1-0 up

It was a super Indian performance that saw them beat England in the 2nd match of the 3 match test series to go 1-0 up after escaping with a fortuitous draw in the first one.


A match in which the Indians didn't hesitate to give back as good as they got (witness Pietersen lying down after just having escaped a Sree Santh beamer).










But some incidents made more news than they should have (witness Zaheer brandishing his bat at the English slip cordon during L'affaire Jelly Bean).








In the end, it was a memorable victory that will go some way in establishing test credibility for this team.

Well done guys!

1993 all over again

"Never has an accused received more public sympathy ...." went Ajay Shukla on today's 9 0'clock news on NDTV 24x7.

Well, happened it has. Sanjay's been sentenced to 6 years R.I. & is already in custody.

I feel sad for the guy. He's seen tremendous ups & downs in his life. This is one more of them.

One thought occurs, why doesn't a politician ever get sentenced like this?

The saddest part though, is that this will probably never see the light of day.

Thought of beating the coming rush at the ATMs that would inevitably happen on the 1st of next month. The one near Friends Fast Food was out of cash.

Trudged to the one under the flyover ..... the place was like an abandoned railway cabin. No power either.

Came home. No electricity. Thought I'd get this done today itself. It's anyway better than sitting at home alone in the dark.

Kept the bag (with the umbrella) at home. Started for the BTM Layout branch. The rain starts.

Remembered Johnny Walker ad, kept walking .... in the rain, in the midst of a cold that refuses to go away. The place was shuttered shut.

Hopping mad now.

Remembered there's another ATM near K.C. Das. Headed for it.

Rain has picked up now.

Reach ATM. Shuttered again.

Head down. Walk back in silence in the rain.

Reach home. Watch videos on the N73 .... for 1.5 hours.

Electricity finally returns at 9 p.m.

4 ATMs, none working. Entire BTM 2nd stage, no electricity. God!

Talent shows

Right now, there are 3 American Idol kind of shows running on TV.

The first is Indian Idol, the bona fide Indian version of the original on Sony.

The second is Zee's Sa Re Ga Ma Pa.

The third is Star's Voice of India.

I've followed Indian Idol since it started, but there has been a perceptible drop in my interest in it over the last 2 weeks or so. The judges' shenanigans are taking too much time & the singers (with the exception of Amit Paul & Emon) aren't doing that well either. And of late, a reverse bias against the guys seems to have cropped up, what with all those voted out till now having been girls.

In contrast, Sa Re Ga Ma Pa seems to have some seriously good singers. The program's presentation could do with a make over, but the essence of the program, the singers, are absolutely on the dot. Besides, the judges Vishal-Shekhar/Bappi Lahiri/Ismail Darbar & Himesh manage to keep things under control as opposed to those in the other two programs who revel in going over the top.

Voice of India doesn't impress me too much.

In the end, it's good to see some Hindi programming on Indian TV that the can hold the male viewer's interest.

Saturday evening

Sittu & me are walking down to the main road, on the way to his favourite egg-roll shop. It's 10 o'clock-ish (p.m., that is) & we're near the temple when a commotion near where the lane joins the main road is spotted. Two heavy set, short men are apparently pushing each other around, but sounds of what seems like slaps can also be heard.

We pause behind a red Maruti Swift parked nearby. Three guys come running toward us & a mention of 'police station' is heard. The guys are now running past us with one of 'em peering under the eyes of another. He soon shouts out, "rokto beriye gechche!" to the 3rd guy running ahead of them. They keep on running toward where the police station is.

The auto driver (with whom they were having fisticuffs with) starts his vehicle & takes off like an F1 driver on pole position.

Sittu & me proceed to cross the road & get to the egg-roll shop before it closes.

Seth visits

Amit Seth came over in the evening today. Must have been seeing the guy after about 8-9 months. He was onsite to Irvine, California for about 3 months & returned a month back.

Shared a lot of insight into the Golden State & the immigrant experience in America today. A lot of it did not make for good listening. But a lot else did. He also got to visit the City of Sin.

Lucky guy.

Soon Soumya came over with an unnamed friend of his. And Sittu arrived 15 minutes later. A full-house it was this evening.

Jason Bourne & John Rambo

My favourite movie character returns next month ....



.... and my one time favourite movie character returns next year.



2 great movie franchises. 2 hard hitting sequels.

Should be good.

Even Kapil agrees with me. See?

Saved by the rain

OK, this is one time when I've followed the rain instead of the cricket.

The occasion is the 1st test on India's tour of England. The match was tantalisingly poised on the 5th day with India needing to get 380 while England needed to knock off the 7 remaining Indian wickets.

Laxman & Dhoni soldiered on gamely but the same old Indian batting collapse ensued & just when the last wicket remained between England & victory .... guess what .... the rain intervened! I've never seen India getting saved by the rain (although I've seen others escape this way), so this was a first.

The final few moments as reported by cricinfo were thus ....

6.20 pm Well that's it. The match has been called off. England have been denied by the rain, India have been let off the hook, it's a draw. Lots of relieved faces in the Indian dressing-room.

6.18 pm The umpires have taken a look at the conditions, they walked out with their umbrellas so it's still raining. We've been informed that they've gone to have a chat with the two captains. You'll have more news as soon as I do ...

6.10 pm Still no change in the weather at Lord's. "It's raining," says Sid V. "Some wild celebrations in the Nursery End of the ground. A Monday crowd getting their money's worth." The Indian contingent no doubt.

5.55 pm Status quo at Lord's. If conditions don't improve, the match will be called off at 6.30 pm. That's in a little over 30 minutes.

