I can't can't , just can't believe Sahasa Simha Vishnuvardhan is no more. I grew up watching his movies and till I discovered some great Dr Raj movies, he was my favorite , even after watching Dr Raj movies, he was still my favorite tho with Annavaru obviously up there.
An unassuming actor with hazaar style(his swagger when he made "whistling" entries in movies) , he made ordinary scripts look extraordinary.
Remember my early days watching his "Neenu nakkare Haalu Sakkare" / the brilliant "Singapoorinalli raja kulla" or several others on Doordarshan on Sunday evening ( This was when we had no cable tv at home ) or watching the super hit "Nishkarsha" in Shanti theater or "Muttina Hara" on independence day or even the kickass "Nishabhda" with his army of dogs.
The man was all style and substance and totally loved him . I couldn't believe that he had played villain in "Gandhadha gudi" coz' he always , always remained the hero who could beat up tons of people with his famous left hand clenching and punching. His family movies were equally brilliant and he made sure the time spent was definitely worth it. Remember watching a total brainless movie , just because it was him when I was even admitted to the hospital earlier this year and more recently watched him in the Baghban remake where he was as usual terrific.
His recent film "Bellary Naga" got rave reviews but I missed the movie . He was one of the 3 actors in Kannada cinema to complete 200 films as a mainstream actor( others being Annavaru and Rebel Star Ambareesh) and I had just seen those posters in Vision cinemas last week(will release soon!) and this morning, when I got up and heard he was no more , I was totally shocked like tons of other fans.
Thank you sir for all the entertainment you provided all these years . God bless your family and we all pray for your dear ones' well being. May this great artist's soul rest in peace..... Amen.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Moviezzzzzzzzz
A break from office and a decently long one at that has resulted in me watching a good number of movies.... Here are my expert comments and if you want to or don't want to watch these movies, you can decide after reading my blog! Please note these may or may not be new movies and the rating has to do with just perception of the movie... Your comments are welcome ( Atleast that way I know someone has read the blog!)
1. Kurbaan - (2.75/5) - Hugely hyped due to the pairing of Kareena and Saif did not make this a box office hit but I felt it was decent despite some flaws and unbelievable( where unbelievable is not equal to jaw dropping! ). Watch it if you like Saif in particular and surprise surprise- Vivek Oberoi has acted well after maybe Company.
2. 500 days of summer - (3/5) - Super casting and a different sort of a flick where this guy is trying to get over his heart break .The order of the 500 days shown in the movie keeps the interest right up there. Some scenes are simply awesome and people can so easily connect to certain situations and will feel they have been there and done that. I never felt I would feel like beating up the girl(the absolutely stunning Zooey Deschanel) but after one particular scene towards the end, this feeling came through ! A nice positive ending ups the happiness quotient but only just. Worth a watch on a lazy Monday morning but if you're busy on a Monday, catch it on a Sunday and maybe you will give it a better rating...
3. Italian Job - (3.75/5) - Loved the movie. Period. This is a brief brief(haha) - A gang steals gold from Venice with the security folks literally watching the gold referred to as the "Italian Job"! (Can't be "Greek Job" or "American" right? ) Then one of the folks comes up with his own idea of stealing the whole thing and even succeeds till after a year, the gang reunites to steal it back with another "Italian Job", this time in America (and even this time, its not called "American Job"!) . I don't want to give away one more byte or even a bit about this as I want you to watch it! (Go to IMDB for more info in case you ain't convinced even now :P). On the downside, you would say that you have seen tons of Hollywood movies in a similar sort of genre but hey, this ain't bad. Another not so good thing I heard was that this is being remade in Hindi, maybe they will call that "Italian kaam"??!! Oh Oh Oh ....
4. Kramer vs Kramer( 4/5) - My level of respect for Dustin Hoffman went up through the roof after watching this heart rendering film.(earlier it was just at ground level :P) Hoffman is a complete workaholic ( atleast in the movie !) and totally ignores his family till one day, his wife leaves him and her son and goes away. The next 18 months is all about the father and son bonding which is delightfully portrayed by Hoffman and Justin Henry( the younger Kramer). The mom( the wonderfully restrained Merryl Streep) returns after this period and a court case follows for the custody of the kid. Kinda gets senti towards the end but I think its a must watch ! By the way, this has been copied already in Hindi and was made into an extra senti movie with the music premise... Remember Akele hum akele tum ?
5. Cinderella Man (4.25/5) - Super duper movie . Success follows failure. True life story of James Bradock. Set during the great depression period. Magical combo of Ron Howard and Russel Crowe with Renee Zellweger adding in her charm. Never loved boxing more . Never shouted so enthusiastically( in my mind, watched it late night) during any other movie climax ( so far atleast) urging away Russel Crowe to kick the other boxer's ass. A must watch. I would put this on the top 10 inspirational movies of all time - The other couple of movies that I think fit this bill are "October Sky" and "Lagaan". Let me not get started on those now! Need to find another 7 on this list but for now, have 3 irreplaceable ones already in here !
6. Mussanje Maatu (0.75/5) - The 0.75 is for the one song that is hummable. I bought this non-pirated VCD for 70 bux coz' it was majorly hyped( not sure if it was a hit). Maybe I made the mistake of watching this after Cinderella Man. The acting was just about passable but the movie seemed so desperate for success and was even a bit manipulative. Hope Sudeep and Ramya's next movie Just Maat Mathalli ain't this disappointing!
7. Color of Money ( 2.25/5) - Had huge expectations what with Paul Newman and Tom Cruise going all out. Story is about this Pool retired guy (Newman) whose hope is rekindled seeing the brilliance of Cruise and tries to teach him how to bet and win money while playing Pool. What follows is a roller coaster ride and somehow I couldn't connect as much or feel that happy about the complete movie . Directed by Martin Scorcese whose movies I generally louuuuuuuuuuuu but somehow, it just, just didn't happen this time around. The rating is for the excellent pool skills ( thousand times better than my Yahoo Pool skills :P ) and the tremendous acting.
More movies / masti soon and part 2 of my trip to follow....
1. Kurbaan - (2.75/5) - Hugely hyped due to the pairing of Kareena and Saif did not make this a box office hit but I felt it was decent despite some flaws and unbelievable( where unbelievable is not equal to jaw dropping! ). Watch it if you like Saif in particular and surprise surprise- Vivek Oberoi has acted well after maybe Company.
2. 500 days of summer - (3/5) - Super casting and a different sort of a flick where this guy is trying to get over his heart break .The order of the 500 days shown in the movie keeps the interest right up there. Some scenes are simply awesome and people can so easily connect to certain situations and will feel they have been there and done that. I never felt I would feel like beating up the girl(the absolutely stunning Zooey Deschanel) but after one particular scene towards the end, this feeling came through ! A nice positive ending ups the happiness quotient but only just. Worth a watch on a lazy Monday morning but if you're busy on a Monday, catch it on a Sunday and maybe you will give it a better rating...
3. Italian Job - (3.75/5) - Loved the movie. Period. This is a brief brief(haha) - A gang steals gold from Venice with the security folks literally watching the gold referred to as the "Italian Job"! (Can't be "Greek Job" or "American" right? ) Then one of the folks comes up with his own idea of stealing the whole thing and even succeeds till after a year, the gang reunites to steal it back with another "Italian Job", this time in America (and even this time, its not called "American Job"!) . I don't want to give away one more byte or even a bit about this as I want you to watch it! (Go to IMDB for more info in case you ain't convinced even now :P). On the downside, you would say that you have seen tons of Hollywood movies in a similar sort of genre but hey, this ain't bad. Another not so good thing I heard was that this is being remade in Hindi, maybe they will call that "Italian kaam"??!! Oh Oh Oh ....
4. Kramer vs Kramer( 4/5) - My level of respect for Dustin Hoffman went up through the roof after watching this heart rendering film.(earlier it was just at ground level :P) Hoffman is a complete workaholic ( atleast in the movie !) and totally ignores his family till one day, his wife leaves him and her son and goes away. The next 18 months is all about the father and son bonding which is delightfully portrayed by Hoffman and Justin Henry( the younger Kramer). The mom( the wonderfully restrained Merryl Streep) returns after this period and a court case follows for the custody of the kid. Kinda gets senti towards the end but I think its a must watch ! By the way, this has been copied already in Hindi and was made into an extra senti movie with the music premise... Remember Akele hum akele tum ?
5. Cinderella Man (4.25/5) - Super duper movie . Success follows failure. True life story of James Bradock. Set during the great depression period. Magical combo of Ron Howard and Russel Crowe with Renee Zellweger adding in her charm. Never loved boxing more . Never shouted so enthusiastically( in my mind, watched it late night) during any other movie climax ( so far atleast) urging away Russel Crowe to kick the other boxer's ass. A must watch. I would put this on the top 10 inspirational movies of all time - The other couple of movies that I think fit this bill are "October Sky" and "Lagaan". Let me not get started on those now! Need to find another 7 on this list but for now, have 3 irreplaceable ones already in here !
6. Mussanje Maatu (0.75/5) - The 0.75 is for the one song that is hummable. I bought this non-pirated VCD for 70 bux coz' it was majorly hyped( not sure if it was a hit). Maybe I made the mistake of watching this after Cinderella Man. The acting was just about passable but the movie seemed so desperate for success and was even a bit manipulative. Hope Sudeep and Ramya's next movie Just Maat Mathalli ain't this disappointing!
7. Color of Money ( 2.25/5) - Had huge expectations what with Paul Newman and Tom Cruise going all out. Story is about this Pool retired guy (Newman) whose hope is rekindled seeing the brilliance of Cruise and tries to teach him how to bet and win money while playing Pool. What follows is a roller coaster ride and somehow I couldn't connect as much or feel that happy about the complete movie . Directed by Martin Scorcese whose movies I generally louuuuuuuuuuuu but somehow, it just, just didn't happen this time around. The rating is for the excellent pool skills ( thousand times better than my Yahoo Pool skills :P ) and the tremendous acting.
