Life is such a Leveler..

I travelled by air from Hyderabad to Raipur at 7 pm in the evening, had an a/c car pick me up at the airport with the rain absolutely pouring down and take me to Bhilai (a 45-60 mins drive) to my relatively decent hotel. I thought I was blessed as I watched the surroundings succumb to the unplanned rains.

And then the next afternoon I saw a bunch of kids playing cricket in the middle of the afternoon on a heated afternoon and enjoying their hearts out. I started to wonder if I was blessed or if I was actually cursed to not be able to enjoy the pleasures that those kids enjoyed in that heated afternoon in bhilai that I was watching from window of my a/c room. I actually was envious of them. i was too busy trying to play stragetgy in the middle of the next afternoon.

Took less than 24 hours to change perceptions.

What the F***!!!!! Life is such a leveler.

i need to learn to live like this...

Dear Shri Anna Hazare, sorry i cant support your noble cause!!!

Dear Shri Anna Hazare, let me start by complimenting you for the cause of corruption taken up by you, and subsequently the support you have received in your movement. What you are doing is quite commendable. In today’s age, for someone of your age to take up the cause of the comman man through the non-violence movement, is a completely different experience for our generation. For our generation which has always known the power of money, corruption or brute force to get things done, your approach to get your issue heard is quite impressive.

However, I am sorry I cannot show my support towards your cause when I am myself guilty of abetting corruption on a regular basis. I am what we call a hypocrite in our society, who wants to rid our country of corruption, but cannot do without it either. I am one of the many who thrive on a corrupt set of bureaucrats to get their personal as well as professional work done. I take pride in never bribing the traffic cop on the street, but am guilty of doing a lot more behind the scenes.

Sir, you are taking the cause up to the politicians and for the Lokpal Bill, however, you would very well be aware that the roots of corruption are spread so far and wide that only implicating people at the top will not serve the purpose because we all are guilty of promoting corruption upto the level of clerks in the government departments. So even if you are able to get the Lokpal Bill strengthened and passed, the law will only be a law like so many others which get broken day after day in our country. More than the law, it is the poeple that you should target to change.

So while I admire your cause, I would like to apologize that I cannot be showing my support for it on moral grounds (however ironic it might sound) that I myself am not 100% moral towards anti-corruption, unless I am willing to change myself personally.

All the best in your movement and hope it brings fruitful results.

Regards
Jigar

Can there be another 2nd April 2011 in our liftime??

After having witnessed the wildest of celebrations for 3 nights 24th March (win over Australia), 30th March (win over Pakistan) and 2nd April (win over SL in the finals), on the streets of Ahmedabad, I am wondering if there would EVER be a celebration like this again.

I believe not.

The energy level, the enthusiasm, the sense of belongingness, the sheer joy of being on top of the world, cannot be matched by anything ever in atleast our lifetimes. The only other time that we might get into this mode if India ever won the Soccer World Cup, and we all know that isn’t happening for a few decades. It was quite refreshing to see people being nice to each other.

I don’t think I have seen sooo many flags of India proudly being displayed and waved at the same time. I don’t think there is every going to be another similar event that will bring together our disintegrated nation together to celebrate as one.

But then, I didn’t think India could celebrate like this for 3 nights to start with. So I hope I am wrong on this too.

Thank you TEAM INDIA and Gary Kirsten!!!!

One thing that stood out in India's win over Australia, Pakistan and finally Sri Lanka, was the amazing 'Emotional Stability' shown by the entire team when they were under pressure.

Yuvraj's emotionless grit and determination against australia until he hit that final four when he finally got down on his knees and slapped his bat in air

The entire teams consistent fielding and bowling under pressure in stopping none other than Pakistan well short of the total in an emotionally charged game. Nehra's guts to bowl the spell that he did after the entire nation humiliated him for his over against South Africa.

Gambhir and Dhoni's calculated emtionless(Australia-like) batting until Dhoni hit that final six when he let out a grunt.

Far too often (match against SA) we have let our emotions get the better of our talent in a pressure situation. not on these 3 occasions.

And then by the time it was over, the emotions and tears all flowed freely.. a bunch of 20-38 year olds cried like babies in front of the whole world. a whole nation of a billion people cried along with them.

CHEERS and THANK YOU to the entire team and especially Gary Kirsten for bringing a nation together.. u did a fantastic job of keeping the emtions in check when you had to.
Thank You, for giving us the 3 most memorable nights in our lives
Thank You, for bringing a billion people to tears

On a Journey to the Land Of GOD - Day 1

Day 0 (24th June 2010) :

I don’t know if there was much different about that day. I know for a fact that I was trying to put together lists of things for vishwesh to do while I was away. Away where? I was still not sure. It was like mechanically my brain seem to be thinking that I was to be gone for 15 days and so I should hand over stuff to someone, but the gravity of the fact that I was going to be on the road to ladakh had still not registered. There was a bunch of shopping to be done, half of which I was sure I wouldn’t use during the trip, but who’s to argue at that last moment. It was a rather uneventful day and the only thing I distinctly remember about that day is the late nite coffee at CCD. i felt so relaxed and happy to be there, I cant explain it. Coffee at CCD is a weekly ritual, but that night I was unusually more relaxed and happy to be there.

