Sonu Nigam is simply unmatchable……

It cannot get better than this for me…. Shreya Ghoshal live in concert in September and Sonu Nigam live in concert in October. However, on the flip side there  was a decent audience at the latter and a crazy audience at the former. It would have been brilliant the other way round…

It was actually the second time I attended a concert by Sonu, the first one being  an anti-climax, due to the fact that the concert could not be continued beyond 10 PM at the Kanteerava Stadium , due to the Mallya Hospital in the vicinity and the concert only began at 9.30 PM.This was in February 2007 and finally after 2 years I got another opportunity to listen to this brilliant performer…

At the jam packed Palace Grounds, it was a déjà vu with the concert beginning 90 minutes late. I had been to a Shankar Mahadevan concert at the same venue exactly an year back and had vivid memories of dancing to his tunes in a steady drizzle. So the expectations were supremely high……(although I still have a Rahman and Sivamani concert to be attended !! )

Sonu entered with a trademark alaap of his and the very own “Palko ke leke saaye…” And the rest was to follow….. Dil Dooba, Falak Dekhoon, Chak de Saare Gham, Tu Jahan Main wahan, Sooraj Hua Madham, Soniyo, Tumko Paaya hai,…..to name a few. He also went on to sing “Don’t say alvida”, a fantastic rendition from a yet to be released movie.

As if this wasn’t enough, there were the following standouts :

1. He explained how a song gets composed, with the help of Lyrics that goes - “Aloo Bhindi Gajar Matar Paneer”….and merged the tune with “Nachle Ve” … it was such fantastic transition from a fancy song to an actual movie song.

2. The best rendition was of  the song “ Phir milenge chalte chalte” from “Rab Ne Bana Di jodi”. Here he actually sang the songs out of which the lyrics were made of , making it into a 15 minute song almost !!! This included “Mere Sapno ki rani”, “Aaja Aaja Main hoon pyar tera”…

3. 4 Kannada songs - “Mungaaru Male”, “Anisutide”, “Ninnindale”, “Neene Bari neene”….with the promise of a ALL KANNADA SHOW next time in Bangalore

4. “Chiggy Wiggy” which included Kylie Minogue’s lines in a female pitch and “I’m the one” by Michael Jackson. “Let’s celebrate his life” said Sonu.

5. Finally my all time favourite Hindi song to end the show… “Kal Ho Naa Ho”, which ended as a rock version….

Due to time constraints once again, the show was snapped when he was actually warming up for lots more…. But nonetheless it was a memorable evening….

The effortless ease with which he switched songs for 2 hours without a break, the maverick energy he had, the improvisations with each of his songs along with witty humour in between, his interactions with the crowd, his maturity of singing…. simply left me flabbergasted.

Thanks Sonu …

By the way : Another Sonu Nigam Chartbuster on the offing.. “Shukran Allah” from the movie Kurbaan…

Perfectionist of an art…and not for any ordinary reason…..!!!

Few days back there was a Disney fan wallpaper released with a quote showing - "Where you are always king of the court". One of the fantastic wallpapers depicting a sportsman as an armed warrior.



It’s been close to 4 weeks since I began the thought process, delayed for certain reasons, for building up a long blog. I have been an avid follower of Cricket, and being an Indian, Cricket and Hindi Cinema come naturally to all of us. After our Parents and teachers, most of us have our idols in these two fields and try to emulate them in whichever various possible ways we can. I developed a liking for Formula-1 few years back and admired Michael Schumacher for his consistency. But he was never one whom I would have wanted to idolise. Another star in my generation has been Lance Armstrong. I always thought of reading his autobiography to know about him, but I am yet to do so. Vishwanathan Anand, Michael Johnson, Sergei Bubka, Michael Phelps, Ronaldo, Zidane, Beckham... some of the several legends in various sports whom I have been following over the years.

But the one sport which I like after Cricket has been Tennis.

And since I started following Tennis is 1993, my first memories are of the great Ramesh Krishnan and young Leander Paes taking India to the Davis Cup Semi-finals with a thriller against Boetsch-Leconte and co. at Frejus. Another was Steffi Graf charming the tennis courts with serenity. And not to forget Pete Sampras lifting the Wimbledon. And his rivalry with Andre Agassi.

But for some reason, I admired Andre Agassi more than Pete Sampras.He had that special charm on the court, while Pete looked like a giant, with an intimidating presence. Slowly as Pete kept on winning Wimbledon's after Wimbledon's, but made only one Semi final at Roland Garros, it justified my following of Andre, because he emulated Rod Laver after 30 years of winning a career slam.