More movies / masti soon and part 2 of my trip to follow....
Monday, December 21, 2009
A super fab trip - Part 1
When my dear friend Ankita announced her marriage dates in early Oct, I was sure I was going to attend her wedding but I never expected the trip to be as memorable and jhakaas as it turned out to be.
Dec 10 - An early morning Spice Jet flight to Delhi was just the beginning. Deepika( my other married friend in the gang) and I met at the airport (Deepthi couldn't make it unfortunately due to health issues). From check in till the time we landed in Delhi, we spoke non-stop , and I mean that coz' I so wanted to sleep during that flight but didn't get an iota of sleep. It was super fun and man, that was just the start.
We anticipated Delhi to be really cold and chilly but was very pleasant and soon we were on our way to Mayur Vihar to meet a couple of other friends in a Delhi auto .That guy didn't loot us even though we were not fluent with our hindi . We spent the afternoon and late evening going to a nearby market place in a cycle rickshaw!!!! Yes, they still do exist in huge numbers and unfortunately, that guy didn't allow me to ride it as I would have loved to do so. For someone from Bengaluru, seeing a cycle rickshaw gets the adrenalin pumping am sure! The small market had this awesome Gol Gappa place and there started our Gol Gappa session.... Was recommended to have "Sujiwale Golgappe" and had exactly that and it was marvellous :D .
Soon evening set in and we headed towards Ghaziabad- the venue of the wedding ( after the ladies took hazaar time to get dressed up as usual) . A couple of decent rooms were booked for us . After spending a few mins there, we went to the wedding venue and it was at its zangiest best. The bride's bro Anmol took us around all the unbelievable arrangements that were made. A huge table for mocktails , another huge table for just salads and fruits, a huge table for pickles initially caught our eye. Walking into the shady area(:D) , we found mouth watering Chaat being served and a sweet caterer and then a huge line full of awesome dishes. Our eating sessions were on and off from 8pm to midnight.... And we had Gol gappas here as well without fail!
Lets come to the main point though... Ankita dazzled completely in an almost unrecognisable getup and we all felt really good seeing her family so upbeat. Soon, the Baraat arrived and the guy was looking so calm and composed and well prepared or maybe he was nervous! Varmala followed soon after and people went to dance on the dance floor. I for one , totally suck at it but who cares ? Just jumped at the opportunity to dance(or awkwardly jump as I call it) my heart out. Ramita was kickass, all we tried to do was follow her. ( and we weren't so good at that). The bride , bridegroom and their entire family then joined on the dance floor and everything was really fantastic... The puja started at 2.30am and went on till 5am by which time I was dozing off sitting next to the mantap like many others !
I created my own record for staying awake for 25 hours at a time before falling asleep at 6am . The wedding was absolutely great but all that I wasn't aware of one single thing when I hit the sack! A couple of other friends represented us at the "Bidaai", something that I am not a big fan of . I mean its an event that completely freaks out the guy!
We headed back at 9am to Delhi after what was a great evening/night/early morning! More in my next post....
Dec 10 - An early morning Spice Jet flight to Delhi was just the beginning. Deepika( my other married friend in the gang) and I met at the airport (Deepthi couldn't make it unfortunately due to health issues). From check in till the time we landed in Delhi, we spoke non-stop , and I mean that coz' I so wanted to sleep during that flight but didn't get an iota of sleep. It was super fun and man, that was just the start.
We anticipated Delhi to be really cold and chilly but was very pleasant and soon we were on our way to Mayur Vihar to meet a couple of other friends in a Delhi auto .That guy didn't loot us even though we were not fluent with our hindi . We spent the afternoon and late evening going to a nearby market place in a cycle rickshaw!!!! Yes, they still do exist in huge numbers and unfortunately, that guy didn't allow me to ride it as I would have loved to do so. For someone from Bengaluru, seeing a cycle rickshaw gets the adrenalin pumping am sure! The small market had this awesome Gol Gappa place and there started our Gol Gappa session.... Was recommended to have "Sujiwale Golgappe" and had exactly that and it was marvellous :D .
Soon evening set in and we headed towards Ghaziabad- the venue of the wedding ( after the ladies took hazaar time to get dressed up as usual) . A couple of decent rooms were booked for us . After spending a few mins there, we went to the wedding venue and it was at its zangiest best. The bride's bro Anmol took us around all the unbelievable arrangements that were made. A huge table for mocktails , another huge table for just salads and fruits, a huge table for pickles initially caught our eye. Walking into the shady area(:D) , we found mouth watering Chaat being served and a sweet caterer and then a huge line full of awesome dishes. Our eating sessions were on and off from 8pm to midnight.... And we had Gol gappas here as well without fail!
Lets come to the main point though... Ankita dazzled completely in an almost unrecognisable getup and we all felt really good seeing her family so upbeat. Soon, the Baraat arrived and the guy was looking so calm and composed and well prepared or maybe he was nervous! Varmala followed soon after and people went to dance on the dance floor. I for one , totally suck at it but who cares ? Just jumped at the opportunity to dance(or awkwardly jump as I call it) my heart out. Ramita was kickass, all we tried to do was follow her. ( and we weren't so good at that). The bride , bridegroom and their entire family then joined on the dance floor and everything was really fantastic... The puja started at 2.30am and went on till 5am by which time I was dozing off sitting next to the mantap like many others !
I created my own record for staying awake for 25 hours at a time before falling asleep at 6am . The wedding was absolutely great but all that I wasn't aware of one single thing when I hit the sack! A couple of other friends represented us at the "Bidaai", something that I am not a big fan of . I mean its an event that completely freaks out the guy!
We headed back at 9am to Delhi after what was a great evening/night/early morning! More in my next post....
Monday, October 12, 2009
Movie of the year - Inglorious B*******
I belong to the breed of moviegoers who come out talking about the negatives of the movie and initially focus on all the not so good things of the movie and then look at the positives(if any). In most cases I find the first bucket completely outweighing the second . Rarely have I come across a scenario thats the reverse and today was one of those rare , extremely rare occasions .
Ladies and Gentlemen - Quentin Tarantino it is ,yet again, making a Tarantinoesque ( next word in Oxford ? ) movie titled "Inglorious B*******" and is it glorious or what ! I won't give away the story here as I would be doing gross injustice to anyone who wants to watch it and hey, every movie fan should and must watch magic - Tarantino style!
Like Kill Bill, this movie is in the form of chapters , like Reservoir dogs and Pulp fiction , this movie is taut and slick and I don't care whether the Oscars are awarded to this movie or not!
Seldom do I go to a night show, infact I remember doing this only a couple of times and seldom is the hall full and seldom does the audience start clapping very very enthusiastically at 12am after the movie is over. The stunned and "Oh my god" expression on the audience faces' once the lights came on spoke volumes about this experience.
You might wonder whether this is an English movie since there are subtitles throughout with german/french/italian , all being spoken at different times but the man keeps it all together leading to a fantastic climax. Acting is top notch with Brad Pitt's strong southern accent matching the Christoph Waltz' ( Hans') spine chilling act and the steely determination of Melanie Laurent. Screenplay is fabulous and the eye for detail is amazing.
All in all , more than Paisa Vasool. Fabulous movie. Fantastic acting. Terrific direction . Quentin Tarantino....
Ladies and Gentlemen - Quentin Tarantino it is ,yet again, making a Tarantinoesque ( next word in Oxford ? ) movie titled "Inglorious B*******" and is it glorious or what ! I won't give away the story here as I would be doing gross injustice to anyone who wants to watch it and hey, every movie fan should and must watch magic - Tarantino style!
Like Kill Bill, this movie is in the form of chapters , like Reservoir dogs and Pulp fiction , this movie is taut and slick and I don't care whether the Oscars are awarded to this movie or not!
Seldom do I go to a night show, infact I remember doing this only a couple of times and seldom is the hall full and seldom does the audience start clapping very very enthusiastically at 12am after the movie is over. The stunned and "Oh my god" expression on the audience faces' once the lights came on spoke volumes about this experience.
You might wonder whether this is an English movie since there are subtitles throughout with german/french/italian , all being spoken at different times but the man keeps it all together leading to a fantastic climax. Acting is top notch with Brad Pitt's strong southern accent matching the Christoph Waltz' ( Hans') spine chilling act and the steely determination of Melanie Laurent. Screenplay is fabulous and the eye for detail is amazing.
All in all , more than Paisa Vasool. Fabulous movie. Fantastic acting. Terrific direction . Quentin Tarantino....
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Iktara iktara...
Of all the new songs that have come out, the one song that has mesmerized me completely is this song "Iktara" sung by Kavita Seth for "Wake up Sid". Its in the sufi genre and her deep voice adds charm to this excellent composition by Amit Trivedi. ( remember Dev D ?) . You can catch a clip of that right here!
Monday, September 21, 2009
An award - WOW !!!
I have been out in the cold ( not weather wise ;) ) coz' of typhoid initially which kept me out throughout July ( celebrated my 25th birthday on bed!) and then been catching up with work and trying to put on weight! As I was getting out of the rough weather, the weather itself slowly turning out to be rough.... Its been raining crazily in Bangalore , great weather but loads of people falling sick coz' of it . God bless all...
The reason for me to write this entry is to express myself at having won an award for "Best Customer Delivery" in the last quarter's all hands that was held recently. This is what anyone does in Services - serve the customer - be it if you're in a Services company or a hotel waiter or a music director trying to churn out zingy tunes for the listener. To be awarded in this category was indeed very special.
The experience was interesting ...I was working from home that Monday afternoon when I dialed into the All hands call. 30 mins passed by with different sort of updates/ plans / what we have to do blah blah and then the awards section kicked in. Previously, I had been nominated in "Emerging Star" , "Innovation" categories and had gotten so used to not getting the award that this time as well when I saw my nomination , I was going to write to my manager asking me not to me for anything.
