Draw a tie

 This Sunday turned out to be quiet an action packed day for Indians in general and for most Bangaloreans in particular. The build up to the India vs England match was marked with interventions from something or someone divine, not sure it was god or the devil(read Mandira Bedi). For one, the match got shifted from Eden Gardens to Chinnaswami. Saurav Ganguly continued to be under the opinion that the match could have very well happened in Kolkotta, so be it that the players of both the teams would have had to adjust a tiny bit and share dressing rooms. That kind of inconvenience he believed was acceptable, especially when the crowd of chota king smoking bengalis would  be out in larger numbers than in Bangalore resulting in the match being more action packed with Smoke Bombs and Water Guns instead of the traditional Lati charge that prevailed here.

 Those who were lucky like the local MLA's third wife's second cousin or stupid like Venkatesh to pay for the tickets through his nose, got to watch what would be equivalent to watching the "divya jothi" at Shabarimalai. They got to see the god, also called Sachin Tendulkar sometimes, perform magic once again, only to go for the mid innings break wondering what had just passed. Did they really see what they saw or did the just imagine the ball flying all over the park like the thousands of devotees do every year at Shabarimalai.

 The lesser fortunate, who didn't get their hands on tickets and were not at the end of a swinging lati got to watch the match in crowded bars. Only a few of them did get to watch the match while most had to satisfy themselves watching heads of the others. All of them however, in the hope of getting drinks had to avoid getting molested as the crowds that had gathered in such bars could have put the mumbai local to shame.

 By the time the second innings came mid way, everyone had mellowed down into a drunk stupor, some of them because of the alcohol, but most of them having early bouts of Monday morning blues. Come batting power play, not only did the Indian team came into spirit, so did the spirited individuals. Among the chats of "Bolo bharat mata ki Jai" and "Dhoni, Zindabaad" there were other more interesting slogans like "Soda, lemon, ginger-pop, I want Deepika Padukone on the top" as she glared on the screen biting Siddhart Mallyas nails(she didnt want to do hers as they had been pedicured specially for the match) and some subdued slogans of "Baath koli na denga" when Grame Swan came to bat also made rounds.

 The bar owners broke coconuts in the name of Shane Warne as the match turned out to be a tie. They were thankful that India didn't lose and therefore their mugs and bottles didn't get a chance to break. They were more thankful that India did not win and they could hold back stocks which could be sold after the Budget.

 Bangalore seemed to sleep early with only a hand full of losers who had gotten out of the stadium early with the expectation of an Indian loss but were too late to enter any bar within the prescribed closure timings of the city who were found singing "Oops I did it again".

close encounter with the opener

 Waiting for something in anticipation is always much better than the real thing.

 Its been a week since the world cup has started. One India match out of the way too, brilliant   batting  performance by the Delhi boys, though the match in itself lacked any real match feeling. However much the Indian players have to say about Bangladesh (revenge and all that), Bangladesh still seems like a school team who seem to practice with a tennis ball in the nets. It was a simple win, a match in which I slept through the second innings, primarily because of abuse of beer during the first.

 Still our players are injured in all over the place. Knees of Sachin and Shewag are in question, and so has Zaheers manhood(He seems to have a niggling groin from time immemorial). Nehra and Srisanth are as usual, injured in their brains. The way Indians are getting the advantage,  making sure all their games being played at home, I don't think it is surprising if ICC would allow Indian team to play in the practice match format - 15 member team for India.


 There has been lots of other action apart from the highly media-fied Indian team. NZ beat the shit out of Kenya and Ricky Pointing beat the shit out of a poor unsuspecting LCD TV. With the "aatakku untu lekkakke illa(There for the game, not for the count)" teams finishing off their matches in a hurry, the World Cup 2011 promises much more action in the coming days.

 Now that the India England match has moved from Kolkotta to Bangalore,  my absence in the stadium will hence be blamed on the ticket prices than as previously planned, the lack of good India matches in Bangalore.

 The practice is on from my end. Got the setup-box for my TV. Warming up my body for this Sunday. Have made a mental note not to consume the beer during the first innings. Would love to use KP as the make shift opener for the bottles.

 May the best team win. India of course.

Chai - na

Some time in 2017, the the world came to being dominated by Asia, especially India and China. Every other country in the world was either part of these two countries or supported  them.

 China had been trying hard to take over the country of India, waging a series of infiltrations in what would later be called the third world war. It was in these times came to power General Chi Thu, a small army general who had about 5000 soldiers under him. He had risen to the rank of a General with in two years of joining the army. This non formally educated boy had grown up in the mountains and, from a very young age had a sharp eye for solving problems. He joined the army and took over a small platoon on the unfortunate death of the platoon commander on one of the infiltrations on Arunachal Pradesh. He soon became a General and was given the primary duty of planning and strategic take over of India.