Ok then.. enough of all this preface...

Year 2001...a lean built man with a stubble and a ponytail, ended Pete Sampras's dream of winning 5 consectuive Wimbledons. All connoisseurs of the game began hailing this young 20 year old as a potential Grand Slam winner and the future superstar of Men's tennis. There have been many who failed to live up to expectations in the last 2 decades after early successes…..Michael Chang, Patrick Rafter, Marcelo Rios, Marat Safin to name a few....I just brushed this aside as the fall of Sampras, rather than arrival another new kid on the block...

Year 2004..The same man with ponytail had won the Wimbledon previous year and won the Australian Open that year to become the World No.1, winning only his 2nd Grandslam title. I had a look at the highlights of that match and I was simply dumbstruck.

A new hero had arrived for me...Roger Federer.

All the following statements are a cliché...but something I enjoy reading time and again and never get tired.

• Roger weaves the tennis racquet like a magician weaving his wand.

• Roger makes Tennis look like an art, like an artist making a painting out of fine fabric colours with a smooth moving paintbrush.

• He makes Tennis look ridiculously so EASY that sends shivers down opponents' spines.

• He plays some of the most difficult shots in the game, with consummate precision and ease, to an extent that "Jaw Dropping" becomes a habit while watching him play.

Let me quote some of the greats of the game -

• John McEnroe described Federer's Forehand as "the greatest shot in our sport".

• Vijay Amritraj on air at Wimbledon 2009 - "You can never hear Roger move on the tennis court..so effortless".

• And no one can beat this Jimmy Connors description - "In an era of specialists — you're either a clay court specialist, a grass court specialist or a hard court specialist... or you're Roger Federer"

Over the past few years Roger has redefined Tennis. I don't need to quote any of his records to say he is the Greatest ever. Look for them here...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Federer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Federer_-_Tennis_Records#Individual_match_records
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Federer_career_statistics

For me, after Pete retired and Andre was at the brink of his career, I had virtually lost interest in following tennis (Apart from watching a few ladies matches :P). It was this man who rekindled my following for Tennis.

If someone were to write an official encyclopaedia for Tennis, Roger Federer would be it !! What does he not have in his game ???

A spectacular Forehand –
He hits it inside out(called the "off-forehand" by Vijay Amritraj and "Dancing Forehand" by Jim Courier ) with the acutest of angles


hits them as down-the-line passing shots, into the corner of the court, on the baseline,


on the sideline and as a fierce winner, with a destructive snap of the wrists generating enormous topspin which does not give any elevation for a return to be hit.

I have never seen anyone with such a variety of forehands.
Check this out for a more elaborated and technical description……….
http://www.tennis.com/yourgame/instructionarticles/forehand/forehand.aspx?id=129054

Fantastic Backhand -
The one handed shot that does not give an iota of idea about which direction it is headed to, there are 4 varieties here –
Down the line backhand,


Crosscourt angular backhand,


A slice volley

and
A slice with backspin.


Precision serve –

He is neither a Goran Ivanisevic, nor a Pete Sampras. Nor is he an Ivo Karlovic or an Andy Roddick. But serving has always been a forte of Fedex's game. He has precision serve from both Ad and deuce courts, equally good on both the centre and wide serves. Another important aspect is the Kick serve he uses for 2nd serves. For the matter of fact, I have seen very few players score a 2nd serve ace at critical points of the match. Federer is one of those very few.

Defence -
Though Roger is predominantly an attacking player, defence is an extremely important aspect of his game. Over the years, as he got to play more and more baseliners as opponents, he had to fine tune his defensive skills. He has a floating backhand defensive return giving him enough time to set himself up to an attacking position and one that looks to land out of the court but teasingly lands in, misguiding players.

Ridiculous shots -
Some of the shots he hits are absolutely ridiculous. Probably only God would hit them so well!!! The passing shot on the run from around the net post, a pickup smash jumping way behind the baseline to return a smash(Roddick, Djokovic and Agassi can tell you about it)
Watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Hp-EArV6s8
and this : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yidqJM1Xl4U
Between the legs winner running back towards the baseline and a sparingly used roll-lob-crosscourt to land at the corner of the court.

