Sachin Ton'dulkar- The big bull of Indian cricket

I hate much use of metaphors, aphorisms, adages or proverbs in writings. It denotes a bankruptcy of talent , my English teacher would say.

And yet I can’t resist using one today. Or maybe two. Or may be three. ( Forgive me teacher). My adrenalin is still high!

Yesterday there were two wars going on. One between the bears and the bulls on Dalal street. One between the Australian and the Indian cricket team. I preferred the Dalal street. The Indian team is more unpredictable than the stock market.

Luckily the timings were such I witnessed both.

I doff my hat to the big bull of the Indian cricket. I know he is a class. But this was master class. Sachin did everything right. The trademark cuts, the elegant drives, the ferocious sixes.
It wasn’t a bull vs. bears. It was a bull vs. the bullies. The bullies won. I am developing a grudging admiration for the Aussies.

Now every one wishes to kick Australia’s butt. But if wishes were horses even beggars would ride. Think about it. Their seven players were injured. And still we lost.

But if Sachin was a class , the guys in the commentary box were classier. As he was crashing the ball in all parts of the ground I heard one bozo gush, “ Ahh now he’s just 800 runs away from 18000”. Now can we call that an expert comment! Can anyone say anything more stupid than that?I was plain jealous. Think he was being paid to say that! I can say a hundred more stupid things and no one would take notice ; forget paying for that.

Tomorrow a new day a new war. Both at the Dalal street and at Guhawati.
( For the record, the bulls are winning at the Dalal street)

Tail piece : Sachin Tendulkar first shot into limelight when as a 15 year old he smashed a triple century in the local harris shield competition. This year a 12 year old boy Sarfaraz Khan hit a record 439 with an incredible 56 boundaries and 12 sixes.

Another sachin in the offing?!!!!!!!

Quirks and Idiosyncracies

Hotel Green Park has some very fond memories. I was one of the first guests there when the hotel was newly built. That must have been at least ten years ago.

But it wasn’t nostalgia that brought us for the break fast buffet last weekend. The hotel has a reputation for authentic south Indian food. “ Genuine Nellore cooks” My friend had informed. I was tempted.

The buffet was a veritable visual delight. As I surveyed the assorted fruit juices, my eyes caught an emerald green juice. The waiter looked alarmed when I filled a glass but said nothing. I can now say with my first hand experience that bitter gourd juice is the last thing you want to eat on an empty stomach! It reminded me of the custom of eating neem leaves on the Maharashtrian new year gudi padwa. Chastised I decided to stick to the known cuisines.

As I was finishing the sumptuous breakfast , I saw a platter of dougnuts, Danish pastries and croissants sitting incongruously in a corner. I suddenly felt a pang of guilt. Doughnut was something I ate everyday with coffee in the evenings in Miami. How could I forget my staple food so soon? Quietly I reached for one.

As I sat there eating my doughnut and slurping sambhar , an American sitting on the next table smiled and quipped, “ Now that’s what I called fusion food!” He was dunking his bread in spicy sambhar! I asked him if he ever heard the pot calling the kettle black! He gave a hearty laugh.

Thank god for idiosyncracies. They make for a delightful change.Imagine if all persons were prim and proper and looked like clones of each other!

I remember one very famous criminal lawyer in Gwalior. He used to argue his cases fiddling with the button of his shirt. He was simply unbeatable. That is until one of his opponent bribed his servant to remove that button. He just folded.

Bless David Shepeherd, one of the finest umpires, who died recently. His quirky humor, best expressed in standing on one leg whenever a nelson ( 111 or 222 ) was on board, endeared him to millions of spectators.

MF Hussain always walked bare foot though I wonder if this was more of a publicity stunt than a real quirk. Somehow I always feel he is more of a showman than a real quirk.


I know a friend who drinks chilled beer with piping hot soup. If that sounds strange , my ex boss used to eat grapes while having coffee. Try topping that.