 He came up with this genius plan of taking over India, not in the usual way the wars are fought. He targeted Bangalore, which by then had become such a populous and rich city that it controlled all of the South India and had even over taken Delhi in population. Bangalore was so huge in terms of importance that, when Mumbai was destroyed in a stray attack by Pakistan before they, who ironically got destroyed by USA in 2014, Bollywood was moved to the then biggest IT power in the world. The people in Bangalore had become so busy that no one was cooking at their homes. Needless to say, the food industry was the most thriving business in Bangalore. This is what General Chi Thu saw as an opportunity which he thought he could exploit.

 He planned slowly flood every restaurant in Bangalore with his men. These smartly trained chinki cooks/terrorists would join as laborers doing mostly cooking but other random jobs. Soon each and every restaurant would have at least one chinki. On one planned day, they would poison every soul in Bangalore and take control of the city. That give them control of South India and then they would attack Indistan( after the US-PAK-EGYPT-SL war, India and Pak got merged of course) from both the sides.

 I believe the process of flooding our food industries with chinkies has already started. Beware Bangaloreans! Beware of that chinki server/cook at your favorite restaurant.

Cat – os – Trophy - 1

 One slightly rainy evening, I was separated from my mother and my two siblings. I must have been about a month and a half old. That sounds like that is the beginning of a horrible story of a poor cat who got separated from family and faced to live a treacherous life. But for cats, thats alright. There is no such thing as a family and friends in our worlds. We are born. We live to eat and eat to live - which ever comes our way. We hump like dogs. Like animals. Its our cycle of life.

 I was placed in a card board box and was brought to what I have started calling home now. I lead a fairly luxurious life. I get fed almost regularly, mostly dried cat food which I love profusely. I have a room for myself with large windows. I love it because I have enough space on the edge of the window where I can sit and look out of the window. There is so much happening outside but that hardly impacts me. Its a nice life us home cats get to live.

 I was given a sand box for the first couple of days. Those were the days I was getting adjusted to the new environment and new food habits. Obviously, I had some bowel issues and finally on my third evening there, I took the biggest dump of my life. Stinked big time. The very next day I got a proper cat litter. I am beginning to believe that action speaks louder than words. It would help if they let the bathroom door opened.

 "They" are mad people. I live with this guy and girl who brought me to this place that rainy evening. The guy is alright. He seems pretty useless. He sits in front of the computer or TV most of the time doing random stuff. He does not seem to have much of a job. He gets to do most of the kitchen jobs. I think he is a sad looser. But he is alright. He feeds me well when he feeds me. Clears up all the mess I create. If he is my assigned care taker, I should fight for a better one.

 That girl is a little crazy. From the time I got here, she has used a hundred names to call me. I think she is going through an identity crisis. She talks to all the plants in the house too. Giving them names. She however loves to flaunt me around. I love attention. She usually has people over who just want to come to meet me. It pisses me off though that she calls me by a different name every time. It is what is confusing. Am not always sure is she is calling me or some plant or ant in the house.

 I have a donkey to play with. He has grown to be my best friend so far. He is pretty dumb and seems to be physically handicapped or something. He expects me carry him around everywhere I go. I usually oblige only because he is my best friend. He hardly talks too. I think he cant really speak. Poor donkey.


 To be continued...

cutting

 Sometimes in life, one faces strange situations. When A has decided on achieving something and after having fought with oneself in the head about how difficult it is to actually achieve it, A is determined to achieve it, he comes across people B, C etc who are determined to make sure A does not do it. Its at these times when a true hero stands out from a normal person. A true hero never succumbs to pressure. I did.

 The current pollution levels in the city and my age and phase of life had prompted me to take a strange but off-beat decision. Grow long hair. It was going to be my last chance to grow long hair. Any prolonged wait would have resulted in failure because of the receding hairline issues of middle aged men and deviation from the age-appearence-social-acceptence rules. So a determined me started on a journey of growing unmanageable curly hair long a couple of months ago. The journey didn't last that long.

 Every person I met for the past few weeks had made it a point to mention my hairdo. Its nice to be noticed and all. Some even liked it but then there were others who ended up calling us(me and the hair) names. Some who met me regularly had even plotted plans to make sure that we had parted. My mom (a post graduate is Science I must admit) even induced fear in me (a BE) saying people with "bad mouths" could say something bad at my hair and that would result in bad energy coming my way eventually resulting in some harm for me.

