Where have they all gone?

It was one of those typical grey, bleak, wintry London mornings when you go through the motions of the whole day, having seen nothing but different shades of grey. I had woken up later than usual and later than what would leave me with a decent amount of time to get ready and go to office – I decided to work from home. So, it was that I had the luxury of time in my hand and was standing in the balcony of my 11^th floor apartment overlooking the expanse of Croydon, when a house sparrow decided to pay me a visit. It flitted on to the railing to the right of me, hopped around my legs a couple of times, wandered along the length of our balcony in a rather forlorn manner and then took flight and disappeared as suddenly as it had come.

It was there for a mere 5 minutes, but it suddenly made me realize how infrequent sparrow sightings have become in urban areas (and I am not speaking of London alone – I was in Bangalore and Mumbai for considerable periods of time before coming to London and try as I might, I couldn’t recollect seeing a single sparrow ever). Yet, they had been such a familiar sight when I was growing up that one would pass by without even a glance or not notice their chirping amidst the general din and even, I guess, get irritated at times, when too many of them would hover around, on the balconies and the rooftops.

What exactly is the reason for their diminishing numbers in the cities, I do not know. But what I definitely do know is that their numbers must be drastically falling for I do not see them up and about ever and I doubt my children, when they grow up, would ever see one outside of a text book.

My guess is that they have fallen prey to technology and have lost their nestling sites – how many houses do you see today that have holes and nooks from which, straws are sticking out?

How I wish mine in London had not been a modern apartment, but an older house with its sealing not so tight. That fleeting sparrow visit definitely made my day, a lot less greyer.

Sports and the Brits – A Media & People Circus

I have been in the United Kingdom for a few months now and thankfully, I have been blessed to see quite a few important sporting events happen during this time. In fact, one of the reasons I was keen to come across to the UK rather than the US was the very simple fact that while I have never really followed the sports that set American pulses racing (NASCAR, MLS, Baseball, NBA etc), the Brits have been our close cousins when it comes to the games that they follow (of course, in most cases, we just inherited their likes and dislikes – except perhaps Rugby, which is not so popular back home and is thus, duly deleted from the list of games that I discuss, for the purpose of this post).

And so it was that in the few months that I have been here, the English Premier League came to its closing stages, the Champions' League football followed, EURO 2008 rounded up the football season, the Kiwis came to English shores for cricket, Ricky Hatton and Amir Khan boxed foreign opponents and Wimbledon is reaching its climax, as I write this post - In short, enough sporting events to observe the peculiar traits of the English media and the English people when it comes to sports.

Peculiar because I have never really come across a more biased view of one's own country's superiority in sports as the ones expressed with impunity time and again by the British media and echoed through different channels, by the gullible junta. Let me state my case –

1. In the days leading to EURO 2008, I was surprised to see a football crazy country like Great Britain put on a charade of complete indifference to a continental showpiece – the reason for such petulant behaviour was obvious – England had not qualified for the tournament and the likes of the Rooneys, the Lampards and the Gerrards had been overshadowed by the Modrics and the Villas of the continent – such an ignominy for six-figure earning superstars to be shown their places by relative paupers from the backwaters of Bucharest and Thessaloniki. No surprise that the English found solace in feigning ignorance of the tournament at large!!!
   
2. However, when the tournament got underway and the media here realized that the flowing football on display was winning hearts and rave reviews from the world at large, the media pundits at BBC and the newspaper sports editors chose to focus on the exploits of EPL stars and made them the lynchpins of their teams' displays – thus Fernando Torres was crowned the "King of Spain" in newspaper headlines, while the wily exploits of Andres Iniesta and the goal scoring prowess of David Villa were conveniently glossed over
   
3. In between the football mania, the New Zealanders came visiting for a summer of cricket – and yeah, they got thrashed by the English in the test matches. Great news for cricket in a country where it is by far a much poorer cousin of football – and then, that's where the coverage stopped. The ODI series that followed saw the Kiwis overrun the English and typically, the media chose to look the other way proclaiming that Test cricket was still the ultimate and the English were, in any case, ranked just above West Indies and Zimbabwe, perhaps
   
4. And then came Wimbledon – and the British press never stops reminding you that it is the Mecca of Tennis – never mind that the grass court season is shrinking every time the ATP comes out with its new schedule. And if it is Wimbledon, it comes associated with that eternal Brit mania of trying to find out a home grown hero who can give Great Britain a singles' Wimbledon champion. Now, when was the last time, somebody amongst the men, who supposedly "gave the world the game of tennis", win the Wimbledon Singles' title? Has it been 15 years, 25 years, 35 years since a British bloke last held aloft the trophy? No, it is going to be 70 years now and still counting – but nonetheless, Andy Murray was given all the hype and support he could dream of – in fact, apart from Roger Federer, Murray was the only other guy to be given the privilege of playing all his matches in Centre Court this year. And what did he do with all this pampered treatment? He made heavy weather of the likes of Xavier Malisse, Tommy Haas and Richard Gasquet [does that sound as if he has scalped any worthy pretender to the crown?] before being summarily dismissed by Rafael Nadal in the quarter-finals, as if he was a speck of dust bothering the Spaniard!!
   

The Olympics are approaching and something tells me that I need to read newspapers back home and catch Indian TV news channels to get a fair picture of what is happening J

For They were Jolly Good Fellows .........And so say all of us

Two glittering careers in cricket are on the verge of receding into the sunset in the coming week. It is not surprising that this year has already seen many such farewells – after all, World Cup years often see the end of the run for many a veteran stalwart in any game, more so with cricket with two World Cups in the same year. Newer stars emerge and the older lot often finds itself unable to hold its own against the younger challengers. Undoubtedly, some survive to fight another day, some come back for final hurrahs but many succumb to the inevitable. Some, however, are still willing to pack a punch, but find to their dismay, that there is no ring to fight in.

Such is the peculiar scenario in which the burly Inzamam-ul-Haq finds himself in. After 15 years of distinguished service to Pakistani cricket peppered with the most test centuries for his country [25 of them, no joke], close to 12,000 runs in ODIs [3^rd highest ever], an average of more than 50 over 119 test matches and long years of stewardship of Pakistani cricket through some of the most tumultuous phases of its history, Inzy has been run out one last time – his own team mates are wary of him occupying the crease again.

Today, at a sombre press conference in Karachi, Inzy decided to bid farewell to Pakistani cricket after being given the chance to play one last test for Pakistan against South Africa at Lahore next week. Many hailed it as magnanimity on the part of the Pakistani cricket establishment, while some called it timely from Inzamam, a parting shot which would help him leave cricket with some dignity. And therein, lies the cruel irony of it all. For it is sad that somebody like Inzamam had to ask for largesse from his own cricket establishment to be a part of a team, of which he was the lead just a little while ago. Yes, he is touching 38 and he has achieved much in cricket and this valedictory gift allows him a chance to leapfrog Javed Miandad to the top of Pakistani run-getters’ list – but here was a person who had clearly spelt out his desire to play tests for Pakistan a little while longer and if statistics are to be believed, was still performing as well as anybody else. But it seems the new team command in the dressing room does not want him pottering around and Inzy himself pointed that out – “I have played cricket all my life and I felt I had 12-18 months left in me still. But I realised the boys are playing well since the World Cup and felt that the age gap between me and them, in the dressing-room, might have been too much. It could have affected the dressing-room.”

Marvan Atapattu in Sri Lanka has not announced his retirement yet, but his international cricketing career is all but finished as well after he chose to burn bridges with the Sri Lankan selectors by refusing to meet them and consequently, seeing himself dropped from the Sri Lankan team for the Australian tour. A former captain, Atapattu too, was humiliated by the Lankan cricketing establishment after being taken as a tourist for the Caribbean World Cup and being overlooked for all matches immediately thereafter.

At the ages of 36 or 37, admittedly, time was running out for both Inzamam and Atapattu. But the way their sagas wound up is a lesson in life for all – how fickle fortune can be – captains and undisputed leaders not too long ago, they found themselves dumped not too long after – Inzy, after his cubs decided that they no longer needed a pater familias guiding them, Atapattu after realizing that all around him had become used to his absence and were better off with it, post his injury which saw him losing his captaincy and then his place in the team.

