My friend Pramod is doing is a fantastic job tracking Ron Paul's campaign trail. If you aren't reading his blog already, I suggest you head over to Ron Paul India.
Cheers Bili !
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Pramod, he's different
Pramod Biligiri and I met for the first time in Vijaya High School. We were in the eighth standard then. Our classes had begun just then and the students were still getting to know each other. Pramod and I hadn't met as yet. At around the same time, a teacher in the math department was putting together a team for a group song performance. Somebody had misinformed her about my singing skills and to my horror I found myself in her cabin staring at two pages of complicated Kannada poetry, not a word of which I understood.
Along with me in the teacher's cabin, was Pramod, who was observing the manner in which the teacher was selecting students for the event. The teacher obviously had no clue about the students in our class, let alone knowing who sang well or who played the tabla well. We were still new faces. She was being advised by a group of senior students who were leveraging their "network" to suggest names from our class.
Teacher: OK, I need two more male voices. Also, is there somebody who can play the veena ?
Senior #1: Uh..my friend Divya told me that her brother's friend Dramod T K plays the veena really well. We should probably take him.
Senior #2: My sister's classmate's brother is apparently an awesome singer. We SHOULD take him. Else I won't participate !!
Senior #3: There's this guy who attends the same music academy that my cousin's neighbour does. I don't remember his name....perhaps starts with A
Soon we had our two "male voices" and Dramod T K for the veena. The teacher now wanted to talk about the song she had selected. Just as she turned her attention to the script, Pramod interrupted her: "Ma'am, I think we need to adopt a more democratic process in selecting the team. I believe in freedom of expression. I believe in public opinion and equal opportunity for all. Do we elect our leaders in the same manner as we have put this team together ? Hearsay ? Clearly our knowledge about our class is limited. Perhaps there's somebody out there who sings much better than this guy ...pointing at me..me nodding vigorously in approval.. How do we know ? We should conduct a Talent Show...provide an unbiased platform for all the kids to display their talents. And then we can proceed to choose our team. My conscience doesn't permit me to be a part this team. I am out. " What the hell was Pramod talking about ? Democratic process of decision making ? Freedom of Expression ?? hello !! The teacher was shocked at Pramod's maturity. She sent us back to our classrooms immediately and canceled the day's practice. Soon, a talent show was announced for the eighth standard students !
So that's how I met Pramod.... over a lesson on democracy, public opinion and equal opportunity.
I won't be wrong if I branded Pramod as the "true geek" among all my friends. When the gang wants to talk about Sushmita Sen in her latest movie, Pramod wants to discuss Ron Paul. When Avinash and I raised a minor complaint about prices of coffee at Cafe Coffee Day, Pramod informed us about the effects of Fringe Benefit Tax on the prices of mosquito repellants. When Kandarp wanted to discuss a certain girl in his class, Pramod wanted us talk about Ubuntu instead. He once made me write a ruby program in a movie hall !
Back in 2000, after we had completed writing a million engineering entrance examinations, Avinash, Kandarp, Pramod and I set off on a trip to discover coastal Karnataka. We were going to visit several beaches and also spend some time in Mangalore. One of the beaches we visited was Kapu. We reached the beach at 5 in the evening, tired after a really strenuous bus ride. Each one of us bought a tender coconut from a peddler on the beach. We threw ourselves on the sand and sat facing the beach with the sun setting in the background. At a distance, very very far away, we spotted a ship that was disappearing slowly into the horizon. We sat there for several minutes, our eyes riveted on that ship. We seemed to have been overcome by a sudden silence that was interrupted every now and then by the sound of the waves and cries of "yellneer" from the peddler. Nobody spoke. Everyone watched...simply watched.
Finally, when the ship had disappeared, Kandarp broke the silence: "Guys, what do you reckon of that ship ?"
Avinash: Don't worry. It's a cargo ship. I have seen several of those in the movies. It won't destroy us.
Me: I wonder what it is carrying...marijuana ? Trafficking human beings ?
Kandarp: What crap ?! I think that ship resembles our life, as it stands at this point in time.
Avinash and I were a bit puzzled, but we managed to put a philosophical look on our faces to suit the occasion.
"That ship was perhaps at a harbour a couple of days ago. It was anchored there in the company of several of it's "friend" ships. It has now embarked on a journey, with a destination in mind. It doesn't know when it is going to return to the harbour, when will it ever get to meet it's friends again. Some of them may meet again, some may never meet at all. Each one of us is now embarking on a similar journey...a journey called life. Will we all stay in Bangalore ? Maybe we'll go to different cities. And what if I decide to go to the US after my engineering ? Will we ever get to meet again ?"
Avinash and I were suddenly taken over by the gravity of Kandarp's remark. All those scenes of we being together, cracking jokes at each other, hanging out in 4th block for by-two coffee by-two idli flashed before our eyes. We were going to be separated, and no one except Kandarp had realised it !! The emotional crescendo had reached a peak. One more word from Kandarp and we were probably going to tumble down with tears in our eyes. Were we really going to be separated ? Avinash searched for his handkerchief.
Kandarp, sensing that Pramod hadn't spoken at all: So Bili, what do you reckon of that ship ?
no answer
Kandarp: BILI !!
Pramod: Uh ?? monopoly, absolute monopoly
Monopoly ? Did he actually say monopoly ? "There are so many coconut trees in this place. There are so many people on this beach. Yet, there's only one guy selling tender coconuts here. Plus this is summer. I am sure he has an exclusive license to sell coconuts on this beach. Perhaps, he has bribed the local politician to ensure no one else is allowed to sell anything here. No wonder we paid 20 bucks for the coconut, while back in Bangalore, we would have paid just 5 bucks. I wonder what the license costed him though."
Kandarp: OK OK, but what about that ship ?
Pramod: What ship ?
Kandarp, Avinash and I buried our heads in disbelief.
Along with me in the teacher's cabin, was Pramod, who was observing the manner in which the teacher was selecting students for the event. The teacher obviously had no clue about the students in our class, let alone knowing who sang well or who played the tabla well. We were still new faces. She was being advised by a group of senior students who were leveraging their "network" to suggest names from our class.
Teacher: OK, I need two more male voices. Also, is there somebody who can play the veena ?
Senior #1: Uh..my friend Divya told me that her brother's friend Dramod T K plays the veena really well. We should probably take him.
Senior #2: My sister's classmate's brother is apparently an awesome singer. We SHOULD take him. Else I won't participate !!
Senior #3: There's this guy who attends the same music academy that my cousin's neighbour does. I don't remember his name....perhaps starts with A
Soon we had our two "male voices" and Dramod T K for the veena. The teacher now wanted to talk about the song she had selected. Just as she turned her attention to the script, Pramod interrupted her: "Ma'am, I think we need to adopt a more democratic process in selecting the team. I believe in freedom of expression. I believe in public opinion and equal opportunity for all. Do we elect our leaders in the same manner as we have put this team together ? Hearsay ? Clearly our knowledge about our class is limited. Perhaps there's somebody out there who sings much better than this guy ...pointing at me..me nodding vigorously in approval.. How do we know ? We should conduct a Talent Show...provide an unbiased platform for all the kids to display their talents. And then we can proceed to choose our team. My conscience doesn't permit me to be a part this team. I am out. " What the hell was Pramod talking about ? Democratic process of decision making ? Freedom of Expression ?? hello !! The teacher was shocked at Pramod's maturity. She sent us back to our classrooms immediately and canceled the day's practice. Soon, a talent show was announced for the eighth standard students !
So that's how I met Pramod.... over a lesson on democracy, public opinion and equal opportunity.
I won't be wrong if I branded Pramod as the "true geek" among all my friends. When the gang wants to talk about Sushmita Sen in her latest movie, Pramod wants to discuss Ron Paul. When Avinash and I raised a minor complaint about prices of coffee at Cafe Coffee Day, Pramod informed us about the effects of Fringe Benefit Tax on the prices of mosquito repellants. When Kandarp wanted to discuss a certain girl in his class, Pramod wanted us talk about Ubuntu instead. He once made me write a ruby program in a movie hall !
