Lesson of Sorts

The 5th ODI between India and Australia in the Hero Honda Cup 2009 was a lesson for me in many sorts. For one, it again proved that class speaks for itself. I wouldn’t be surprised if Tendulkar were to appear for a charity match 20 years down the line and score a century there too! The best thing about the man is that he is humbleness personified, despite reaching the various zeniths of success. Mind you, many people achieve success in life, but to retain one’s name as the best for a span of 20 years, is not everyone’s cup of tea. There have been Michael Jacksons and Mike Tysons who have tasted extreme success at some point in time, but they never had in their personality what it takes to handle the fame. The disappointment of the loss was so genuine on Tendulkar’s face, only a man of his passion could feel it. ( I wonder how could Dhoni come to the post match presentation with a smiling face )

Secondly, the re-iteration of the fact that there is no short-cut to success. Whatever I spoke of Tendulkar in the paragraph above applies to the whole Australian team. Over 2 decades they have dominated world cricket. They no longer have the big names or the talent that they once had such as Shane Warne and Gilchrist, but they have re-built their reputation based on pure hard work. Let’s not forget that this is actually a back-up Australian squad; they have more debutants than India. Their fitness levels, builds, stamina, flexibility etc are all fruits of their efforts. They bat hard, bowl hard and one need nothing to say about their fielding. You can make it out from the sweat of Shane Watson who spends almost 80 overs on the field either bowling, batting or fielding – yet doesn’t show even a second of lapse in concentration. Talent can take you to a level, it can take the horse to the pool, but then the drinking has to be done by the horse itself. As for example, Tendulkar’s talent almost took India to victory, but the end had to be written by India itself, and it scripted failure. And is this the first time? Take a look at this chart: http://stats.cricinfo.com/ci/content/current/records/284237.html . It gives the highest scores for a losing cause and you can see how many times the little master’s name has appeared in the list.

Next, success is all about application and commitment at the moment, on the field. These are 2 qualities that are inseparable – they come together: you either have both or lack both. If you see the Indian team fielding, they lacked both, because they were not committed, they were less alert, misfielded, dropped catches – put simply – didn’t get the things right when they mattered. In the final overs, the bowlers just went through the motions – as if they were paid only to make sure they don’t bowl wides and no balls and they were not responsible for anything beyond that. Barring Tendulkar and Gambhir, all Indian batsmen remain routed in crease with no footwork whatsoever, any good length ball results in a dot ball instead of a single, thus piling up the pressure to get runs off risky boundaries. Australia on the other hand, were like hawks on the field. They bat with amazing technique anywhere in the world, and their bowlers get pace and bite off the wicket on even dead flat tracks. Even when the match seemed desperately beyond them, the men from down under were pouncing on the slightest of opportunities – bent bodies ready to dive, flat throws to the keeper, cutting off quick singles, bowlers firing dot balls at the right moments, keeper saving what would have been 4 byes – all to make sure the pressure re-mounted on the batsmen. Their commitment resulted in better application – one instance, when they realized it was not their day in hitting stumps directly, they preferred to loop the ball across to the bowler who calmly got Jadeja run out. On the other occasion – the fall of the last wicket, the fielder from long on took his time, only to deliver the perfect long throw to the keeper which beat Praveen Kumar by the minute fraction of a second and resulted in another run out. 2 different applications, yet executed to perfection at the maximum of pressure.

Lastly, about luck and destiny – factors which we believe are out of our control. One can keep arguing – what if India had not conceded 22 runs in the last 7 balls of Australian innings, what if Nehra had not given a boundary at long on which seemed like no more than a single, what if Raina had not tried a sixer to a rising ball when India was cruising to victory, what if Jadeja had shown better common sense than that exhibited on street cricket, what if Praveen Kumar had dived into the crease etc etc, the list can go on and on. But it was clear that lucky and destiny favor only those who work hard and show commitment and application. Dhoni said in the post match interview that even if India had restricted Australia to 320 or 330, the result would have been different. I am sorry Dhoni, but in the previous match the target was only 250 on a good batting track, the team messed it up and allowed Australia to get the momentum which they will never lose for the rest of the series. Another day, had luck favored, Australia would have missed few shots in the end, Raina’s shot would have found the middle, the throw that ran out Praveen Kumar would have been wide, Tendulkar himself would have remained unbeaten and ultimately with even the slightest luck India would have won!

But it was not to be. Let’s accept that fact Indian team didn’t deserve victory on Tendulkar’s heroics alone. Yesterday only 12 men deserved victory – the 11 Australians and the one Sachin Tendulkar. It’s only sad that the Indian legend ended up on the losing side .

