All is not well

Cricket is going through a tough time - again. As if the placid wickets, the one-sided matches and the half-filled stadiums were not enough, we now have cases of ball tampering and spot-fixing, in newer ways that could make any out-of-the box thinker proud. While we may go on cracking jokes on it (like I have done here), the truth is that it is upsetting for a cricket fan. While the Pakistani authorities have accepted ‘Ignorance is bliss and deny to stay in biz’ as their tried and tested mantra, it would be foolish to imagine that the plague has been confined to Pakistan only. Thanks to the ICC Anti Corruption Unit (ACU), for a moment the CWG organizing committee can perhaps celebrate because they might not be the most inefficient body after all.

Talking about the CWG organizers, their attitude hasn’t been something that one can be proud of. Check out this still from the movie Prince (it’s showtime) – the greatest movie ever made (ain't it Ankit, Ashish?). The greatest tragedy and the difference between Vivek Oberoi and Manmohan Singh is that while the former can’t act, the latter just refuses to do so. It is worrying that no one in the administration is even worried about it. The icing on the cake came from Lalit Bhanot who said that Westerners have a different standard of hygiene than the Indians. Yeah right. Perhaps the Congress headquarters has two bathrooms – one for Sonia Gandhi and another for all the Indian members.

All said and done, like every Indian, I pray that the event would eventually be remembered for the right reasons and that the organizers are not the only Indians who walk away with gold.

Moving on to something else, Google came up with a ‘new’ feature (which was actually started by Yahoo! some 5 years ago). I don’t want to start anything on that because that would trigger a ‘Being First’ vs ‘Being Best’ debate, But I happened to read the following statement by their PR – ‘If every Google user around the world switched to Instant, we'd save 3.5 billion seconds a day, or 11 hours per second.’ Now, if there was ever a moment where one particular acronym perfectly summed up a statement, it is this - WTF!!! So what’s next? I guess Kayam Churn coming with a line that will say, “If every individual around the world had Kayam Churn before sleep, they would have quicker motions which would save ‘googols’ of seconds per second”. Ah, this would give us enough time to organize a Common Wealth Games Event every second.

Coming back to the cricket fiasco, I am devastated not because they cheated, but because it would be difficult to trust them again.

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When you are on the wrong side of 25, even the good titles betray you

I would start by congratulating Aashish who has just ‘lit his own bulb’. While others in SMDO were busy discussing trivial things like who would be the first to get married in the group, Aashish had other plans. He is now officially the first entrepreneur in SMDO. Kudos dude! May you have all the luck (and of course, clients) to take your venture to new heights. Make us prouder.

Meanwhile, the Indian team did nothing to make us proud at Dambulla today. But while India lost miserably, there were a few silver strings attached. India won’t be playing Sri Lanka again for quite some time (at least not unless they meet in the knock out stage of the World Cup). Isn’t that what you call relief? Also, India FINALLY dropped Ravindra Jadeja from the squad today. Isn’t that what you call justice? Just hope this isn’t like those Spiderman movies where the villain is killed in the end, only to be back in a sequel. Hope there is no Ja'deja vu'.

Also wanted to write about my visits to a government-run school in Bangalore where I go to teach on Saturdays. Not sure how much I actually help them learn any spoken English, but it sure is a wonderful experience being with them. It feels great with the way they greet you when you enter the room, or hang by the bus just to shake your hands (or even make fun of your hand-writing :( ). Trust me, these kids are so full of energy. They always remind me of the following lines which I had read somewhere: (a web search did not reveal any concrete source, so I was tempted to take the credit myself)

“Haath badhakar in bacho ko kuch taarein choo lene do
Chaar kitaabe padh kar hum jaise ban jaenge”

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I'm not getting any younger

I’ve been missing from this space for quite a while, so just thought would write something to feel a sense of being alive. Well, I just celebrated my 25th birth day a couple of days back. This is the oldest I've been so far. Trust me, 25 is a scary milestone to knock. Suddenly you start associating with all the stuff you read about things like the quarter-life crisis. You know you’re just kidding when you say you’re still a kid at heart. I wouldn’t dare refute Bryan Adams when he says it’s about what you feel inside, but then there are no fairy tales which have a 25 year old in them, are there? (Michael Douglas would definitely disagree because the exact day he turned 25 saw the birth of Catherine Zeta Jones, his second and current wife).