Back in 2000, after we had completed writing a million engineering entrance examinations, Avinash, Kandarp, Pramod and I set off on a trip to discover coastal Karnataka. We were going to visit several beaches and also spend some time in Mangalore. One of the beaches we visited was Kapu. We reached the beach at 5 in the evening, tired after a really strenuous bus ride. Each one of us bought a tender coconut from a peddler on the beach. We threw ourselves on the sand and sat facing the beach with the sun setting in the background. At a distance, very very far away, we spotted a ship that was disappearing slowly into the horizon. We sat there for several minutes, our eyes riveted on that ship. We seemed to have been overcome by a sudden silence that was interrupted every now and then by the sound of the waves and cries of "yellneer" from the peddler. Nobody spoke. Everyone watched...simply watched.
Finally, when the ship had disappeared, Kandarp broke the silence: "Guys, what do you reckon of that ship ?"
Avinash: Don't worry. It's a cargo ship. I have seen several of those in the movies. It won't destroy us.
Me: I wonder what it is carrying...marijuana ? Trafficking human beings ?
Kandarp: What crap ?! I think that ship resembles our life, as it stands at this point in time.
Avinash and I were a bit puzzled, but we managed to put a philosophical look on our faces to suit the occasion.
"That ship was perhaps at a harbour a couple of days ago. It was anchored there in the company of several of it's "friend" ships. It has now embarked on a journey, with a destination in mind. It doesn't know when it is going to return to the harbour, when will it ever get to meet it's friends again. Some of them may meet again, some may never meet at all. Each one of us is now embarking on a similar journey...a journey called life. Will we all stay in Bangalore ? Maybe we'll go to different cities. And what if I decide to go to the US after my engineering ? Will we ever get to meet again ?"
Avinash and I were suddenly taken over by the gravity of Kandarp's remark. All those scenes of we being together, cracking jokes at each other, hanging out in 4th block for by-two coffee by-two idli flashed before our eyes. We were going to be separated, and no one except Kandarp had realised it !! The emotional crescendo had reached a peak. One more word from Kandarp and we were probably going to tumble down with tears in our eyes. Were we really going to be separated ? Avinash searched for his handkerchief.
Kandarp, sensing that Pramod hadn't spoken at all: So Bili, what do you reckon of that ship ?
no answer
Kandarp: BILI !!
Pramod: Uh ?? monopoly, absolute monopoly
Monopoly ? Did he actually say monopoly ? "There are so many coconut trees in this place. There are so many people on this beach. Yet, there's only one guy selling tender coconuts here. Plus this is summer. I am sure he has an exclusive license to sell coconuts on this beach. Perhaps, he has bribed the local politician to ensure no one else is allowed to sell anything here. No wonder we paid 20 bucks for the coconut, while back in Bangalore, we would have paid just 5 bucks. I wonder what the license costed him though."
Kandarp: OK OK, but what about that ship ?
Pramod: What ship ?
Kandarp, Avinash and I buried our heads in disbelief.
Sunday, December 23, 2007
My friend Kandarp
This post is dedicated to my friend Kandarp, or perhaps to a certain problem that keeps haunting him every now and then. Kandarp and I met for the first time in 1992. Our schools had closed for the summer break. Kandarp was visiting his grandparents who lived in Jayanagar. I was spending an unusual amount of time in the playgrounds playing an ununsual number of cricket matches with my friends. It was during one such cricket match that another friend of mine called Ganesh introduced Kandarp to me.
Ganesh: Vindy, meet Kandarp !
Me: Oh ! Hey Gandharv, how are you doing ?
Kandarp: Hi... uh..actually my name is Kandarp
Me: Yes yes, Kandraap
Kandarp (irritated, his face turning red): No! It's Kandarp K-A-N-D-A-R-P
Me: Oh Kandarp, Kandarp...sorry sorry. You know it's not too often that one comes across somebody by name Kandarp in Bangalore...ahem So, are you from India ?
Kandarp: Ofcourse I am from India. Kannada barathappa !! Kandarp is another name for Manmatha. Have you heard of Manmatha....Cupid ? The Roman God who makes people fall in love ? That's me.
Vinay: Wow.. really ? (thinking about my recent crush in Sudarshan Vidya Mandir)... Man, I would love to be your friend
And so this very conversation that happened on a hot Monday afternoon triggered a friendship - a friendship that has lasted for 15 years now, an intense friendship that I am now going to take undue advantage of....
Off topic:
Kandarp was smart chap (he still is). He could do decimal multiplication and division really fast. He knew the answer to every question our science teacher asked. He seemed to know the capital of every country you could think of. He knew the GDP of every nation on this planet, including Burkina Faso. Kandarp was indeed a smart chap. Girls would come to Kandarp during the lunch break to have their math doubts clarified. And Kandarp would come over to my desk to have lunch with me. As a result, I got to hang around with all the popular girls of my school !! Pretty cool stuff I must say. It felt really good being his friend. Just that I couldn't see any chemistry happening between me and my crush. But Kandarp advised me to be patient and I gladly agreed to follow his advice. After all, he was cupid ! btw I am still following his advice....psst
Back to the topic:
You see, I was not the only guy who got his name wrong. In all fairness to Kandarp, I think he has a wonderful name. My grandmom really likes his name and so does a Sanskrit teacher at a nearby temple. But throughout the 15 years that I have known him, I have come across several people who have had problems registering his name when they hear it the first time. They would look at his name, think for a couple of seconds and then change it to something that suited them. For example, back in 6th standard, Kandarp and I had won the south zone inter-school badminton competition and we were now going to compete at the inter-zonal level. On the day of the competition, Kandarp walked over to the registration desk to register our team and to announce our arrival to all the other teams. A physical training instructor from one of the participating schools was registering the teams
PT instructor (munching paan parag): yenappa hesaru ?
Kandarp: Kandarp, sir.
PT instructor: Aaaaahhhhhh ? (with knotted eyebrows)
Kandarp: Kandarp, Kandarp
PT instructor: Oh ok .... ahem ahem (spits the paan parag out)
The instructor went through names from all the participating teams and finally declared that there was nobody by name Kandarp! Kandarp was distraught. This couldn't be happening. We had fought really hard to make it to the zonal level and it seemed like some administrative glitch somewhere was going to keep us out of winning the zonal title. Wiping sweat from his forehead, Kandarp thundered "Illa sir, chanceeee illa...naav south zone winners sir...sudarshan vidya mandir !!!"..... The instructor went back to his list and specifically looked for the south zone winners. Lifting his head and spitting out some more paan parag, he said "Sheeeeee, the wonly team we have here from SVM is Vinay and Sikander".....Sikander ?? what the hell ! Kandarp took out his south zone certificate, showed it to the instructor and got his name changed on the list. We were finally set to roll. I opened my bag and pulled out a glittering maroon Yonex - our brahmaastra if I could say so.
A couple years passed by and we were now in high school. Back in those days, the second most coolest thing a kid from Bangalore South could do, was to go to Vijaya High School. The coolest thing obviously was to eat dose at Dosa Camp. Kandarp had aced the 7th standard board exams with a percentage of 99.98. He had lost just one mark in his math exam owing to a spelling mistake !! To everybody's horror, I had managed a decent score too. So our parents took us out of Sudarshan Vidya Mandir and put us in Vijaya High School. On our first day at VHS, we were all made to sit in an open air auditorium and a teacher by name Dumar kept calling out our names one after another to assign us to various sections. Dvinash Atreya D section, Dramod Biligiri D section, N R Drasad F section, Darsha Honappa D section, Vinay Murthy D section Dogish D section.... and so the list went on and on until about 500 kids were assigned to their sections, with the exception of only one guy. Kandarp was still sitting there in the hot sun with ears that had turned red listening to Dumar for two long hours. Kandarp couldn't think of a reason why he hadn't been assigned a section. Perhaps, they had a special K section just for him ? Dumar looked at Kandarp and said "Yeno sundaraanga, aagle class-inda aache haakbittra ?" Kandarp, who was blushing now, replied "illa sir, nan hesare karililla neevu" Dumar was surprised. He had meticulously stepped through the entire list crossing out every name as soon as he had called it out. After all he had been doing this for 20 years now. It did surprise him that he had missed out on Kandarp's name. Dumar put on his reading glasses and went through the entire list again. He finally found one name that hadn't been crossed - Kandar.P... sigh !! The necessary corrections were made and Kandarp was finally assigned to the D section. Manmatha was back in action, ready to impress all the girls with his laser sharp brain.