Don’t du count mich out!

While, the frequency of my blogs has been decreasing, this one is to announce that I am not completely out of it yet. A 3rd round exit in singles and doubles in the table tennis tournament, a trip to Kolkata and Mumbai, marred by viral fever, and a trip to my native Kasaragod for the Ganesh Chaturthi fest has been ‘all’ that has happened since my last blog. The highlight of the trip to Kolkata was another trip to the Gantok, the chinese border at Nathula pass and a walk into Nepal. I found a lot of things to write about, and some time too. The latter one is more important. There are no shortages of topic in this world for homo sapiens, especially for the ones dwelling in the sacred land for India. Even a person nearing 75 does a Rajanikanth by writing about Jinnah and his heroics. If some foreigner were to suddenly arrive in India and pick up newspapers, he is bound to believe that Jinnah is some kind of virus; for nothing other than H1N1 was being discussed with so much prominence in the past days! So despite the infinite number of topics I have short listed a select few on which I can apply the masala of humor.

Talking of H1N1, looks like the hype of it is slowly dying, although the virus is still alive. You got to give it to the media though. Top headlines on the front page of every newspaper would ensure that the fear of the virus replicates faster than the virus itself. They would suppress the fact that those who succumbed had other chronic illnesses which aggravated on the invasion of the virus and ultimately resulted in death. People started hunting for masks everywhere, in such large numbers that those masks with fancy names called N-95 were getting sold in black. I envy the personnel working in those mask companies; they would receive morale boosting increments and bonuses even in this age of a slowly recovering economic recession.

Next, let’s talk about the people wearing them. When one sees them, subconsciously the mind seeks to avoid them, thinking these are the victims rather than ‘precautionaries’. The day after the first victim died in Pune, the Mumbai airport was full of women wearing masks. Hats off to them too. They wanted to show that they were well prepared before we half asleep men. When you look at them, you can make out only eyes staring back at you, non-vocally wanting you to ask them the question “Aaj, mere paas, bungla hai, gaadi hai, tumhaare paas kya hai?”. And as if after millennia, their quest to prove themselves better than their masculine counterparts was finally a success, they would gleefully reply “Mere pass MASK hai”

Topic Change – I was finally a happy customer at a saloon in Mumbai last month. I got a smart haircut done for Rs 30; this meant that after a long period justice was done. Well, if you are confused lemme explain this one. I don’t think I have more than 30 hair on my head. And in Bangalore saloons, I have been paying 40 per haircut. To me this translates into more than a rupee per hair strand! And the frustration is, the cost is same for a person having two hundred thousand hair on his head. Not fair! The ‘slightly better’ saloons in Bangalore charge 50 bucks: they have an air conditioner which is never switched on, but the customer has to pay for that additional facility. The saloon closest to my house was charging 30 bucks when he set up his camp a few months back, but he was quick to make it 40. When asked the reason, he politely replied that he is paying a rent of 9000 for the saloon and that he has to find means of paying it back. I wonder if the rent was less than 9000 when initially his charge was 30 bucks. I call these guys ‘the initial setup cheats’. :-X

Meanwhile, at office our style of work has changed dramatically. We are following the increasingly popular ‘lean management’ or ‘scrum methodology’. Each project has a celebrity called The Scrum Master. Everyday the scrum master takes the status of the project: a micro management one- we have to state what we have accomplished the previous day and whether it is in line with the target set for that day. If we failed the target, then we have to ‘analyze’ and ‘explain’ why we failed, and ‘plan’ to make sure we do not fail again. And we then finish with what we plan to do till the next meeting. This crap methodology has ensured that we lose whatever flexibility we had earlier: earlier there were days when we used to work up to 18 hours a day and on other occasions days when we put in only 4; it was all up to us.. Now the per day divided work means we have to compulsorily put in 10 hours 42 minutes 36.538 seconds every day to ensure that we have some result to show for the next meeting!

Nothing more to pen down for the moment. Wifey is still waiting for her result, which speaks in itself for the quality of the paper evalutation process at the Bangalore University. I shall end this blog on a slightly serious note. A car is not an investment, it is in fact a significant expenditure. I came to know that one time servicing for my Ford Ikon costs Rs 3000/-. I have to give the car for servicing every 6 months; else I lose the warranty on it. In the first 6 months of my car, I drove 1800 km, which accounts to 170 liters of petrol (= Rs 8500/-) . So all in all, I have spent Rs 11500/- for traveling 1800 km in 6 months. After applying math, it boils down to Rs 64/- for 10km everyday. Food for thought!

