality is the worst. Yet, everyone seems to be outside. To top it all, it is already relatively hot and humid (see image above). No one seems to care. Incredible!

I am hoping it gets better as the days take everyone to summer, when Delhi swaps bad air for sweltering heat and humidity.

It really is the best place on earth. (s)

Interesting reads and a video

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_pollution_in_Delhi
   The basics in text.

2. A good overview of the problem and some suggested solutions based on how Beijing did it

   https://youtu.be/-VPYbJxPvzY

3. Let’s make our own rules and standards
   Indian government’s solution to rising pollution levels

4. Why do babies take longer to potty train today?
   Something different from today’s AQI focused issue

A project I discovered

Like protocol buffers, but better^*

GitHub - gepheum/skir: Like Protocol Buffer, but better · GitHub

Like Protocol Buffer, but better. Contribute to gepheum/skir development by creating an account on GitHub.

^*: Read why the maker thinks so

A photo I took

Last week I talked about wanting to work on a project in the atmosphere. I started work on something; a podcast hosting platform. It is in ideation, and I will talk more about it going forward. Both here, and on bluesky. If you’d like, feel free to give me a follow there.

Until next week 👋🏽