Flying high

It was a typical Bombay summer morning. Clear blue sky, the sun was out, the crows had started crattering, and a bunch of bright green parrots with even brighter red beaks flew by making their presence felt. A gentle sea breeze drifted into the house as if wishing everyone a good morning.

Suddenly a shrill shriek ripped through the apparent chaos. The crows were silenced for a moment. The parrots had flown off, far into the distance. Almost instantaneously, an excited young boy ran through to the window of his house and bared it open. There it stood, on the terrace of the next building, the queen of the Bombay skies, a magnificent bird, the Black Kite. Its sharp, piercing eyes looked straight at the boy for a moment. The boy was awestruck. And just as he thought he was the luckiest person alive to witness this majestic bird of prey, it gave out another cry. Reacting to it, the boy gave out his own imitation of the cry, almost like an extended, high-pitched, horse's neigh.

As if stunned by the sound and looking for its source, the bird frantically scanned the horizon, its head bobbing from side to side, its eyes searching. And then, as quickly as the whole episode had started, it came to an end. The bird unfolded its massive wings and glided off, riding the waves of breeze flowing in from the sea.

So continued the love-affair of the boy and the birds; flying high, birds of prey.

Sunday evening

Last Sunday, I think like for the first time in a long long time, I FORGOT about the F1 race!! All because of this silly, but rather engrossing, movie I was watching called '1408'.

I'm not so much a person for horror flicks, but I do like it when any movie transports me into another world. And this one does it quite well. Its got plenty of those moments that made my hair stand up, and my body thud back onto the chair... But now that I think of it, 3 days down the line, I can't remember too much else.

There was always a sense of what's going to happen next, but in the end it turned out to be a strictly okayish film. Though I must admit feeling quite satisfied that I'd managed to kill an hour and a half rather quickly :-P

The rest of the evening of course was devoted to switching between ESPN & Star Sports watching the finale of the EPL. A tense game at the JJB against Wigan, and a rather sloppy one at the Bridge rounded off a successful evening :-) The battle-royale is now set for Moscow on the 21st, and I'm looking for friends & a bar which'll show it through the night. Or else, the beer shall flow at home! Go ManU!

LMAO

For years, my Mum has been a regular reader of the Reader's Digest. Its generally quite a good read for anyone in the family with different articles to suit different tastes.

I've read it off and on, and my interest mostly gravitates to the Humour sections and some nifty word games. As I picked up this month's edition, I couldn't help but feel a sense of deja vu, with the same kind of cover page with articles on exercising, diabetes and saving the world. Nevertheless, I was determined to get to my serving of humour.

RD humour is light, intelligent and never fails to bring a grin on my face. One article/compilation of one-liners I read in this month's edition was just out of this world. Just thought I'd share my favourite quotes/one-liners from that article.

• How many people have telekinetic powers? Raise my hand. EMO PHILIPS

• I went into a McDonald's yesterday and said, "I'd like some fries." The girl at the counter said, "Would you like some fries with that?" :D JAY LENO

• I constantly walk into a room and I don't remember why. But for some reason, I think there's going to be a clue in the fridge. (How very true! Hahahaha!!) CAROLINE RHEA

• The ball missed the bat like a kiss in a Hindi movie. Who else but NAVJOT SINGH SIDHU

• What if... what if there were no hypothetical situations?? JOHN MENDOZA

• So they're showing me, on television, the detergents getting out bloodstains. I mean come on, you got a T-shirt with a blood-stain all over it. Maybe laundry isn't your biggest problem right now! The unbelievably awesome JERRY SEINFELD

• The problem is that God gives men a brain and a penis, and only enough blood to run one at a time. ROBIN WILLIAMS

• You don't get married to get sex. Getting married to get sex is like buying a 747 to get free peanuts. (This one totally had me in splits!!) JEFF FOXWORTHY

Good stuff that.

What us MBAs say

An old post on the 32 blog...