Wednesday, the 1st of July

Half of 2009 is over and we enter into the second half. Geez! Time just flies doesn’t it? I am aware I haven’t posted for a while now, part of the reason being that I was busy at work and lazy at home. The other part is that I didn’t find any suitable topic to write on, barring Indian cricket, its disastrous world cup, Dhoni’s slow but sure downfall and so on and so forth. But then, I realized I shall be just like those millions of cricket experts in our nation, who have their own management theories on every ball played on the cricket field. I am sure someone may have even written a book on how to make best use of the drinks break . And given the fact that most of my blog readers are not exactly cricket fans, I decided to wait till I get something solid to write about.

Back to my personal life. Wifey has finished her exams and that means my half-yearly ‘Van-vaas’ is over. And hopefully for the last time! I am getting better food to hog and hopefully will have to spend lesser eating outside. 3 weeks from now we’ll be off to Kolkata and Mumbai for a 2 week vacation. So buying time in anticipation of the fun that lies ahead. That’s what life is all about, ain’t it? Setting milestones and then buying time till we reach them..

Talking of milestones, the next big one for wifey is the CSIR-UGC-NET exam. Sounds like the key for a video games CD, doesn’t it? I haven’t got much of a hang about it, but I guess it is an exam through which all nerds can get their spectacles power doubled! Yes, if you clear this exam, you get to do a PhD and then hopefully become a scientist in the future

Meanwhile, at office, I have enrolled for a table tennis competition. I am hardly in touch with the game, but then I am not gonna repeat the mistake of not participating: a mistake that has cost me dearly during my teen ages. I still remember the singing competition we had for our annual college day in 1st year PUC. I did not participate. The competition had ultimately only 7 singers and was won by someone, who, I thought, was pretty average. Missed chance! Next year, I participated. But as Murphy’s laws had to have their say, there were more than 60 participants next time around!

So last couple of days, I have been visiting the TT room whenever I get time. Like students studying for the exam last minute, the TT room is filled with up to 10 people competing for a game on the table! ‘Vinaasha Kaale Vipreeta Buddhihi’ I thought to myself (applies to me as well). 9 out of 10 days, there isn’t a soul to be seen near that room and when a competition is announced there are 9X10 souls haunting round the clock. And I got to see some ’specimen’ table tennis players. Like this lean guy with long hair, and spectacles. Before every point, he gets ready for his poise, feet angled towards the table, and body pivoting on his toes. In some way, similar to ladies tennis players who swing their asses to and fro like a pendulum, while they are on the receiving end of a serve. Except that, when this guy does it, it ain’t equally sexy . His hair keeps coming across his eyes, and this is followed by a sharp movement of the cranium to shoo the hair back to its place. While playing the game, he makes all sorts of body movements: one moment you feel he doesn’t have an arm, the next moment you find a limb popping out of his armpit. Added to the special effects are the sounds he makes, those which would make the opponent’s heart skip a beat. Only at the end of a point, you would realize that all this drama was in the attempt of adding some extra spin to the ball

Sports tournaments come with their own set of ironies. I registered for the men’s doubles event with Vincent Keane (name changed ), a fellow friend in my company, as my partner. Though we are quite different personalities, our fortunes tangle quite often. I first met him at an inter-school Interaction Club meet during our 10th. Later, we ended up on the same bench, the second-last one in the class, for the two years of pre-university. We did our engineering at different places, and didn’t see each other during that span. Destiny made us meet again 5 years down the line: during our recruitment interview at SAP. Both of us made it, joined the company on the same day, got subsequent ID numbers (his ends with 31 and mine with 32), had our training together and to round if off, joined the same team! A re-organization in our company. 6 months later, meant he had to move to a different team and I too changed my team 2 years later. And right now, both of us reside by the Bannerghatta road. But it simply doesn’t end here.

When the fixtures for men’s singles event were announced, guess who my opponent turned out to be? ‘Doubles partner bana singles opponent’. One thing is sure: At least one of us is gonna make it to the next round; be it in singles or in the doubles . It is going to be a keen contest!

Leagues and Knock-outs !

So, the IPL season 2 is bygone and we are fast approaching the T20 world cup ‘09. As we all know, these tournaments have a blend of league and knock-out stages. This blend brings with it a strange irony. However well you perform in the league stages, one bad day will knock you out of the tournament. On the contrary, however badly you perform in the league, if you just manage to sneak into the knockout stage by a whisker, you can change it all around with one brilliant performance or with a slice of good luck. This brings a question to my mind: Are these tournaments really seeking the best team around? Or are these tournaments purely for entertainment?