Don’t want to start sounding like some Agony Aunty, so better stop here. Instead, like a birthday boy would, I did draw a ‘wish list’ for the next year (this is at least better than writing your quarterly goals). Anyways here a few *sharable* things from the list (not in any order):
1) India winning the World Cup. I've already poured my heart here.(And wouldn’t this turn into a fairy tale if I get a chance of being at the Wankade to witness the event).
2) Federer winning a grand slam… and defeating Nadal in the finals… (This one is starting to sound more like a fantasy, so I better stop here).
3) A trip to Andaman. This (alongwith Kashmir) is one location in India which is missing from my resume. (The places for which I can proudly tick the checklist include, the backwaters of Kerala, the beaches of Goa, the sand dunes of Jaisalmer, the white waters of Rishikesh, the jungles of Jim Corbett, the raw beauty of Tawang – and of course, last but not the least, the awesomeness of Shillong).
4) Sending my parents to a vacation somewhere.
5) Writing a ‘farewell mail’ in Yahoo! :) (This would actually be a consequence of something else). If you’re reading this blog from the corp network, please ignore this. :D

Hmmm… If wishes were horses, beggars would ride!!! Anyways would end with a quote from a movie I saw recently (ironically, the name of the movie was ‘Grown-ups’)
“In life, the first act is always exciting but it is the second act – that’s where the depth comes in.”

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A crook; and something from my old book...

Well this week, for a change, saw me at the receiving end of plagiarism as the article i wrote was copied verbatim by another blog. (Good thing they even copied the first comment otherwise the needle of suspicion could have boomeranged back to me). Well, I'll show some restraint and control my emotions, and give those bastards the benefit of doubt. Maybe they are environmentalists and this is their idea of 'going green' - by recycling the same article.

UPDATE: The article was removed after a few days. Like I said, they were environmentalists and the article probably just bio-degraded.

Anyways I was scanning my mailbox and I managed to dig up a short story I had written quite a while back; thought would share it.

Karan merely managed to avoid hitting a fat lady trying to cross the road as he pressed the accelerator even harder. He realized it was the first time he had crossed 80 kmph while driving, let alone touch the 120 barrier. He tried the phone again but still no answer. As he took another sharp turn, he tried to recollect all the weird things that had happened to him in the last six months. It all started when he purchased a weird looking second-hand television set from an even weirder looking man; a bit too cheap he had thought. He soon found, much to his horror (and later to his amazement) that the TV aired the programmes an hour earlier than their stipulated time. He used it to gamble on cricket matches and horse races and had carved a fortune for himself. He had never been happier; having a bank balance he had never even dreamt off and was soon to tie the nuptial knot with his fiancé, Anjalee, a TV reporter. But all that changed 55 minutes earlier. He wiped the sweat off his face as he remembered watching the 'live' coverage of Anjalee's show in marine drive - on the very place he had popped the question to her. He recollected the day when he had gone on one knee and professed his love to her - she had just smiled then, but that had been enough. Today in the TV show, just as she was signing off, wearing the same smile, a long black car had driven straight into her and the next thing the camera showed was blood - all over. He found something strange about the car but could not recall what it was. He tried calling her one more time to warn her of the impending danger but no response again. He glanced at his watch – the accident would happen anytime. As he loudly uttered another swear word, to noone in particular, he did not notice the bus in front of him. Without warning, he steered left and crashed into something. When he gained senses a few minutes later, he found himself sitting in his black BMW with a pool of blood around the car. Just then it struck him what was so strange about the car he had seen in his TV.

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The epilogue

So my first article is finally out (my grammar teacher would definitely argue that this was my fourth article considering that she had already taught me ‘a’, ‘an’ and ‘the’). In 22 hours it already has 324 views which I deem quite an achievement because I personally refreshed the page just 311 times. It means 13 of them were actually genuine readers (now atleast my mathematics teacher is going to be very proud of me for this flawless computation).

There is one mistake in the article which I realized only after submitting the piece. Saurabh Tiwari has been picked for the squad which will tour Sri Lanka, and not Bangladesh. The site hasn’t bothered to correct it as yet despite me contacting them. So if any body of you have booked tickets for Bangladesh after reading the story, please change it immediately. I offer my apologies (it is as unconditional as Ravindra Jadeja’s).


Another joke on the same lines, just for this blogger page:

Once Yuvraj used to lift weights, now he is the weight.



All said and done, I think we all know what Yuvraj is capable of doing when he is on song. So here's a prayer for him - Yuvraj, sing!!

Thanks once again to whoever read the article. It does feel good. :) Will try and come up with more.

Enjoy maadi!!!

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