I have already told you about two cool things that kids in Bangalore South could do back in the days. Apparently, the third most coolest thing was to write the NTSE exam. The principal of VHS had impressed upon us that if we cleared the exam, the Indian government would adopt us. By adopt, he actually meant a scholarship. The first time our parents heard our principal talking about the NTSE exam, they literally freaked out. They didn't need anybody to adopt their kids ! Anyway, all the cool kids decided to write the exam and so I gave name too. To nobody's surprise, Kandarp aced the state level exam. To everybody's surprise, I managed to clear the exam too. And so here we were enrolling ourselves into a month long coaching class at the Kumarans' for the national level exam. On the first day of our classes, we were all made to assemble in a well lit classroom. There were kids from all over Karnataka. Kandarp even found his childhood sweetheart from Mysore in that class. Our teacher for the first class was a person by name Divakumar. As is the usual practice in all first day classes, Divakumar laboured through the intricacies of the national level exam and by doing so, he convinced me that I stood no chance of clearing the exam. I could clear it if I attended his class religiously and took all his tests. But that meant that I couldn't play for the local Apollo 11 cricket team anymore. I was already getting tensed about this NTSE exam. Perhaps I should have stuck to playing cricket. NTSE ?? definitely not my cup of tea. Divakumar decided to take a roll call and started calling out our names Dvinash...present sir, Drasad ... present sir, ..... , Vinay...a feeble present sir, Dogish...a confident present sir. Having completed the formality, Divakumar got ready to talk about the application of the harmonic mean to an average speed problem. As soon as he opened his mouth to talk, a hand was raised among the students and Kandarp got up. There was a faint murmuring in the classroom. Everyone wanted to know who this guy was. All the girls looked up. Divakumar was impressed. For the first time in his life, he had come across a student who had a doubt on day's topic even before the topic could be discussed...what a student to have in your class. But Kandarp had a totally different concern... "Sir, my name wasn't called".....err..... Divakumar's excitement sank in a couple of seconds and he opened the attendance register again. He looked at Kandarp and said "The only person who is absent today is Bhandari".... Dvinash, Drasad, Dogish and I burst out in peels of laughter.
And so the saga of Kandarp's name continued for several more years later. Several attendance registers were corrected, countless certificates were changed, a couple of T-shirts were re-printed, a degree certificate was re-embossed and a passport was also set right. One fine Sunday morning, Kandarp woke up and decided that he had to put an end to all this confusion. He convinced his parents to change his name to Kandarp Srinivasan and since then, I have been told that Kandarp prefers to introduce himself as K Srinivasan.
Cheers Kandy !
Ganesh: Vindy, meet Kandarp !
Me: Oh ! Hey Gandharv, how are you doing ?
Kandarp: Hi... uh..actually my name is Kandarp
Me: Yes yes, Kandraap
Kandarp (irritated, his face turning red): No! It's Kandarp K-A-N-D-A-R-P
Me: Oh Kandarp, Kandarp...sorry sorry. You know it's not too often that one comes across somebody by name Kandarp in Bangalore...ahem So, are you from India ?
Kandarp: Ofcourse I am from India. Kannada barathappa !! Kandarp is another name for Manmatha. Have you heard of Manmatha....Cupid ? The Roman God who makes people fall in love ? That's me.
Vinay: Wow.. really ? (thinking about my recent crush in Sudarshan Vidya Mandir)... Man, I would love to be your friend
And so this very conversation that happened on a hot Monday afternoon triggered a friendship - a friendship that has lasted for 15 years now, an intense friendship that I am now going to take undue advantage of....
Off topic:
Kandarp was smart chap (he still is). He could do decimal multiplication and division really fast. He knew the answer to every question our science teacher asked. He seemed to know the capital of every country you could think of. He knew the GDP of every nation on this planet, including Burkina Faso. Kandarp was indeed a smart chap. Girls would come to Kandarp during the lunch break to have their math doubts clarified. And Kandarp would come over to my desk to have lunch with me. As a result, I got to hang around with all the popular girls of my school !! Pretty cool stuff I must say. It felt really good being his friend. Just that I couldn't see any chemistry happening between me and my crush. But Kandarp advised me to be patient and I gladly agreed to follow his advice. After all, he was cupid ! btw I am still following his advice....psst
Back to the topic:
You see, I was not the only guy who got his name wrong. In all fairness to Kandarp, I think he has a wonderful name. My grandmom really likes his name and so does a Sanskrit teacher at a nearby temple. But throughout the 15 years that I have known him, I have come across several people who have had problems registering his name when they hear it the first time. They would look at his name, think for a couple of seconds and then change it to something that suited them. For example, back in 6th standard, Kandarp and I had won the south zone inter-school badminton competition and we were now going to compete at the inter-zonal level. On the day of the competition, Kandarp walked over to the registration desk to register our team and to announce our arrival to all the other teams. A physical training instructor from one of the participating schools was registering the teams
PT instructor (munching paan parag): yenappa hesaru ?
Kandarp: Kandarp, sir.
PT instructor: Aaaaahhhhhh ? (with knotted eyebrows)
Kandarp: Kandarp, Kandarp
PT instructor: Oh ok .... ahem ahem (spits the paan parag out)
The instructor went through names from all the participating teams and finally declared that there was nobody by name Kandarp! Kandarp was distraught. This couldn't be happening. We had fought really hard to make it to the zonal level and it seemed like some administrative glitch somewhere was going to keep us out of winning the zonal title. Wiping sweat from his forehead, Kandarp thundered "Illa sir, chanceeee illa...naav south zone winners sir...sudarshan vidya mandir !!!"..... The instructor went back to his list and specifically looked for the south zone winners. Lifting his head and spitting out some more paan parag, he said "Sheeeeee, the wonly team we have here from SVM is Vinay and Sikander".....Sikander ?? what the hell ! Kandarp took out his south zone certificate, showed it to the instructor and got his name changed on the list. We were finally set to roll. I opened my bag and pulled out a glittering maroon Yonex - our brahmaastra if I could say so.
A couple years passed by and we were now in high school. Back in those days, the second most coolest thing a kid from Bangalore South could do, was to go to Vijaya High School. The coolest thing obviously was to eat dose at Dosa Camp. Kandarp had aced the 7th standard board exams with a percentage of 99.98. He had lost just one mark in his math exam owing to a spelling mistake !! To everybody's horror, I had managed a decent score too. So our parents took us out of Sudarshan Vidya Mandir and put us in Vijaya High School. On our first day at VHS, we were all made to sit in an open air auditorium and a teacher by name Dumar kept calling out our names one after another to assign us to various sections. Dvinash Atreya D section, Dramod Biligiri D section, N R Drasad F section, Darsha Honappa D section, Vinay Murthy D section Dogish D section.... and so the list went on and on until about 500 kids were assigned to their sections, with the exception of only one guy. Kandarp was still sitting there in the hot sun with ears that had turned red listening to Dumar for two long hours. Kandarp couldn't think of a reason why he hadn't been assigned a section. Perhaps, they had a special K section just for him ? Dumar looked at Kandarp and said "Yeno sundaraanga, aagle class-inda aache haakbittra ?" Kandarp, who was blushing now, replied "illa sir, nan hesare karililla neevu" Dumar was surprised. He had meticulously stepped through the entire list crossing out every name as soon as he had called it out. After all he had been doing this for 20 years now. It did surprise him that he had missed out on Kandarp's name. Dumar put on his reading glasses and went through the entire list again. He finally found one name that hadn't been crossed - Kandar.P... sigh !! The necessary corrections were made and Kandarp was finally assigned to the D section. Manmatha was back in action, ready to impress all the girls with his laser sharp brain.