My father’s friend had a strange habit. He always read the book from the end to the beginning. Yes even Agatha Christie and Hitchock! He said it was fun to see how the writer creates the story.

I am reminded of a software engineer in New York who only ate one cantaloupe in the whole day. When asked how did he manage, he would retort that a human body needs only that much energy. We pamper our body too much.

Some food for your thought!

Of cricket, Bananas and Hope!

Originality is a myth. Even God was original only once when he created Adam and Eve. The rest, in the modern jargon, was a cut and paste job.

Life ,being a part of the system ,cannot be different. That’s why we hear comments like life imitating art or real life copying reel life.

My life, currently, is as volatile as the stock market. Bullish one day and bearish the other. Happiness is like the Foreign Instituitional Investment. Its withdrawn and left a huge trough. We both are still recovering from our bad health. The flu was like the RBI Credit policy which triggered the collapse. But we both are optimistic and look enthusiastically for the markets to reopen on Tuesday! There is no place in the stock market for permanent gloom. You just accept both the phases and try to make the most of them. Sell on rallies and buy on dips. That means you don’t wait for the proverbial sunshine to make hay! Treat every day as a sunshine and try to make hay!

Some farmers have shown remarkable ingenuity in Erode district in AP. Their crops were doing badly. But as the going got tough, the tough got going. They had to experiment. They first tried Pepsi as pesticide. It worked! Common sense. If it can screw human, there is no reason it will not kill pests! Next they mixed brandy in their soil and Bingo! got a huge crop of bananas. This was not only cheaper than the conventional fertilizers, but also the crop out put has been remarkably high. The experts are baffled and trying to figure out the reason. Maybe the experts can have a drink or two while trying to figure it out. If it can work on the banana trees, it sure would work on them.

The Australian team lost James Hopes yet we look hope less. They lose Brett yet we look bre(a)tt(h)less. They lose Paine yet look pain less. One is left wondering if we are waiting for Ponting and Hussey to get injured to make us look like champions! I know some die hard fans would be scandalized but the last win was far from convincing. Only Dhoni saved us the closing blushes. Can we really call ourselves the no.1 team? To me this seems more like Obama holding the Nobel prize.

The mornings are suddenly pleasant. There is nip in the air. Soon it will be cold in the north. I have spent too long in the sunny climes of Miami to being called a ‘son of a beach’. Gwalior would soon drop to 4 degrees centigrade. The mornings would be foggy. Visibility close to zero. Cheeks would be ruddy and the nose ruddier. Time to get buried in layers of warm clothing. Time to go home.

To many the fierce and biting cold may mean a sign of discomfort. To me it’s home!

I am still in Hyderabad. But soon I shall visit Gwalior. The Sensex will rise and the bananas will grow larger. The Indian cricket team will play like champions.

The Optimists never give up hope.

My gift wrapped days!

I had a very romantic idea about childhood. Those tender years when you were carefree, always laughing, not a worry in the world. The days were soft like cotton and nights silky and gossamer. How wrong!

I am once again reliving those wondrous days with Tanmay, my friend’s delightful seven year old son. I now understand their stresses, the tensions , their fears and apprehensions.

My day starts delightfully as he jumps on my bed and wraps his soft arms around me and whispers that the tea is ready. Today is maths test. He cant remember the table of 4. I tickle him and tell him he knows it. We revise the tables playfully running around bumping furniture and sipping tea at the same time. His mother feigns anger as she readies his bath. He is late for school. She airlifts him ,arms flying,to the bathroom. I get that much time to read the newspaper and catch up with what is happening around the world. The outside world stops as he comes out of the bath and its pandemonium. He has tried my black shoe polish on his white sneakers and his mother is grumbling. He looks sheepishly at me. I wink and get a cleaner lotion from inside my bag. We both shake the bottle and apply the lotion allowing it to dry and wipe the shoe clean. We both whoop delightfully as the shoes look sparkling white and give each other high fives.