Let’s consider some examples: In the recently concluded IPL season 2, Delhi topped the league table with a huge margin: a margin of 3 points against 2nd placed Chennai, 4 points against 3rd placed Bangalore and 6 points against 4th placed Hyderabad. What’s more, Hyderabad managed to end up 4th in the table purely on the basis of a better net run rate than Punjab, with the same number of points. Truly speaking, Delhi was by far the team of the tournament: they were superior to others in all aspects of the game. Even when they were knocked out, it was not due to their poor performance or due to Hyderabad’s brilliant team display, but they were undone by an extraordinary innings by Adam Gilchrist. Just one knock ended their tournament; that too it was not that their bowling effort was below-average, it was just that God Himself had presided Gilchrist’s soul during the first six overs of their run chase. In the end, the team which barely qualified for the knockout, ended up winning the tournament!

Yet another example was South Africa in the T20 world cup 2007. Believe it or not, apart from being the hosts and the favorites, they were the best in the tournament having won all the 4 matches they played. But one loss against India closed the shutters for them. Reason: yet again, a team fell behind the net run rate of another team, the other team being New Zealand. In sharp contrast, in the other group, Australia, who had a very average tournament, having lost to Zimbabwe and Pakistan, and having won only 3 out of their 5 matches, one being against Bangladesh, made it to the semis! Fair? I bet, not many would agree.

However, this analysis does not always hold good. Some teams which begin poorly get a second chance to perform to their true potential. In the ‘99 World Cup, the Australian team, which ended up 3rd in the points table in the group stages, unleashed extra-ordinary vigor and went on to win all of their super-six and knock out matches (barring the famous tie against South Africa in the semis). Without doubt, they were the best in the tournament.

So, what then is the best format? If you ask me, as far as deciding the best team goes, leagues and knock-outs should not be blended together. Like, in English football, they have a separate league competition, the Premier League, in which the team with the most number of points over the span of 9 months and 38 games wins the trophy; and then they also have the FA Cup, which is a complete knock-out event, in which a team moves to the next round only on winning the previous one. However, from the point of view of entertainment and revenues, the knock-out phase of cricket tournaments soar much higher over the league phase, so they will stay. Also, according to the organizers, the knock-out phase is the ultimate test of character: Which team can raise its game and perform when it matters most! What’s your take on this?

Wednesday, the 27th of May

Depressing defeat for Namma Hudugas. I can go on about 100s of Ifs and Buts, and think that even if one of those had gone our way, they would have written history. Don’t even wanna talk about it! However, my gut feeling says Monkey is gonna pay up for his ‘Manga-cheste’ big time. Wait for the Champions League..

Time please.. Change of Topic: Uncle Sam is spreading aids to Padosan. Oops! I need to re-phrase this sentence: Uncle Sam is providing a huge amount in aid to Padosan. Anyways, either of the sentences indicate the same. 20 years ago, Uncle Sam created a virus called ‘Balitan’; I wonder which Shaitan will they come up with this time!

In practicality, Uncle Sam is a scientist and Padosan is a laboratory. Padosan government is the lab attendant. Uncle Sam claims to be working on a ‘vaccine’ against a contagious virus (which he himself introduced), but the vaccine mutates and new viruses (the likes of Tusker-e-Boiler) are created. The lab attendant trains these new viruses to spread flu in the adjacent department. He gets a devilish pleasure when the people in the adjacent department sneeze and cough.

Unfortunately for Uncle Sam and the lab attendant, all viruses go out of control, they even spread to the cabin of the Head of the Department and other scientists are also affected. Uncle Sam feels he has made a fool of himself and blames the lab attendant for negligence. Lab attendant demands a salary hike as motivation to clean up the mess. Uncle Sam obliges. Lab attendant uses a vacuum cleaner to cleanse the lab of the contagious disease. The cleaning is still in process. But, both Uncle Sam and lab attendant are intentionally ignoring the new mutant viruses that they have created. They are hoping that by the time the HoD is satisfied with the cleaning effort, the mutant viruses would have created an epidemic in the adjacent department!

By the way, Uncle Sam and his friends are so unjust. On one hand, when Padosan has to get rid of Balitan, it is given huge amount in aid; whereas, on the other hand, when Emerald Island needs aid to rebuild civilization post war, it has to seek loan from Earth Bank! Grr..