The director read out the nominations and then as the Power point slide slowly switched to the next slide and the director said " and the award goes to " , I didn't want to get disappointed like earlier times and as a result had no expectations . But then he said "Madhu M " and the slide had my name and why I had won the award . WO HO HO .It felt really kickass didn't feel out of the world but felt good!
Instantly had quite a few messages from my friends on the chat tool congratulating me and over emails. It felt wonderful . A unique compliment was from a friend who said his belief in the reward system was restored coz' someone like me had won this award.
Thank you! This probably means that I should work harder on the not so bright side of it (;) )...
The reason for me to write this entry is to express myself at having won an award for "Best Customer Delivery" in the last quarter's all hands that was held recently. This is what anyone does in Services - serve the customer - be it if you're in a Services company or a hotel waiter or a music director trying to churn out zingy tunes for the listener. To be awarded in this category was indeed very special.
The experience was interesting ...I was working from home that Monday afternoon when I dialed into the All hands call. 30 mins passed by with different sort of updates/ plans / what we have to do blah blah and then the awards section kicked in. Previously, I had been nominated in "Emerging Star" , "Innovation" categories and had gotten so used to not getting the award that this time as well when I saw my nomination , I was going to write to my manager asking me not to me for anything.
The director read out the nominations and then as the Power point slide slowly switched to the next slide and the director said " and the award goes to " , I didn't want to get disappointed like earlier times and as a result had no expectations . But then he said "Madhu M " and the slide had my name and why I had won the award . WO HO HO .It felt really kickass didn't feel out of the world but felt good!
Instantly had quite a few messages from my friends on the chat tool congratulating me and over emails. It felt wonderful . A unique compliment was from a friend who said his belief in the reward system was restored coz' someone like me had won this award.
Thank you! This probably means that I should work harder on the not so bright side of it (;) )...
Monday, June 15, 2009
June 15 2009
After an unusually long hiatus guess whose back - ah , its me again. I shall take an oath as well which is that i promise not to crack pjs in this blog.
Well, i just lost the passion to write for a few months and then suddenly, there was a sensation that made me write this. What have i done in the last few months ? I certainly haven't travelled which reminds me that I forgot to complete part 2 of that trip. Just to cut that short, while coming back, I missed my flight ( I think this was destiny!) and as a result got a night out at Paris( Blimey, Paris !!!) .
The only mistake I made was to go around with this annoying Indian guy who was freaking self obsessed and just wanted to be shot (may i add, with the camera!). Leaving that apart , I must say, Paris is probably the most beautiful place I have seen. Its rocking and it stands for all the wonderful things anyone can ever dream of - beautiful places( you can omit the under ground stations in this category!) , awesome buildings none better than the magical Eiffel , fantastic fashion sense , kickass subways, brilliant roadside eats and terrific weather ( atleast when i was there! it was 4degrees celsius!) . Though this trip also resulted in me missing my friend's engagement. Well, there has to be a compromise somewhere na ?
I was hooked onto the IPL the past month or so till it got over, supporting namma bevdaas till the end and they happily messed it up . Nadal lost which broke my heart and then Federer won and cried and was hailed the greatest ever . Come Wimbledon with no Nadal and we are in for a teary final yet again ! Nooooooo not again, Murray - come on !
Did i hear someone say "What else ??" Ok , let me think .
Oh yes, we also played a cricket tournament and lost all the games . This was even after we paid 8k from our pockets to play the tournament - Shame shame .
"and then ??"
Hmmm, after a long time, I somehow feel like reading a book or books and I just bought a book called "Six graves of munich" from the great Mario Puzo . Hope its a good read .
"dude, no movies? " - The only thing I have seen that is worth seeing is "Angels and demons" and this was infinitely better than Da vinci code and hey hey, have watched almost an entire season of the most amazing TV show ever - Crystal maze !! Do you all remember how awesome a show that was ? Solving interesting games and getting a super crystal at the end of it all ? Trust me ,its worth watching all over again..... And yes, Prison Break has ended . What happens at the end ? Its a happy ending and they killed the hero as a result of which there can't be sequels or new challenges in that show until the hero's kid grows up :D.
Last thing - India sucked bigtime last night at the world cup. I think they all need a big break. Fatigue has overtaken them and I have got tired of watching cricket ..... WImbledon, come fast....
Well, i just lost the passion to write for a few months and then suddenly, there was a sensation that made me write this. What have i done in the last few months ? I certainly haven't travelled which reminds me that I forgot to complete part 2 of that trip. Just to cut that short, while coming back, I missed my flight ( I think this was destiny!) and as a result got a night out at Paris( Blimey, Paris !!!) .
The only mistake I made was to go around with this annoying Indian guy who was freaking self obsessed and just wanted to be shot (may i add, with the camera!). Leaving that apart , I must say, Paris is probably the most beautiful place I have seen. Its rocking and it stands for all the wonderful things anyone can ever dream of - beautiful places( you can omit the under ground stations in this category!) , awesome buildings none better than the magical Eiffel , fantastic fashion sense , kickass subways, brilliant roadside eats and terrific weather ( atleast when i was there! it was 4degrees celsius!) . Though this trip also resulted in me missing my friend's engagement. Well, there has to be a compromise somewhere na ?
I was hooked onto the IPL the past month or so till it got over, supporting namma bevdaas till the end and they happily messed it up . Nadal lost which broke my heart and then Federer won and cried and was hailed the greatest ever . Come Wimbledon with no Nadal and we are in for a teary final yet again ! Nooooooo not again, Murray - come on !
Did i hear someone say "What else ??" Ok , let me think .
Oh yes, we also played a cricket tournament and lost all the games . This was even after we paid 8k from our pockets to play the tournament - Shame shame .
"and then ??"
Hmmm, after a long time, I somehow feel like reading a book or books and I just bought a book called "Six graves of munich" from the great Mario Puzo . Hope its a good read .
"dude, no movies? " - The only thing I have seen that is worth seeing is "Angels and demons" and this was infinitely better than Da vinci code and hey hey, have watched almost an entire season of the most amazing TV show ever - Crystal maze !! Do you all remember how awesome a show that was ? Solving interesting games and getting a super crystal at the end of it all ? Trust me ,its worth watching all over again..... And yes, Prison Break has ended . What happens at the end ? Its a happy ending and they killed the hero as a result of which there can't be sequels or new challenges in that show until the hero's kid grows up :D.
Last thing - India sucked bigtime last night at the world cup. I think they all need a big break. Fatigue has overtaken them and I have got tired of watching cricket ..... WImbledon, come fast....
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
A joke worth a Coke ?
Before i go ahead with my blog story of Copenhagen , I wanted to share a "pathetic" joke.
A friend and colleague Aditya and I were having some technical discussion and at the end of it , the following ensued:
Well , he wanted to punch me but I guess this is one of my better lines in the last several months . Hence blogging about it !
Just when I finished that, another friend said , "hey, am headed out" .
Me : "Unfortunate that you missed the goal " ( " Headed out " !) .
Ppl say that Pun is the cheapest form of humour and my level falls in that unfortunately !!
A friend and colleague Aditya and I were having some technical discussion and at the end of it , the following ensued:
Aditya: no more comments from u/
?
i thought u ll fire in a few more of them
me: am not a fire engine
?
i thought u ll fire in a few more of them
me: am not a fire engine
Just when I finished that, another friend said , "hey, am headed out" .
Me : "Unfortunate that you missed the goal " ( " Headed out " !) .
Ppl say that Pun is the cheapest form of humour and my level falls in that unfortunately !!
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Copenhagen Visit
Sunday it was and i moved out early from my dear village and caught the first train available. The air was chilly and was snowing. (Well, 1 week and I was accustomed to it ! No longer surprised). The train journey was a bit chaotic owing to the fact that there were tons of people travelling with their luggages strewn all over. I made a mistake by going to the Copenhagen Airport coz' later I discovered I could have bought 2 tickets - one to go to the last stop in Sweden and then board another train to Copenhagen city. Blimey! This would have saved some time!
A big Latte, a to and fro ticket from the Copenhagen airport and a quick 10 min journey to the city on a Sunday was refreshing to say the least! Armed with jackets, a monkey cap and gloves, I stepped into the lovely city of Copenhagen. The atmosphere around reminded me of a really old city that takes pride in the architecture and designs. I had chalked out a plan about what I wanted to see at this place and to my dismay, found that one of the main tourist destinations was undergoing construction ! Well, it doesn't happen just in India :)
I have found this new found passion for walking along streets with a camera in my hand just to take a quick pic if I find anything interesting. Again , I was disappointed coz' most of the shops were closed coz' it was a Sunday. Hoping that my plan of going there wasn't all spoilt, I spoke to a couple of Arabs who have been there and they found it really funny that some guy was going around the city in that cold weather. But but but , they were really helpful and told me what would be open! I headed back to the train station and had 2 options - Find something more useful or get into a train and go to the next stop where there was apparently a museum!
I opted for the former and guess what ? The Taxi driver turned out to be an old Indian man. He was drunk though but did enough to drive me to Nyw Haven( wrong spelling but don't mind!) - from where a canal tour was about to start . I found this in the nick of time from the map and was obviously thrilled ! What better than to go on a Canal tour in a port city !
The canal tour had loads of tourists and the trip was fantastic! Saw various boats and ships that were used in their old times, saw their Opera house, the Little Mermaid , the Copper house, their flag, loads of museums and finally lovely churches - beautiful architecture all around. Believe me , it was freakin cold in the ship but hey, how often do I get to see all this!