I have already told you about two cool things that kids in Bangalore South could do back in the days. Apparently, the third most coolest thing was to write the NTSE exam. The principal of VHS had impressed upon us that if we cleared the exam, the Indian government would adopt us. By adopt, he actually meant a scholarship. The first time our parents heard our principal talking about the NTSE exam, they literally freaked out. They didn't need anybody to adopt their kids ! Anyway, all the cool kids decided to write the exam and so I gave name too. To nobody's surprise, Kandarp aced the state level exam. To everybody's surprise, I managed to clear the exam too. And so here we were enrolling ourselves into a month long coaching class at the Kumarans' for the national level exam. On the first day of our classes, we were all made to assemble in a well lit classroom. There were kids from all over Karnataka. Kandarp even found his childhood sweetheart from Mysore in that class. Our teacher for the first class was a person by name Divakumar. As is the usual practice in all first day classes, Divakumar laboured through the intricacies of the national level exam and by doing so, he convinced me that I stood no chance of clearing the exam. I could clear it if I attended his class religiously and took all his tests. But that meant that I couldn't play for the local Apollo 11 cricket team anymore. I was already getting tensed about this NTSE exam. Perhaps I should have stuck to playing cricket. NTSE ?? definitely not my cup of tea. Divakumar decided to take a roll call and started calling out our names Dvinash...present sir, Drasad ... present sir, ..... , Vinay...a feeble present sir, Dogish...a confident present sir. Having completed the formality, Divakumar got ready to talk about the application of the harmonic mean to an average speed problem. As soon as he opened his mouth to talk, a hand was raised among the students and Kandarp got up. There was a faint murmuring in the classroom. Everyone wanted to know who this guy was. All the girls looked up. Divakumar was impressed. For the first time in his life, he had come across a student who had a doubt on day's topic even before the topic could be discussed...what a student to have in your class. But Kandarp had a totally different concern... "Sir, my name wasn't called".....err..... Divakumar's excitement sank in a couple of seconds and he opened the attendance register again. He looked at Kandarp and said "The only person who is absent today is Bhandari".... Dvinash, Drasad, Dogish and I burst out in peels of laughter.
And so the saga of Kandarp's name continued for several more years later. Several attendance registers were corrected, countless certificates were changed, a couple of T-shirts were re-printed, a degree certificate was re-embossed and a passport was also set right. One fine Sunday morning, Kandarp woke up and decided that he had to put an end to all this confusion. He convinced his parents to change his name to Kandarp Srinivasan and since then, I have been told that Kandarp prefers to introduce himself as K Srinivasan.
Cheers Kandy !
Friday, December 21, 2007
Davan, Dhavan, the keyboard kid and I
I am going to tell you about an incident that happened when I was a primary school kid in Sudarshan Vidya Mandir. The year was 1990. My parents had just then moved to Bangalore from Baroda. I was enrolled "mid-way" in November into the 3rd standard. I could neither read nor write Kannada, which was the third language in the school's curriculum. I was a fairly unknown character in the school back then and my only claim to fame was ace-ing the mid-term Kannada exam after having spent just about a month learning the language. The guys knew me as "Vinay" and the girls knew me as "some random Baroda kid".
The school fixed a date for the Annual Day celebrations and the teachers got busy selecting kids for various cultural programmes. Every class had to present one programme. It was decided that the 3rd standard kids would present a play about the Ramayana. The play was supposed to be a whirlwind tour of the epic, beginning with Rama's fourteen-year exile to the forests and culminating with his appointment to the throne of Ayodhya. The play had a crew comprising of 30 students and 4 teachers with a separate team just for the musicals ! Costumes had been hired from Prabath Kalavidaru and apparently the principal had evinced keen interest in the play as well. Absolutely serious stuff I tell you. You were considered cool if you were a part of the play....in whatever manner possible.
The play had 7 major roles - Rama, Lakshmana, Sita, Bharatha, Ravana, Hanuman and Dasharatha. The supporting roles included Lava, Kusha, Shatrughna, Vishwamitra, Sugreeva and Vali. And finally there were a bunch of boring "extra" roles like a soldier in Rama's army who would make a 2 second appearance on the stage only to have Ravana's sword pierce through his body. His only dialogue was to scream in pain "AAAAAAHHHHHH" when Ravana's sword made it's way through him. He would then be carried off the stage by a bunch of other "extra" guys. Obviously the kids who were most popular with the teachers got the major roles (you know how things work in primary school, don't you). The least popular ones would end up with the fringe roles. Now, ace-ing a Kannada exam once doesn't make you intensely popular and so, I ended up playing that soldier who would get shred to pieces by Ravana. I spent a whole night in bed figuring forty one different ways of screaming "AAAAAAHHHHH" and I must say that I had it in me to make the scene highly emotional.
Three days to go for the mega event and we promptly assembled in the GMT hall for after-hours practice. We quickly reached the scene where I had to make my entry. I executed my role with such passion that the teacher who was directing the play shouted "Very Good. Next !". I was supposed to be followed by Hanuman who would engage Ravana in an intense gadha battle. The keyboard guy in the backstage got ready to play the ting sound every time the gadhas would meet. Ravana stood on stage waiting for Hanuman, but the kid who was supposed to play Hanuman was nowhere to be seen. The teacher shouted "Where is Hanuman ??" ... no sign of Hanuman .... "Where the hell is Hanuman??"....still no sign. Suddenly there was this feeble voice from back stage "Maam, Danesh has typhoid and he will not be participating in our play". Duh! OK, so we have a problem now. Hanuman is missing and we all know that you can't have a play about Ramayana with no Hanuman in it. The teacher, visibly disturbed, looked around to see if any of the other kids would fit into Hanuman's role. Just around the same time, I was being carried off stage by Davan and Dhavan (yeah, twins). The teacher shouted "Put Vinay down"....what ?? ... that was not in the script. I was supposed to be carried off the stage. So I tried getting up to complain about this sudden change in the script that had happened without my knowledge. Just then, the teacher walked up to me and said "OK Vinay, you are going to play Hanuman"...wait a minute, I spent a whole night figuring out forty one ways of screaming in pain and now, all that was going down the drain ? Just because Danesh woke up one day and had a hot plate instead of a forehead ? More importantly, we had just three days left !! For somebody who was trying to enhance his popularity with the best "AAAAAHHHH" people had ever heard, I was being set up for failure. I didn't know the dialogues and Hanuman had quite a lot of things to say. I was not even sure whether the costumes would fit me. This was just not fair. But then, in primary school, you really can't flex your muscles a lot and so I had to accept the role, quite reluctantly if I may add. The soldier's role was trashed and with that Davan and Dhavan lost their roles too. They had to sit and watch us perform. Sad exit for the twins. They were sacked and I seemed to have got a promotion.
The day finally arrived. I was dressed in the weirdest costume I had ever worn for a play. I had a huge tail tied to my waist. I had a fairly ornamental headgear as well. Holding a mace in my hand, I was all set to beat the hell out of Ravana. Our play started and I must admit that we were all doing a great job. The audience was totally mesmerized by our performance. Everyone watched, intently. I walked out and gave Ravana a couple of extra punches than what we had earlier planned. After all, he had stolen my pencil a couple of days ago !! The audience couldn't stop applauding the two of us while we were putting up a wonderful demonstration of "mace fight". The tings from the backstage happened at the same time the maces met...what synchrony... even the keyboard kid was doing a fantastic job. Applause applause everywhere. The mace fighting scene with Ravana got over and the play soon rolled over to the final scene where Rama is sitting on the throne with Sita alongside....a couple of extras start a dance sequence celebrating Rama's victory over Ravana .... the backstage choir is singing a song "Jaya jaya Rama, jaya jaya Sita....".....somewhere in that song when a brief mention is made of Hanuman, I was supposed to leap across the dais, shout "Bolo Shri Ramchandra ki....Jai" and finally genuflect in front of Rama. As soon as the song started praising Hanuman, I took off. I was probably air borne for three to four seconds. Just when I was about touch down, one of the guys from the dance troupe meandered into my glide path... Oh gee, we have a problem. Where's air traffic control ?? There's a kid on the run way .... I couldn't quite manage to avoid this obstruction which had emerged from nowhere and with no prior warning. Quite predictably, I crashed into this kid. My mace hit him on his head and he fell down. Time froze for a couple of seconds. Everybody on the stage was dumbstruck. The teacher, who all along kept cheering us from the side-wings, was now searching for a place to hide. The choir stopped singing. The audience froze. Rama seemed clueless for the first time in his life. This couldn't be happening now, that too towards the end of the play. I had ruined what seemed like a stellar performance by a bunch of awesome 8 year old kids. Nobody knew what to do. I looked around and spotted Davan and Dhavan sitting with their parents. I waved at them frantically to tell them we had a casualty on the stage. Luckily these guys were in a traditional costume that made them presentable on stage. They promptly walked on to the stage, lifted the kid who had fallen down and carried him off the stage...just like they were supposed to carry me off when I was the soldier. Now that the debris had been cleared, a gleeful Hanuman started jumping around with his mace shouting "Bolo Ramchandra Ki" "Bolo Ramchandra Ki"... the keyboard kid played a couple of ting tings to wake up the choir which seemed to have gone into a trance and the dance continued from where it had been paused. The air went alive with cheers of "JAI JAI" from the audience and Rama was back to smiling again.