In a way it is good, for both Inzy and Atapattu epitomized cricket, the way it was – a lazy and sublime sport for entertainment – not the power-packed, frenzied, big moneyed, winner takes it all avatar, that it has turned into with Twenty 20 and all that.

"There are many things you want to achieve but you can't always. Overall, I can look back and thank God for the career I have had." Thus spake Inzamam at the end of that conference in Karachi and I say the same – Thank God for giving us players like Inzamam and Atapattu to tell us what sublime beauty is all about.

[For my post on Inzy's ODI retirement announcement - check out]

Bow Barracks Forever

Anjan Dutta had disappeared from the world of movie productions for a long time and one could be pardoned for thinking that he had taken the commercial failure of BADA DIN too much to heart [remember the Marc Robinson, Tara Deshpande, Shabana Azmi starrer?] Thankfully, of late, he has dispelled such notions with two back to back releases – THE BONG CONNECTION, which I have not been able to catch so far and BOW BARRACKS FOREVER, which I just did, over the weekend in Mumbai.

BOW BARRACKS FOREVER provides a delightful insight into the trials, the tribulations and the triumphs of a forgotten community of cosmopolitan urban India – the Anglo-Indian community. The story has a real backdrop – the setting is that of a quaint corner of North Kolkata – the Bow Street, where a varied assortment of Anglo-Indians struggle to cope with a city that has outpaced them in changing to a different equation of life, where they are an unwanted hangover of the colonial era. Living in a set of old, dilapidated barracks which once housed the American soldiers of World War – I, the inmates seem to live with a cloud of destruction perennially hanging over them – destruction of their abodes which is under the malevolent gaze of a land-grabbing builder; destruction of their culture in a city, which has bypassed them on its path to the future; destruction of their destinies, as embodied by a young Clayton Rodgers who says that the best that he can hope for is to become a waiter in a Park Street restaurant. The gora sahibs may have gone, but their colonial cousins desperately hang on to the remains of the day. So much so, their mongrel existence has left them schizophrenic, neither completely Indian nor completely phirang. In Potter terms, they are the original half-blood prince and princesses who build their local bands on terrace tops, while dreaming of making it Beatles' land.

Anjan Dutta has woven beautifully rendered tales of human relationships, the highs and lows around each character – Peter, the Cheater, a former soldier and the proud descendant of an American World War officer, but who now specializes in con jobs as a vocation, under the guise of an antique dealer; Mrs. Emily Lobo, forever dreaming of severing her links with the crumbling world around her by shifting to London to her eldest son, making infinite calls to her son, only to be repeatedly met with voice messages and a stony, obdurate silence from the other end; Tom, an Armenian Christian wife-beater who has taken to smuggling and his wife, Anne, trapped in a dysfunctional, abusive relationship; Mrs. Rosa D’ Costa, desperate to latch on to anybody who is willing to take her away from Bow Barracks and thus, away from her husband, who is too much in love with his ancestral dwelling.

Remarkably, each one of them show a tremendous resilience to rise above their destinies – Peter may well be a fraudster, but he is a gentleman to the core and that too with a huge, kind heart and the old soldier’s blood still boils over in the face of injustice and Mrs. Lobo realizes that her younger son, may well not succeed as much as her elder son, but is a much finer human being, while Mrs. Rosa finally realizes the worth of true love and a nice human being and Anne is rid of the trauma of her abusive husband. And of course, the jolly and rambunctious community with all its idiosyncrasies, still has its guitars and trumpets and the wannabe John Lennons and George Harrisons to tide over the worst and rekindle the love for one’s own sweet home in the midst of each one’s hearts.

On the negative side, one may say that Anjan Dutta has perhaps chosen to go with a stereotyped image of the Anglos in Kolkata and the editing of the movie could have been better to make it a little tauter. Certain actors like Rupa Ganguly, George Baker and even the wonderfully talented Sabyasachi Chakraborty have been wasted. The sex scenes are quite uncalled for and most awfully picturised, leading to sheer misery as a cinema-goer. Interestingly the term Anglo-Indians is a loose umbrella term for all kinds of Eurasian Christian minorities in Kolkata and the uninitiated might find it strange that distinctly Portuguese sounding surnames like Lobo or D’ Costa or the Armenian Christian Tom are all passed off as Anglo-Indians.

But, watch the movie for the stupendous performances from Victor Banerjee as Peter, the Cheater [you have to pardon a few instances of him going overboard, in Fagin like mannerisms from Oliver Twist] and Lillette Dubey as Mrs. Lobo, apart from the interesting sepia tinged look at this fast dwindling heritage community – of course, a certain acquaintance with Kolkata and its Anglo-Indian community would help make it that much more meaningful.

Come Play !!!!

"I can't quite understand what motive one can have to kill a person like Bob Woolmer." crooned former Pakistani great Imran Khan.

A youngster seated next to me, snorted in derision - "Can't quite understand?? Kya bakwaas hai. It is obvious that the betting mafia used the underworld dons to eliminate him because he was about to spill the beans."

Really? Is this what cricket has become? Is the "murder" of a cricket coach during the World Cup the culmination of years of corruption that has seeped in or is it just the tip of the iceberg? And to think that when my father used to watch cricket avidly, teams didn't even have coaches !!

Indeed, so much has changed for the game. Hanif Cadbury, Saleem Langda, Arshad Pappu - are these then, the characters that decide the fate of international matches today instead of the Brian Laras and Glenn McGraths, that we are made to believe? Why, the names remind me of typical Bollywood masala flicks and indeed, that is typical of the drama that is now unfolding in the Caribbean.

"It is time for cricket to exorcize the ghosts of yore once and for all and start afresh" says Alan Border. But who will do that? Is anybody beyond reproach? Pardon me, but all the conspiracy theories have demented my rational thinking - can it be possible that just like in a typical Hindi film flick, when our honest cop finds out that even the Police Commissioner is in cahoots with the bad boys (recollect all those insufferable rehashes), perhaps all and sundry are involved - perhaps, Malcolm Speed is the very Head Honcho who is driving this all??? Not plausible? But then, what is? That gun-toting mafia dons who are planning to blow up railway stations and World Trade Centers are also determining the outcome of cricket matches? Perhaps, this is the example of the growing clout of cricket internationally that the ICC boasts of !!

There was a time when cricket was just a sport. Or at least, most of the times back then. And it was not too long ago - I was a kid then and I am still a young guy. When one would be all pumped up for a cricket match and invite anybody and everybody in the neighborhood for a good day of cricket watching. There were no odd coloured Pepsi colas or batsmen with weird drawings under their eyelids. But it was still enjoyable. Television channels did not disseminate information about the details of the Thai cuisine that the newest kid on the block likes or which brand of toilet paper he uses to wipe his ass in the morning, but then we still liked our players. Cricketers did not endorse everything from multi-grain biscuits to flavoured condoms, but people still bought those products. When 250 was a winning total in 50 overs and the first 10 overs were still about consolidation and not inane power-hitting without any semblance of technique on subcontinental dustbowls - one still had exciting matches. Dickie Bird would not raise crooked fingers at people or spectators were not addled by concepts like Power Plays - fixed and flexible and what not. One did not have telvision channels like Set Max which is all so eager to air the same ads zillions of times, that it often eats up the last delivery of an over or the first of the next one and God save you, if that last ball ended up as a wide or a no-ball. Don't even expect to watch the extra ball which was about to be bowled because by then the idiot box is spewing out some cranky ad where a bunch of ruffians are shouting "Ooh - Aah India" [how obscenely kinky words :)]and cricketers are transmogrified to tigers - the fact that they are soon to become lambs for slaughter only increases the irritation levels.

I had read somewhere that Erapalli Prasanna took a break from cricket to complete his education so that he has some recourse to good jobs once the cricket days were over. The other day, Lala Amarnath was recounting the early days and how cricketers from different parts of Mumbai would catch the train that would take them to their next test match venue, at different local stations depending on where their residence were. Now, with a huge army of support staff that does everything from massaging their legs to pressing their underwears, with stays in the most deluxe of hotels in the most elite of company, with brand endorsement moolah rivalling those of the Bollywood Badshahs, are the cricketers still not satisfied? Perhaps, such is the slavery of Mammon.

No Cheers for 300

So this is some new genre of film-making and Frank Miller is supposed to be its high priest? And like we have found inane euphemisms for all kinds of things in life these days, we have started calling comic books as graphic novels?