On court presence -

There have been only two occasions (Out of the very few) that I have seen Federer get frustrated -
Once when he called out "Roger,Idiot" when he served a double fault against David Nalbandian.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIWeuvOrG9o
And once when he smashed and broke his racket on a windy and frustrating day against Novak Djokovic.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXeysnDFchA
He is the epitome of calmness and sedation under the highest of pressures, celebrating his wins in the calmest manner. An extremely well behaved person and a thorough gentleman on court (Off court as well, based on what people around him say).


Confidence -
The level of confidence he has in his ability, often makes me think that he always gears up for the business end of a tournament(semis and beyond), going through the motions in the early rounds. He experiments on different aspects - shots, angles, speeds and plays around with lowly ranked players in the first few rounds, gauging himself on his form, saving energy for bigger battles ahead and calibrating his repertoire.


Chink in the Armour....
The only chink in his armour has been his battle against his well known rival - Rafael Nadal. Nadal has been another tremendous tennis player and being 5 years younger, a deserving successor to Roger. However the battle only gets better. Rafa leads 13-7 in all matches and 5-2 in Grand Slam finals.

But at this stage of his career, with 15 Grand Slams and more to come, 237 weeks as number 1 and now back at the helm within a year of losing it, a career Slam, 21 successive Slam semis, 16 of 17 Slam Finals , 20 Slam Finals in all....Federer is left with only few things to achieve in his career. Now that he’s more relaxed after all the hullabaloo surrounding his fatherhood, it should motivate him to chug along for many more years.
And setting right his record against Nadal would top his list...no doubt about that.

Looking Ahead…
Few people still say " How can he be the greatest when he is not the greatest of his generation ? "...
They will need a lesson in common sense; however Federer would definitely want to shut their mouths. All said and done, there are more goals for enough motivation ... 8 Wimbledons (He already has 6) to beat Sampras' 7, 25 Grand Slams to beat Margaret Court's 24, Holding all 4 slams if not a calendar slam, a Davis cup win, an Olympic Singles Gold Medal (what better than to win it at Wimbledon in 2012)....
Nevertheless, even if Roger doesn’t manage to match them all, it cannot take away anything from him. For he has enthralled fans all over the world, opponents do not envy but respect him, legends acknowledge him as one among themselves....


He has set the benchmark for the generation to follow and that is what created a monster called Nadal. And will create many more......

Finally to conclude this tribute to Federer on account of his 28th Birthday (August 8th 2009)...

To me, there has never been a Tennis player as aesthetically pleasing to watch as Federer....
To me, there never has been such a humble and down to earth, popular champion...

To me, there never will be a champion who will cry both while losing …


As well as winning...


To me, there never ever will be another Roger Federer...!!!

Take a bow Fedex...looking forward to lots and lots of Slam wins, lots more of those forehands and that gracious charm on the court......

Finally a Federer quote:
A journalist asked Roger - "What is the secret of your success- Genius or Hard Work?"
Roger answered - "I worked hard on my genius" ....

All those days are gone.....

All those days....The days where Tennis and Cricket used to dominate our discussions at college , more than our syllabus, lecture classes, internals, labs, marks etc. People have moved on and so have I. 3 years later, it doesn't fascinate as much as it did, not that I have lost interest but its all about keeping in constant touch with each other. In my previous blog, I had a small dig at 2 of my friends for delaying my blog specially for them. The look-back-references for them are this and this one. When Roger Federer won the French Open and Wimbledon this year, I was extremely ecstatic and happy for him and for the fact that I was fortunate to be in the era where Roger played tennis. But there was no such getting back at the two of my friends on those occasions, except for two SMSes exchanged. When there were instances where I would be on the receiving end, I used to get pings from them and that would start the banter. But when things are other way round, my pings have left me with relatively no responses. After all, i don't need to dwell much on it. The fact is that responses from my side is what triggered the debates. Its a known fact that, if you don't have the 2nd hand, you cannot hear the clap. Now nobody cares for the clap....so why bother? After all Its done and dusted now.... phew !!!

The Light at the end of this road is to be diplomatic, no banters, no trespassing...
They say, Life's all about 'Moving on'..... Truly so !!

Although my blog page shows only one follower, I have 2 other people who read my blog. So fortunately the number is 3 !!
My blogs will keep coming....Including the one I have promised in the previous one. Will take some time to mould my words now, as it would be a commemorative blog than one for the originally intended reason.
If not for audiences, atleast for myself when I look back into my life at my ripe old age ......

Life always comes a full circle....

Life always comes a full circle....

A short post in a jiffy....

From South Africa to England.....

From Johannesburg


To Lord's...