Lemme end this blog on a lighter note. Back to some cricket. Yesterday, Calypso Kings were chasing a target of 328 against the United Jack-Asses. The best part was, their star batsman Bunderballl reached his 50 in 96 balls. Wonderful strike rate, isn’t it? Now guess which team has picked up Bunderball for the IPL? Yes, Namma Hudugas indeed – need I say anymore about the ‘Test Team’ of IPL?

Thursday, the 21st of May

Hello again! I had scripted a paragraph on Monday but unfortunately couldn’t finish the thing due to work load. I wanted to continue on the same, but things had changed a lot in 3 days.

For example, I was about to mention that KKR should change their name to Kite Riders as they may have better luck at the kite festival in Gujarat next year. Just then they gave a tight slap to the Yellow Jerseys and sent the Registan Loyals back to the deserts. I have failed to understand what KR actually means. Knights are warriors who ride horses, but then who ride the Knights themselves? Their wives? :O

Talking of wife, my one has warned me that should I write anything smart about her, she’ll start a counter-blog to return the favour. She also hinted I should think of my left leg while blogging. Was that really a hint?!!!!

By the way, this Sunday was a fun filled day. As I am barred from outdoor sports I have decided to spend time ( or should I rather say ‘waste’ time) on the indoor versions of the same. Bought a MS pc video games pack yesterday. 500 bucks, 16 CDs, 1741 games :O. Of these 41 games were covered in 15 CDs and one CD alone contained 1700 games! I still wonder how 1700 games can be covered in 700 MB, meaning lil more than 400 KB per game. Anyways I haven’t opened that CD yet, so let me publish the post-mortem results later.

I played a few games like car racing and football. Believe me you, these games are so marvelous, I feel hospitals need to have a new ward for “sick” games. The controls are so smooth, that the moment you turn left, the car goes out of race contention, and the moment you turn right the opposition gains possession of the football. And Did you know? The football game is a family contest. It is five-a-side, and all players have plain faces: no eyes, no nose, totally distorted-yet-similar features. All look alike like family members, if not like pentuplets! What more can I expect at the rate of 3 games per rupee?

Wifey was more engrossed in some brain game covering Egyptian symbols which were moving across the screen faster than our own Bangalore’s UP Express Bhaiyya’s bowling. Her gaming experience was more satisfying than mine. I finally took liking to a bike race which I won at the first attempt itself B-). I returned to the drawing room with a broad grin, only to find Wifey sorting out some Greek symbols this time :O I wondered if she had mistaken these ’symbol’ video games for some of Dan Browns symbol thrillers. (Hope I seemed dumb enough in this paragraph, else you know what!)

More to pen down, but I got to leave now. Got to catch the match between the Maadis and the Guldies. Looks like both are gonna make it to the semis this time

Sunday, the 17th of May

I woke up today morning with more pain in my knee joint that there was yesterday. Perhaps climbing the stairs yesterday afternoon allowed my nervous system to play the game ‘Postmaster to my brain – Conveyor of pain’ . For the records, I had got my Anterior Central Ligament torn during a dance performance the day before my wedding. I had to be operated, and this cancelled our honeymoon, but on the brighter side I got the perfect excuse to bunk office for a month and a half .

It’s been 8 months since the ‘no-perfect-adjective-to-describe’ incident and last week I experienced a replay action while playing cricket. Thankfully through, this time around the damage seems much lesser. Doc suggested I should strengthen my hamstring. So after 6 months of silence, the ‘Limp’bizkit in me has woken up again. That translates into no outdoor activities for some time. So I have to find some alternate means to entertain myself. Or maybe this time I can opt for a new role and be the entertainer myself

One fact that cheers me up is that my knee is performing better than the KKR. None of their organs seem to be working, except for the brains of the fake ipl player. Boy, he has a sense of humor, doesn’t he?

Meanwhile Cong’rest’ have won the elections hands down. They can rest for another 5 years . Politically, they deserved it, not on the basis of their deeds, but on the basis of being the champion opportunists. Firstly, the never gave away on their advantages like the Gandhi name. Secondly, they made the most of the mistakes by their rivals. It will now be a monopoly at the center. Few lessons for the other parties. For the southpaws: ‘Loyalty (to Congrest) is the best policy’. For the oranges: ‘Hate backfires’, ‘Preference dominates ignorance’ and ‘Actions speak louder than words’. For the other parties: ‘Third front can not be formed without a backbone’. As for us, we have our big mouths to fuel endless discussions on Indian politics.

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