Wimbledon

I have been following Wimbledon for over 20 years (yeah, I am an old man). Those days Wimbledon used to be one of only a few "live" events. The days when Ivan Lendl was trying to win the only grand slam event that would elude him. Steffi Graf taking over from Martina Navratilova as the "Queen" of Wimbledon. The rivalry between Borris Becker and Stefan Edberg. The Pete Sampras era! The Roger Federer era! One of the most memorable match just happened last night! At least since Goran Ivanisevic became the only unseeded player to win the championship after beating Patrick Rafter in a five setter!

What a match it was last night! Consider this: Roger Federer, the world number one and defending champion, on his way to winning his fifth straight Wimbledon. On his path is Rafael Nadal, the world number two, and challenger to the Federer domination of men's professional tennis. And the match lived up to the expectations. For 3 hour and 45 minute, the match swung in favor of the two warriors. Till 2-2 in the fifth and final set, the match could have gone either way. Then suddenly, a few glimpses of Federer magic, and the championship was Federer's.

My heart goes out to Nadal: the clay specialist, who has overcome all odds to be in the second consecutive Wimbledon final, and lost again! But surely, this is not the end of the rivalry between FedEx and Nadal!

Shivaji - The Boss

I was warned! People said, it is a crazy movie. Blogs said, there is nothing in the movie! Chain email warned about the stampede-causing-hysteria. Friends said the laws of physics were defied! My knowledge of Tamil is limited, although it was recently boosted up by 30% (the three words that I learnt from the Bingo ad: Waango, Pongo, Ukaarongo)!

Still, I went to see "Shivaji - the boss"! Before going, I did some homework. Went through websites about the movie and its stars. Read spoilers to ensure I follow the story. Practised my two finger whistle. Drank a few mugs of beer. All that helped!

Enough has been said about the movie everywhere. I am not going to repeat them. These are my observations:

• Myth busted: All South Indian actresses must have a slightly rounded figure. Shriya Saran was surprisingly normal!
• Tamil language is very expressive! Though I did not follow the dialogues, the way they were said, I got the idea.
• Rajnikant can't dance for nuts! He was very very natural otherwise though - I actually liked his acting.
• People going to watch the movie hence should be warned about the length of the movie: it's a very long movie - guess that was required so that they could club four and a half plot in to one movie.
• What dialogues! Want a piece of that? Here goes: "After six, there's seven. After Shivaji, there's heaven". Oh, here's another: "Pigs come in herds, Shivaji comes alone"!
• Those Rajni stunts! Surprising what he did with a coin, and then his sunglasses. The "Tsook, tsook, tsook" sound is still playing in my head!
• They must have spent some obscene amount of money for the sets! They were totally over-the-top!
  

Oh! What a movie! When I woke up this morning, for a moment, I thought, it was a dream!

Wanted!

Ladies and Gentleman: This man is a criminal specializing in stealing T-shirts. Typically, he invites the unsuspecting victim to his place in Delhi. Sometimes (most of the time, really), the victim himself goes to his place without invitation and spends the weekend having a lot of fun. They watch movies together, cook with sometimes (read mostly) disastrous results together, roam around the city, meet old friends and have all night parties, and get drunk.

However, when the victim leaves, he would invariably miss a few T-shirts. This criminal has a special affinity for memento T-shirts – like Singapore t-shirt, or Auroville, Pondicherry t-shirt. Upon query, he simply says, “Oh! That’s your T-shirt? You forgot it here! I am wearing it, it’s nice. Now you will not get it!”

He is also known to harass his victims (at least one victim: me) by registering the victim’s phone number in his ICICI Bank account. Each time Aro adds someone as a payee / beneficiary, I get a notification like “You have added Bholu as a payee…“, and genuinely wonder what’s going on!!! But now I am used to it.

He is also known to torment his neighbors and friends by laughing at over 100 decibels continuously for six / seven minutes. One is advised to remain away from him during those times, as it might cause irreversible damage to the ears.

On my last post, I urged him to return my T-shirts again, and mildly threatened him that I would write about this and make him infamous. His reply, and I quote him over here, was “dude...I like to be known....anyways...u left those t-shirts in my place...it is the price you pay for keeping things....”

Friends, delhiites and fellow countrymen: Should this man return all t-shirts that he has gathered? Please vote by SMSing “Aro Y” or “Aro N” to my cell phone number. You can also comment in this blog and vote.

Vote for ...