Davan, Dhavan , the keyboard kid and I shot to fame. The guys knew me as "Vinay" and the girls came to know me as "Vinay" too.
The school fixed a date for the Annual Day celebrations and the teachers got busy selecting kids for various cultural programmes. Every class had to present one programme. It was decided that the 3rd standard kids would present a play about the Ramayana. The play was supposed to be a whirlwind tour of the epic, beginning with Rama's fourteen-year exile to the forests and culminating with his appointment to the throne of Ayodhya. The play had a crew comprising of 30 students and 4 teachers with a separate team just for the musicals ! Costumes had been hired from Prabath Kalavidaru and apparently the principal had evinced keen interest in the play as well. Absolutely serious stuff I tell you. You were considered cool if you were a part of the play....in whatever manner possible.
The play had 7 major roles - Rama, Lakshmana, Sita, Bharatha, Ravana, Hanuman and Dasharatha. The supporting roles included Lava, Kusha, Shatrughna, Vishwamitra, Sugreeva and Vali. And finally there were a bunch of boring "extra" roles like a soldier in Rama's army who would make a 2 second appearance on the stage only to have Ravana's sword pierce through his body. His only dialogue was to scream in pain "AAAAAAHHHHHH" when Ravana's sword made it's way through him. He would then be carried off the stage by a bunch of other "extra" guys. Obviously the kids who were most popular with the teachers got the major roles (you know how things work in primary school, don't you). The least popular ones would end up with the fringe roles. Now, ace-ing a Kannada exam once doesn't make you intensely popular and so, I ended up playing that soldier who would get shred to pieces by Ravana. I spent a whole night in bed figuring forty one different ways of screaming "AAAAAAHHHHH" and I must say that I had it in me to make the scene highly emotional.
Three days to go for the mega event and we promptly assembled in the GMT hall for after-hours practice. We quickly reached the scene where I had to make my entry. I executed my role with such passion that the teacher who was directing the play shouted "Very Good. Next !". I was supposed to be followed by Hanuman who would engage Ravana in an intense gadha battle. The keyboard guy in the backstage got ready to play the ting sound every time the gadhas would meet. Ravana stood on stage waiting for Hanuman, but the kid who was supposed to play Hanuman was nowhere to be seen. The teacher shouted "Where is Hanuman ??" ... no sign of Hanuman .... "Where the hell is Hanuman??"....still no sign. Suddenly there was this feeble voice from back stage "Maam, Danesh has typhoid and he will not be participating in our play". Duh! OK, so we have a problem now. Hanuman is missing and we all know that you can't have a play about Ramayana with no Hanuman in it. The teacher, visibly disturbed, looked around to see if any of the other kids would fit into Hanuman's role. Just around the same time, I was being carried off stage by Davan and Dhavan (yeah, twins). The teacher shouted "Put Vinay down"....what ?? ... that was not in the script. I was supposed to be carried off the stage. So I tried getting up to complain about this sudden change in the script that had happened without my knowledge. Just then, the teacher walked up to me and said "OK Vinay, you are going to play Hanuman"...wait a minute, I spent a whole night figuring out forty one ways of screaming in pain and now, all that was going down the drain ? Just because Danesh woke up one day and had a hot plate instead of a forehead ? More importantly, we had just three days left !! For somebody who was trying to enhance his popularity with the best "AAAAAHHHH" people had ever heard, I was being set up for failure. I didn't know the dialogues and Hanuman had quite a lot of things to say. I was not even sure whether the costumes would fit me. This was just not fair. But then, in primary school, you really can't flex your muscles a lot and so I had to accept the role, quite reluctantly if I may add. The soldier's role was trashed and with that Davan and Dhavan lost their roles too. They had to sit and watch us perform. Sad exit for the twins. They were sacked and I seemed to have got a promotion.
The day finally arrived. I was dressed in the weirdest costume I had ever worn for a play. I had a huge tail tied to my waist. I had a fairly ornamental headgear as well. Holding a mace in my hand, I was all set to beat the hell out of Ravana. Our play started and I must admit that we were all doing a great job. The audience was totally mesmerized by our performance. Everyone watched, intently. I walked out and gave Ravana a couple of extra punches than what we had earlier planned. After all, he had stolen my pencil a couple of days ago !! The audience couldn't stop applauding the two of us while we were putting up a wonderful demonstration of "mace fight". The tings from the backstage happened at the same time the maces met...what synchrony... even the keyboard kid was doing a fantastic job. Applause applause everywhere. The mace fighting scene with Ravana got over and the play soon rolled over to the final scene where Rama is sitting on the throne with Sita alongside....a couple of extras start a dance sequence celebrating Rama's victory over Ravana .... the backstage choir is singing a song "Jaya jaya Rama, jaya jaya Sita....".....somewhere in that song when a brief mention is made of Hanuman, I was supposed to leap across the dais, shout "Bolo Shri Ramchandra ki....Jai" and finally genuflect in front of Rama. As soon as the song started praising Hanuman, I took off. I was probably air borne for three to four seconds. Just when I was about touch down, one of the guys from the dance troupe meandered into my glide path... Oh gee, we have a problem. Where's air traffic control ?? There's a kid on the run way .... I couldn't quite manage to avoid this obstruction which had emerged from nowhere and with no prior warning. Quite predictably, I crashed into this kid. My mace hit him on his head and he fell down. Time froze for a couple of seconds. Everybody on the stage was dumbstruck. The teacher, who all along kept cheering us from the side-wings, was now searching for a place to hide. The choir stopped singing. The audience froze. Rama seemed clueless for the first time in his life. This couldn't be happening now, that too towards the end of the play. I had ruined what seemed like a stellar performance by a bunch of awesome 8 year old kids. Nobody knew what to do. I looked around and spotted Davan and Dhavan sitting with their parents. I waved at them frantically to tell them we had a casualty on the stage. Luckily these guys were in a traditional costume that made them presentable on stage. They promptly walked on to the stage, lifted the kid who had fallen down and carried him off the stage...just like they were supposed to carry me off when I was the soldier. Now that the debris had been cleared, a gleeful Hanuman started jumping around with his mace shouting "Bolo Ramchandra Ki" "Bolo Ramchandra Ki"... the keyboard kid played a couple of ting tings to wake up the choir which seemed to have gone into a trance and the dance continued from where it had been paused. The air went alive with cheers of "JAI JAI" from the audience and Rama was back to smiling again.
Davan, Dhavan , the keyboard kid and I shot to fame. The guys knew me as "Vinay" and the girls came to know me as "Vinay" too.
Saturday, November 24, 2007
We, the people
This is going to be "crib" post, but with a difference. This post is not meant to be a complaint about life, but rather a reflection on our true selves and our capabilities as thinking individuals.
If you ever gave me a chance to speak about my life, I will bore you to death, I promise. Obviously you aren't here seeking death. If death is what you really wanted, please venture your lives on the roads of Bangalore. Yes, roads, or rather the traffic in Bangalore, will figure prominently in this post. I have always believed that if you wanted to get a measure of how civilized a nation is, take a look at how people behave on its roads. A month ago, I wrote about an incident that took place in front of the Forum mall. While the generous act was duly appreciated by the needy, the world around didn't seem to like it at all. Be that as it may, for changing minds is a tough process. I have tried it several times with several people. It takes quite an effort. However indulging in a take-a-look-at-yourself act every once in a while is not going to be wasteful either.