To be continued
A big Latte, a to and fro ticket from the Copenhagen airport and a quick 10 min journey to the city on a Sunday was refreshing to say the least! Armed with jackets, a monkey cap and gloves, I stepped into the lovely city of Copenhagen. The atmosphere around reminded me of a really old city that takes pride in the architecture and designs. I had chalked out a plan about what I wanted to see at this place and to my dismay, found that one of the main tourist destinations was undergoing construction ! Well, it doesn't happen just in India :)
I have found this new found passion for walking along streets with a camera in my hand just to take a quick pic if I find anything interesting. Again , I was disappointed coz' most of the shops were closed coz' it was a Sunday. Hoping that my plan of going there wasn't all spoilt, I spoke to a couple of Arabs who have been there and they found it really funny that some guy was going around the city in that cold weather. But but but , they were really helpful and told me what would be open! I headed back to the train station and had 2 options - Find something more useful or get into a train and go to the next stop where there was apparently a museum!
I opted for the former and guess what ? The Taxi driver turned out to be an old Indian man. He was drunk though but did enough to drive me to Nyw Haven( wrong spelling but don't mind!) - from where a canal tour was about to start . I found this in the nick of time from the map and was obviously thrilled ! What better than to go on a Canal tour in a port city !
The canal tour had loads of tourists and the trip was fantastic! Saw various boats and ships that were used in their old times, saw their Opera house, the Little Mermaid , the Copper house, their flag, loads of museums and finally lovely churches - beautiful architecture all around. Believe me , it was freakin cold in the ship but hey, how often do I get to see all this!
To be continued
Älmhult(pronouncedElmhult) experience
Following are my thoughts/experiences in a place called Älmhult in Sweden . This first one is about my arrival in Älmhult.
Well,
What an eventful first day in Europe ! Well after what I thought was a really long flight to Paris (close to 11 hrs from Blore, have been in longer flights before but i guess it was after a long time and hence felt weird!) , we were not allowed to get down from the plane coz' ppl were busy trying to clean up the ground coz' it had snowed in Paris, the previous night. After what seemed like an eternally long delay, we got down and i saw one of the most confusing yet cool airports. Confusing coz' there are way too many terminals and cool , coz' the design of the airport is such that ppl landing out of flights and ppl chking in the same area .... Something that is uncommon.
The next flight was pretty much normal and short ...close to 2 hr flight to Copenhagen . Only interesting aspect was that I didn't get any veg food in the flight apart from some juice and bread and that added to the hunger. I thought the interesting parts of the journey were complete without knowing that the most interesting part was just about to start !
The next one was a 100 min train from Copenhagen to Almhult and man, was it an amazing train journey. The train kept going from one place to the other and even backtracked with instructions like "train will change track to this , train will change track to that " . I must have seen a couple of places atleast twice . Also, the speed of the train was something amazing to experience .Reminded me of Sydney but this was superior by a long way ( that was coz' of the distance ..this was inter-city whereas that was just within sydney). At 5.01pm ( yes , its 5.01 and not 5.02 or 5.00) , it landed there and i froze more than i ever did in my entire life.
The place was filled with snow.(pics to follow soon!) 1st time in my life had i seen actual snow all over and that too covering a real large area .....a super sight . After quickly wearing the new overcoat that i bought just before I left( thankfully) , i proceeded to figure out where this hotel was . At that time, i could hear familiar sound of tamil and found that our indian population came to my rescue here as well ! 3 wiproites who are working here for the same customer , talking in tamil walked past and that was enough for me to enquire about the hotel .
They gave me some instructions and asked me about my journey and why i was there etc and went away. As I walked on those slippery roads at one point of time, i completely lost balance and fell on the road to the joy/glee of a guy in the car who was on the . Quickly figured out that the funda is to walk with small,short steps without a trace of dragging your step and thankfully didnt slip again!
Was blissfully thankful to find the room and man, the room looked like a hostel room but very well furnished . This is surely the smallest hotel room i have ever stayed in .
There is a window and a door that leads me out to a common lawn shared by other rooms and guess what? Its freezing out there and its filled with snow ! The lady at the reception told me to wait for a few days to see 100% snow as this was a mixture of snow and rain .
Well, i then enquired what i should do about food and she said the restaurant was closed but i can use the microwave oven. MTR came to my rescue here and the couple of packets i had taken along with a kitkat made sure that i had enough to eat for now and wait for hopefully sunny skies on the morrow.
Well,
What an eventful first day in Europe ! Well after what I thought was a really long flight to Paris (close to 11 hrs from Blore, have been in longer flights before but i guess it was after a long time and hence felt weird!) , we were not allowed to get down from the plane coz' ppl were busy trying to clean up the ground coz' it had snowed in Paris, the previous night. After what seemed like an eternally long delay, we got down and i saw one of the most confusing yet cool airports. Confusing coz' there are way too many terminals and cool , coz' the design of the airport is such that ppl landing out of flights and ppl chking in the same area .... Something that is uncommon.
The next flight was pretty much normal and short ...close to 2 hr flight to Copenhagen . Only interesting aspect was that I didn't get any veg food in the flight apart from some juice and bread and that added to the hunger. I thought the interesting parts of the journey were complete without knowing that the most interesting part was just about to start !
The next one was a 100 min train from Copenhagen to Almhult and man, was it an amazing train journey. The train kept going from one place to the other and even backtracked with instructions like "train will change track to this , train will change track to that " . I must have seen a couple of places atleast twice . Also, the speed of the train was something amazing to experience .Reminded me of Sydney but this was superior by a long way ( that was coz' of the distance ..this was inter-city whereas that was just within sydney). At 5.01pm ( yes , its 5.01 and not 5.02 or 5.00) , it landed there and i froze more than i ever did in my entire life.
The place was filled with snow.(pics to follow soon!) 1st time in my life had i seen actual snow all over and that too covering a real large area .....a super sight . After quickly wearing the new overcoat that i bought just before I left( thankfully) , i proceeded to figure out where this hotel was . At that time, i could hear familiar sound of tamil and found that our indian population came to my rescue here as well ! 3 wiproites who are working here for the same customer , talking in tamil walked past and that was enough for me to enquire about the hotel .
They gave me some instructions and asked me about my journey and why i was there etc and went away. As I walked on those slippery roads at one point of time, i completely lost balance and fell on the road to the joy/glee of a guy in the car who was on the . Quickly figured out that the funda is to walk with small,short steps without a trace of dragging your step and thankfully didnt slip again!
Was blissfully thankful to find the room and man, the room looked like a hostel room but very well furnished . This is surely the smallest hotel room i have ever stayed in .
There is a window and a door that leads me out to a common lawn shared by other rooms and guess what? Its freezing out there and its filled with snow ! The lady at the reception told me to wait for a few days to see 100% snow as this was a mixture of snow and rain .
Well, i then enquired what i should do about food and she said the restaurant was closed but i can use the microwave oven. MTR came to my rescue here and the couple of packets i had taken along with a kitkat made sure that i had enough to eat for now and wait for hopefully sunny skies on the morrow.
Monday, December 01, 2008
Will I stay alive to see another day?
After the recent blasts in Mumbai, in the last few days, I have not had too much guts to go out to places that are thronged all the time and I think thats' been the case with most people. Now, its a different thing that I would surely go probably after a few days, but somewhere in my mind ,there would be a lingering thought - Will I come back alive ? When I spoke about this to a few friends of mine , they seemed to agree without any qualms.
I happened to be in Hint, one of the popular pubs in the past few days after the blast, and guess what ? There were 6 people at 9 pm in the night and the attender said that they would close shop at 10pm and go out. This is the same freaking place where you can't step in on most of the days - weekdays/weekends.
After the first blast early this year, public was angry and they spoke about the "spirit" of the city. The Govt came in , consoled people , pledged to fight against terrorism . But hey, soon there was another blast in another city . Reactions - ? Ditto . People were still "asking"/"hoping" for better security. But after the blast on 26/11, people have had enough of that. Even the elite society has now woken up . The reactions have been strong and people are demanding security from the Govt or saying that they won't vote. With Elections just 5 months away, the Govt is rolling a few heads ( All this time , nothing of that sort happened), the Opposition is basking in the glory and hoping that this would be their primary election strategy.
On one of the news channels, I heard a politician say : "See what happened at the Parliament. They attacked it once and then we fortified it to such an extent that the same terrorists will have to think 10 times before they think of attacking Parliament." . A member of the aam janta, who was also there said : "If you can fortify the Parliament after just one attack(where no person died and remember there was a political consensus on that !!!), why can't you people fortify or atleast improve the security in the city". Time was up and the politician was stunned . Program ended.
I ain't saying that politicians shouldn't make money , let them make tons of it , but do your freaking job atleast ! The Ex-deputy chief minister of Maharashtra(he resigned this morning since his "conscience" told him last night to do so this morning ! Last evening he had said that there was no question of him resigning!!) said a couple of days back that a "Small thing" like this keeps happening in such big cities. The first thing I wanted to tell that incompetent fool - "If out of the 200 people ,even if 4-5 people were from your family, would you have said anything ? " Damn you !
Another thing thats been irritating me is the phrase "Hindu Terror". What the hell ? There is no such thing as Hindu terror or Muslim terror as terrorism doesn't have any religion . If religion was part of that , as part of the recent attacks, there wouldn't have been 5 muslims, all from the same family, wouldn't have been killed in the railway station. Ridiculous nonsense!
Every now and then , we have so many people dying due to natural causes like floods , tsunami and earthquakes and now , to add to that we have these bomb blasts day in and day out . At this point of time,I can't think of what inhabitants in Kashmir/ Naxal areas might be going through daily.
I think the only thing that has happened because of this recent terrorist attack / other attacks in the past few months , is to bring in more equality amongst people of different classes in terms of thought - People in Kashmir , in North East, in the metros , will all have the same thought - " Will I stay alive to see another day?"
I happened to be in Hint, one of the popular pubs in the past few days after the blast, and guess what ? There were 6 people at 9 pm in the night and the attender said that they would close shop at 10pm and go out. This is the same freaking place where you can't step in on most of the days - weekdays/weekends.
