Bullet for your Valentine...

Nostalgia perforates my memory as I remember that last hypnotic dance of my blessed teens .A smattering of cards on an exquisite platter in an otherwise doleful bed room , the delectable clink of steel on china ,a faint rumble of those crisp October leaves .Hold on….Things are probably getting a bit too effusive for one’s liking. That’s what reading, rather drooling over those schmaltzy ‘Love in the time of Cholera ‘lines can do to you. And somewhere down the line, in the god forsaken, now overly mawkish fragments of my heart, I feel pervasive empathy for those testosterone charged individuals whose heart skips a beat whenever the slushy topic of the Waves Ball crops up.

In American society, snobbish as it may sound, balls are remarkably fashionable affairs with one grandiloquent hostess and an eclectic congregation of people.  High school proms though are more to do with what we call ‘sophomoric’ love, that indispensable part of our adolescence. Be it your confidante, next door neighbor, the girl you see everyday by the nearby cafe or your beloved inamorata, prom nights are sure to give you regular bouts of insomnia. Dance balls can also be ridiculously clandestine affairs. It’s almost a case of an overflow of juvenile adrenaline. People are seen speaking in hushed tones in desolate places, Man United aficionados seamlessly ranting on phones to their gawky Gabriellas even while Berbatov scores a scorcher for the Red Devils, not to forget those gallons of text messages that flow between two surging hearts.

Last Waves the prom caused quite a stir with costumes flying over from Panjim followed by a gripping craze to learn the nuances of Waltz accompanied by remarkably ‘absorbing’ tales of acceptance and rejection. And on those lines , we should expect a more animated gathering this time around .Amidst all the sardonic pleasure that people derive taking digs at the Waves Ball (writer included),one thing has to be acknowledged .It does serve an elegant prologue to an absolutely frenetic three days.

 Whenever some one mentions about the ball, my encephalon sifts through half fading pictures of ballerinas, forgotten ballads of Tennyson and cranky numbers of a raucous Welsh heavy metal band  ‘Bullet for my Valentine’.  Heavy metal doesn’t quite go with the rather somber and mushy tones of a ball .But it isn’t a bad pick up line to ask somebody out. Is it? 


(Published in the BITS Herald dated Oct 15 ,2010)

The Cup of Life...

The pulse is riveting, the air pregnant with expectations and the experience should be exhilarating.

Yes, the cup of life is back. It’s been an exquisitely painful wait and the Cup of deliverance is at hand. For weeks, the world has been twittering anxiously, the English (for a change) more involved in the team’s tactics rather than unraveling intricacies of metatarsals ,Kolkata panwallas ready to debate the merits of 4-3-3 and even the most tenacious of housewives taking time off from their tea-parties to understand the offside rule. .The World Cup pushes at the margins of madness in the obsession it incites, in the extremes of elation and despair it provokes .Fans meanwhile will be forced to produce a dexterity  that will send the likes of Messi dizzy ,at once juggling time zones , job ,children, wife and goal differences.

The world cup has been a mesmerizing spectacle, just not because of the exalted quality of soccer that will be exhibited, but this is the paragonal pinnacle of the word’s most popular game. Coaches will reverse tactics, chew fingernails and exhale smoke from quite a few orifices, most notably their ears .They will pray to their Gods for the absence of injury, wonder if the only way to stop Messi, Rooney or Robben is to hire a hitman. Moreover, this is a chance for the always grief stricken and delusional Africa to shine on the global stage. Officials will blithely go on about world peace stating football must do what politicians have failed to do. But if soccer’s role must not be overestimated, neither should it be undervalued. In the Ivory Coast, a country torn to shreds by the atrocities of racial and ethnic discrimination, the team has become an unifying symbol and even if differences are temporarily mowed down, football has played its part.

Soccer appeals to all; a game elemental yet complicated, seducing both novice and expert. The game has a distinctive aura of rhythm, flair and music attached to it….attacks gradually elegantly building up and swirling into a crescendo. While Messi is the singular proof of football’s beauty as a sport , its players like Rooney who make you stand and applaud for their indomitable spirit and unflinching desire.

In the World Cup, every nation silhouettes its dreams on the canvas of global expectations. We have waited and waited, watched as teams chopped and changed, regurgitated old rivalries, argued Maradona and Pele, wondered if Africa will reach the finals and even had a bet if there will be a Spain-Brazil final.