Just a coupla thoughts on what us MBA folks generally say... and don't say :)

Say (rather non-chalantly): I average about 4-5 hours of sleep a day
Don't say: I sleep for 3 hrs in class, which I conveniently forget to count

Say: I stay up till 5 in the morning doing assignments...
Don't say: I start working on my assignments around midnight (Thanks to Harsha Bhogle)

Say: We have to make regular presentations which require a lot of preparation...
Don't say: We believe in recycling... Who said we can't use stuff from one presentation in the other.. And of course, Google rocks!

Say: The days are always packed...
Don't say: They're also packed with AOE, GTA, Fifa, Quake III...

Say: The parties here ROCK!!
Don't say: If you don't drink, smoke or 'get high on dancing', you'd be bored to death.

What do you say?!

Sporting mantra

Which're the sports that have caught the attention of Indian urban youth in the past decade or so?

• Formula 1
• Soccer (EPL & Spanish leagues)
• Tennis
• Basketball/NBA (not so much now, but late 90s to early 2000s)

While these are sports which are anyways popular across the world, and have aggressively marketed themselves in the country, I think there's one factor which has made them so popular - Winners, challengers & the promise of a battle

Of course, you'd say that every sport has winners and challengers, what's so different about these sports. They have had huge, individual personalities who've single-handedly attracted viewership.

Take F1 - late 90s - the winners - Jacques Villeneuve & Mika Hakkinen. The perennial challenger - the cold, determined, German - Michael Schumacher. A lot of people started watching F1 when they heard about this great battle between a certain Villeneuve and a certain Schumacher. After Villeneuve's downfall, his 'supporters' switched loyalties to Mika (or in some extreme cases to Michael!). More people kept getting added to the fold. Some supporting Mika, some Michael. The battled raged on, and the viewers were loving it! Then, Michael started winning, and winning, and winning. The 'battle' was no longer a battle, people started getting bored. Had this situation occurred when the sport had just entered the country, one could have written its obituaries, at least for the next few years!

The English Premier League and Spanish La Liga have been broadcasted unwaveringly by ESPN-Star Sports. Again, people started getting really hooked when they saw winners & challengers - ManU winning the treble in '99 brought in a huge fan-base. David Beckham, Cole, Yorke, Scholes, Giggs, all individuals attracting youth to the sport. The great Barca-Madrid rivalry again getting thousands of new eyeballs!

Tennis - Sampras, Agassi, Federer... need I say more!?!

NBA - Jordan, Shaq, Kobe, Malone

The pattern I see is having outright winners to 'attract' new viewers to a sport. Then, have a coupla challengers thrown in to keep the interest going. Make sure that the winners are not winning too much, et voila, you have the perfect recipe for a hooked audience!

Sports like A1 GP I thought, lost the plot a bit here. There was never a clear winner, never one guy winning races all the time to make the headlines, and a promising concept fell by the wayside. Do I suggest, they should've 'manufactured' a winner, just to get in the audiences?! Well yes, and no. Yes, coz they couldve left a little more room for bigger money teams to build a touch better cars to consistently beat the field. But that again would've spoilt the concept itself? Its a far less individualist a sport compared to the likes of Tennis, where raw talent can make a winner.

For the ongoing IPL - the concept is fabulous - getting over with a cricket match in just 3 hours - but if the teams continue to be so close, I doubt if it'll see the success that its capable of. Only 15 countries or so ever really even think of cricket. To get the remaining 160 to watch, the IPL needs a clear winner. A team that blows past opposition almost every time it plays. Only this can get the world audience to sit up and take notice, and once that happens, the real games can begin.

Jimmy

October 6, 1996. My family got a new member. A cute little labrador+golden ret+cocker spaniel. Shyam (bro) and I were always fond of dogs.. memorizing the names, heights, food requirements, health issues & what not of several dozen breeds. Shyam was the one who always wanted one at home. I didn't mind, thought it'd a nice to have one around. We managed to convince everyone. And we got Jimmy.

Having a dog, is like having a baby in the house. They demand a lot of attention, care and their every move delights you!