After the first blast early this year, public was angry and they spoke about the "spirit" of the city. The Govt came in , consoled people , pledged to fight against terrorism . But hey, soon there was another blast in another city . Reactions - ? Ditto . People were still "asking"/"hoping" for better security. But after the blast on 26/11, people have had enough of that. Even the elite society has now woken up . The reactions have been strong and people are demanding security from the Govt or saying that they won't vote. With Elections just 5 months away, the Govt is rolling a few heads ( All this time , nothing of that sort happened), the Opposition is basking in the glory and hoping that this would be their primary election strategy.
On one of the news channels, I heard a politician say : "See what happened at the Parliament. They attacked it once and then we fortified it to such an extent that the same terrorists will have to think 10 times before they think of attacking Parliament." . A member of the aam janta, who was also there said : "If you can fortify the Parliament after just one attack(where no person died and remember there was a political consensus on that !!!), why can't you people fortify or atleast improve the security in the city". Time was up and the politician was stunned . Program ended.
I ain't saying that politicians shouldn't make money , let them make tons of it , but do your freaking job atleast ! The Ex-deputy chief minister of Maharashtra(he resigned this morning since his "conscience" told him last night to do so this morning ! Last evening he had said that there was no question of him resigning!!) said a couple of days back that a "Small thing" like this keeps happening in such big cities. The first thing I wanted to tell that incompetent fool - "If out of the 200 people ,even if 4-5 people were from your family, would you have said anything ? " Damn you !
Another thing thats been irritating me is the phrase "Hindu Terror". What the hell ? There is no such thing as Hindu terror or Muslim terror as terrorism doesn't have any religion . If religion was part of that , as part of the recent attacks, there wouldn't have been 5 muslims, all from the same family, wouldn't have been killed in the railway station. Ridiculous nonsense!
Every now and then , we have so many people dying due to natural causes like floods , tsunami and earthquakes and now , to add to that we have these bomb blasts day in and day out . At this point of time,I can't think of what inhabitants in Kashmir/ Naxal areas might be going through daily.
I think the only thing that has happened because of this recent terrorist attack / other attacks in the past few months , is to bring in more equality amongst people of different classes in terms of thought - People in Kashmir , in North East, in the metros , will all have the same thought - " Will I stay alive to see another day?"
Monday, October 27, 2008
Happy Diwali!
Wish you all a very very happy diwali ! Diwali - the festival of lights is meant to light up the lives of people. (Even during the Economy crisis!) . People still bought new stuff ,people still bought crackers, ppl still ate all the sweets that they would have wanted to have , people also visited friends and family to wish them .
An interesting angle to Diwali that I read recently in newspapers was how people were suggesting to the Ambani brothers that they should forget the enemity and go and give the other brother a hug during Diwali coz' as the saying goes, "if it doesn't happen during Diwali, then it won't happen !" (Well , I came up with this saying...so copyrighting it anyways). Having witnessed quite a few of these personal fights between different sets of ppl in close quarters and also been involved in such periods of no communication, it kinda felt good there were ppl who actually suggested that the brothers should celebrate Diwali together.
But then if you look at it logically, how can 2 people who have been fighting for ages , forget
everything that has gone on for the past few years and go ahead and patch up ? Sounds totally ridiculous. If such things cannot and don't happen within friends and even members of a family when its just the ego that comes in between the way, leave alone crores of rupees and countless other instances, how can anyone even think of such a thing happening ? Again , Diwali is a festival where logic etc can be kept aside.
I have had friends telling me at later points of time that they thought of wishing me during Diwali(but they didn't call on the day!) but atleast if you trust that part, the thought of wishing someone whom you fought with or with whom you don't want to keep in touch with , is something that probably makes you feel good about.
I don't know whether the Ambani brothers wished each other as yet, ( if they do , I am sure it will make the headlines! So , I think as of now ,they haven't) , but as a normal person , I would like to say that whether Ambanis wish each other or not, other people atleast should give it a thought . If ego is the only barrier, try keeping it aside for 10 mins and go and wish that person. A simple call can solve matters. A simple wish can make a huge difference. A simple thought can make you and the other person happy. After all , Diwali is also about spreading happiness and love .....
Happy Diwali.
An interesting angle to Diwali that I read recently in newspapers was how people were suggesting to the Ambani brothers that they should forget the enemity and go and give the other brother a hug during Diwali coz' as the saying goes, "if it doesn't happen during Diwali, then it won't happen !" (Well , I came up with this saying...so copyrighting it anyways). Having witnessed quite a few of these personal fights between different sets of ppl in close quarters and also been involved in such periods of no communication, it kinda felt good there were ppl who actually suggested that the brothers should celebrate Diwali together.
But then if you look at it logically, how can 2 people who have been fighting for ages , forget
everything that has gone on for the past few years and go ahead and patch up ? Sounds totally ridiculous. If such things cannot and don't happen within friends and even members of a family when its just the ego that comes in between the way, leave alone crores of rupees and countless other instances, how can anyone even think of such a thing happening ? Again , Diwali is a festival where logic etc can be kept aside.
I have had friends telling me at later points of time that they thought of wishing me during Diwali(but they didn't call on the day!) but atleast if you trust that part, the thought of wishing someone whom you fought with or with whom you don't want to keep in touch with , is something that probably makes you feel good about.
I don't know whether the Ambani brothers wished each other as yet, ( if they do , I am sure it will make the headlines! So , I think as of now ,they haven't) , but as a normal person , I would like to say that whether Ambanis wish each other or not, other people atleast should give it a thought . If ego is the only barrier, try keeping it aside for 10 mins and go and wish that person. A simple call can solve matters. A simple wish can make a huge difference. A simple thought can make you and the other person happy. After all , Diwali is also about spreading happiness and love .....
Happy Diwali.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Rafi Resurrected - Sonu Nigaam
A show called "Rafi Resurrected" - by Sonu Nigaam in front of a sold out Birmingham Symphony concert hall with a live orchestra was telecasted last Sunday on Sony TV. If ever there was a singer who idolised Rafi saab and could probably sing his songs with utmost ease it has to be Sonu Nigaam. A tremendous evening with one lilting tune after another was sung with the orchestra which was completely filled with people of British origin. Can't wait for the album to hit the market . Am sure to buy it !
Youtube videos as always, provide the required snippets of the concert. Be it "Patthar ke sanam" or "yaad na jaaye" or "dil ke jharoke se" or "yahoo" , it was sung with perfection! If you haven't seen it and your a fan of old hindi songs, then definitely this is a must listen album!
Youtube videos as always, provide the required snippets of the concert. Be it "Patthar ke sanam" or "yaad na jaaye" or "dil ke jharoke se" or "yahoo" , it was sung with perfection! If you haven't seen it and your a fan of old hindi songs, then definitely this is a must listen album!
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Tequila
For the uninitiated, Tequila is the national drink of Mexico city . Every restaurant there has atleast 110 varieties of Tequila and I had been warned before going there that if I did not taste Tequila( i am a tee totaler otherwise) in Mexico city, then it would be a shame that would be kinda unmatched !
I was prepared mentally to have it. So let me describe the experience . It was mid week and did not have too much work for the next day . It was about 8pm and met my colleague JL and his colleague in the lobby of the hotel . They have an exquisite bar and we just "attacked" the place.
So i first learnt about the process - learnt about the different types of Tequila - 3 types - 1st type - its fermented for a really long time and supposed to be exceptionally good , 2nd type - fermented for a shorter duration of around maybe 5-10 years and called Reposado and 3rd type - kinda fresh stuff and might not impress you if your trying it for the first time! Seeing the prices, we went for the Reposado variety.
Tequila , Margerita (tomato juice in other words) , Lemon and other side items were ordered . And the stage was set . ( Mind you ,every freaking picture of this experience was clicked . Gonna follow soon mate! ) Squeezing the lemon , followed by tasting the Tequila and then drinking a bit of Margerita was part of the "Best Practices" and I duly followed it . A tinge of burning sensation in my food pipe and a want to gulp down more tomato jucie followed by "what did you feel , tell us " expressions from my colleagues were roughly what followed! It was one hell of an experience and definitely something that I will remember for a long time! Only after effect was that next day morning , I had a slight headache.
Pics show - a better view of what we were going to drink , the setting for the evening , all the other finer details !
I was prepared mentally to have it. So let me describe the experience . It was mid week and did not have too much work for the next day . It was about 8pm and met my colleague JL and his colleague in the lobby of the hotel . They have an exquisite bar and we just "attacked" the place.
So i first learnt about the process - learnt about the different types of Tequila - 3 types - 1st type - its fermented for a really long time and supposed to be exceptionally good , 2nd type - fermented for a shorter duration of around maybe 5-10 years and called Reposado and 3rd type - kinda fresh stuff and might not impress you if your trying it for the first time! Seeing the prices, we went for the Reposado variety.
Tequila , Margerita (tomato juice in other words) , Lemon and other side items were ordered . And the stage was set . ( Mind you ,every freaking picture of this experience was clicked . Gonna follow soon mate! ) Squeezing the lemon , followed by tasting the Tequila and then drinking a bit of Margerita was part of the "Best Practices" and I duly followed it . A tinge of burning sensation in my food pipe and a want to gulp down more tomato jucie followed by "what did you feel , tell us " expressions from my colleagues were roughly what followed! It was one hell of an experience and definitely something that I will remember for a long time! Only after effect was that next day morning , I had a slight headache.
Pics show - a better view of what we were going to drink , the setting for the evening , all the other finer details !
The journey...
Its been a really long time since I wrote anything on my blog. It finally feels great to be getting back after what has been a long break. When I mean great, I mean I feel GREAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT to write again . The journey in the last one and a half months has been exciting, frustrating, rewarding and tiring, all at the same time. So what is it that I have been doing ?