I must admit that I had really looked forward to 300 – the battle of Thermopylae occupies quite a distinguished place in history and for history buffs like me, the spectre of watching an action filled historical with the heroic Spartans and the legendary armies of the Achamaenians was quite mouth-watering.

Unfortunately, 300 is not a historical movie at all – the visuals might look stunning to naïve 10 year olds who perhaps are only interested in that kind of stuff, but it does no justice to more serious pursuers of historical movies. The fanatical heroism that Sparta has always been known for has been treated, for want of a better word, in some kind of an immature manner – you do not feel any kind of a glowing pride as one might have expected of the bravery shown. I also could not fathom the reason for the sudden volte-face of the Judas of Thermopyale – Ephialtes (who for no reason that I can think of, is shown as a hideous, diseased hunchback – a kind of throwback to the Golum of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings – must things be unnecessarily distorted, just because it is a comic book?) – He says that he wants to fight for Sparta and redeem his father’s honour etc and yet, rejection of admission into the Spartan army suddenly makes him so vengeful that he turns against them? Or for that matter, even if Leonidas is unable to employ Ephialtes as a member of the phalanx, couldn’t he possibly have given him some other role to play in the Spartan army? Historically, there have never been any reports of Persian armies employing war elephants and Frank Miller perhaps deserves credit for introducing war-rhinoceroses for the first time ever.


The Monument to Leonidas in modern day Thermopylae

But perhaps, most of all, what was so disconcerting to me, as a viewer in India, was the not-so-subtle racist underlining that permeates the movie. And while some may just call it historical inaccuracies, I can’t buy that line of thought. It is quite simply put, an effort to show everything Asiatic and Oriental as quite debauched and barbaric, as against a superior and honorable Occidental culture. Can anybody pray tell me who gave Frank Miller the absurd idea of showing Xerxes as some weird, body-piercing Nubian assassin rather than the Achaemenid prince with full beard, long gown like dress and a crown on his head that stares at all in countless stone reliefs found in Persepolis? And are those Halloween type mask wearing monsters supposed to be a good illustration of the legendary Immortals of Xerxes? Perhaps, one would do well to remind Miller that both Iranians and Greeks, neighbours in the Mediterranean for centuries, do not look all that different from each other – his fetish for depicting all the Persian soldiers as some kind of dark devils is rank racist.

A depiction of Xerxes-I from a stone relief in Persepolis

So Long and Thanks for Everything, Inzy

It has been the most unusual of times for Pakistani cricket over the last 2 weeks in the Caribbean. Even the cataclysmic loss to Ireland which saw Pakistan tumble out of the World Cup was overshadowed by the sudden and mysterious death of Bob Woolmer which has shrouded the World Cup in a pall of gloom and unleashed the many dormant evils that have plagued the game of cricket in the recent past. Unfortunately, all this has kind of pushed the ODI retirement of Inzamam-ul-Haq to the background. And that is so very unfortunate.

This was sadly, not the way Inzy would have liked to end his long innings on the international platform. Over the last one year, so much has changed for Inzamam. After being hailed as a hero after standing up for Pakistani pride in the Oval test fiasco, Inzamam’s pictures were supposedly stomped on in Lahore and even his hometown Multan and his house attacked, post the disaster at the World Cup. But for one last time, when he trudged back, teary-eyed, to the pavilion after another typically belligerent innings against the hapless Zimbabweans, everything was forgiven. Like a supernova, which flashes brilliantly before its final imminent collapse, all that was good and great about Inzamam shone forth in our eyes and minds, one last time.

That brutal assault which zapped the Kiwis into submission in the 1992 World Cup semis was the first to spring to mind – Inzy, then a cherubic, clean shaven youngster, staked his claim for inclusion into the pantheon of cricket greats with that impudent, audacious knock. Through the years, he mellowed, the clean shaven look transformed into the bearded patriarchal look that the later generation would perhaps, remember him for; religious moorings took shape and press conferences and post match tête-à-têtes started increasingly with “First of all, thanks to Allah….”. Some things however, never changed – the innocence and general amiability that always characterized and in many ways defined him as a gentle giant, the ever bumbling running between the wickets, the safe pair of hands in the slip cordon, the sometimes bemused and absent look on the field when things were not going his way, the elegant bendy flicks off his hips, the hunched cover drives and savage cuts, that almost lazy stride to the middle when he came out to bat – beautifully and quite ironically, epitomizing both an aversion to any kind of hurriedness in life as well as a supreme confidence in his self and utter disdain for any bowlers, the constant gum chewing which would put the most arduously ruminating of cows to shame – we will definitely miss all of these. But perhaps, what Pakistan would miss most of all was the eternal hope that Inzamam provided, every time he walked out to the middle, irrespective of whether he was in form or not. Like his illustrious predecessors Salim Malik and the peerless Javed Miandad, no opponent could ever heave a sigh of relief till Inzamam was at the crease to guide Pakistani fortunes, no matter how choppy the waters seemed.

Of course, he has only bid adieu to ODIs and that leaves a possibility of us seeing some more of Inzy in the Tests. But considering the tumultuous world of Pakistani cricket, you never know.

As the saying goes, the show must go on, but when people like Inzamam take a bow, somehow, it is never feels the same without them.

Polyester Prince - Dhiru and Guru - a la Mani Ratnam

The fact that it is a film made by Mani Ratnam automatically raised my expectations from it. And rumours that it has been inspired by the story of Dhirubhai Ambani only whetted my curiosity further. The grapevine had it that the movie has made a tremendous beginning at the box office and Amitabh Bachhan quite shamelessly, I think, endorsed son Abhishek's acting skills in the movie in an interview aired on NDTV. All in all, I was really looking forward to watching Guru and luckily, I got to see it this Sunday at the PVR multiplex in Forum Mall.

And I am a tad disappointed. The rumours are of course spot on – only that the movie is not merely inspired by, it is almost a biopic of Dhirubhai. And you can easily figure out the other characters in the movie are inspired by other historical figures – Arzan Contractor is definitely based on Nusli Wadia, Manik Dasgupta on Ramnath Goenka, Shyam Saxena is S. Gurumurthy, Champaklal Damani's character has been shown as a childhood friend and brother of Kokilaben. Kokilaben Ambani has hardly ever been in the limelight and I know precious little of her life's story – so I can only assume that Aishwarya Rai's character is based on her. Turkey replaces Yemen in the movie and curiously, Gurubhai in the movie is only shown to have two daughters – Mukesh and Anil bhai have been conveniently forgotten. Warring kinmen apparently have no place in family sagas.

But of course, Mani Ratnam has made biopics earlier and his Iruvar was widely appreciated. This movie, however, seems to lack a punch and finishes without taking a very clear stand between the two rival threads that run through the film. Abhishek Bachhan's defence during the RBI grilling is unconvincing and his attempt to relate his travails and fights with Gandhiji's fight against the British is ludicrous. Abhishek Bachhan has however turned in a stupendous performance in a role, which, though it was author backed to the core, required him to enact a person much older in age and maturity. Mithun Chakraborty makes a welcome return to mainstream Bollywood and excels in the role of the media patriarch. However, I did feel that the shift in equations between Guru and Manik Dasgupta from friendship to enmity was very sudden and out of sorts. Would a person suddenly dedicate himself wholly to finish off somebody, who, till the other day, was like a son to him? The chemistry between Abhishek and Ash is for all to see, otherwise, Ash really did not have much to do. Her introduction in the movie was however, quite spectacular and Rajeev Menon has handled the photography department with aplomb, as ever. Madhavan and Vidya Balan have however been wasted and the development of a parallel romantic angle between them is totally unrelated to the movie. I simply cannot comprehend the necessity of introducing an item number in a movie like this – perhaps the need to have Mallika Sherawat gyrate in a typical Turkish belly dance is what led to the shift of the background to Turkey from the historical Yemen.

Biopics, if they are simply visual rendition of a true story, without any kind of message being pushed forward or any other kind of embellishment, engender a sense of incompleteness to a movie and I think, that is the problem with Guru.

Hail the Prince

Sourav Ganguly has indeed, scripted a most remarkable comeback, a story as good as any other to be a parable for inspiration.