Mahendra Singh Dhoni's life has come a full circle in a short span of 2 years. Whatever goes up has to come down, and that's what is one of life's bitter realities.And after you fall down, the only way is to go upwards!!!

In this span of 2 years we have seen MSD taking Indian cricket to near champion levels, raising the bar of expectations.

So there's no point at all....For the media to make a scapegoat out of him !!

The Media is partly responsible for this backlash and not only MS Dhoni.He publicly came out and apologized to fans for the T20 WC loss...

Now then..which media person has ever come out and tendered an apology for any mistake he/she did ?? And its almost close to impossible that anyone will ever do!!!

So there's no point pondering over whatever media says, rather creates, about Indian cricket.
The only thing they must be trusted for is the statistical news that they provide.

By the way..another champion sportsperson's life too has come a full circle...and more ironically at the same place where he began his rise..Eagerly waiting to see if he can overcome the setback....

"The Championships" kicks off next Monday at Wimbledon - 22 June 2009.

People all around the world would hope for this encore......


However, if at all Nadal crashes out in the quarter finals or earlier and Federer goes on to lift the trophy for the 6th time,it would also topple Nadal from the World No.1 spot.And its not even been one year since he was crowned the No.1.

So fingers crossed.....!!! Hoping for a Federer win though :)

For two reasons:

• I have kept my blog on Roger pending since the Roland Garros triumph
  

• I will settle my scores with 2 of my friends if Federer re-gains the World no.1 ranking
  

Roland Garros de King Dethroned

I never happened to watch a single shot of this match.I had been to a family function, hence could not do so.But as I was returning back home,drenched in rain that hits Bangalore only in the evenings ,I came to know of the result by an SMS from one of my good friends (who happens to be a staunch supporter of the main protagonist in this blog). And it was a mixed feeling for me. Firstly,I responded by telling him that it was one of the greatest upsets of all times.Secondly,I was really wondering, DID IT REALLY HAPPEN???

YES Indeed.... Rafael Nadal had been beaten at Roland Garros !!! This was the image that I saw on Television coming back home!!



One who had risen up the ladder of Men's Tennis from being a clay court specialist, to King of Clay and to challenge and overcome the best of them all, on any surface. Frankly, I was just in awe watching him from 2005. Being a very staunch Roger Federer fan, it was really tough for me to see him being challenged and dethroned by someone relatively inexperienced. And
Rafa did exactly just that......It was not until he beat Federer at Wimbledon,that I had to simply adore him for his meteoric rise.

Alright he had to lose some day at Paris...but when?? He was in such tremendous run on clay, that none on earth looked capable to snatch the Coup de Mousquetaires or the Musketeers Cup from him.Federer tried thrice, also getting brutally hammered in 2008.He had lost only 5 matches on clay in the last 5 years, and had never lost a best-of-5 clay court match.
More so, he was stretched to 5 sets only thrice in them !!!

Keeping this apart, he had never lost at Paris since making his debut at the age of 17 in 2005.

Many Federer fans will rejoice at Nadal's loss, for it has been the only Grand Slam Roger has never won, thanks to Nadal standing in his way.

But it would be completely foolish and insane to say Rafa's gonna fall down after this defeat !!

Simply look at his achievements in the past 4 years:

• 4 French Opens in a row, from 2005 to 2008
• First man to Win both French Open and Wimbledon in the same year(2008) after the great Bjorn Borg. This to stop Federer's 5 year golden run at London-SW19.
• When critics began to point out his weakness on Hard Courts, he came out and beat Federer at the Australian Open in 2009, after a gruelling 5 hr semifinal a day before.
• Has already won 15 masters series titles(tied with Federer), second only to Andre Agassi's 17.
• When the whole world was predicting a 25 GrandSlam collection for Roger Federer, Nadal rose out of nowhere, and now Federer is finding it hard to break Sampras's 14.
• Broke Federer's 237 week long Streak at the Top spot of Men's tennis.
• Only player to beat Federer in GrandSlam Finals.
• Furthermore, he had to beat Federer to win each of his Grand Slam titles ( 5 Finals and 1 semi-final)
• Leads Federer 13-7 in Career meetings. The only player currently in the top 10 to boast of this record.
• Last but not the least, he won the Olympic Gold Medal in singles, something that Federer dearly misses.

And the list goes on and on....

I might have been a bit Parochial in mentioning Federer several times in the blog, but that has what's been the benchmark for men's tennis in the last 6 years.
And that's what Rafa's tennis career has been about as well..."how he dethroned emperor federer"...