The final scoreline:

England 298 & 282
India 201 & 282/9

Down with the cold :-(

Ne-Yo's video 'Because Of You' shows him using my mobile!

Knowing how hip-hop stars tend to make use of the latest & the most expensive, that does make a statement, even if I say so myself ;-)

European GP

The race started amidst heavy rain & the red flag was out before the 3rd lap got over. Several skid-outs including Hamilton. Let's see what happens after the restart.

EDIT: Alonso finished first after a great overtaking manoeuver over Ferrari's Massa 5 laps before the finish. Hamilton finished out of the points.

Here's the video of Alonso's overtake, courtesy YouTube.

So tall .....

I'd been following its progress since last year, and this Saturday night, the Burj Dubai finally overtook Taipei 101 to become the tallest building in the world.

Dubai's doing it.

India's first woman President is here.

Jaguar - a Tata product?

As if Bajaj's interest in Ducati & Triumph wasn't news big enough, it is now being reported that Tata is looking seriously at buying Land Rover & Jaguar (no less!) from wallowing-in-losses Ford.

And yes, the Yanks are aware.

Picked-Up!

Until now, in the name of decent pick ups Indians had a 'pick' of this ....

.... the Mahindra Bolero Pik-Up, or this ....

.... the Tata 207 DI.

Not anymore.

You see, Mahindra's come out with this ....

.... the Scorpio Getaway.

And Tata's come up with this ....

.... the Tata Xenon.

Within days of each other.

Kewl!

Jolly appears to have got over his armed forces fixation for good & is willing to look at the corporate world more benignly now.

Meanwhile, all URLs containing the word 'blog' have been blocked at the office. Cheapskates. This company is becoming another TCS. Arni says those people have limits on the number of printouts they can take daily!

Hamara Ducati?

According to this piece of news, Hamara Bajaj is planning a big European acquisition.

And by big, the Big B means really big ..... as in Ducati or Triumph!

God works in strange ways.

There comes a time, once every few years, or perhaps once in a lifetime, when one has to pause, look around, look behind & look into the future. Think of all that has gone by, what could have been & what is. Ponder, contemplate & reassess.

Was it worth it? Will it be worth it? Did I do justice to myself & my abilities? Were expectations, mine & others', lived up to?

It could have been better ..... but then, it could have been a lot worse.

Will this be it or can the game be raised to another level? What if it is? What's wrong with how it is now?

The mind boggles ..... the questioner is the best answerer. Or is he?

Roger & Me

Michael Moore's first. Very impressive & hard hitting.

I love this guy's way of putting across points with solid proof, especially the part where the scenes of the family's eviction are interspersed with Roger's Christmas Eve speech about the dignity of the individual.

Plus the fact that this documentary is related to cars touched a chord.

America isn't the land of milk & honey that most of us Indians believe. And I admire the way guys like Moore are allowed to hold up the mirror to that country.

It's been 2 years of Applying Thought.

C2 is mobile

Sittu became the proud owner of a black TVS Apache RTR 160 today.

Hell, five years later I'll be writing the same thing ..... it's just that I'll have to replace owner by father & black TVS Apache RTR 160 by baby boy/baby girl. Heh!

Missile time

Some very interesting news has been emanating from the Indian defence establishment since yesterday.

Apparently India's nuclear triad is now complete or at least, the capability has been acquired.

Plus, there's news of DRDO going in for a full fledged ICBM with a range of 6000 km.

If true, this development surely ranks next only to Pokhran I and II. Let's hope it is.

We live in interesting times.

British GP

Hamilton gets pole & McLaren looks all set to win another this year. But Ferrari puts in some awesome strategy to put Raikkonen in front after his final pit stop. The Finn wins his 12th race & Ferrari earn a well deserved victory.

Alonso brings in second for McLaren with Hamilton finishing on the podium yet again with third. A very interesting race.

Junoon

End of the work day on Friday & I was in a good mood. Come home; switch on the TV & Friday evening serendipity is complete with this ..... Abhijeet Sawant's latest, Junoon.


It appears that he (or Sony BMG, or both) has taken a conscious decision to go in for a reinvention of his image.

India's first Indian Idol could so far be seen in all kinds of videos that appealed to the gum-chewing, teenybopper, girlie crowd that bought his albums in droves. The songs were designed for mass-appeal & the guy justifiably went on to reach great success & popularity.

Cut to now, & what do we see? A stark, brooding number filled with introspective lyrics amplified by the desolate visuals of Ladakh where the video's been shot. Plus, there is a perceptible change in his voice which now sounds like a cross between those of Mika & Gary Lawyer! I'm anxious to know who the music composer is.

Amazing as that may sound, the end results are very impressive. A pop-rock sound, lyrics that aren't half as inane as those on his first album & a smashing video to boot. If this is the change that Indian non-film music needs to get it out of the present rut it's in, then I'm all for it.

All new Hayabusa

The latest Hayabusa is here.

A 1.3 liter engine producing 200 bhp! You gotta hand it to the Japs!

Well done!

It was a tough ask & when I'd gone to sleep with India needing 149 to win against the Proteas on a very seamer friendly wicket, I hadn't given them much of a chance.

But morning brought a pleasant surprise because India 152 for 4 (Yuvraj 61*) beat South Africa 148 for 7 (Kemp 61, Gibbs 56) by 6 wickets, thereby taking the 3 match series 2-1.

Here's the bulletin & a special word for Yuvi. Nice!

Now this IS unbelievable!

French GP

A Ferrari 1-2. Hamilton provides the saving grace for McLaren with 3rd. Alonso had a tough race finishing down at 7th.

Good show by Ferrari under pressure.

Anand marte nahin ....

All these years later, this scene still makes my hair stand on end.