The last time, I had written about him, Ganguly had just been unceremoniously dumped from the throne of Indian cricket and pundits, all around were busy, writing his epitaph. In the long months of his exile, whenever he would talk of still nursing dreams of playing the World Cup in the Caribbean, people would dismiss it as mere wishful thinking; some would even proffer a few words of pity for someone who had risen so high, but had fallen so mightily. Even the most loyal of his fans had begun doubting a comeback, but it is entirely to his credit that Sourav Ganguly just refused to throw in the towel. Of course, the exile served him well – he has improved his fitness considerably, he has lost that air of “nothing can happen to me and my place in the team, come what may”, he has been playing Ranji trophy matches even in places like Dhanbad, unlike times when he would pull out of even international matches without batting an eyelid. But it is his confidence and the burning desire to prove his critics wrong that has propelled him towards another new innings in Indian colours.

May the Gods script a successful saga for this innings of his.

Who are we blaming??

Hardly anybody in India knew who Jade Goody is, a couple of weeks ago. Now of course, she is perhaps topping the list of the most hated person by an Indian. And all because of a reality TV show – Big Brother – whose Indian spin-off – Big Boss – is one of the stupidest (and to attain that tag, you have to be really special) TV shows I have ever watched on sitcom.

As the racial row erupted and threatened to engulf all kinds of players [at last count, apart from the TV channel, the contestants and the gullible all-knowing audience; the Governments of both UK and India; leaders of the European Union, Bollywood actors, starlets, wannabe models; had-been TV stars turned TV hosts; cricket celebs; newspaper columnists across the racial divide – all had pitched in with their thoughts on this], I daresay, I watched with keen amusement the indignation that Indians and South Asians, in general, exhibited at the treatment meted out to Shilpa Shetty. At the very outset, let me state that I haven’t seen any episode of the concerned TV show and my knowledge of the events that unfolded at the show is purely from media reports and video clips of the concerned episode when it all started.

First things first – I was initially surprised that Shilpa Shetty, who is still going reasonably strong at the Bollywood sweepstakes, would want to participate in a much-rehashed reality show with co-participants, who can only be described, in polite terms as either have-beens, also-rans or wannabe gone wrong (Ms. Lloyd would fit the last category perfectly). But then, from what is all turned out to be, I think it was a smart move by Shilpa’s agent – for it has definitely made her a household name now in the U.K. and if not the Oscars, perhaps she can aim for a few BAFTAs.

While I am in no way, condoning some of the remarks that were passed around in the show, I am amused at the sudden bout of propriety being exhibited by all and sundry, when it must be borne in mind that a majority of these participants do not have the privilege of elitist up-scale education and class that Shilpa seems to have and infinitely more importantly, when it is widely understood that nobody would like to see a program where there are no tamashas, no fights and bitching, no envy or jealousy. Clean, nice, polite people, who are always adjusting, make compromises in the bigger interest, who are welcoming towards one and all, who never fight amongst themselves or take nasty, bitter broadsides against each other behind each others’ backs, do not make for good TRPs. That is just what it is all about – Channel 4 could not have just scripted a nice wonderful happily ever after kind of a show and still hope to catch eyeballs. I am not being sarcastic – sure, it has backfired to a big extent and there are plans of scrapping the program altogether, but all this muck still made national headlines and everybody who previously did not know of or did not see Big Brother, is now wiser about it. And who knows, perhaps the news that it will be scrapped altogether, might just make people nostalgic about this 7 year old program and it might just burn out like a supernova at the end and ah!, what a grand finale that would be.

But all this brouhaha brings me to the larger issue of racism. We, i.e. all who have melanin in different dosages and in higher content than whites in our system – are too quick to react to any kind of behaviour that mildly suggests a racial undertone to it. And yeah, it has got to do with our history, of the past unjustness exhibited by our fairer brethren etc. But the fact is that all of us are racist deep inside and it just manifests itself differently in different people.

Gujaratis in Mumbai are unwilling to allow non-vegetarian tenants or residents in their housing complexes, the same goes for South Indian Brahmins in different parts of cosmopolitan India – Bangalore may be the new buzzword in the global arena, but if you go to Malleshwaram and say, that you are a fish-eating Bong and would want to rent a house, the landlord is most likely to smirk. God save you, if you are a non-vegetarian in Borivali and you need to buy eggs urgently – all the best, trudge miles for a shop that stocks it. Try going to some of the most happening places in the sunshine beaches of Goa – some of the Hindu converted “Portuguesophile” Goans would treat you like dirt and through subtle means, would try telling you that those places are reserved for the gora chamdis. Imagine, being marginalized in your own country by your own people. And we display these traits copiously – go down to the Gateway of India in Mumbai anytime and you would see scores of us, always eager to help the white tourist, whenever he needs something or being over-enthusiastic in answering their questions or allaying their fears [there is the other kind too – the one that fleeces them like hell, but they too act in the most subservient manner to the whites]. Ask the same people to help out a Nigerian or Kenyan tourist and they suddenly remember lots of work or display plain disdain for people, who are more coloured than they themselves are. Sure, for the economically weaker section of this subservient domain, it is simply the power of the relative currencies that dictates their action, but notice the difference when some of the airlines crews interact with white and black foreigners and you will know what I am speaking of. We label backward places as “just like Bihar”; we tend to think that all Tamilians must say “Aiyyo” at every thing in the most stupid manner and we portray accordingly in movies and serials; we tend to believe that every Muslim in the neighbourhood secretly supports Pakistan in an Indo-Pak cricket match; we think that all Mongoloid looking young females in the cities must be sluts and the males, drug-addicts; we think all Bongs are too arrogant and feign intellectual prowess of the most irritating kinds; we believe that all Marwaris are nothing but money-minded ogres who would do anything to make profits; we believe all Parsis are zany idiots etc etc.

Who are we blaming then??

Why is Old not Gold?

Suresh Raina was hailed as the next biggest thing to happen to Indian cricket. He seemed to have all the requisites for stardom – he was a brilliant fielder; a superb athlete, eager to improve his fitness at every chance; besides having a claim to all the strokes that a good batsman should have in his repertoire. He had already made waves in the U-19 circuit and the wise men of Indian cricket (or a bunch of jokers, if you still remember Jimmy Amarnath’s comments) decided that the time was ripe to blood him in Indian cricketer. “We must invest in the youth”; “We are building a team for the 2007 World Cup” etc. In the midst of all this, experienced cricketers were given the boot – V.V. S. Laxman could not run the 200 m at sub 25 second timings, he could not slide for 3 feet to catch a ball in its tracks before it reaches the boundary rope, he cannot fling himself parallel to the ground to take astounding catches – more importantly, in any case he was on the wrong side of 30 and therefore was not a prospect for the future.

A few months down the line with the World Cup getting perilously closer, India seems to have lost the plot altogether. The bright young things that had been carefully groomed for the event have had their failings cruelly exposed in domains that are different from their usual backyards. And the veterans, having been allowed to rot in the cruel environs of our Ranji setup seem to have got rusty. We are facing a crisis.

Perhaps, it is time to reflect on what has been a usual trend in Indian cricket these days – the tendency to hoist young cricketers too soon on to the international stage. Raina may be a supremely fit youngster with immaculate skills in running between wickets and saving runs, but he is nowhere half as good as V.V.S. Laxman, when it comes to scoring runs, incidentally, his chief job as a batsman. And the reason this is happening is that these days, performances in the U-19 and U-21 levels are all that matter; the long years of hard toil in the Ranji and other domestic tournaments may well be damned. Irfan Pathan had a meteoric rise, straight from the U-19 level and now seems woefully muddled on the international scene; Yuvraj Singh and Mohammed Kaif have never quite seemed to be ready to accept the mantle of senior players; former U-19 World Cup champion Y. Venugopala Rao (Kaif captained that team in 1999 and Yuvraj was a member too) failed to find his feet in international cricket. Go back a few years and you will find more such examples of players who had been blooded a little too early – the spark that the selectors saw in their few matches unfortunately never quite translating into a flame on the biggest stage – I am not sure how many people would remember Laxmi Ratan Shukla – hailed as India’s umpteenth solution to finding a Kapil Dev clone – made his debut when he was stil shy of his 19th birthday and had been forgotten before his 20th; Reetinder Singh Sodhi (incidentally, another of the U-19 winning team of 1999) – vanished after around a dozen desperate chances , cruelly unprepared for international standards etc etc.