I have had a chance to make business trips to Mexico first and later to Philippines. 3 days in between these 2 trips were spent in San Francisco and 2 days in Bangalore and finally when I landed in Manila, my body was totally screwed up thanks to all the jet lag. Sleep and eating light food at the appropriate times were the only solutions to these problems. The 10 day period between the time I left Mexico till I landed in Manila, allowed me to touch 6 different countries( mostly airports and most of them in transit) and I remember watching the Olympic highlights of previous days mostly on these flights! ( I guess this is about what I can boast off in my resume! 6 countries in 10 days)
What did I do in these places ? Well since it was a business trip it was more or less packed throughout the weekdays , but would like to surely add that the Mexico trip was much more enjoyable and fun since I had more company compared to the Philippines trip. It was also the place where I had my first shot of a lovely drink - Tequila ! I found this whole experience amazing and will soon be dedicating an entire blog entry to my first tequila shot.
Meeting different people, tasting different items ( you do get some different stuff to taste even if your vegetarian!) , getting the same old weird stares from people around who couldn't believe that I only ate "vegetables" (If your a vegetarian , it means you eat only vegetables ) and answering the standard (unfortunately not innovative!) NO to questions like :
"So you dont eat meat right ? "
" Do you eat fish ? "
" You don't even eat fish ?!!! (The exclamation marks are just there to stress how shocked people are) .
followed by questions like : "Ok , so let me get it right . So from the time you were born till now, you have never ever eaten meat ? " and then a "No" to that generates what I would call an unbelievable "OH" followed by an impressed look which is very close to looking at you like a total alien ! I guess at times I feel I shouldn't be so fussy but just can't motivate myself to eat meat!
Adding to that, being part of conversations when people completely ignore your presence coz' they are either talking in Spanish (in Mexico) or in Tagalo(in Philippines) was also very much part of the experience . Working late nights , weekends without breaks was also more of a feature that was common to Philippines rather than Mexico.
I also would like to pay my tributes to 2 places that always come to my rescue in most places and certainly in these 2 places - Subway and Starbucks. I got "subwayed" especially when I had to finish stuff and my mere presence in that place , warranted the guy asking me whether I wanted to have "Veggie Delite" again ! Funny that most of the funny incidents in most of the places I have visited has got to do with what I eat ! Anyways, cutting all that short, I must summarize that during this phase I was particularly impressed by the Olympics : Phelps' 8 golds - I saw him get all his golds in different parts of world and was phenomenal to watch him. My favorite was the team gold that US won thanks to Jason Lezak , watching a fantastic volleyball match between Cuba and China from the San Francisco airport and watching Bolt bolting across like only he can on TV were amongst the other good parts.
Best part about the Mexico city trip : My tech lead, Project manager and I had been to this place called Mama Rumba - a total Salsa place where you have the most amazing of people coming and doing salsa to live music thats played . We were there till about 2am in the morning from around 9pm that night and it was simply outstanding to see them dance. It was almost like each one of them present there was born to salsa. The place was packed even on a Thursday evening and for the capacity that it had,I guess I was fortunate enough to see some of the most amazing Salsa dancers. That day I really repented having wooden legs ! Freaking thing !!
Ah, this is another thing that I picked up - "Freaking thing" from Arturo - my Panamanian tech lead who is a total party animal and an absolutely wonderful person to work with . Using it in different contexts and with various impacts was part of this . Also saying "Kay" (what in spanish ?) after the Spanish guy tells you a whole lot of stuff also added to the fun !
What about the Philippines ? The people there are so friendly and the one thing I noticed here was that your knighted by default . I used to be called "Sir" Maa(maee)du all the time till I told them that they should be just calling me Maa(mae)du ( Thats the way its pronounced!) . You address women as "Maam" (not maam but a more rounded maom!) . Well I had never seen 4 malls interconnected and each mall being 3-4 times bigger than anything in Bangalore, very humid weather and typhoons. I was scared the day I left Manila since it was in the middle of a typhoon.
Anyways, now I am back in Bangalore and more than happy to be back and blog !
ps : I would also like to express my shock at the way these blasts have been rocking the country and I am not sure what can be done by the Govt. I had a chance to see "A Wednesday", a movie about terrorism and maybe moves such as those are required to somehow reduce atleast the frequency (just maybe) of such cowardly acts.
I have had a chance to make business trips to Mexico first and later to Philippines. 3 days in between these 2 trips were spent in San Francisco and 2 days in Bangalore and finally when I landed in Manila, my body was totally screwed up thanks to all the jet lag. Sleep and eating light food at the appropriate times were the only solutions to these problems. The 10 day period between the time I left Mexico till I landed in Manila, allowed me to touch 6 different countries( mostly airports and most of them in transit) and I remember watching the Olympic highlights of previous days mostly on these flights! ( I guess this is about what I can boast off in my resume! 6 countries in 10 days)
What did I do in these places ? Well since it was a business trip it was more or less packed throughout the weekdays , but would like to surely add that the Mexico trip was much more enjoyable and fun since I had more company compared to the Philippines trip. It was also the place where I had my first shot of a lovely drink - Tequila ! I found this whole experience amazing and will soon be dedicating an entire blog entry to my first tequila shot.
Meeting different people, tasting different items ( you do get some different stuff to taste even if your vegetarian!) , getting the same old weird stares from people around who couldn't believe that I only ate "vegetables" (If your a vegetarian , it means you eat only vegetables ) and answering the standard (unfortunately not innovative!) NO to questions like :
"So you dont eat meat right ? "
" Do you eat fish ? "
" You don't even eat fish ?!!! (The exclamation marks are just there to stress how shocked people are) .
followed by questions like : "Ok , so let me get it right . So from the time you were born till now, you have never ever eaten meat ? " and then a "No" to that generates what I would call an unbelievable "OH" followed by an impressed look which is very close to looking at you like a total alien ! I guess at times I feel I shouldn't be so fussy but just can't motivate myself to eat meat!
Adding to that, being part of conversations when people completely ignore your presence coz' they are either talking in Spanish (in Mexico) or in Tagalo(in Philippines) was also very much part of the experience . Working late nights , weekends without breaks was also more of a feature that was common to Philippines rather than Mexico.
I also would like to pay my tributes to 2 places that always come to my rescue in most places and certainly in these 2 places - Subway and Starbucks. I got "subwayed" especially when I had to finish stuff and my mere presence in that place , warranted the guy asking me whether I wanted to have "Veggie Delite" again ! Funny that most of the funny incidents in most of the places I have visited has got to do with what I eat ! Anyways, cutting all that short, I must summarize that during this phase I was particularly impressed by the Olympics : Phelps' 8 golds - I saw him get all his golds in different parts of world and was phenomenal to watch him. My favorite was the team gold that US won thanks to Jason Lezak , watching a fantastic volleyball match between Cuba and China from the San Francisco airport and watching Bolt bolting across like only he can on TV were amongst the other good parts.
Best part about the Mexico city trip : My tech lead, Project manager and I had been to this place called Mama Rumba - a total Salsa place where you have the most amazing of people coming and doing salsa to live music thats played . We were there till about 2am in the morning from around 9pm that night and it was simply outstanding to see them dance. It was almost like each one of them present there was born to salsa. The place was packed even on a Thursday evening and for the capacity that it had,I guess I was fortunate enough to see some of the most amazing Salsa dancers. That day I really repented having wooden legs ! Freaking thing !!
Ah, this is another thing that I picked up - "Freaking thing" from Arturo - my Panamanian tech lead who is a total party animal and an absolutely wonderful person to work with . Using it in different contexts and with various impacts was part of this . Also saying "Kay" (what in spanish ?) after the Spanish guy tells you a whole lot of stuff also added to the fun !
What about the Philippines ? The people there are so friendly and the one thing I noticed here was that your knighted by default . I used to be called "Sir" Maa(maee)du all the time till I told them that they should be just calling me Maa(mae)du ( Thats the way its pronounced!) . You address women as "Maam" (not maam but a more rounded maom!) . Well I had never seen 4 malls interconnected and each mall being 3-4 times bigger than anything in Bangalore, very humid weather and typhoons. I was scared the day I left Manila since it was in the middle of a typhoon.
Anyways, now I am back in Bangalore and more than happy to be back and blog !
ps : I would also like to express my shock at the way these blasts have been rocking the country and I am not sure what can be done by the Govt. I had a chance to see "A Wednesday", a movie about terrorism and maybe moves such as those are required to somehow reduce atleast the frequency (just maybe) of such cowardly acts.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Consequence of not reading emails correctly!
A couple of days back , I got an email saying I have been nominated for an award at office that would be given during a meeting where some leaders would speak. I obviously got excited at the thought of being amongst the 3 people who got nominated to win this award and felt that a 0.33 percent chance is not too bad a chance to win something .
Today was the D day and though I was super thrilled about our DC win than anything else, this award nomination was somewhere at the back of my mind . As the award part of the function started, I could feel an urge of anticipation from my side. Then the slide that showed our names flashed on the stage and suddenly I saw 2 other names along with the 3 I had known and then the results were called out and the person who read it out said there was a tie. I was kinda hopeful since 2 out of 5 is still a better chance than 1 out of 5. The 1st winner's name was flashed across - It wasn't my name and I just clapped like all the others and waited and then they announced the 2nd name - It was another guy's name and though my position in the seat did not change, I could feel my heart sink . I know one of the awarded guys personally and he is outstanding and have absolutely no regret but its just that feeling of hope that was there and that want of winning something that was killed in that single moment. That event was enough to put me off completely for the day. I had a pretty good time with my friends later but that irritating feeling just overshadowed every other emotion I had for the rest of the day.
Curiosity as it was, I came back and checked the email that was sent to us and realised that none of the winners were part of the email and then suddenly realised that what I had missed was a single line, written in Times New Roman in Font 10 and in bold - "Please be present physically to collect your nomination certificate" and then it suddenly hit me that had I read this line earlier, these unnecessary hopes wouldn't have been there, I wouldn't have probably had this expectation at all , I would have remained happier in the thought that I was nominated and would have forgotten about it . The email was so crystal clear and said that you did not win any award and that you were just one of the several nominees . I felt miserable after I read that and felt that I should be honest and blog about this as well.
The last few hours have been so irritating and frustrating that I I seriously just hate the thought of even getting nominated for any such award for future . But it has taught me one single thing - Read every line , Read every punctuation mark , Read every damn thing !