... anything! Guess that’s the trend these days. And these are not the regular votes to elect your MLAs / MPs. There are several ways to exercise your voting rights, these days!

There are several talent shows running on TV, where the results are determined by votes from the general public. Invariably, the shows and the results of these shows are controversial! Remember the incidence where a popular couple vying for the top spot in a dancing competition distributed a few SIM cards to friends to vote for them? Remember how a ‘fame-ous’ singing couple won a competition, though it was clear that the guy didn’t sing one song with all the right notes in the entire competition? Needless to say, these singers / dancers are no longer seen displaying their “talent”!

Next is the opinion poll. Every news channel, every newspaper is now running daily polls for viewers / readers to “voice their opinions”. Let me give you an example from yesterday’s Times of India. The question was “Improvement in civic infrastructure should be our policy maker’s first priority”! The results were even better: 95% said “Yes”; 4% said “No”; and my favorite 1% said “Can’t say”! Wonder what they can't say.

The latest trend is to go global! A for-profit organization has started a global voting for the Seven Wonders of the World. Voters from across the globe can vote for their favorite “wonder” of the world. There were initially 21 entries, but following a protest from Egypt, the pyramids of Giza were given honorary membership! So, now there are 20 finalists to choose from. From India, we have Taj Mahal contesting for this honor. Every public media is urging people of India to vote for Taj Mahal. Now, I am thinking what will happen if Taj doesn’t make it to the top seven. Will it cease to be the ultimate token of eternal love? Will it lose any of the thousands of visitors who come there every day? I don’t think anything will change for these wonderful architectural / engineering feats irrespective of whether they ultimately make it to the top seven. But what is sure to happen is the organization promoting this contest will be making a lot of money from all the voting. In the FAQ section of their website, they have clearly mentioned that they get a share of money from every SMS that voters send, besides the money they make from selling certificates and other souvenirs.

There are better ways of finding talent in our country – let qualified people do the judging. Remember, talents like Sunidhi Chauhan, Kunal Ganjawala and Shreya Ghosal were all found through judges voting. There are better ways of voicing your opinion – write a letter to the editor, e-mail the news channel, write a blog post. There are better ways to honor wonders of our world. There is a huge UNESCO list of heritage sites of the world. Find one of those sites near you or one that you believe in, and do something (however small it may be) worthwhile for it. I mean, find your own way of contributing. But please think before you do anything.

The sound of music

Yesterday, I saw “The sound of music” for the umpteenth time, but after a long time. It brought back memories of my childhood. Our extended families, with all our uncles and aunts and cousins, would meet a few times a year to celebrate something or the other. We used to have an awesome time with a lot of singing, dancing and food. Among other things, a ritual used to be to rent some VHS cassettes (of course no CD / DVD then) and watch them in a packed room. And without fail, we would get “The sound of music”. All of us knew all the songs by heart, and would sing along while the movie played: “The sound of music”, “Confidence”, “Do, re, mi”, “I am sixteen”, “The lonely goatherd”, “Edelweiss” and so on.

The simple flow of the plot; the brilliant performance by Dame Julie Andrews; the evergreen music; the subtle humor; the lovable von Trapp kids and personally, for me, the nostalgia: makes this one of my anytime-watch movies.

Award winning ad!

All of you must have seen the ad where a cool dude from an Indian IT major knows everything and gives loads of funda to the investment banker, who incidentally gives him a lift. I didn’t think much about the ad myself; however, recently this ad got an award and I can’t get over this fact! Award for this ad! What is this world coming to?

Going by this ad, I wouldn’t trust this company with any business (it is another matter that I have no business to offer). They send this guy for an “overseas project” and he leaves with a backpack which cannot carry more than a laptop! And what kind of a guy wears faded jeans with a shirt and tie(!!!) and a cap!

If our smart Alec was going on such an important project, why was he relying on a lift (in the middle of nowhere)? Isn’t that leaving too much on chance? If there was a helicopter for his pick-up in the middle of nowhere, why couldn’t the helicopter pick him up from another point in the middle of nowhere?

Where's Waldo?

Exploring TV channels that he thought never existed! Just realized there are TV channels beyond the usual: NatGeo, Discovery, T&L, ESPN, StarSports, HBO, Star Movies! Well, Indian Idol is on Sony, Voice of India is on Star, Sa Re Ga Ma Pa world war of singers (more like among the 'gurus') is on Zee.

Of course, I am eating and reading a lot too. I did buy some books that we (my mom and me) wanted to buy and read them.

Now its time for me to return to Bangalore; back to normal life!