Curiously, if you look at the some of the strongest teams of the last decade in international cricket, you would not notice such rashness in introducing new players. Michael Hussey played for years in the Pura Shield before making his Aussie debut at the ripe age of nearly 30 – and boy, he took to international cricket like a fish to water. He reached 1,000 runs in test cricket in the quickest time ever, has made a reputation as one of the most brilliant finishers in the game of cricket ever, keeps piling on runs as if he cannot be expected to score less ever and is already being talked about as Ricky Ponting’s successor. When Glenn McGrath wanted a break from international cricket, the Aussie selectors brought on Stuart Clark, himself over 30 at the time and what a successful career he has had with Australia since. Justin Langer, Matt Hayden, Damien Martyn, Ricky Ponting, Glenn McGrath, Shane Warne - all of them are on the wrong side of 30 - some of 35 - yet the Aussie selectors continue to repose their faith in them and more often than not, with good results.

Unfortunately we, in India, are only too eager at dropping players who do not have some sort of a glam quotient – you would have to be breathtakingly spectacular in some game or sensationally young to warrant investiture as a future prospect. Ramesh Pawar keeps putting in decent performances in ODIs, yet never seems to be part of any stable Indian team; J.P. Yadav played solid, stable cricket in the few chances that he got, yet the selectors only seem to notice his age and little else. Even Dinesh Mongia, despite some good performances in his limited chances, never seems to have the team management’s support. And while some of the players named above can end their playing careers with the consolation of having still got the opportunity to represent India, the likes of Amol Muzumdar (long ago, touted as the next Tendulkar), Kanwaljeet Singh and Rizwan Shamshad would just have to spend their lives telling their grand-children of their monumental Ranji trophy feats, all in vain.

Perhaps, we need to reflect!!

The Charm of the Written Word

I am told that it is not that kids of today have completely moved away from books. Somebody I knew had read it somewhere. I hope it is true. For I for one, believe completely in the age old maxim of "Books are a man's best friend".

A lot of what I am today is because of the kind of things that occupied my mind and time during my youth and reading happens to be one of the chief activities that would keep me busy then. And boy, did I love reading? I used to have a voracious appetite for books, ever since I recollect - and this was for all kinds of things readable - books, magazines, newspapers and later e-books etc - I have never discriminated against any medium of readable information. The use of them however was dictated by the availability, weight of the wallet, ease of reading etc at different times.

As a kid, I used to go to my grand-parents's houses regularly during my school vacations - both sets - paternal ones in Patna and the maternal ones, a little yonder, in Bhagalpur. Both my grandfathers had a healthy appetite for books and they, thankfully, transferred their genes on to me, albeit in different ways.

My paternal grandfather would spend hours reading the morning newspaper (in fact, later, when we used to stay with him and I was much elder, there would be a fierce competition in the house regarding the primary possession of the morning newspaper between me, my father and my grand-father !!) and would regale me with stories and events from there and from the works of various other authors, of which he had considerable knowledge. As a kid, the newspaper fascinated me - it seemed to me, a mysterious fount of stories from all around the world - it was through its pages that I learnt of the splendour of Angkor Wat and Borobudur, it was through those pages that a certain Diego Armando Maradona kindled my love for football, it was through them that I first heard words like glasnost and perestroika. In fact, the habit of spending at least sometime in the morning, come what may, going through the pages of the daily newspaper is something that I have strictly adhered to over the years, since I was a 7 year old boy. The sections that aroused my interest have expanded - but the order has remained constant through the years - sports, headlines, world news and then the rest. As a kid growing up in Kolkata, THE STATESMAN was regarded as the finest epitome of the Queen's English and we were asked to go through its editorials religiously in order to improve one's vocabulary and spellings. I am not sure how many of those weighty articles really caught my fancy at that age, but I must say that the sessions have not been in vain.

My maternal grand-father, on the other hand, had bequeathed a fine set of tomes for his descendants, for he was, unfortunately, no longer around when I really began reading earnestly. I hardly have any memories of him that I can draw up, but I owe my interest in a plethora of esoteric subjects completely to his collection of books. On countless afternoons in Bhagalpur, when the rest of the inmates of our house would rest in slumber, I would take apart those weighty tomes - page by page. There was one book especially that I cherished the most - LIVING TOGETHER AS WORLD NEIGHBOURS - Don't remember the author , but I do recall Macmillan as the publisher - but I recall reading with rapt attention the description of the peoples , cultures and histories of the whole world. It used to have lovely photographs of different cities of the world - most of them in B&W - but they seemed to light up the world for you in front of your eyes - the minarets of Kremlin, a long liner passing through the Panama canal, two-humped Bactrian camels loitering in the vast steppes of Central Asia, a Russian family sitting down for breakfast in their traditional Cossack costumes (I still remember, how surprised I was at seeing the quantity of food they had at their breakfast table), students milling around Heidelberg University, regarded as one of the oldest and grandest seats of learning in Europe etc etc. It had also a spectacular set of maps of each continent (in fact, the maps in that book with vast swathes of colonial Africa with names like Belgian Congo, Rhodesia, Nyasaland, U.S.S.R etc would seem perhaps, to be completely from a different planet to a kid of today) and this book was singularly responsible for my keen interest in maps and geography, something that I retain, to this day.

Of course, there has to be constant encouragement from parents and a lot of interest from their side as well before any habit is really ingrained in the children. I have imbibed my love of reading and knowing things - all kinds, all over the world - from my mother (who, having been raised up in small-town Bihar, has never ceased to amaze me with her knowledge of global events and her keen enthusiasm of learning about things even now - guess, my grand-father is to be credited) and my father, who used to spend so much time explaining to me such diverse topics as the structure of the United Nations, stories of different wars, dictators etc.

Kids today have a much larger and mind-boggling variety of entertainment options to choose from. I am not sure whether the Famous Fives, Secret Sevens, Enid Blytons etc form part of the consideration set of kids these days. But I hope that they do - books maketh a man. Very true.

The First of Many?

Marcus Trescothick’s international career as an England batsman may well be over after this latest bout of stress disorder that forced him out of the Ashes series. As a keen cricket buff, who has followed the ebb and tide of English fortunes in the cricketing field over the years, I am disappointed. England may well have turned the tide in the last year and half, topped by the famous Ashes triumph over the old foes, and perhaps much of the credit for that has gone to the young guns – Flintoff and Pietersen, but it was the solidity that Trescothick gave at the top of the order that had paved the way for many a win in recent years. The show, however, as they say must and will go on – a new star would arise over the horizon to take Trescothick’s place, sooner or later. I am optimistic on that count.

But, it is as a simple cricket lover, that I am despondent over the future of cricket. As with some other sports, cricket has now gone beyond the realm of a game – cricket is now a global business with its own set of sleaze and muck. The innocence and simple fun associated with a game is beginning to fade away. The game is run by administrators, who I am sure, are well-meaning people with innovative marketing ideas, solid administration experience etc, albeit coupled with a lot of love for the game; but most of them lack one crucial criterion – they have not played the game. Consequently, they fail to see the cricketer as a human being – they look at him as a resource to generate the moolah that has transformed cricket today. The Malcolm Speeds, Lalit Modis and Sharad Pawars have never been on extended trips to places far away from home, away from family and friends with the expectations of as much as a million people burdening you and millions analyzing your every damn movement to expose chinks in your armour. They are busy making jazzy presentations to all kinds of parties not integral to the game – sponsors, media barons, ad agencies – devising a more and more packed schedule of matches, finding out newer and newer places to play the game. Not that cricketers are above any kind of blame – the lure of money tends to overshadow all kinds of objections to its pursuit – but individually, a cricketer has little option – it is a fiercely competitive world these days and one chance slipped away may mean the end of your career.

Trescothick may well be an exception – you can always say that you have to grow up and be counted as one of the big boys. My only concern is that he may be one of the first to succumb to the greed of the modern game.

Welcome to the Gowda Circus

Mr. H.D. Deve Gowda likes to call himself the humblest farmer in India. His son, Karnataka CM Mr. H.D. Kumaraswamy professes to live by the ideals of Simple Living – High Thinking. His son, Mr. H.D. Nikhil Gowda obviously decided that he had had enough, living in the shadows of his illustrious forebears and decided to step out into the limelight in his own inimitable way.