And what a journey it has been so far...This small roadblock would make him even more determined and stronger.

I found a very good article describing Nadal's rivalry with Federer...Aplty sums up their camaraderie and I endorse the views as well...
http://tennisworld.typepad.com/tennisworld/australian_open_2009/



And as he went out of the tournament, he simply admitted defeat saying it wasn't a tragedy after all..Superb head on his shoulders one must say.Andre Agassi predicted that Nadal could be the first man to win a single year grand slam this year, after the legendary Rod Laver.

But now that that's gone, Nadal would certainly want to get the career slam with a US Open title into his kitty.By the way, he did put the man whom he idolizes and has been his no.1 rival, under pressure, by saying that Federer is the favorite to win the elusive French open. The win would complete Federer's career slam and put him on par with Sampras' record of 14.

That would be a sigh of relief if it happens, because I really did believe this year when Nadal won at Melbourne, that he could beat Sampras before Federer does !!! And as I write this blog, Federer has just made it to his 20th consecutive Grand Slam quarter final,with a come-from-behind 5 set win over Tommy Haas.

Hope Federer wins the Musketeers' Cup this year !!!
Hope I get to savour and write more and more about the rivalry and more and more about Rafa.....

IPL Season-2 Re-visited

IPL Season-2 Re-visited

Yes..it's a comeback of sorts for me to cricket blogging. And no points for guessing the topic. Oh yes..it is the end of the carnival that kept millions of Indians glued to televisions, with their daily time tables re-scheduled.Indian Premier League Season-2.
Often it's easy to keep track of short tournaments and revisit the moments at the end.But due to the sheer volume of the matches played and that too without any time to recover (both for the players and for me to track the matches), its more for the reason of remembering the event, is why I am blogging some of the IPL 2009 memories.

So here I go...in no order of preference:

The Match of the tournament: 3 choices - Rajasthan v Mumbai, Rajasthan v Kolkata and Deccan v Kolkata. I would go for the 1st one, since it was more Topsy-turvy than the other two and for the fact that Rajasthan miraculously won it from nowhere.


The Jaw dropping moment of the tournament: Undoubtedly has to be Adam Gilchrist literally killing Delhi Daredevils bowlers.A knock of 85 off 35, right up there with his knock of 149 in the 2007 ICC World cup final at Barbados.


The best commentary quote: In one of the matches involving Royal Challengers Bangalore, when Anil Kumble's best figures of 5-5 flashed on the screen, Harsha Bhogle said - "These are outstanding figures.Something you associate with, in a match between 4th std-A and 4th std-B".

The most cliched words said: No prizes for guessing. It has to be "Thats a DLF maximum". As the tournament progressed , so called ROCKSTAR Danny Morrison made it as "Thats a DLFer"...

The Ice-man : 3 contenders for it - Rohit Sharma,Irfan Pathan and Munaf Patel. However Rohit Sharma takes the cake for his breath-taking brilliance in the final over against the Kolkata Knight Riders and almost repeating it against Kings XI Punjab.


The SOUTH AFRICANS : This coveted crown sits on the head of Mumbai Indians, for showing all of us how not to handle pressure situations. Whats more, they were coached by Shaun Pollock and led by Sachin Tendulkar. That should tell it. (with due respect to both!!)

The best media coverage for the tournament: It has to be the Fake IPL player(http://fakeiplplayer.blogspot.com), who faked to be a 'real IPL player' and gave us all the masala that we needed.It ended in an anti-climax, with him not revealing his identity. However, will we get a glimpse of him again at the ICC World T20??
Time will tell....

Captain of the tournament: MS Dhoni,Gilchrist,Kumble and Warne stood out.But without an Iota of partisanship here, Kumble it is, for simply making the Royal Challengers rise from the ashes like a phoenix. Hats off Anil...I salute you!!


Statement of the tournament: Ashish Nehra was on cloud nine taking a bunch of wickets and went out saying - "I can do whatever Zaheer Khan can do". The very next day, Adam Gilchirst plundered him for 18 runs in his first over and brought him back to earth !!

The glamour icon: No.. it was not Mandira Bedi this time.Danny Morrison,with a goatee beard and extravagant English, had his fair share of moments with cheer leaders. On one day, he had an Aircel Cheer leader sitting on his right lap for an interview and on another day, he had one of Mallya's 'White Mischief Gals' sitting on his shoulders. I wonder what's in store for him,if he does the same things next year in India.