Today was the D day and though I was super thrilled about our DC win than anything else, this award nomination was somewhere at the back of my mind . As the award part of the function started, I could feel an urge of anticipation from my side. Then the slide that showed our names flashed on the stage and suddenly I saw 2 other names along with the 3 I had known and then the results were called out and the person who read it out said there was a tie. I was kinda hopeful since 2 out of 5 is still a better chance than 1 out of 5. The 1st winner's name was flashed across - It wasn't my name and I just clapped like all the others and waited and then they announced the 2nd name - It was another guy's name and though my position in the seat did not change, I could feel my heart sink . I know one of the awarded guys personally and he is outstanding and have absolutely no regret but its just that feeling of hope that was there and that want of winning something that was killed in that single moment. That event was enough to put me off completely for the day. I had a pretty good time with my friends later but that irritating feeling just overshadowed every other emotion I had for the rest of the day.
Curiosity as it was, I came back and checked the email that was sent to us and realised that none of the winners were part of the email and then suddenly realised that what I had missed was a single line, written in Times New Roman in Font 10 and in bold - "Please be present physically to collect your nomination certificate" and then it suddenly hit me that had I read this line earlier, these unnecessary hopes wouldn't have been there, I wouldn't have probably had this expectation at all , I would have remained happier in the thought that I was nominated and would have forgotten about it . The email was so crystal clear and said that you did not win any award and that you were just one of the several nominees . I felt miserable after I read that and felt that I should be honest and blog about this as well.
The last few hours have been so irritating and frustrating that I I seriously just hate the thought of even getting nominated for any such award for future . But it has taught me one single thing - Read every line , Read every punctuation mark , Read every damn thing !
Persepolis.
Persepolis - An animated film based on the true story of an Iranian woman - from her childhood to the time she moves out to France, is what you would probably call a complete entertainer . You feel her emotions , you feel sorry for the Iranians , you feel sorry for the people suffering through it and your heart goes out to the people who have had to live in such trying conditions where your not sure of seeing another day.
Here is an example of a film that is so different in terms of the concept but you can still connect with it coz' the character is like anyone of us. Its not what you would normally expect from a Pixar kinda animated movie. Instead, this is a story that almost seems real but just that it is unconventional.
Set in the backdrop of Iranian revolution, this is a story of a small girl whose family has been actively involved in the revolution - staging against the oppressors etc. As the mins go by, it slowly unveils what happened when the regime took over the country, that resulted in so many illogical rules - examples included women wearing scarfs, complete ban on alcohol , not being able to share your views in public , other oppresive rules which just made life so difficult for people .
It also highlights the period where the Iraq-Iran war raged on, where close to around a million people were killed. The terror that was prevalent can be easily sensed in the movie and it makes for some captivating viewing.
Coming back to the story, due to circumstances, the girl is sent to Vienna to study, where she finds mixing with people extremely difficult initially because of the cultural differences. Whenever she tells someone that she is from Iran, they just take look at her in utter disbelief ! And though she changes slowly , she still feels guilty of having left her family back in Iran. Finally, after a set of disappointments in Vienna ,she returns back home only to discover that things have changed way too much and just she cannot come to terms with it . She again finds it almost impossible to adjust at her home, this time. More of it would just completely spoil it for those who might want to see this wonderful movie.
Some of the things it concentrates on are questions like , how women with liberal thinking ,symbolised by the girl's granny , can still survive even in such places though expressing anything of this sort in public is almost impossible. People who even think of doing so are punished - whipped or they have to pay huge amounts of money. There is a particular scene where her father says , this was the same land where 15 years ago , your mom and I used to hold hands and walk on the road but now its impossible. Another scene where she cries in front of her grandmom about her impending divorce is amazing. In reply to this , her grandmom says, "Don't worry, the first marriage is just a practice for the second".
After seeing the movie, you get a feeling as to how people, who have no idea of anything called freedom still have the will to survive and you are forced to stand up and appreciate this. Maybe at times, they just live their lives , even if they don't want to!
Its a hard hitting film that was nominated for Academic awards last year, it makes for a wonderful weekend watch . And why would I go to such a movie ? Narayan is the answer to that coz' in him , you have a genuine film lover who views each of these as an experience! Thanks for convincing me to watch this movie.
Here is an example of a film that is so different in terms of the concept but you can still connect with it coz' the character is like anyone of us. Its not what you would normally expect from a Pixar kinda animated movie. Instead, this is a story that almost seems real but just that it is unconventional.
Set in the backdrop of Iranian revolution, this is a story of a small girl whose family has been actively involved in the revolution - staging against the oppressors etc. As the mins go by, it slowly unveils what happened when the regime took over the country, that resulted in so many illogical rules - examples included women wearing scarfs, complete ban on alcohol , not being able to share your views in public , other oppresive rules which just made life so difficult for people .
It also highlights the period where the Iraq-Iran war raged on, where close to around a million people were killed. The terror that was prevalent can be easily sensed in the movie and it makes for some captivating viewing.
Coming back to the story, due to circumstances, the girl is sent to Vienna to study, where she finds mixing with people extremely difficult initially because of the cultural differences. Whenever she tells someone that she is from Iran, they just take look at her in utter disbelief ! And though she changes slowly , she still feels guilty of having left her family back in Iran. Finally, after a set of disappointments in Vienna ,she returns back home only to discover that things have changed way too much and just she cannot come to terms with it . She again finds it almost impossible to adjust at her home, this time. More of it would just completely spoil it for those who might want to see this wonderful movie.
Some of the things it concentrates on are questions like , how women with liberal thinking ,symbolised by the girl's granny , can still survive even in such places though expressing anything of this sort in public is almost impossible. People who even think of doing so are punished - whipped or they have to pay huge amounts of money. There is a particular scene where her father says , this was the same land where 15 years ago , your mom and I used to hold hands and walk on the road but now its impossible. Another scene where she cries in front of her grandmom about her impending divorce is amazing. In reply to this , her grandmom says, "Don't worry, the first marriage is just a practice for the second".
After seeing the movie, you get a feeling as to how people, who have no idea of anything called freedom still have the will to survive and you are forced to stand up and appreciate this. Maybe at times, they just live their lives , even if they don't want to!
Its a hard hitting film that was nominated for Academic awards last year, it makes for a wonderful weekend watch . And why would I go to such a movie ? Narayan is the answer to that coz' in him , you have a genuine film lover who views each of these as an experience! Thanks for convincing me to watch this movie.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Victory in a Corporate Challenge fest!
A couple of weeks back, we got an email saying there was a Corporate Challenge being
organised by Honeywell and as soon as we saw DC, we were all excited to take part in it.
Unusual requirement was, instead of the usual 3, they needed 4 ppl in the team. Aravind and I
were sure to take part, then we approached Aditya, from my junior batch and equally passionate about Dumb Charades, part of a good DC team in college and he approached us as well . Voila! We had 3 in the team. Next, we thought of Sridhar, my batch mate who was part of another equally kickass DC team in college. So here we were - 4 from Cisco set to take part. The funny part was all 4 of us were generally used to acting in our respective teams !!!
As is our wont, we did not bother doing anything till the last min. And a couple of days back, we decided to use "our"(Aravind and I) team's codes since 2 of us were in a majority. All we did was make fun of each other's codes and then we were all set to go to the fest.
Interestingly enough, our 3rd original DC team member Narayan, now part of another company,
also came with a different team .We definitely missed having him in our team, but we wished him the best of luck and hoped they would do really good as well.
To our surprise, there was tremendous response to the event , as there were overall 80 teams
taking part in DC from 45 different companies !!! We also found our perenial DC competitors -
previously from RV, now working for NI, taking part and we just wished each other , already
hoping that we would clash again in the finals.
The prelims started and by the time we went, we had already seen around 8 teams get all the 3
parts of the chit - a Personality, a movie and a word in less than 90 seconds and we had to get it well within time. I picked up a chit and had a "not so easy" set compared to others.
We got :
Tiger woods - very simple
Resident Evil - movie - kinda ok but tricky
Prank - again tricky.
But we had 3 great DC guys who transformed into amazing guessers and managed to get it in 58
secs which was very tricky coz' there were few other teams coming after us. At that stage we
were 5th in the standings. One more team cracked their chit in 55 secs and we were in the 6th
position and hoping that no other team would crack it ! And thats exactly what happened ! We
were the last team to qualify , the NI team was also there in the finals as expected and so were other equally talented teams and yo ! we were set for yet another duel!
The finals started and we shared the lead with the NI team after the first round. Second
round was a theme cum mirror round - where a particular theme was given and we had one actor acting, the other actor mirroring exactly what he was doing and the 2 guessers looking ONLY at the mirror. Luckily out of the 2 choices that were available - Harry Potter and Music, we got Harry potter and managed to crack the chit in 47 secs( out of 60) , and the crowd went
crazy and so did we - jumping on top of each other !! We were now in the lead !!
Next round probably defined the complete finals for us . All teams had to guess names of English movies, sorted into easy, moderate and tough categories and as many as possible in 90
secs. We defined our strategy to go for the tough category and we cracked that round big time! We got 6 tough ones in 90 seconds when most other teams only 2 moderate + 1 easy, 3 moderate and so on, which was truly fantastic! We hit a jackpot with 180 points ( 30 for
every tough one) and the organisers said " We are stunned that they could crack 6 of them in
the tough category" ! The other team did pretty well too - cracking 5 tough ones in 90 secs.
The final round required 3 actors to act 3 different things and connect them with a theme .Since our team was filled with actors , we just went with it and got a pretty easy set - Opera house , Eiffel tower and Statue of liberty, the connection being that they all lost in the race for the 7 wonders of the world .We cracked this set in 23 seconds and celebrated like we used to in college . Jumping up and down and sharing high fives !!