Jim was an immediate hit with everyone. As his teeth started sprouting, he'd be chewing on just about anything, including our hands! But its one of the nicest things to experience, getting your hand chewed upon by a pup :-P (Later on in life, even with much a much bigger mouth and stronger teeth, Jim didn't mind chewing our hands, but somehow he always did it with the right amount of pressure, as if taking care not to hurt..!)

As he became more and more used to us, and we did to him, we found an ideal comfort zone... His daily routine was set and we knew exactly what he wanted when he wanted. He was a huge fan of Idlis, any South Indian dish, for that matter. And like a true brahmin, he was pure vegetarian! :-D Once when he was sick and the doc asked us to feed him some (non-vegetarian) dog food... he flatly refused to eat it (even though he was hungry, as he subsequently devoured like 5 Idlis)

I don't know how they do it, but dogs seem to know exactly what we're feeling at any time. I've read that its because of their acute sense of smell, sensing minute changes in our body odour..
He'd come and curl up to you when you're sad, and just giving him a nice petting would immediately make you feel better. Its one of those things that emphasizes how important 'touch' is to human beings. And dogs seem to have it all wired into them.

If you're looking for the meaning of 'true love', then you can't feel it easier than when you come home to your dog. The absolute joy which exploded from Jimmy when any one of us came home was the purest kind of love that one could see. As soon as I rang the bell, the barking would get louder as he ran from one corner of the house to the door. On opening the door, he'd want to be the first one to meet me. Jumping, baring his teeth, as if he were smiling ear-to-ear, vigorous tail-wagging, running around in circles. He would just be totally out of control! And every time, without fail, it had brought a smile to my face.

But, for all the joy and good times that he gave us, we always knew he'd not be with us forever. I wonder sometimes why they say 'All good things must come to an end'.. well that's part of life I guess, you need some bad times to really appreciate how good the good times were/are...

Last Saturday (3rd May), home went silent. After two months of hell, as Jim grappled with acute kidney failure, we had to take the incredibly difficult decision to put him down, out of his pain.

The last moments at the vet will forever be etched in my memory. He looked calm and peaceful, waiting to be poked for what would have seemed to be the millionth time. A few moments after the vet put in the injection, he closed his eyes... And he never opened them again

Goodbye Jim, you gem.

Miss you forever.

Sporting moments - I

I wonder why I'm so succinct with all my writings. Be it answers in an exam paper or this blog. Almost through the day, there's a flood of thoughts, words, racing about in my mind for putting onto this blog, but somehow very very few of them actually find their way through to my fingers and onto the screen. I sometimes wish there was a mind-recorder attached to my brain, noting down this stream of thoughts and just typing it out. That way I'd be writing much much more and I feel, better as well. Its just that I'm always wanting what I write to be near-perfect, if not perfect. I find it difficult to write in a way, which when read would seem like I'm speaking with you, the reader.

Anyways, this post was intended to refresh some of my memories of great sporting moments that I've experienced in school. They are vivid in my memory, as though they've just happened! And they almost bring me to tears when I relive those moments of unbridled joy...