As its time to leave for school, he looks at me and his dad impishly and we wink. That’s the signal to pick his bike. Mom complains that he must walk.Besides, once I leave she would find it hard to carry back the bike. But we ignore her and take the cycle down the lift. He squeals with delight as I run behind him with his bag and water bottles and tiffin carrier.

He scares his friends by ringing the bell and then deftly maneuvers his cycle through the bunch of kids. As the school bus nears, suddenly he remembers the he has forgotten his writing board at home. A frown creases his face. He doesn’t smile as I wave him. Clearly he is worried.

Daddy and I take a detour and reach his school as they are in recess for snacks. The broadest of smile comes on his face as he clutches the board gratefully. He gives his list of things to be purchased from the school supplies. The supplies could furnish an army. He needs tie and school badge every month, shoes every two months and shirt every three months. He patiently explains that he is very gentle. But the other boys are naughty. A few class mates complain about him to my friend. Tanmay simply glares.

Evening we get a call from him. What time are we coming home. Seven. His father replies. The negotiations begin. No make it six. Ok 6.30. finally we settle to 6.45. Pick me from the teacher’s home. He orders. Next. what are we going to bring for him. We agree for biscuits from the bakery. Don’t bring the hard ones. He warns. I broke a tooth because of it. Ok cream biscuits. One last try. Come at 6.15. daddy shouts and he hurriedly keeps the phone.

When we reach home we find that one tooth has fallen. It’s the incisor. He wants to see it in the mirror. The mother shouts if you see, the new one wont grow. i tell him wrap it in some cotton and keep it below your pillow. Childhood is about fantasy not reality. let him dream of fairy god mother bringing his new tooth.

We study English. I try to correct his pronunciation. I patiently ask him to repeat Lion. But he ends up saying Loin. Again I correct Bear and explain that beer is something we drink. He is unhappy. The teacher will be angry. I pick up the phone and call his teacher. I gently advise her to look into how the kids pronounce. She is young and brash. I am curtly told that that’s how it is pronounced in Hyderabad. My joke about the king of the jungle not being happy if you don’t call him correctly falls flat. When I mention Beer she warns me not to spoil the child by mentioning alcohol. I try another angle. I ask her your name is Lata. How would you feel if someone calls you Latha. Well she is indeed Latha. She has dealt a knock out punch.As I keep the phone down, he looks at me with concern, “ was she angry?” “ No. But at home we shall pronounce it as Lion”. He gladly agrees.

Time for some fun. We bring out the colors and paints. I watch mesmerized as his imagination takes wings. I take pictures with my camera as he is immersed in his creativity. I title it “ The artist at work.” I have captured him for posterity.

A few years back he was in his shower. Suddenly he squeezed himself inside the bucket and smiled naughtily. I rushed for my camera and took a picture. I titled it “ It’s my world”. The picture won an award in USA and it was printed in their annual book. That book is safe in his father’s locker. A pearl from his precious oyster. A remembrance of his colorful childhood when he grows.

He draws an aeroplane and tells me proudly that he will fly it when he grows. When? I ask. Soon very soon. To grow fast, he eats spinach. So that he gets muscles like popeye.

Everyday he checks his muscles in front of the mirror.

The dear innocent angel. Little does he realize that its one of life’s paradoxes. As soon as he grows old , he would yearn to be a child again.

I shall not be alive then. He may relive it some day through another Tanmay.

Just like me.

For now I feel like a kid sitting besides a lake watching the days fly like the brightest kites one can paint.

Big brother and the birth of a Mega star!

I am now a big fan of the great KRK. For readers like you who have a less desperate life than me, it may be KRK who? Well to be fair I would have had the same question if I was busy like you guys or had more eclectic tastes. KRK is Kamal Khan, the star who became the first person in the history of Big brother to be evicted for throwing a water bottle at a fellow inmate in the realty show ‘Big Brother’. One could ask how does he become a star by throwing bottle? Well because the great man thinks so.!