The Diary Circle - Bannerghatta Road intersection is quite an interesting case study if you wanted to know more about the psychology of the "India Driver". I was driving towards the Forum mall yesterday at 10 in the morning. As I reached the Dairy Circle on Bannerghatta road, the traffic signal turned red. Back in primary school, I was taught to stop at the red light and so I brought all my learning to the front and slowed down my car. However, a lot of people driving ahead of me weren't keen on breaking their inertia and so, they decided to jump the signal. Their mindless act ended up creating a jam under the ramp that goes over the intersection. I didn't want to contribute to the prevailing entropy and so I decided to stop. Plus the signal was red. I had to stop. It turned out that this very act of bringing my vehicle to a halt resulted in more confusion and more angry drivers on the road. The stage for the opera was set by yours truly and as expected, the musical began. Four cars with perhaps the loudest horns that I had ever heard in my life went blaring as though they were being trampled by an elephant or something. It didn't seem like Earth for a moment. I turned on the radio, hoping for some instant relief. A couple of seconds later, a guy dressed in a three piece suit knocked at my window. He looked very irritated and wanted to talk to me urgently. People who have known me will tell you that I am one those guys who would listen to all your crap and keep listening and listening and listening until you ran out of things to say. Relieved at having emptied your mind at my expense, you would leave happier and lighter. (Thankfully I am not a piss pot). Thinking that Mr three-piece needed some help, I rolled the window down facilitating a conversation between the two of us. He scowled at first and then with a loud high pitched voice screamed at me "Just what are you doing ?". I found it rather amusing to be honest. I replied back "Just following the law". Mr. three-piece threw his arms up in the air, showered the usual Hindi abuses at me and made his way back to his car. I stood still because, you see, the signal showed red. Meanwhile, a rickshaw driver pulled over by my car and said "En maadthideera saar ?? hogtaayirbeku..." (What are you doing sir ? Keep moving). Just like most others, he too jumped the signal. The dude in the suit had to wait though. I was blocking his way and he didn't have enough clearance to manoeuvre his car past mine. A minute later, the signal turned green and I drove towards Forum. Mr three-piece, who was now following me, still seemed miffed with the whole incident.
Anyway, now let us involve ourselves in a serious exchange of thoughts. Most of us seemed to be perennially unhappy with our roads, our country and our politicians. We blame the government (or the lack of it) for all our miseries. We blame others on the road for the mad traffic. We blame the traffic cops, who quite honestly, are a helpless lot. Almost anything that the cops do (including using BlackBerries), seems to backfire. The increasingly cunning Indian always has a way around things. We rue the lack of legislation in our country. "I wish we had a law that prevented people from switching lanes whenever they felt like", "I wish we had a law against honking on the roads", "I wish we had a law that gave the first right of use on roads to the pedestrians, the old and the buffaloes". The funniest part is, as a nation, we have failed to respect the limited amount of restriction that has been imposed on us by way of law. And here we are complaining about the inadequacy of law in our country.
I think India's biggest problem is it's people (and that includes me as well). For when you try to follow the law, what you get to hear is the unfriendly MCs and BCs. You are considered dumb if you agree to follow a set of rules that are designed to bring in some order in your lives. How will tightening the law ever help solve our problems unless we are prepared to follow the law ? How will a strict legislation ever help us when we don't think twice about bribing a cop to escape a ticket ? How will we keep our cities clean unless we stop spitting on the roads, dumping garbage outside our home and decorating the walls of our cities with posters of our politicians, their fathers, their mothers and their wives ? And oh, here's one complaint that my grandmom always has "Why is it that we behave ourselves when we are in a foreign country, but let ourselves loose when we return to India ?" Your first meeting with corruption in India happens as soon as you land..yeah the customs in the airport ! And you will find Indians, who have probably shopped their wallets out like crazy, bribing their way through customs. A guy in the Bangalore airport actually offered to take me out of the customs queue if I paid him a dollar ! A lot of my co-passengers, i.e citizens of the great country of India, obliged. Not sure what they had in their bags.
Some of you may read this and think that I am probably jobless on a Saturday afternoon. Some may appreciate this post and my simple act of stopping at the red light. But the question is, how many of us are willing to follow the law, come what may. As long as we are happy punching our favourite bags i.e politicians, corruption, population, illiteracy and these days even global warming, our country will continue to rot under the surface. And we will have always things to bitch about in the kitchen or in the hallways at work. I have always believed that as individuals, we have the power to influence others. We have the ability to make an impression. Through our actions, we can make people around us think and take a look at themselves. More importantly, we can change people around us. If hanging out on Orkut is considered "cool", why isn't following a set of laws considered cool as well ? Would you help usher a new trend ? A trend where the coolest thing to do is to let the old man cross, to seldom honk, to use the garbage bin to throw your movie tickets when you don't need them any longer.... the list goes on. The more the merrier. If you are already doing all of this, I couldn't be more thankful to you.
If you ever gave me a chance to speak about my life, I will bore you to death, I promise. Obviously you aren't here seeking death. If death is what you really wanted, please venture your lives on the roads of Bangalore. Yes, roads, or rather the traffic in Bangalore, will figure prominently in this post. I have always believed that if you wanted to get a measure of how civilized a nation is, take a look at how people behave on its roads. A month ago, I wrote about an incident that took place in front of the Forum mall. While the generous act was duly appreciated by the needy, the world around didn't seem to like it at all. Be that as it may, for changing minds is a tough process. I have tried it several times with several people. It takes quite an effort. However indulging in a take-a-look-at-yourself act every once in a while is not going to be wasteful either.
The Diary Circle - Bannerghatta Road intersection is quite an interesting case study if you wanted to know more about the psychology of the "India Driver". I was driving towards the Forum mall yesterday at 10 in the morning. As I reached the Dairy Circle on Bannerghatta road, the traffic signal turned red. Back in primary school, I was taught to stop at the red light and so I brought all my learning to the front and slowed down my car. However, a lot of people driving ahead of me weren't keen on breaking their inertia and so, they decided to jump the signal. Their mindless act ended up creating a jam under the ramp that goes over the intersection. I didn't want to contribute to the prevailing entropy and so I decided to stop. Plus the signal was red. I had to stop. It turned out that this very act of bringing my vehicle to a halt resulted in more confusion and more angry drivers on the road. The stage for the opera was set by yours truly and as expected, the musical began. Four cars with perhaps the loudest horns that I had ever heard in my life went blaring as though they were being trampled by an elephant or something. It didn't seem like Earth for a moment. I turned on the radio, hoping for some instant relief. A couple of seconds later, a guy dressed in a three piece suit knocked at my window. He looked very irritated and wanted to talk to me urgently. People who have known me will tell you that I am one those guys who would listen to all your crap and keep listening and listening and listening until you ran out of things to say. Relieved at having emptied your mind at my expense, you would leave happier and lighter. (Thankfully I am not a piss pot). Thinking that Mr three-piece needed some help, I rolled the window down facilitating a conversation between the two of us. He scowled at first and then with a loud high pitched voice screamed at me "Just what are you doing ?". I found it rather amusing to be honest. I replied back "Just following the law". Mr. three-piece threw his arms up in the air, showered the usual Hindi abuses at me and made his way back to his car. I stood still because, you see, the signal showed red. Meanwhile, a rickshaw driver pulled over by my car and said "En maadthideera saar ?? hogtaayirbeku..." (What are you doing sir ? Keep moving). Just like most others, he too jumped the signal. The dude in the suit had to wait though. I was blocking his way and he didn't have enough clearance to manoeuvre his car past mine. A minute later, the signal turned green and I drove towards Forum. Mr three-piece, who was now following me, still seemed miffed with the whole incident.
Anyway, now let us involve ourselves in a serious exchange of thoughts. Most of us seemed to be perennially unhappy with our roads, our country and our politicians. We blame the government (or the lack of it) for all our miseries. We blame others on the road for the mad traffic. We blame the traffic cops, who quite honestly, are a helpless lot. Almost anything that the cops do (including using BlackBerries), seems to backfire. The increasingly cunning Indian always has a way around things. We rue the lack of legislation in our country. "I wish we had a law that prevented people from switching lanes whenever they felt like", "I wish we had a law against honking on the roads", "I wish we had a law that gave the first right of use on roads to the pedestrians, the old and the buffaloes". The funniest part is, as a nation, we have failed to respect the limited amount of restriction that has been imposed on us by way of law. And here we are complaining about the inadequacy of law in our country.