And what a grand entry he has made – if you happen to stay in Bangalore, you must have noticed news about him and his deeds, screaming at you from the front page of news-hungry papers. From what we read of him in the newspapers – and never mind that it constantly changes course on a daily basis – we know this much – Nikhil Gowda is apparently a college drop-out. Thus, the academic route to greatness being closed on him, Nikhil chose to test his future as a politician by debuting on the surefire anti-social plank.

The event as it seems to have occurred, without the many twists and turns inserted later, is as follows:-
Last week on one of the weekday nights, Nikhil Gowda and some of his companions (I am starved of a better noun, for reasons explained later) decided to have a gala time, stooped in drunken revelry. When the party wound up at around the wee hours of the morning, Nikhil et al found out that they were so busy drinking, that they had forgotten that their stomachs had been grumbling for some time now. So they trooped over to Hotel Empire International on Church Street in Bangalore and demanded Ghee Rotis and Chicken Kebabs at 0330 hrs. For want of the financial muscle that Nikhil and his ilk can flex, the poor kitchen staff at the Empire International are not the ones who can party similarly. So they had done their bit for the night, closed the kitchen, swept the floors etc and had peacefully dozed off. Nikhil of course, would have none of it. He was the C.M.’s son – that gives him the right to kick people out of their sleeps at whatever time he wishes and order Kebabs and Sherbets. So it was that when the Empire staff pleaded helplessness, the Lord Nikhil Gowda decided to teach them a lesson for their insolence. He and his henchmen decided to vent their ire on the furniture and equipments inside the hotel premises and they ran amok. The hotel staff to their credit, showed considerable spine in fighting off the ruffians and in the course of this fight, Nikhil and his cronies, being outnumbered, decided on a quick retreat. Finding that physically they are not up to it, they decided to put their well-oiled connections to use. So the gang went to the nearest Police Station – Cubbon Park and filed a complaint of assault and bodily harm against the Empire hotel staff. And then they decided to get in touch with their underworld friends, whom they carefully groom for such occasions, and pressed them into action. Faced with the might of the professional goondas, the staff at Empire International succumbed this time and could only watch helplessly, as their place was thoroughly ransacked and some of their colleagues were sent to the cleaners. Incensed, their GM – one Mr. Junaiz went over to the same police station and filed a complaint against Nikhil and his cronies. He also claimed that the CCTV at his hotel had recorded the entire incident and this would be the clincher.

If you liked the above story, I guarantee that you will love the parts that will follow.

As expected, this incident created a storm – the Opposition parties conveniently forgot their own track record and lamented that complete breakdown of law and order in the city and decried the C.M. for encouraging his kith and kin to throw their weights around. Our simple living-high thinking C.M. however had a novel explanation for all this – he claimed that his son was not involved in this incident at all and it was all the handiwork of jealous opposition politicians who wanted to vilify him through his family. He lamented the fall in moral standards in politics that enabled some unscrupulous characters to use innocent kids like his sons as pawns for their political gains. Former PM Deve Gowda said that “Boys would always be boys” – as if that explained and condoned everything that had happened.

All this had happened in the morning after the incident. The media hawks would have none of this and ridiculed the C.M. To bolster his case, Kumaraswamy claimed to have overheard a secret conversation in the Assembly a couple of days earlier, in which two politicians were hatching a plot to unseat him through a scandal involving his family. Peculiarly, he claimed to have proof of this conversation – methinks, Kumaraswamy is perhaps one of these James Bond kind fellas, who moves around with tiny radio antennae fixed to his wrist watch, recording clandestine conversations – and more unusually, but in tunes with the recent trend of political dramas, he refused to make it public, saying that he will do so at the opportune time. The Empire International owners were also lent some friendly advice – pronto, Mr. Junaiz issued a press statement that the complaint he had filed in the Cubbon Park P.S. only named unidentified assailants, as in the dark, the hotel staff had not been able to identify the miscreants. The Police Station officials duly agreed with this version of the story. So what happened to the CCTV tapes and all the evidence – we were told that unfortunately the CCTV at the hotel had gone kaput that very week and had thus been rendered useless. How nicely convenient!!

More was to follow the next day. This time, Mr. Junaiz stated categorically that Nikhil Gowda was not involved as he had been a regular customer at the place and had he been involved, all the hotel staff would have instantly recognized him. He stuck to the anonymous goonda theory. The C.M. decided to do his own bit to clear the increasingly murkier air – he said that Nikhil actually had been sleeping in his house, when some of his acquaintances decided to pay him a courtesy call in the middle of a night and dragged him to some party – yeah, the C.M. claimed that his doodh peeta innocent bacha was dragged to a party. Actually, it was conveniently discovered that one of the guys named was somebody called Syed Ehtesham, who had a prior criminal record and also had some Congress connections (C.M. Kumaraswamy is from the rival JD-Secular party) – all fingers were immediately pointed towards him and this guy became the scapegoat. Kumaraswamy claimed that he had been planted by rival conspirators – Nikhil too, lost no time in disowning Ehtesham, claiming that he had not known him at all and they just had some common friends, perhaps. The Hotel staff was roped in to corroborate this story – Junaid claimed that Nikhil Gowda was actually standing outside when the entire melee happened and Ehtesham was actually the villain. It is more dramatic than the average Bollywood potboiler – methinks Junaid and his staff were struck by lightning and they suddenly remembered that the hitherto unnamed guys were Ehtesham and his cronies, while good boy Nikhil was just a mute spectator.

As I write this, public focus has been shifted to Suvarna Karnataka celebrations – Kumaraswamy has decided to don the mantle of guest editor of the Times of India in Bangalore for a day, where he has handpicked articles on subjects close to his heart (as claimed by the newspaperJ) – social justice, equality for all, development of the poor and the trodden etc – you guys know the list.

I? I just love this country. Where else would you get so much entertainment for free??

Good Bye, Andre

In the end, it was a qualifier that got him. It wasn't the walk into sunset that he probably, was looking for. The signs had been portending this, the whole year. He had been limited to a few appearances this season due to sciatica. The old shell outside had not been able to match steps with the sprightly youngster that inhabited its interiors. Going into the last major of the year, he had a negative win-loss record. Many bemoaned the fact that he had lost a golden opportunity to call it a day, the year earlier, when he surprised one and all, with a golden run to the ultimate round. "He should have given up, then....", they shook their heads in dejection, as he trudged on to the net for his final walk off a tennis court.

But giving up has always been an alien concept for Andre Agassi. Few can stake claim to a career graph marked by as many crests and troughs as this American immigrant of Persian ancestry. Of his talent, none had any doubts, since he burst out of Nick Bollettieri's tennis factory at the age of 16; of his temperament and dedication, gadzillions. Over the course of his career, Agassi would not set the tennis world on fire, as his teenage coach had once predicted. 8 majors is the kind of achievements that only the very best can ever hope for, but Agassi was better than many of the very best. He is the only man in the open era to have achieved the distinction of winning all the major slams - a feat unrivalled by even the likes of Bjorn Borg, John McEnroe, Pete Sampras or Ivan Lendl - all titans in their own right.

Andre Agassi literally lived his life through the medium of tennis - it is here that the golden pony-tailed, convention defying Bohemian Agassi would generate hysterical adulation as he trudged on to the field in his purple shorts, blowing kisses to his legion of female fans. He embraced the anti-establishment rebel image completely - wearing colourful dresses at Wimbledon, pushing its strict sartorial boundaries, boasting cheeseburger diets and even endorsing the Canon "Rebel" camera. In fact, he refused to play in the Australian Open for the first 8 years of his pro career and also skipped Wimbledon from 88 to 90. Success would not elude him for long - the 1992 Wimbledon triumph over the eternal pretender to the Wimbledon throne - Goran Ivanisevic - portending many more in the years to come. Indeed, the win in the U.S. Open in 1994 and his debut triumph in the Australian Open in 1995 seemed to put him in the hallowed echelons of tennis history.

But then perhaps, geniuses have a proclivity for self-destruction. A mismatched marriage to Brooke Shields, flamboyant pursuits in modelling, collecting Porsches etc also contributed to his distraction from tennis and his fortunes were further imperiled by unfortunate injuries. His ranking plunged to the 150s and even his die-hard fans were speculating what to write on his sporting cenotaph.