Now the Mandira Moment: Prior to the match between RCB and MI, in an interview with Neil McKenzie,Mandira refered to Abhimanyu Mithun of RCB as a Wicket Keeper.He turned out to be a medium pacer!!!.The best thing was Neil McKenzie too did not know about it. And SET Max never bothered to care about it..Mandira continued to anchor at-the-venue reports !!!

The Joker: It has to be that man again - Sreesanth. He gave Hayden a mouthful after dismissing him,despite being bludgeoned for 22 runs off the previous 5 balls. And he went for a victory run after castling MS Dhoni with an inswinger when the teams met the next time. Perhaps he was venting out his anger for not having been selected for the India T20 WC team, and making his case worse with the sprint!!




The Guffaw Moments: Suresh Raina,Shadab Jakati and Badrinath messing up with the ball like school kids against Deccan Chargers.And I never saw MS Dhoni as grumpy as he did that time.Another moment was the entry of the dog on the field to stop play for 20 mins in the first match of the tournament(CSK v MI).Not to forget, Shilpa Shetty introducing her beau to Geoffrey Boycott, when Boycs was searching for attention from Shilpa.

Catch of the tournament: Rather it would go to 3 people. I cannot remember any better catches in the tournament than the ones held by Roelof van der Merwe and Vinay Kumar at PE, to dismiss Dhoni and Hayden respectively. And they came in a must win game for the Royal Challengers.
The other one was Suresh Raina pulling off a screamer at Point to get rid of Gautam Gambhir at Jo'Burg.

Ego-hurting moments : Abhishek Nayar carting Andrew Flintoff for 3 sixers in an over in the tournament opener.Later in the tournament,Sourav Ganguly never batted in the game against Daredevils, after Knight Riders got a good start.What's worse, Morne van Wyk, Moises Henriques and Wriddhiman Saha got to bat ahead of him !!

Biggest BOO's: These are reserved for Greg Shipperd and John Buchanan for their cries to allow more than 4 foreign players in the playing XI. It made sense for Shipperd, since he had to keep Glenn McGrath out.But Buchanan showed the world that he's the biggest fool.He played Langeveldt and Mortaza for one game each after they were out of the tournament, and gave extended runs to ordinary players like Moises Henriques and Morne van Wyk....!!! Come on..This is the INDIAN Premier League..!!!!

Penultimately, the only thing that was good(if at all there was!!) about SET MAX's extraa innings T20 was the theme song composed by Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy!!!! I better not mention anything else about one of the worst post and pre match shows,(in terms of content) ever presented.




And finally....Special mention to youngsters like Manish Pandey, Amit Singh, KP Appanna,Pragyan Ojha,Tirumalasetti Suman,Vinay Kumar,Ravindra Jadeja & Raina,Rohit and others for keeping the Indian Cricket's young talent flag flying high.

Kudos to Adam Gilchrist's Deccan Chargers for the spectacular IPL victory.


IPL season-2 certainly lived up to its standards !! But IPL-1 was the best... Only because, I was virtually helpless about what to do in the evenings, after the tournament ended. But no such feelings this time around !!! And as Lalit Modi said...Hope the IPL comes back bigger and better next year in India..!

Setting an example..are they??!!!

"Kuch nahi ho sakta iss desh ka!!!" ...These were the first words of a promotional video that was being aired a few days ago on various television channels.Basically, it was an attempt by young people of Indian Cinema appealing to the Indian Public, more specifically the Youth,to vote in the general elections.These actors were guided by a prominent filmmaker in reaching
out to the public by means of strong statements.

Are they setting an example??? Just decide for yourselves.

More than 3 quarters of the "actors" who appeared in the promotional video did not vote!!!
Courtesy: http://www.bollywoodhungama.com/features/2009/05/02/5121/index.html

And the reasons given, are beyond logic...
Some were busy with shooting schedules,some didn't have their names on the electoral list,some did not bother to travel to the places of their domicile, where they could have voted...Some were on holidaying!!!
What did those people think of when they shot this video !!!??? FOOL People???!!!
Why does the government declare holidays for voting??
We have seen common people waiting in the scorching heat in queues to vote, and these people who travel in Air conditioned vehicles , do not have the time to vote!!!
ALAS!!! They proved that with irresponsible "acting",really nothing can happen of this country!!!

And have a look at this...Of the ones who voted, this is what we saw the very next day.
Most of us have had great respect for the Bachchan family for having entertained us all these years.But the photograph on front pages of many newspapers made for disrespectful statement from the Bachchans.