I think India's biggest problem is it's people (and that includes me as well). For when you try to follow the law, what you get to hear is the unfriendly MCs and BCs. You are considered dumb if you agree to follow a set of rules that are designed to bring in some order in your lives. How will tightening the law ever help solve our problems unless we are prepared to follow the law ? How will a strict legislation ever help us when we don't think twice about bribing a cop to escape a ticket ? How will we keep our cities clean unless we stop spitting on the roads, dumping garbage outside our home and decorating the walls of our cities with posters of our politicians, their fathers, their mothers and their wives ? And oh, here's one complaint that my grandmom always has "Why is it that we behave ourselves when we are in a foreign country, but let ourselves loose when we return to India ?" Your first meeting with corruption in India happens as soon as you land..yeah the customs in the airport ! And you will find Indians, who have probably shopped their wallets out like crazy, bribing their way through customs. A guy in the Bangalore airport actually offered to take me out of the customs queue if I paid him a dollar ! A lot of my co-passengers, i.e citizens of the great country of India, obliged. Not sure what they had in their bags.
Some of you may read this and think that I am probably jobless on a Saturday afternoon. Some may appreciate this post and my simple act of stopping at the red light. But the question is, how many of us are willing to follow the law, come what may. As long as we are happy punching our favourite bags i.e politicians, corruption, population, illiteracy and these days even global warming, our country will continue to rot under the surface. And we will have always things to bitch about in the kitchen or in the hallways at work. I have always believed that as individuals, we have the power to influence others. We have the ability to make an impression. Through our actions, we can make people around us think and take a look at themselves. More importantly, we can change people around us. If hanging out on Orkut is considered "cool", why isn't following a set of laws considered cool as well ? Would you help usher a new trend ? A trend where the coolest thing to do is to let the old man cross, to seldom honk, to use the garbage bin to throw your movie tickets when you don't need them any longer.... the list goes on. The more the merrier. If you are already doing all of this, I couldn't be more thankful to you.
Friday, October 19, 2007
Virtues of gully cricket
The neighbourhood has been buzzing with a lot of talk about gully cricket. Since I spent a considerable part of my childhood patronizing the game, it is quite natural that I should be adding to the buzz. Coming to think of it, if it were not for my engineering degree, I would have probably ended up playing gully cricket all my life. The sport has been such a major influence on my life ! So...
To gully cricket With love. Read on.
After Dada and Viru, it is finally Jammy's turn to be rested. Rested, in cricket, is a gentleman's way of saying that a player has been dropped from the team due to various reasons, the most common one being a lack of form or consistency on the part of the player. Soon, the selectors of the Indian Cricket Team will start ranting about Jammy's poor performance to justify their decision to drop him, quoting all kinds of crazy statistics in the process. And to be fair to Jammy, they would also let him know what he could do to reclaim his spot in the team i.e go back to domestic cricket, smack those hapless bowlers left right and centre and get back to the team with truck loads of confidence. Sure, Jammy can do that and do it pretty well if I may add, but I think Jammy should start playing gully cricket if he is serious about getting back to the team as quickly as possible.
For a batsman like Jammy, gully cricket (GC) is a sort of panacea for all his batting woes. Here's why:
GC is typically played on streets which are about 60 metres (approx. 200 ft) long and about 2.5 metres (8 ft ) wide. In addition, the streets have houses on both sides;the houses in turn have windows of glass. Also the houses have uncompromising inmates who would go to any length to ensure that the kid who broke their windows will indeed cough up the money to mend them. In addition, the inmates would also go to the extent of complaining to the kid's parents, explaining to them in great detail how unruly their child had been and convincing the parents that the child had to be grounded for a week. Jammy being a nice guy, and his parents being nice and obliging neighbours, will definitely have to keep those windows in mind. This is going to be a huge challenge (quite a non-cricketing challenge if I may say so)
Now there are two ways of using a street to play GC. One could play along the length of a gully, or at times when a construction work in the neighbourhood has dumped bricks, sand (and what not) on the road, one could also choose to play across the gully. While playing along the length, a batsman is forced to go for straight shots - those which are executed by showing the full face of the bat to the bowler. He really can't go for that swash-buckling square-cut or a gorgeous flick of his legs, for those shots could land him in that immensely dreadful situation of being grounded for a week. However, the batsman can afford to loft the ball as long as he ensures that the ball flies over the bowler's head in a trajectory parallel to the rows of houses on either sides. In a real cricket match, this amounts to bisecting the gap between the long-on and long-off fielders to perfection, a shot that invariably results in a four or a six ! So a batsman could use along-gully if he thinks he needs to curb his shots square of the wicket and at the same time, improve his ability to play straight and through the line of the ball.
The other alternative of course, is cross-gully. Unlike along-gully, cross-gully lets a batsman experiment with his square cuts, pull, flick and the hook - shots that were fraught with danger in along-gully. Since the ball again travels parallel to the houses, no windows are broken and no flower pots are smashed. However, if it is required that pocket money be rather spent on collecting WWF stickers and improving the cricket infrastructure in the gully than on fixing window panes and flower pots, straight shots with an open face of the bat have to avoided. The question of a lofted drive doesn't even arise.
I told you that there were two ways of using a gully. Actually there is a third option too. This one is called diagonal-gully. To play diagonal-gully, one needs to find two trees on either side of the road, the trees being diagonally opposite to each other. The trees conveniently replace the stumps of along and cross gully thereby obviating the need to find six stones which would have served as low cost stumps in along and cross gully. Diagonal-gully obviously allows the batsman a wider range of shots and doesn't necessarily restrict him to playing either straight or across the line of the ball everytime. So, once Jammy has put along and cross gully to good use, he could graduate to playing diagonal gully and a bring a sense of "completeness" into his training.
If you thought shot-making was the only aspect of your batting that you could improve playing gully cricket, you are wrong. Since gully cricket is generally played in a very narrow and restricted space, as a batsman you are typically surrounded by several close-in fielders, some so close that you can feel their breath. Attempting a quick single amidst those close-in fielders and ensuring that you complete the run without crashing into any of them is indeed an art worthy of mastering. Also one needs to be mindful of the occasional passing by of a buffalo or a car and of course, the droppings of the friendly neighbourhood dog. Isn't this intense ? Time to trash all those computer games I tell you !
They say that as a batsman, you need to be capable of playing on all kinds of surfaces. Sure, a place like Jayanagar can offer Jammy a wide variety of pitches - from flat bouncy tracks in the form of its finest roads to pothole-ridden pitches exhibiting uncertain bounce. What an ideal situation to be in !
And finally, as PK points out, rules like one-hand-pitch-catch can improve Jammy's fielding and help him reinvigorate his reflexes. However, Jammy will have to pay special attention to the drains on either sides of the roads and ensure that he doesn't fall into them while taking off for that quick single or while diving for a pitch-catch. Minor risk, but it pays to be cautious nevertheless. After all he wouldn't want all this training to go down the drain.
Isn't gully cricket challenging ? How could you possibly achieve all this playing domestic cricket ? It is said that when Imran Khan was given the responsibility of putting together a cricket team for Pakistan, the first places he visited were the streets of Pakistan and not the grounds. To think that Jammy will regain his touch playing domestic cricket is absolutely preposterous !
This post was written in the honour of gully cricket and not with an intention of ridiculing any person, living or dead.
To gully cricket With love. Read on.
After Dada and Viru, it is finally Jammy's turn to be rested. Rested, in cricket, is a gentleman's way of saying that a player has been dropped from the team due to various reasons, the most common one being a lack of form or consistency on the part of the player. Soon, the selectors of the Indian Cricket Team will start ranting about Jammy's poor performance to justify their decision to drop him, quoting all kinds of crazy statistics in the process. And to be fair to Jammy, they would also let him know what he could do to reclaim his spot in the team i.e go back to domestic cricket, smack those hapless bowlers left right and centre and get back to the team with truck loads of confidence. Sure, Jammy can do that and do it pretty well if I may add, but I think Jammy should start playing gully cricket if he is serious about getting back to the team as quickly as possible.