I am not a great fan of the ‘Big Brother’. What could be more torturous than watching a bunch of self indulgent has beens or out of jobs actors making a fool of themselves in front of the whole nation. But sometimes life throws moments with a hobson choice at you. And the perspective changes. My luck had finally run out and I was down with flu. Yes the swine did have flu. But it wasn’t swine flu! I was bored.

I had warned my friend that I would rather go miles to the woods and watch monkeys scratching their asses rather than sitting at home and scratching mine waiting for him to return from work.
He pointed to the idiot box. He threw in some cds for me to watch. It couldn’t hold my attention for long. I switched to the news. Barkha dutt was all over NDTV. Someone sue Prannoy Roy. I am not sure on what put me off! Her loud mouth or her louder makeup. I kept surfing.

Suddenly I came across this nugget. he was being interviewed by the great Amitabh Bachchan. It was like a duel between AB and KRK. AB served a quick serve. Don’t you think you behaved like a bad boy. No way! he was a good Samaritan. The poor model sherlyn needs money. She was being nominated by her fellow inmates. So he gallantly offered to leave instead. Also he had promised himself when he entered the big house of the big bro that he would go in a blaze of glory. And he was proud that he didn’t let himself down. Another serve. Well the inmates complained that you never did any work. My fans don’t vote me for the jhadoo pocha. They vote me for what I am. AB looked at him speechless. Andre aggassi would have felt proud.
Didn’t he feel bad. Nah. My name will be inscribed in the history of Big brother for ever as the first contestant who was evicted ; who cares for violence. Point , Set and match to KRK. And yes , AB just stared dumbly as he majestically declared that he was not such a small star that he would be evicted the first week!

Generously he offered a role to AB in his next movie. I wished I could advise him on adding a couplet of ghalib in that movie. “ badnam hue to kya hua naam na hua?”

There’s a fine line between fame and notoriety. Who cares? At least not KRK!!!!!

Let the power be worry about the quality and the dignity in television shows. At least not KRK!!!!! He’s too big a star!

Thanks KRK. I can’t promise you that I will watch your movie but I felt priveleged to be there at the momentous occasion and see the birth of a mega star and yes I shall be grateful for saving me that one visit to the woods.

Fashion street is a dead end street!

The Indians have great sartorial style and are dapper dressers. It hit me hard twice in the last week. The Americans believe in dressing only for formal occasions or when in office.
In the USA , its common to wear shorts and t-shirt for a party. In fact, they wear shorts all the time when they are not in office.

As they say in Rome do as romans do. They also say its easy to catch dirty habits. Well I caught this dirty habit easily and behaved as the romans, I mean Americans for a large part of the last ten years. My mind , it seems , went for a vacation as soon as I arrived home. I should have remembered that I am in India now. One need not be a Gautam Buddha and sit under a tree. Epiphany can strike you even when you are exhibiting your hirsute legs to a group of elegantly dressed gentry sipping cocktails and mocktails.

Also, you need not be badly dressed to make an idiot of yourself. I remember when I joined my first company in London. The Englishmen are some of the finest dressed people. My bad luck I was joining on a Friday. The HR lady who was in charge of my orientation did a perfect job ,only forgetting to tell me about the funky Friday. All came dressed in torn jeans and tshirts.I reached there to find me looking like a bull in a china shop.

Times have changed since we were kids. I was tacky then ,I am tacky now. But it requires more money to keep us tacky now. The fashions have undergone a huge change. Lots of things changed. Branded clothes weren’t available then as easily.But one thing remained constant. No matter what I wear I manage to look cheap!

Style is something which doesn’t depend on the money you spend. It depends on how you can carry it.

The earlier Film stars were originals. I remember the time when Rishi Kapoor and Neetu Singh were the rage. They made those ugly bell bottoms look hip. Rajesh Khanna brought in the Guru Kurtas. Jeetendra brought white shoes in fashion. Among women, Zeenat Aman was an iconoclast. Before her , the heroines were meant to be all coy and dressed up only in saris. She broke all the barriers. Boy cuts, halters, the minis and the midis. She made everything look great. Sadly these days the stars simply follow the international couture. Its hard to see any special signature style.