However, if we take a look at this link, Amitabh Bachchan himself clarifies that he was not alone in doing this act.

http://bigb.bigadda.com/?paged=2

There were more people who chose to signify their "I have voted status" in the same show-off of the "Election-Finger"..!!!

The Election commission then had to justify the reason for choosing to put the mark on the middle finger !!! So we really cant blame the Bachchan family !!!.

If all these people were not objected for this show, then same thing must extend to MTV and Channel-V in the future,to make free usage of such obscene remarks,without being censored. Isn't it???

What does the government have to say on this???NOTHING!!!
They are busy freeing names of culprits who are not yet sentenced,from CBI lists and carrying on with mudslinging..
What are the other political parties doing about this?? Simply moving around the bushes!!!

By the way,I did cast my vote traveling 10+ hours to my domicile.That doesn't mean i am showing it off..at least i did my duty when many people did not bother to do it!!!

But the plain simple thing still remains - "Kuch nahi ho sakta iss desh ka!!!!".

To speak or not to speak...

There are occasions where one has to carefully speak whilst discussing matters of sensitivity in public places.And in India, these matters relate to politics(especially now being the election season), movies, religious issues,..and of course cricket.I had one such similar experience today when i had been to a petty tea shop, during a short tea break from my work.

I was with 2 of my colleagues and i discuss cricket with one of them very regularly..This time the point of discussion was the most thrilling match of IPL 2009 till then, between the defending champs and a team owned by a bollywood superstar.

The match had gone to the wire and thanks to a flamboyant knock from former India captain, the champs who looked set to win, had to settle to a tie.However, it is a different matter that the champs went on to win the match in the deciding 'super over'.The bone of contention of our discussion was about the result.

This colleague of mine always had only one opinion about the former India skipper...contempt and i had immense respect for what the captain had done to Indian cricket,albeit all the controversies associated with him.My point of argument was that, without his knock they would have lost hopelessly, while he was hell bent on his point that he could not finish off the match,to which i agreed. However when he tried to mention that his innings was a fluke, i was tempted to make the discussion even more heated.

Since this was taking place in a busy street, there were many people around.And an auto rickshaw driver overheard us and poked his nose into this chat.I ignored him and so he spoke to my colleague and began blabbering about how the last over went and how good a young 18-yr old fast bowler had bowled it, getting out the former India captain.

So my colleague said " Yes he bowled really well..he's a good bowler".

In response to that, i stressed "He needs to get his bowling action right".
The response from my colleague was "We'll talk about this later"..

I wondered what made him say this. I now had glance at the other person,whom i had ignored and it was then that i realized why he joined the discussion.

We finished our tea as the guy was continuously chattering and making an eye contact, started walking back ot our office
My colleague then asked - "Do you know why i stopped the discussion?"
I responded in the affirmative. And then i told him that "Yes, but i was speaking to you not to the other guy.The bowler is good but his action looks really iffy".

Now then...the reason why the auto driver joined the discussion was because of the surname of the bowler(I need not elaborate much on this!!)
And lo...this was taking religious proportions out of an animated discussion on a sport..!!!

And thus i have decided to be extremely watchful of similar such experiences that i can possibly come across in the future...


But this is the case with people in India...!!! And certain questions pop up in my mind...

1. Why are sentiments associated badly with things, that should be dealt with logically??

2. Why would anybody want to interfere into a discussion happening between strangers ?? And that too without any invitation ?

3. Aren't people feared when speaking on certain topics, to people of different religious background??
Or rather do they really have to fear?? Are they not common people??

I am not sure whether i can get answers for these, but one thing for sure...
"Freedom of speech" is never the same anymore for me....!!

(Bad)LUCK BY CHANCE???!!!

Finally i take some time to write my first blog for 2009.I had thought several times, i would begin for this year some way or the other. But ironically this is the topic i chose to write on.

If one was to analyse about a situation, it would either be to think about what went wrong or what went right.I am pondering over an incident that happened on March 22,2009. I had been to the Innovative Film City located at Bidadi about 40 kms away from Bangalore. It was a company sponsored outing and after having seen some of the snapshots of the Film city,i was looking forward for some enjoyment.