The overall mood was still very somber, because Akbhabhi seemed quite upset at Satyenbhai finally going on the trip. Tejas was being his usual self by adding salt to injury with his smart ass comments. Its strange how bhabhi would kick my ass if I made any comments like that, but if tejas makes them she juz has funny faces to make. I need to take some training from tejas in buttering.

Day 1 (25th June 2010):

We were supposed to start off at 6:30 in the morning, but to nobody’s surprise and my frustration it wasn’t until 7:30 before we had finally picked up Jaydev before embarking on towards Delhi. Delhi, woooow!!!! We were going to be driving to Delhi, onwards to Manali and Leh. Woooow!!!!

Everyone was in such a shock that it took the first hour for each one to convince the others that we were finally headed out towards Delhi. Satyenbhai’s monstrous SUV was all loaded with the right gadgets to make our life easy and pleasurable.

By the time we crossed Himmatnagar we had got the first taste of a lot of experiences to come. A speeding white swift rushed by us, then slowed down, drove parallel to us and asked us to pull over. Why?? Because he wanted to know what freaking car it was and take a picture with it. WTF. The guy told us that he was following us at 140 kmph juz to keep up with us before he finally pulled besides us to make the request.
People sure are obsessed with size. Arnt they?? Lol

The morning for most part was wonderful and we enjoyed a nice cool beer before lunch. We had picked up the beer on Udaipur by-pass and enjoyed the beer before we took a lunch break. Satty-boy could not enjoy the beer since he was driving and so he was enjoying a nice cool masti chaas.

The afternoon is when the fun really started. As we were driving through the HOTTT steamy part of Rajasthan, the car finally decided it had had enough and wasn’t going to fight the head anymore. So the a/c went out. YES, the a/c went off in the middle of the afternoon, in the middle of the hottest state of the country. Whatever could go wrong, was starting to go wrong on the first afternoon of our long anticipated trip. The stick-shift was so hot you could barely touch it, forget changing gears. We even tried our luck by spraying water on the under-chassis of the car in the hope that it would cool off the car, the stick-shift and make the a/c work. It was only wishful thinking. The next cpl of hours none of us spoke a word. We were too darn drained and sweety to say something.

Satty-boy finally gave up and handed over the car to me to drive while he caught up on some much needed sleep. As luck would have it, around 50 kms before jaipur we had stopped to fill up gas, and a huge dust-storm hit us. You could barely see anything a few meters ahead. Luckily for us, I think that was the trigger which changed things for us. With the dust-storm the temperature came down, it rained a bit, the car cooled down, the a/c came back to life and we were all fresh and kicked.

It was time for one more beer(s).

The car, dust-storm and rain had slowed us down quite a bit and so we were running well behind schedule of reaching delhi around 7 pm.
Varun had his own reason for reaching Delhi by around 8 pm (for details you would need to ask him). He was soo darn disappointed at our delays that eventually satty-boy used all his rough-driving skills to somehow get us into the Raddisson at 10:00 pm in the night.

Better late than never I say. I was glad to be in a hotel instead of the car. Satty-boy was happy to find a bed to sleep on. Jaydev was happy juz to be able to get a drink. And varun was happy he had a chance. ;)

A chance which he took or not is something only Varun can answer.

On a Journey to the Land Of GOD - Preface

Honestly, I still cant believe me made the trip.

Each one of us had our doubts if the trip was actually going to happen. None of us said it out loud, but until we set off at 7 pm on 25th morning, all four of us were still skeptical if we were actually going to go out on this wild trip that looked fantastic on paper, but too good to be true in real.

There are painters and sculptures who with their colors and forms wow us. Then there is GOD who with his mountain forms and the colors of nature tells us how he is the best painter and sculpture of them all. The entire greater Himalayas is something of a canvas on which god has put together amazingly beautiful landscapes with gorgeous colors that only he could think and conceive. From various shades of brown, to luscious green shades, to ever amazing purple mountains, white show in different shades, green on mountains to saffaron yellow grit. As if the mountains and greenery wasn’t enough, he finally decided to add water streams, water falls, rivers, lakes smack in the middle of all these awe –inspiring mountain ranges.
The sights just leave you spell bounded. Pictures dont tell you the entire story. You have to be there to see if for yourself.

It was a journey into the land that GOD has truly created for himself.