Monday, December 18, 2006

A Memorable Victory

These days, I do not follow Indian cricket(or cricket, in general) as passionately as I did a few years ago. Many a time, I won't even be knowing when is India's next match. Despite that, that I am writing a post on the Indian cricket team's win over South Africa today, is because, this was not just a test match win for the team. It was much more than that. It was victory against unsporting, manipulative tactics. It was a victory against ugly arrogance. It was a victory for fair play. It was victory for the gentleman's game. It was a victory for the Indian people.

It's a universally known fact that pitches are prepared to suit the home team. But what the South Africans did was doctoring the pitch in the worst possible way. They watered the pitch on the evening before the test match in anticipation of an Indian batting collapse on a wet pitch. On the contrary, not only did the match start late due to this misadventure, but also it was the South Africans who surrendered to a high quality Indian pace attack and that too after India managed to put up a respectable total. It was a sort of poetic justice that the South Africans were bowled out for their lowest score in test cricket since their readmission to international fold.

As if all this was not enough, the South African team showed arrogance that did no good to the game. Andre Nel, who looks like a pussy cat against the Aussies, tried to intimidate Sreeshanth by sledging. Sreeshanth's reaction(which did not include verbal counter-attack), is now of course, well known. The humiliation on Nel's face when Sreeshanth hit that famous six and did that famous bat-dance, is something that I can never ever forget. Players like Nel are a shame to the game.

On the other hand, Indians played it fair. They maintained their calm. They did not get into ugly things like sledging, true to their indian nature. They instead, let their cricket do the talking. They did not crib about the pitch even on day one(If it had happened in India, the whole world would have joined to condemn the curator and the Indian board to hell.). They made the most of a wet pitch.

To sum it up, it was a victory for the good. Congratulations, team India. You did all of us proud.

Sunday, December 10, 2006

What a movie, ya!

A few months ago, I watched Nayagan - one of the best movies in India in my opinion, which engendered in me, a love for Tamil movies, especially those by Mani Rathnam and Kamal Hassan. Although, I do not understand Tamil(I can only understand very basic Tamil), this new foumd interest enabled me to see such good movies as Anbe Sivam, Kannathil Muthamittal and a few other movies(Thanks Arjun, for giving me those DVD/CDs). The latest in the list of Tamil movies I have watched is, Iruvar, which I viewed today.

As with all other Maniji's films this too was brilliant. Yes, I could not understand Tamil poetry which was in full flow in that movie. This, I am sure, would have taken half the sheen off it. Yet, it was a great watch. This was because of the simply amazing storytelling combined with A R Rahman's music composition that was perfect to say the least. Mani Rathnam's direction ensures that, a film, that could have so easily slipped into a documentary, is transformed into a must-watch-movie, one that has used Tamil political saga to perfection.

'Equitable Development'

The 'secular-politics' played out in this country, reached it's nadir, when our Prime Minister said yesterday, that 'Minorities, particularly Muslims, should have the first claim on national resources'. You need not have to be a social scientist to realize how dangerous this proposal is. 'Equitable development', which this Government claims to swear by, cannot be achieved by any particular group having a 'first claim' on national resources. Dear Prime Minister, you have made the most appalling statement of your life.

Saturday, December 02, 2006

Why you should not give me your mobile phone number

As is evident from the copious amounts of crap this blog contains, writing long, uninteresting, insipid posts, about my 'ideas/thoughts'(which are always ones that have zero utilitarian value) is something that I like. This extends beyond this space of mine on 'blogosphere' to scrapping on Orkut and SMS.

The SMS version of 'me boring people' is the latest. Traveling an hour by bus to office, gives me a lot of scope to do this. 'Concisely expressed profound thoughts about life' is usually the theme of such 'invaluable' SMSs of mine. But, people, to whom I send such 'invaluable' thoughts using the medium of text messaging via cellular telephone, do not see these messages of mine in that light. They usually ignore it. ( But this is not unusual in history. It happened to Krishna, Gandhiji and many others like me.)

'Giving analogies between life and vehicular traffic and between real life and virtual world, you try to bring out the essence of life, Harish', is something that not even a single reader of my messages has said. Anyway, I am undeterred by this and continue to do my 'good work'. I am tempted to end this narcissistic post of mine with an example of the kind of 'thoughts' I normally send through SMS. Here it goes,
"Life is similar to driving in traffic. Disappointments, like the red signal, can frustrate you. But you have to take heart from the fact that, happier times, like the green signal, are surely round the corner".
'No doubt, people ignore your messages', is, I am sure, your opinion. Isn't it?