We reached the venue at about 10.45 AM and after all the preliminaries, simultaneously giving our cameras some hectic usage,the first thing we did was to watch a 10 min clip of the epic "SHOLAY".The best thing about this was the setting - a small mobile village theatre with wooden benches and dim lighting.We saw the "Yeh Dosti" song and the famous Gabbar-Kaalia sequence in the 10 mins.As we moved along , next on our itinerary was "Velocity". This was the Go-Karting event.

As we reached the track,my first view of the track was that it was an amateur one and not professional.Secondly,it was a first time for me, hence it suited me well, although i wasn't scared, since it can only be a bit tough if one doesn't know how to ride a car.Thirdly, the mindset was to enjoy as it was not a race.

Everybody waited for their turn to get onto the track and so did i.The track consisted of two types of Karts.One was a double seater, called the "Family Kart" and the other was the normal single seater.Some of my colleagues went on a ride on the Family kart with their wives,while the rest of us,namely bachelors waited for our karting rides.

There was one round of family kart followed by a round of single karts.This was succeeded by another family kart round and when this was not yet finished, the track instructors called for the next single seater rounds.

The track pit lane has 8 cars and i got to sit on Car no.7. Although not superstitious, i consider no.7 as one of my favorite numbers(not lucky). Another of my colleague was in car no.8 (I'll keep him anonymous with his initials-Mr.A).I sat down on the car and was adjusting my legs on the pedals.The scary thing was that the Fuel tank(rather a plastic kerosene can) was placed right in front my seat,below the steering wheel. But it seemed to be safely attached.

The instructor guided all of us one by one with the usage of pedals. I was just putting on my safety helmet and the instructor came to me and said -
"The right pedal is for the Brake and left pedal for the Accelerator. Hold the Steering firmly to control at the curves. If you bang other vehicles you shall be disqualified. If you bang the boundary safety walls you will be fined".

Saying this he proceeded to car no.8 to repeat the same.
I turned back to him and asked-
" hello boss,'right one' is the brake... right??" .
This is because the the positions of the pedals are the other way round in a Car.
The guy nodded and also told me-
"please fasten your helmet strap sir".
I said "Ok" and turned back.Since my legs are a bit long, i adjusted myself on the pedals once again.The next thing to do for me was to fasten the helmet strap.

After having read the story till here, one might feel, "Abey kya paka raha hai??". But let me make clear my intention about blogging this real life incident- "Luck ya Bad Luck????"

"BANG!!!!!!!!!!". This was what i heard the next second. The time gap wasnt even enough for me to put the helmet strap and the next moment i was sandwiched between two cars- One, on which i was seated and the second -car no.8- which was on top of me.So what happened???
None of the cars had been started, since the instructors themselves come and pull the trigger starting from car no.1.
However Mr.A had rammed his car right on the top of my head, sending my helmet for a wild toss and my Head went crashing against the steering wheel- "WHAM!!!!".
The next moment i was trying to wriggle my way out of this mess and the weight of the car was much more than a 100 kilos.Goodness Gracious!! It was a Go KART after all....After a few seconds one of the instructors came and pulled me out and another of my colleague came running(Mr.H) and saw my forehead-"Oh man...you've got a cut...."

I saw backwards as to what happened and there was Mr.A's car on my car and he was getting out of it.

That is when i came to know what had happened. A colleague of mine(Mr.R) on a family Kart who had set off in the previous round had come to park his vehicle in the pit,but what he did was to ram his kart on to kart no.8. He was arriving at such a speed that the momentum caused the havoc to happen with such ferocity.

I was simply taken for a first aid, people waiting for the karting rounds backed off seeing this sight and all of them were running around me asking -
"Are you feeling giddy?? Drink some water...Dont worry its just a small cut..".

I sat on the bed and asked the lady there.."Is the cut deep??". She cleaned the wound and said "Dont worry, it's just a skin deep wound"...They checked my nose and back and it was fine.
I closed my eyes and thought of my beloved people, trying desperately not to panic. My manager(Mr.V) asked me "You've had a tetanus injection recently??"

I said "Yes..in Jan"...As the wound was getting dressed I was given water to drink.I was still closing my eyes,trying not to vent my frustration.

The next thought that crossed my mind was " What's this that i went through just now????"

My bad luck that i faced this without any fault or involvement of mine ???
OR
Is this life's way of showing its cruelty to me??
OR

My Good luck that i was not seriously injured as Steve Waugh was in Kandy in 1999 after a dash with Jason Gillespie??!!!


OR
My Good luck that the cars did not catch fire and were not blown up into pieces??!!!


A week after the 'accident'.....I still am searching for answers to these......!!!!