For a batsman like Jammy, gully cricket (GC) is a sort of panacea for all his batting woes. Here's why:
GC is typically played on streets which are about 60 metres (approx. 200 ft) long and about 2.5 metres (8 ft ) wide. In addition, the streets have houses on both sides;the houses in turn have windows of glass. Also the houses have uncompromising inmates who would go to any length to ensure that the kid who broke their windows will indeed cough up the money to mend them. In addition, the inmates would also go to the extent of complaining to the kid's parents, explaining to them in great detail how unruly their child had been and convincing the parents that the child had to be grounded for a week. Jammy being a nice guy, and his parents being nice and obliging neighbours, will definitely have to keep those windows in mind. This is going to be a huge challenge (quite a non-cricketing challenge if I may say so)
Now there are two ways of using a street to play GC. One could play along the length of a gully, or at times when a construction work in the neighbourhood has dumped bricks, sand (and what not) on the road, one could also choose to play across the gully. While playing along the length, a batsman is forced to go for straight shots - those which are executed by showing the full face of the bat to the bowler. He really can't go for that swash-buckling square-cut or a gorgeous flick of his legs, for those shots could land him in that immensely dreadful situation of being grounded for a week. However, the batsman can afford to loft the ball as long as he ensures that the ball flies over the bowler's head in a trajectory parallel to the rows of houses on either sides. In a real cricket match, this amounts to bisecting the gap between the long-on and long-off fielders to perfection, a shot that invariably results in a four or a six ! So a batsman could use along-gully if he thinks he needs to curb his shots square of the wicket and at the same time, improve his ability to play straight and through the line of the ball.
The other alternative of course, is cross-gully. Unlike along-gully, cross-gully lets a batsman experiment with his square cuts, pull, flick and the hook - shots that were fraught with danger in along-gully. Since the ball again travels parallel to the houses, no windows are broken and no flower pots are smashed. However, if it is required that pocket money be rather spent on collecting WWF stickers and improving the cricket infrastructure in the gully than on fixing window panes and flower pots, straight shots with an open face of the bat have to avoided. The question of a lofted drive doesn't even arise.
I told you that there were two ways of using a gully. Actually there is a third option too. This one is called diagonal-gully. To play diagonal-gully, one needs to find two trees on either side of the road, the trees being diagonally opposite to each other. The trees conveniently replace the stumps of along and cross gully thereby obviating the need to find six stones which would have served as low cost stumps in along and cross gully. Diagonal-gully obviously allows the batsman a wider range of shots and doesn't necessarily restrict him to playing either straight or across the line of the ball everytime. So, once Jammy has put along and cross gully to good use, he could graduate to playing diagonal gully and a bring a sense of "completeness" into his training.
If you thought shot-making was the only aspect of your batting that you could improve playing gully cricket, you are wrong. Since gully cricket is generally played in a very narrow and restricted space, as a batsman you are typically surrounded by several close-in fielders, some so close that you can feel their breath. Attempting a quick single amidst those close-in fielders and ensuring that you complete the run without crashing into any of them is indeed an art worthy of mastering. Also one needs to be mindful of the occasional passing by of a buffalo or a car and of course, the droppings of the friendly neighbourhood dog. Isn't this intense ? Time to trash all those computer games I tell you !
They say that as a batsman, you need to be capable of playing on all kinds of surfaces. Sure, a place like Jayanagar can offer Jammy a wide variety of pitches - from flat bouncy tracks in the form of its finest roads to pothole-ridden pitches exhibiting uncertain bounce. What an ideal situation to be in !
And finally, as PK points out, rules like one-hand-pitch-catch can improve Jammy's fielding and help him reinvigorate his reflexes. However, Jammy will have to pay special attention to the drains on either sides of the roads and ensure that he doesn't fall into them while taking off for that quick single or while diving for a pitch-catch. Minor risk, but it pays to be cautious nevertheless. After all he wouldn't want all this training to go down the drain.
Isn't gully cricket challenging ? How could you possibly achieve all this playing domestic cricket ? It is said that when Imran Khan was given the responsibility of putting together a cricket team for Pakistan, the first places he visited were the streets of Pakistan and not the grounds. To think that Jammy will regain his touch playing domestic cricket is absolutely preposterous !
This post was written in the honour of gully cricket and not with an intention of ridiculing any person, living or dead.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Now that the customary first post is over, let's get down to doing some serious business. Actually, I am really bad at being serious about anything. Seriously !
What got me writing this post was an incident that happened a couple of days back in front of the Forum shopping mall in Bangalore. It was yet another weekend and therefore time to visit a few friends who live in the vicinity of the mall. As usual, the weekend traffic on the road from Diary Circle to the mall was crazy, packed with all kinds of vehicles which were defying every possible law of Physics in an attempt to wriggle through of the chaos. What made matters worse was the presence of pedestrians trying to cross the road at the same time, regardless of what the traffic signals said. It almost seemed like a battle was being fought between the vehicles and the pedestrians, the sole purpose of the battle being to prevent the enemy from getting to the other side. Most often, the pedestrians would end up on the losing side giving into the might of the vehicles and surrendering themselves to a wait that seemed endless.
This is virtually the scene on most busy roads in Bangalore on most days. Bannerghatta Road is another example where crossing is indeed a nightmare. There are no designated pedestrian crossing points on the road. This, coupled with the fact that pedestrians are never offered the "first right to use" on most Indian roads, makes crossing Bannerghatta Road a frustrating experience. I have been in situations where I have had to wait for close to 20 minutes for the traffic to ease up and let me get to my office. So, when I saw a young couple looking helpless with all their shopping bags, having made a gazillion attempts to cross the road in front of Forum, I decided to stop my car and offer them a chance to scamper across. I had to bear the insane honking that took place behind me, as if to suggest that by letting the couple to cross I had committed treachery and therefore deserved to be called a traitor (and what not). The couple though was pleasantly surprised. The look on their faces suggested that their prayers were answered and that good will had finally descended on the planet. While the couple legged it as though there was no tomorrow, they turned around, smiled at me and showed a thumbs up.
The point I am trying to make here is that, on busy roads where the traffic never seems to let up, pedestrians are often at the mercy of vehicles to give them a chance to cross. Unfortunately, like most other roads in India, the ones in Bangalore are unplanned, have no sufficient signage and more importantly are not pedestrian friendly. And given that traffic laws dont necessarily require that vehicles slow down to let people cross, offering to lose the battle every once in a while to please the helpless is not a bad idea.
What got me writing this post was an incident that happened a couple of days back in front of the Forum shopping mall in Bangalore. It was yet another weekend and therefore time to visit a few friends who live in the vicinity of the mall. As usual, the weekend traffic on the road from Diary Circle to the mall was crazy, packed with all kinds of vehicles which were defying every possible law of Physics in an attempt to wriggle through of the chaos. What made matters worse was the presence of pedestrians trying to cross the road at the same time, regardless of what the traffic signals said. It almost seemed like a battle was being fought between the vehicles and the pedestrians, the sole purpose of the battle being to prevent the enemy from getting to the other side. Most often, the pedestrians would end up on the losing side giving into the might of the vehicles and surrendering themselves to a wait that seemed endless.
This is virtually the scene on most busy roads in Bangalore on most days. Bannerghatta Road is another example where crossing is indeed a nightmare. There are no designated pedestrian crossing points on the road. This, coupled with the fact that pedestrians are never offered the "first right to use" on most Indian roads, makes crossing Bannerghatta Road a frustrating experience. I have been in situations where I have had to wait for close to 20 minutes for the traffic to ease up and let me get to my office. So, when I saw a young couple looking helpless with all their shopping bags, having made a gazillion attempts to cross the road in front of Forum, I decided to stop my car and offer them a chance to scamper across. I had to bear the insane honking that took place behind me, as if to suggest that by letting the couple to cross I had committed treachery and therefore deserved to be called a traitor (and what not). The couple though was pleasantly surprised. The look on their faces suggested that their prayers were answered and that good will had finally descended on the planet. While the couple legged it as though there was no tomorrow, they turned around, smiled at me and showed a thumbs up.
The point I am trying to make here is that, on busy roads where the traffic never seems to let up, pedestrians are often at the mercy of vehicles to give them a chance to cross. Unfortunately, like most other roads in India, the ones in Bangalore are unplanned, have no sufficient signage and more importantly are not pedestrian friendly. And given that traffic laws dont necessarily require that vehicles slow down to let people cross, offering to lose the battle every once in a while to please the helpless is not a bad idea.
Here I go....again
After having spent a couple of years on LiveJournal, I am finally here to give Blogger a shot. The aim is to publish on a regular basis, though I am not sure how regular "regular" will be. After all, the greatest challenge in maintaining a blog is to publish frequently.
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