The difference in points between the 2nd team and our team was 108 and we were completely
ecstatic that we won convincingly! More than the gift vouchers ( which were very good!), we just
totally enjoyed the thrills and the spills and the adrenalin rush that just comes with DC since all 4 of us are pretty crazy about it!
The finals was watched by a packed audience and as we went down from the stage, people rushed to congratulate us and it continued throughout the evening. We even had people from other companies who went on stage to speak about the Fest as such, talk about having had a great time looking at the Cisco team in the DC finals!
More was to follow . The Cisco team came 6th in Mad ads and 2nd in the "Battle of the bands"
and guess what? We won the overall trophy which was a beautiful crystal trophy along with a
"man of the match" type of cheque saying that Cisco had won the event this year.
A fitting end to a great great day that will stay in memory for a really really long time!!!
organised by Honeywell and as soon as we saw DC, we were all excited to take part in it.
Unusual requirement was, instead of the usual 3, they needed 4 ppl in the team. Aravind and I
were sure to take part, then we approached Aditya, from my junior batch and equally passionate about Dumb Charades, part of a good DC team in college and he approached us as well . Voila! We had 3 in the team. Next, we thought of Sridhar, my batch mate who was part of another equally kickass DC team in college. So here we were - 4 from Cisco set to take part. The funny part was all 4 of us were generally used to acting in our respective teams !!!
As is our wont, we did not bother doing anything till the last min. And a couple of days back, we decided to use "our"(Aravind and I) team's codes since 2 of us were in a majority. All we did was make fun of each other's codes and then we were all set to go to the fest.
Interestingly enough, our 3rd original DC team member Narayan, now part of another company,
also came with a different team .We definitely missed having him in our team, but we wished him the best of luck and hoped they would do really good as well.
To our surprise, there was tremendous response to the event , as there were overall 80 teams
taking part in DC from 45 different companies !!! We also found our perenial DC competitors -
previously from RV, now working for NI, taking part and we just wished each other , already
hoping that we would clash again in the finals.
The prelims started and by the time we went, we had already seen around 8 teams get all the 3
parts of the chit - a Personality, a movie and a word in less than 90 seconds and we had to get it well within time. I picked up a chit and had a "not so easy" set compared to others.
We got :
Tiger woods - very simple
Resident Evil - movie - kinda ok but tricky
Prank - again tricky.
But we had 3 great DC guys who transformed into amazing guessers and managed to get it in 58
secs which was very tricky coz' there were few other teams coming after us. At that stage we
were 5th in the standings. One more team cracked their chit in 55 secs and we were in the 6th
position and hoping that no other team would crack it ! And thats exactly what happened ! We
were the last team to qualify , the NI team was also there in the finals as expected and so were other equally talented teams and yo ! we were set for yet another duel!
The finals started and we shared the lead with the NI team after the first round. Second
round was a theme cum mirror round - where a particular theme was given and we had one actor acting, the other actor mirroring exactly what he was doing and the 2 guessers looking ONLY at the mirror. Luckily out of the 2 choices that were available - Harry Potter and Music, we got Harry potter and managed to crack the chit in 47 secs( out of 60) , and the crowd went
crazy and so did we - jumping on top of each other !! We were now in the lead !!
Next round probably defined the complete finals for us . All teams had to guess names of English movies, sorted into easy, moderate and tough categories and as many as possible in 90
secs. We defined our strategy to go for the tough category and we cracked that round big time! We got 6 tough ones in 90 seconds when most other teams only 2 moderate + 1 easy, 3 moderate and so on, which was truly fantastic! We hit a jackpot with 180 points ( 30 for
every tough one) and the organisers said " We are stunned that they could crack 6 of them in
the tough category" ! The other team did pretty well too - cracking 5 tough ones in 90 secs.
The final round required 3 actors to act 3 different things and connect them with a theme .Since our team was filled with actors , we just went with it and got a pretty easy set - Opera house , Eiffel tower and Statue of liberty, the connection being that they all lost in the race for the 7 wonders of the world .We cracked this set in 23 seconds and celebrated like we used to in college . Jumping up and down and sharing high fives !!
The difference in points between the 2nd team and our team was 108 and we were completely
ecstatic that we won convincingly! More than the gift vouchers ( which were very good!), we just
totally enjoyed the thrills and the spills and the adrenalin rush that just comes with DC since all 4 of us are pretty crazy about it!
The finals was watched by a packed audience and as we went down from the stage, people rushed to congratulate us and it continued throughout the evening. We even had people from other companies who went on stage to speak about the Fest as such, talk about having had a great time looking at the Cisco team in the DC finals!
More was to follow . The Cisco team came 6th in Mad ads and 2nd in the "Battle of the bands"
and guess what? We won the overall trophy which was a beautiful crystal trophy along with a
"man of the match" type of cheque saying that Cisco had won the event this year.
A fitting end to a great great day that will stay in memory for a really really long time!!!
Monday, June 23, 2008
Condolences to Jane Mcgrath
Having spent a good amount of time during a period of 6 months last year in Australia, one of the things I realised there was sporty the entire nation was and the amount of respect they had not only for sports people but even for community causes. I must have seen atleast 3-4 covers of different magazines highlighting the story of Jane Mcgrath - a cancer survivor. She was as popular there as her illustrious husband, probably the best line and length bowler in cricket - Glenn Mcgrath. The two of them set up the Mcgrath foundation for spreading awareness and helping those out suffering from Breast cancer.
This morning I heard the shocking news that Jane Mcgrath is no more and on reading online articles , heard that her health deteriorated after complications from a bone cancer operation. May her soul rest in peace and Australians/all others round the world would always be grateful for her support towards the cause and being helpful to all the other people who were suffering from the same disease. It seems she passed away with her husband and her two children by her side. May God bless them and give them the strength to overcome this huge loss .
Amen.
This morning I heard the shocking news that Jane Mcgrath is no more and on reading online articles , heard that her health deteriorated after complications from a bone cancer operation. May her soul rest in peace and Australians/all others round the world would always be grateful for her support towards the cause and being helpful to all the other people who were suffering from the same disease. It seems she passed away with her husband and her two children by her side. May God bless them and give them the strength to overcome this huge loss .
Amen.
Monday, June 02, 2008
IPL
Its official now . IPL has been the biggest thing that has hit World cricket since maybe the Kerry Packer series and people who watched it all over the world cherished it . BCCI made awesome profits in the range of 350 crores or more according to newspaper reports , the Franchise concept worked - some of them were trying to draw even in the first season while others were busy sacking their CEOs. There was also a hilarious forward which had the Blore owner , asking people to drink a particular brand of beer he is associated with because he invested a lot of money and his team just wasn't able to perform !
A day after IPL, in the evening ,even my dad felt that he missed watching cricket - which almost resulted in me collapsing from my seat as this was probably the last thing I would expect from him. I truly agree with him though. IPL , as one of the news channels kept saying , threw all the Saas bahu serials out of contention and ironically, even the news channels suffered since people in general were no longer were bothered about the 9pm news but were instead worried about what their favorite city IPL team was going to do in the last 5 overs !
There were very many great moments - McCullum's first day "beltax" century, Akhtar's fiery spell in his comeback match against Delhi, Gilly playing that hurricane knock against Mumbai ( I actually saw this in the airport just before boarding a flight and generally, janta queue up much before the announcement goes by , but this time was different , as they approached the line , they were walking slower and slower so that they don't miss Gilly's batting and yes, he didn't disappoint - Match got over at 11.25 pm mins before we boarded the flight ! ) , a few hatricks , loads of action and drama , a Hollywood inspired first IPL final ( a 1 sec slot was worth 10 lakhs during the breaks during the final !) and Rajasthan Royals !
The Royals - they beat all the pre tournament hype and criticism when people said any team would win except the Royals ! Watching them play was a treat and a great learning to any other team . Led by the "Blonde Bombshell" ( Read Warne) , as Ravi Shastri put it , they just walloped every damn team on the way and won the finals and also the hearts of zillions of cricket fans . For more on this, just type in Royals and IPL in google and you will find crazy number of articles talking about this team!
Finally, if anybody comes back home after work and suddenly says, "who's playing today" and suddenly realises that IPL is over, you will know that he has been hit by what many call the IPL effect ! Next year it will be bigger and better with more money for everyone involved. Finally, who is the loser ? maybe the aam janta who pay up the money to watch the match !!!
A day after IPL, in the evening ,even my dad felt that he missed watching cricket - which almost resulted in me collapsing from my seat as this was probably the last thing I would expect from him. I truly agree with him though. IPL , as one of the news channels kept saying , threw all the Saas bahu serials out of contention and ironically, even the news channels suffered since people in general were no longer were bothered about the 9pm news but were instead worried about what their favorite city IPL team was going to do in the last 5 overs !
There were very many great moments - McCullum's first day "beltax" century, Akhtar's fiery spell in his comeback match against Delhi, Gilly playing that hurricane knock against Mumbai ( I actually saw this in the airport just before boarding a flight and generally, janta queue up much before the announcement goes by , but this time was different , as they approached the line , they were walking slower and slower so that they don't miss Gilly's batting and yes, he didn't disappoint - Match got over at 11.25 pm mins before we boarded the flight ! ) , a few hatricks , loads of action and drama , a Hollywood inspired first IPL final ( a 1 sec slot was worth 10 lakhs during the breaks during the final !) and Rajasthan Royals !
The Royals - they beat all the pre tournament hype and criticism when people said any team would win except the Royals ! Watching them play was a treat and a great learning to any other team . Led by the "Blonde Bombshell" ( Read Warne) , as Ravi Shastri put it , they just walloped every damn team on the way and won the finals and also the hearts of zillions of cricket fans . For more on this, just type in Royals and IPL in google and you will find crazy number of articles talking about this team!
Finally, if anybody comes back home after work and suddenly says, "who's playing today" and suddenly realises that IPL is over, you will know that he has been hit by what many call the IPL effect ! Next year it will be bigger and better with more money for everyone involved. Finally, who is the loser ? maybe the aam janta who pay up the money to watch the match !!!
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