Agassi, however, thought otherwise. He rolled up his sleeves and started from scratch again - I still remember the surprise in the voices of the seasoned tennis commentators as they narrated his efforts in the Challenger series. Andre Agassi playing in the Challenger circuit - that is where you have players like Harsh Mankad, Danai Udomchoke and Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan slug out (if you don't know their names, that is just the point !!). His head shaved, the ear-studs gone, Andre Agassi had re-dedicated his life to tennis and by 1999, one year after that comeback, he had defeated Medvedev in an epic 5-setter to win the French Open and become a member of that elite group to have won all the Slams. He would become World No. 1 - a remarkable comeback by any standards. He would go on to win one more Slam in 2003, maintain a consistent top-10 ranking till 2005, make that memorable run to the 2005 U.S. Open final, re-occupy the No. 1 slot in between to become the oldest player ever to have held that position and consistently defy the pundits by chasing down balls of opponents 15 years younger at times.

He was not the best player of his generation - Pete Sampras had taken care of that. He was not the best behaved - he once spat on a line umpire and in the early part of his career, often took ugly pot-shots against the likes of Sampras. But if there ever is a poll on who was the greatest superstar of tennis in his days, you know whose name will be there on the top.

God's Own Country Indeed

As the aeroplane breaks through the sea of white clouds and starts on its inexorable descent towards Mother Earth, you can’t but help notice the abundance of green all around. A thick green carpet seems to have enveloped the ground only to give way to a sparkling azure spectacle a little way beyond. Welcome to Kerala – my flight is just about to touch ground at Kochi International Airport.

This trip came about a little unexpectedly and a little bit irritatingly to disturb a new rhythm of marital life that had just about managed to hum itself to some level of audibility. My wife was to join office, the day I was told to travel to Munnar. With my marriage just about entering its second nascent week, a trip to a hill-station, could have just been the ideal fuel to propel it to greater heights – unfortunately, I have to travel alone.

Now, apart from those in the South, not many in India have heard of the charms of this exquisite hill-station, tucked into a corner of Kerala, hardly 40 km away from the border it shares with its larger eastern neighbour. And had I not been with Tata Tea, it is unlikely that I would have had an official trip incorporating this wonderful place. But Tata Tea owns many of the tea estates that dot the entire landscape of this place and though estates have become an anathema to most tea companies today, thankfully, the company is still holding on to a few pockets to ensure that some of its newest recruits can still glimpse an idyllic life and landscape.

Kochi International Airport is a private airport, in fact, the first one of its kind in India and I must say that it is a shining example of the virtues of privatization in this country. A beautiful airport and sparkling clean interiors puts me in the right frame of mind, as I scan for banners that would lead me to my driver for a 3 hr trek to the highlands of Munnar.

A head full of jet black hair, embellished with a liberal dose of coconut oil and a toothy grin are the most striking aspects of my driver’s appearance, as I locate him easily from the placard that he is carrying, and he gives me a most interesting name when I ask him – Jacob Rahman, he states proudly, and disappears to fetch the car. A curious combination and I am still contemplating the nature of his ancestors as we speed out of the airport. There are huge cut out posters of some important religious figure from the Syrian Catholic community and churches and temples keep appearing incongruously next to each other to remind one and all, the unique festering ground of a trio of major religions that Kerala is.

Kochi International Airport is actually at Nedumbassery and you are out into the verdant backyards of Kerala soon enough. Men in shirts and white mundus crowded around a tea shop, rows of coconut trees resembling an untiring bunch of eternal sentinels, an occasional mosque or temple rearing its head above the usual profile of thatched houses, green fields in abundance - make up a brightly hued montage as we scream down well-maintained state highways towards the beginnings of the Ghats. We still have some time before we hit the mountains, assures my driver and I decide to take a quick nap to compensate for my early morning flight discomfort.

Unfortunately, when I wake up, we are already into the mountains and I have missed the transition of the plains into the alluring topology of the mountains. The weather has changed considerably and there is a prominent chill in the air. It is still early morning for the mountains – 0930, says my clock – and the mountain is not to be disturbed from its diurnal flirtations with Morpheus. The mist has gathered all around and I can see huge, swirling clouds hovering beneath us and sometimes travelling along with us. Other colours are now rivalling green in catching one’s eye, as we meander through gushing cataracts that pierce through the heart of the hillside creating such a splendid spectacle, that on more than one occasion, I get down from the car to admire nature at its purest best. My driver is more nonchalant; he’s been through this route innumerable number of times, but he is a jolly fellow and puts up with my frequent requests for stops as I pause to either watch nature, or to capture slices of it in my digicam for posterity. The foliage around us gets thicker and the nip in the air gets a little more sting as we continue our climb. Munnar is around 4,500 feet above MSL and at its highest point, reaches nearly a couple of thousand feet more. An occasional climber saunters by during our climb. There is an almost ecstatic feel of languidness in his gait. Settlers in these parts of the world are not accustomed to major changes in their lifestyles almost every second, as us urban slaves. Life, for them, meanders around much more lazily.

Munnar appears on the horizon and the landscape is now dotted with miniature houses and the trappings of civilization. Despite experiencing this on countless other occasions, I never fail to admire the Lego-like quality of cottages and huts, built on the mountains, stacked above each other at different levels. It is difficult to remember that you are here on an official visit and have work to do. I head straight for the tea estates – once upon a time, most of Munnar belonged to the Tatas – that has changed – the Tatas are exiting plantations, but we still retain a couple of tea estates and it is to one of these that I head – Pullivasal. It is going to be my first proper visit to a tea estate – I have earlier passed through a few in the Dooars, on my way to Sikkim, and I am excited.

Tea estates are a complete microcosm of their own. You have to live in one to experience it. It is a different world altogether – a world far removed from the hurly-burly life of the average city dweller. I decide that I shall not be just a casual observer, but get down on to the grounds among the famed shrubs of Camelia Sinensis. The tea estate manager is the undisputed king of his estate – my manager for this estate is a jovial, 6’3” strapping Sikh, who agrees to take me on a ride through the estate on his old Willy. And what a ride it proves to be. Now, the Willy may have faded into oblivion, but on difficult terrains such as these, it is the old faithful to which you must return, if you want to negotiate the crests and troughs in a cost-effective manner. Women with the wicker baskets strapped on to their backs are at their work – much like in other Tata enterprises, the labourers here too, are 2nd or 3rd generation workers in these plantations. The shrubs are spruced once every 2 or 3 years and rows of uniform-height shrubs make for an interesting pastiche.

In the days of yore, the typical planter was to be found on his jeep, surveying the estates, in a hat and half-pants, with a half-smoked cigarette dangling from the corners of his mouth. Post evening, there was not much to do in these sleepy hamlets and a club, like the High Range club, in Munnar, would offer the only respite from tedium. The planter community would meet for an evening of casual socialization, indulging in a round of billiards or squash, while those with a bacchanalian disposition made their way towards the bars for a round of good old whiskey.

Times have changed – the English planters have been replaced with the brown sahibs and they now have a myriad number of options as far as entertainment is concerned. Consequently, the High Range Club in Munnar is no longer a frequent haunt of anybody at all, but the place retains such a unique old-worldly charm, that I couldn’t resist from singing its paeans in print. It is built in the old colonial architectural fashion and as you enter the lounge, you cannot but help notice the beautifully embellished wooden floors, high ceilings and the big hearth, that has unfortunately, fallen into a state of disrepair. A waiter scurries through one of the doors leading out and I notice that he has the elaborate headgear of the British era and a red cummerbund around his impeccable white uniform. I stroll out of the lounge and through a side door into the bar, which proclaims, through a prominent sign, that ladies are not allowed there. I chuckle to myself as I imagine the consequences of the introduction of such rules in today’s modern world. The bar room is a treasure trove of old antiquities of every kind – hides and heads of a huge variety of animals, cover every inch of the wall. Being a non-vegetarian myself, I cannot take any moral high ground on hunting and such stuff and I gape wide-eyed at the monstrous sizes of some of the exhibits. Old sepia-toned photographs show victorious members of different tea estate teams from tournaments played in the 1920s and 30s. Medallions and citations presented across the years create the perfect ambience as I order a Kingfisher Light for myself. I scrutinize the visitor’s log book diligently in between swigs, and am pleasantly surprised to see the names ranging from Lord Mountbatten and Liaquat Ali Khan to M.S. Subbulakshmi and Amitabh Bachhan. A full-course dinner awaits me and soon, it is time to retire to bed.