Among the politicians, I remember Benazir Bhutto’s visit to India with her father PM Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. She was a big hit with the media because of her style.

The Late PM Mrs. Gandhi too was always immaculately dressed. She had a charisma about her. I remember seeing her after she lost the elections. I was a school boy then. She came to address a rally in Agra. There wasn’t much security as she was no longer a PM. I could see her from pretty close. As the other boys and girls waved, I just gawked. She had that effect.

The late Maharani Gayatri devi of Jaipur had that effect too.

The young generation of politicians are all pretty fashionable and each has his own signature style. My favorites would be Omar Abduallah, Sachin Pilot, Scindia and Rahul Gandhi.

How can we forget the king of fashion , the stylish Sidhu with his matching turbans and ties!

Each one of us may not possess fashion sense but we must at least try to fashion our common sense into not doing something stupid.

I remember my date with pretty Gisela. As we made ourselves comfortable and looked at the menu to order our drinks, I whispered in her ears that I was a hit with girls cos they considered me harmless. I pass out after the first drink. She laughed loudly and complimented me on my sense of humor. That should have been my cue to shut up.

She was wearing a very chic Pierre Cardin dress. As I complimented her she beamed happily. To my horror I heard myself saying, “ Isn’t it ironic that we spend huge amounts of money to buy clothes but our happiest moments are when we are out of them.”

Clearly any kind of sense can’t be taught in the books – fashion sense or even plain horse sense!

Indian Diary II

This by far, is the weakest diwali I have ever seen. There seems to be no enthusiasm. It seems specially strange for a city like Hyderabad. The city emits a positive energy. But this year I can’t see any decorations or much hype. I first came to this city on dusehra some twenty years back. Today it is like a second home to me.

I love the hyderabadi hindi. ‘Bole to. Uno hich dekh leta. Tu light le. Pareshan nako ho.’ Or ‘Arre woh samne wali building kanne ruk main tyran main hawa dalke ataich abhi.

Professionally, I am still not going anywhere. I never thought that getting four real good software candidates would be so difficult.

We collected almost 50 resumes. One look and you get a feeling that Bill Gates would send his chartered plane to pick these guys. But within the first few minutes of the interview you realize that you have been duped. I imagine Bill Gates sending the plane to drop these guys back. Why do we lie so much? The client is totally fazed. He wants to shift base and try in Pune. But the swine flu and the high cost of living makes me try harder.

I remember last year meeting an American in the bar in the Taj hotel. He complained that even after four years in India he still finds it hard to work with Indians. His grouse was that they were too quick to accept any dead lines but never bothered to finish them in time. We tried explaining that India is a big country. There are good people and bad people. And it was just his bad luck. Today I need to remind myself about that conversation to pep me up. Come on good guys! Where are you hiding?

Yugesh, my nephew , decided to give his uncle a surprise but was surprised himself. Poor boy, came all the way from Dehradun to Gwalior to meet me. Wish he had checked it out with me. I too feel strange that this is my first diwali in India when I am not home. But young Tanmay is happy. He fails to understand why everyone doesn’t live in his house. He is too young to understand that as we grow we create our own islands.

We Indians have remarkable buoyancy. We take calamities in our stride. The floods have wreaked havoc. But the indomitable triumph of these brave people triumphed. Life is again coming back to normalcy.

It was one cold and blustery night in Haridwar a few years back. I saw one young boy carrying huge loads on his slender shoulder. Suddenly he slipped and the load fell down. I , along with a few passerby rushed to help him. He slowly staggered back on his legs and smiled impishly. “ its just a bruise nothing serious.” I asked him how did he manage to smile. He grinned back , “ My leg is bruised but my lips are alright.”

It is this indomitable spirit that refuses to bow down.

Its October the fifteenth. I have already been here for a fortnight. Looks like the time has wings. Its flying like a breeze. Next week hopefully Gwalior and Dehradun. Or maybe not!

Ah the glorious uncertainities !!!!!!