 Thats it! Its over. I give up. When you fail, you not only let yourself down, but also a few who have supported you through it. Sucks but such is life!

9 days to go

The country is going to be under productive for the next couple of months. World Cup 2011 followed by IPL4. Hurray!

 I am a sucker for cheap publicity stunts. And nothing captures our imagination as much as cricket and Bollywood does. Everything about cricket and Bollywood is worth reading about. Despite of the spectrum of scams hogging our country, I get a kick out of a "Bhajji slapped Srisanth" or "Kareena kissed Shaid" stories. I know I should be ashamed but ah! what the heck... To behave in tune with the core of my personality, I would rather watch a cricket match or a film awards ceremony than watch Burkha and Rajdeep spit shit. Its Star Sports on my Sony Bravia hence forth.


 The current Bollywood and cricket "heroes" seem to have vague but vital similarities. This is possibly due to the rise of both platforms of entertainment around about the same time (or at least they have been there since I, as a two year old first could make out whats what). Its interesting when one draws loose parallels.

 Gavaskar could be an Amitab Bachhan - They say they have done lots of good work... but I couldn't care less.. The less I see them, the better I feel.

 Yuvi is like Akshay - There is a lot of hope and the end of it there is always a let down. A few(read very very few) glimpses of classes in the process.

 Srisanth = Sallu - More fart than actual shit types

 Raina = Hritik | Kholi = Abhay Deol | Bhajji = Paresh Raval | Siddhu = Bobby Darling and such.

 Which brings us to another interesting observation. I happened to watch Ajay Devagan on KWK the other day - Not really good looking; at least not conventionally. Came with a bang in a few action packed roles. Few awesome performances in the way. Settled into a comfortable place in business. Cool. Calm. Knows there is shit around. Knows how to deal with it. Knows how to handle media. No one is really a fan but would not mind watching him over the other jokers. Just like Dhoni on so many levels. I hope he can get us the cup. At least for Sachin's sake.

 Was trying to figure out a parallel for our beloved Sachin. But he is god and all isn't he? The true son of the country. Like Lord Ganesha. Or Chota Bheem may be

take me home kantri road

I am not really a morning person. Definitely not a Monday morning person. I hate the fact I cannot stay in bed and let my dreams take control of life. Monday plays spoil sport every week. Fuck Mondays.

I have gotten used to the traffic here. If one lives and works with the same company with considerable commitment to either of them, one ends up taking the same route day after day, between mostly constant points on the map and surely enough, one soon finds that perfect time of the day to commute with at least a perception that, that time of the day has streets that are least traffic infested (though that may not actually be true). Anyway, now that I don't "commute" to much per say to work(20 mins on my worst day; if I am not working from home ie - beat that suckers!) I don't really mind the traffic after all.

Its the time between entering the office gate and the time I first check my email that I find the most depressing. This involves

1. Parking

2. Elevator ride

3. Machine launch

Offices these days have way too many cars. The previous statement is the highly mellowed down version of the truth. So irrespective of the number of spots of parking available, there are always more cars. This is the case with at least me and a few hundred miserable people like me who work in my building. An average driver would take about 12 minutes from the gate to find a spot and park it satisfactorily between the given yellow lines. This would vary depending on the time of the day of entrance to the parking lot and weather or not you are stuck behind a not so average driver. Two wheelers are a little less unfortunate. I mostly fit into this category these days.

Thank god there are elevators. Taking the stairs from -2 to 6 is not something I would prefer to do any day of the year, certainly not on a Monday morning. But what irritates me about them are the bugged algorithms that run in the ones in my building and the people who use them to climb up or down 1 floor. I usually end up spending as much time waiting for a lift as I spend traveling on one owing to the aforementioned two reasons. This being an average of my combined experience with elevators in general, though a lot of the sample points are taken from my current employers building. My twitter page today reads, #ifihadagun I would shoot people who use the elevator between 1 2 floors. You who use the life between single floors, you are worse than traffic rules offenders. Shame on you.

The world of technology has advanced so much that visiting the moon is no longer a dream. It still is a dream to turn on a computer and not waiting for it to boot. Every computer I have turned on in my life (over a span of 18 years) has been a computer which takes close to 5 minutes before it can start accepting human instructions. These 5 minutes after having walked to ones seat exchanging strange "Monday morning blues" looks with co-employees present and sitting in the seat trying to look like one is making oneself comfortable always seems an eternity. Launch of mail client, chat clients and other necessary software required to progress in one's day takes as much time.

That's a good 30 mins on an average from the gate to my first instruction to my computer. What a waste of time. I will work from home tomorrow