I step out of the main building on my way to my cottage. It is pitch black outside – even the basketball court, a little way off, is not visible. There is a faint humming from afar – the waiter tells me it is a hoopoe. The hills have retired to an eerie slumber in the backdrop – I look up – the sky is a diamond studded carpet. They are perhaps, smiling from up above. I smile back - there is a beautiful sense of contentment inside.

SEVEN ISLANDS AND A METRO

Mumbai is now my hometown – rather, the address that I fill in the Permanent Address columns of a thousand registration forms – both on paper and in the paperless, virtual world - bear Mumbai as the place to which I am permanently tethered to. It is ironic, because I am the aimless vagrant and less dramatically, because I have never really lived in the city. I have lived here as an itinerant, in the interregnums between the established milestones in my life. But it is Mumbai where my parents are, it is here that I did my post-graduation and made wonderful friends to last a lifetime, started off a new phase of life in my first job post my MBA... consequently, the city awakens in me a keen bout of nostalgia and a fair sense of belongingness.

And it is a city that assaults your senses and challenges the person inside you, irrespective of who you are and what your beliefs are. It is a city that is uniformly loved and loathed, but seldom ignored. Simply because Mumbai does not give you that option. She opens up in front of you and shows her myriad colours, much like a peacock on the dusty Delhi-Jaipur highway and you cannot, but be seeped in into her folds.

Its problems are manifold and well documented. Millions travel to and fro in her local trains – serpentine worms coursing through her belly carrying milliards of eggs inside; passengers packed like sardines. Despite having the country's sturdiest mass transport system, Mumbai is crumbling beneath the weight of her freight. The number of local trains are proving inadequate; the roads are permanently clogged with traffic; the pace of new infrastructure is losing the race to the greater pace of an ever expanding population; the local populace is increasingly being marginalized by outsiders and xenophobic demons are rearing their ugly heads; slums are mushrooming all over, disfiguring the face of the maiden and assaulting the dreams of many who want the city to be Shanghai - but proving resistant to half-hearted attempts at demolitions by politicians who peddle the Shanghai dream and look for votes in these very slums simultaneously, without a trace of the inherent dichotomy; gigantic cement-mixers keep rumbling in like military tanks at Tiananmen and crush the dwellings of migrants who have lived in the outskirts since fleeing from the horrors of partition; the custodians of the law are running amok threatening the encomiums heaped on the city as the safest for the fairest in the country; communal politics is seeping into the veins and the arteries, splitting up people, compartmentalizing them into their own burrows; the Mafia may be down, but is not out yet and newer Chhota Rajans and Dawoods are emerging from the shadows of their notorious predecessors.... the list of woes is long and emasculating.

But like Saladdin, Mumbai manages to survive. She tricks her way past the seemingly insurmountable hurdles, faces up to a few and puts off a fight good enough to push Armageddon away by a few light-years and in most cases, she simply ablactates herself from the issues and allows them to mellow and then die down. And she is adept at the art of survival. She has faced the marauding navies of the Arabians, dodged the cunningness of the Portuguese, stood up to the naked ambitions of the British, stoically borne her barter between Spanish princesses and English monarchs, lived through the loss of her mill lands, endured the activism of Datta Samant, George Fernandes and their smouldering armies of plebeian warriors, picked up the pieces after riots that would have shattered the fabric of her sisters and winked at the virulent diatribes of self-appointed custodians of the local culture.

She has fed all who have come to her for nourishment, refusing to differentiate her sons from those of her sisters. Hordes swim to the El Dorado, ending up on pavements, slums, mujra houses, bars, factories, construction sites. A few amass wealth, some find their dreams fulfilled but countless, faceless others struggle on, but with hope in their hearts. A persecuted community from far-off Persia found her to be their promised land and rose to the pinnacle of their success and fame here and shaped many of the things that we like about her. She has embraced all - from the ancient Kolis, Pathare Prabhus and the East Indians to the new converts known as bhaiyyas. Zoroastrians, Syrian Catholics, Bene Israeli Jews, East Indian Roman Catholics, Bangladeshi immigrants, Sindhis and Gujaratis – they are as much bhoomiputras as the Marathi manoos. She dazzled the Europeans with her grandeur and culture, while providing the restless youth of the country with the ideal grounds for fomenting revolutions to unshackle ourselves from them. She has stood up for her daughters when they were violated and ensured that the law did not drag its feet when it came to handing out punishment. She taught her sons that colour, caste and creed are the vices of the pusillanimous. She nurtured an institution like Bollywood, which continues to be the single most efficacious glue holding our nation together and gave us messiahs like Tendulkar who would embody our national pride like no other. She taught us commerce and trade and put us on the path to economic glory.

She is fraying at the edges now and has seen a fair number of sunsets to acquire that aura of one who has been there, done it all. Newer challenges keep coming up daily. But she has taught her children to tide over them. Sunil More was not spared by the law, the common man refused to be a mute spectator when Uzer Patel went on a ghastly killing spree at the Gateway, strangers helped each other stoically through the worst city floods that Mumbai had ever seen, the more radical of its political parties is getting more inclusive.

It is time to raise a toast to her !!

A month of Magic

"All I know of life, I knew from the football field"
Thus spake Albert Camus.

And football frenzy nears its climax as the World Cup approaches. A fortnight remains and for millions across the globe, football would be the theme that will rule their lives for a month of sheer madness.

Football is by far the most popular game on earth and one which has the maximum number of adherents in the form of nations playing it.

And for those who are enamoured of its diverse charms, ESPN-Star's recent advertisements about the game would seem absolutely germane - Agony & Ecstasy; Celebrations & Catastrophe; Despair & Delight; Victor and the Vanquished - a game of 90 minutes can indeed teach one everything about life and beyond.

Who can forget the tears streaming down the face of that peerless genius Diego Armando Maradona as Germany dethroned the defending champions in Italia '90 , who wouldn't have wept along with Gazza as England contemplated the life beyond, in the same tournament? Roger Milla and his band of merrymen proved that there was skill and entertainment beyond the traditional powerhouses and won millions of hearts in the process. Bebeto chose to share with the whole world his exhilaration at his impending fatherhood and millions opened their arms to embrace his baby. Karl Heinz Rummennigge, in the finals of Mexico 86, showed in a short period of 20 minutes that hard work, discipline and organization can make the seemingly impossible, nearly possible; only to be pipped at the post by the magical skills of the divine Maradona. Michael Owen proved that talent is unstoppable in those magical moments of France '98 with his "Goal of the Tournament", while Senegal made the mighty French eat humble pie with their awe-inspiring run in 2002.

Demigods proved that they too had human frailties - Zico and Roberto Baggio would be etched in our memories for their catastrophic penalty misses, while a generation of football lovers would be haunted by the tragic sight of the proud Oliver Kahn clutching the goalposts, his head hung in despair and his eyelids twitching to contain the inevitable efflux from his eyes, contemplating the fumble that enabled Ronaldo to extinguish German hopes in far-away Tokyo.

Unknown entities have achieved immortality during the course of this tournament - Toto Schillaci may have been an unknown before Italia 90 and indeed, sunk back into oblivion soon after, but his Golden Ball winning efforts in that tournament would give him, his eternal seat in the supreme pantheon. Sami Al Jaber would prove that the Middle East were no middlings when it came to footballing skills, while Davor Suker and Zvonimir Boban would give a fledgling, young country a reason to be proud of themselves.

The veteran and the tyro, the young and the old, the established and the challenger - they all want to be a part of this celebration of football at its highest altar. Not all, would however, make it to Germany 2006 and amongst those, who do, some would bid their fans goodbye at this highest of platforms.

Zinedine Zidane would don the French colours for his last hurrah and the sporting world indeed, would be much poorer without his sublime skills to feast their eyes upon. Wayne Rooney, billed by many, as the inevitable superstar of this edition, races against time to be fit and England must now make plans without their talisman. Dietmar Hamann found that yeoman service counts for nothing when it comes to the greatest stage of football and tearfully announced his retirement on being ignored by former club-mate and current coach Juergen Klinnsmann, while Polish goal-keeper Jerzy Dudek came face to face with the vicissitudes of fortune, when he was surprisingly excluded from the Polish squad, less than a year after taking Liverpool to victory in that titanic Champions' League final. Such is the capricious nature of Dame Luck.

The show must however go on and we wait with bated breath for a month of magic.