• It was I guess one of my first cricket coaching camps, probably class V or VI. I remember being a huge fan of Curtly Ambrose during those days and used to mimic his action to the T. Of course at 1/3rd his height, I wouldn't have been able to get that kind of bounce, but I was always quite pacy :-P .. My bowling coach (forgot his name.. was a district bowler and looked a lot like the head mess-guy at IIM-I who goes around in that Luna-esque motorcycle) had a close look at my first ball. It was a good ball I thought to myself. But he immediately took me aside and explained not to have an 'open-chested action' like a West-Indian fast bowler! He said I should try and bowl like Allan Donald instead! Knowing, and being a great admirer of his action as well, the next ball was Allan Donald steaming in! A pat on the back right after that ensured that the action has stuck with me for the rest of my life, although depending on the situation I now switch to Warne, Sehwag, Saqqi or Pollock even! But yes, those were the days.. early summer mornings, running off to school in whites and playing like there was no tomorrow!
• Another memorable instance was when I was in Class X I think, or maybe Class IX.. We had an inter-class 'challenge' match! It was the world-cup of our school! :-P I always prided myself as a bowler who could do his bit as a pinch-hitter (yeah I know given my frame it looks nigh impossible that I could get the ball past the bowler even.. but its all about timing yaar ;-)) Anyways, as it stood, the match hung in the balance, I was the last guy left at the crease with 5 runs to win.. enough overs left, but I couldn't, of course, afford to get out! I struggled for the first 3-4 balls, trying a different batting stance (I don't know why). With junta shouting, screaming, egging me on, sledging me, ridiculing me, all at the same time... somehow I managed to connect the next ball and swank it over the bowler's head for a six! That was it.. for one moment I didn't know what the hell happened! The next moment, I was in the air, being tossed around like a praying-mantis on a hot frying pan!
• My first, and only, Gold medal came in an unlikely setting.. a three-legged race partnering a guy twice my size! I can't remember the reason we paired up but what I can remember is enjoying running a most terrific race. We ran and ran, and before we knew it we were in the lead. Amit burst into a laugh, as he couldn't believe his eyes, as many of our accomplished competitors fell, tripped or just slowed down! Somehow... somehow, containing our laughter, we finished the race! It was great!! And that remains my only gold medal to date! :-D

There're many many more instances I reminisce.. maybe in a later post as the evening belongs to (Abhishek) Sharma - the Marketing DUDE - who needs to buy short-pants :-P

Over n out.

Happy Birthday Moksh

To my best buddy Moksh (a.k.a. Billu, Billeshwar) ...

"Happy Birthday"

hEll Clásico :|

Football is life. I can't imagine life in the last 2 months without catching some football match every week.

And they don't (usually) come much better than the El Clásico. Last time's 3-3 draw was about as thrilling a football game as anyone can get. I had hopes for this one, that Barca would salvage some pride, spoil their title party yada yada yada... But it was a painful one to endure as (an I dare say depleted) Real ripped apart a (definitely depleted) Barca side.

Without Inesta & Deco, Barca suffered a distinct disconnect between offense and defense. After just 5 minutes of football, it was clear that Real were going to come out on top. All hope and prayers for no early Real goal failed as the ever-green Raul scored with a wonderful curling effort (after what seemed to be a foul! I aint complaining, just an 'honest observation'). And the rest was as excruciating as watching a pack of vultures devour a wilde-beast carcass on a hot day in the middle of the African Savannah.

Barca are now sure to finish no greater than 3rd in the League and its a sad end to a great era under Rijkaard. There will be many changes to the team, but the last thing any self-respecting Barca fan would want to see is Jose Mourinho as coach. His defensive mentality will kill the joy of watching a Barca side. Ultimately, I think its not about your team just winning... its about doing it in style, even if it means not winning sometimes... That's why I like teams like ManUtd, AC Milan, Tottenham, Reading even. I'd have liked Real & Arsenal too, but fell in love with Barca and ManU before em, so can't help it.. one's gotta be loyal yunnow! :D

Action over the weekend is just mouthwatering as the EPL draws to a close. No prizes for guessing for which team I'd be rooting for!

The Why of it

Two months of intense action - including the likes of watching endless hours of HIMYM, movies, chatting, random browsing (TV & Internet) & not to mention, 32 trips to the friggin Mumbai passport office - has, unfortunately, started getting quite boring. So I thought to myself 'Lets change it around a lil bit' and here is my 2nd attempt at a blog.. (ooh how incredibly exciting) What happened to the first one? Well, 'twas on for quite a while, in my engineering days, but had like 7 posts in 2 years, and after joining work, it promptly went off the radar.

With still a month to go before I (re)-join the corporate world, I'm attempting to give my chances of getting the Carpel Tunnel Syndrome a boost. Hopefully, its something I'll continue even after I start work, but fingers crossed about that...

So, here goes nothin...!