And now, its time to stop the talking. Lets play.

Aamsutra.....

Recollect staggering along the undulating village roads with your pals and finding yourselves jobless .The first thing in the mind would be rush to the nearest mango tree and hurl a few pebbles at the irresistible looking fruits . One or two would certainly yield to our efforts and fall down(lets discount Newton and gravity for sometime ,please).And then the glory of savoring the fruit was no less than accomplishing any herculean real life act.

If you have had no such experience, I’m afraid but you might not have appreciated the blissful act mango eating really is. Although products like mazaa ,fruity and flavoured icecreams have made the Maharaja of Indian fruits, the aam literally commonplace ,but they have truly undermined the delightful act mango eating should be .While it comes naturally to children and even monkeys for that matter, for the greater part of the evolved Indian community this delectable act has been reduced to a mere inanity. Although the ladies of the British Raj were loathe to consume the fruits in the privacy of their bathroom, mangoes and privacy seldom go together .The fun is paramount when a group of friends partake this feast. Ask the village-wale bhaiyyas and they will tell you that using knives upon the mango or trying to suppress slurping or any other ‘refined gestures’ are bad manners. Talk of any sort of moderation and you kill the pure joy of mango eating.

While eating,any attempt to prevent one’s clothes from tasting the nectary pulp is a strict no-no. Yes, yes , ”daag ache hain” .This holds true for mango eating than any other activity. And last but not the least, the most important commandment of mango morality says that all mangoes, procured by whatever means, are kosher .Therefore when someone offers the fruit ,it is sacrilegious to ask its source. Unfortunately the world is teeming with too many street smart people. To them ,there is only one reply. ” Janaab, aam khaiye, ped mat giniye ”

Did he really deserve it?

This is an article I had written last semester .But I decided to put it up for the sole reason that the man in question is arguably the most important man in the world today. Not only has he changed the face of hope as the messiah in the radiant lexicon of international politics,but has more importantly, changed the way we look at the most powerful nation in the world .But has he delivered the goods as yet? Or is it just the remarkably synergistic promise that lures us into believing in the man?On Oct 9,2009 Barack Hussein Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize after just eight and a half months at the White House. Did the Nobel Prize committee award the prize more out of awe for the enormous promise that Obama beholds rather than recognition of concrete achievement?It was worth viewing the whole affair from both sides of the spectrum.............

View:

In an era of renewed multilateralism, President Obama embodies the new spirit of dialogue and engagement on the world's biggest problems: climate change, nuclear disarmament and a wide range of peace and security challenges.
The peace prize came as an implicit condemnation of Mr. Bush’s presidency. And countering the ill will Mr. Bush created around the world is one of Mr. Obama’s great achievements in less than nine months in office. And another is Mr. Obama’s willingness to respect and work with other nations . Bolstering America’s global standing by renouncing torture, this time with credibility, he has pledged to close the prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba; rejoined the effort to combat climate change and to eradicate the world of nuclear weapons; and recommitted himself to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; and offered to engage Iran while also insisting that it abandons its nuclear ambitions. While he has made an excellent start on climate change with new regulations that finally begin to grapple with carbon emissions, the United States has to lead the way to a global agreement.
Mr. Obama did not seek the prize. It is a reminder of the extraordinarily high expectations for any American president — and does bring into sharp focus all that he has left to do to make the world and this country, safer. Americans elected Mr. Obama because they wanted him to restore American values and leadership — and because they believed he could. The Nobel Prize, and the broad endorsement that followed, shows how many people around the world want the same thing. And his words in Oslo on receiving the Nobel Prize accentuate this opinion. "Throughout history, the Nobel Peace Prize has not just been used to honor specific achievement; it's also been used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes," Obama said. "And that is why I will accept this award as a call to action — a call for all nations to confront the common challenges of the 21st century."

Counter View :

Giving the Peace Prize to the president so soon in his term embarrasses him and diminishes the honor.

After receiving the Nobel Prize before he had completed even a year in office, Obama managed to be both abashed and appreciative in his response. But no amount of self-effacing spin can obscure the oddity of this decision. Obama’s escalating image as the new prophet of world politics may have just been enough for the Nobel committee in draping the peacemaker’s mantle on the shoulders of a president who is presiding over two distant wars and who may soon send as many as 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan.
Obama was cited for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."  Yes, he has reached out to adversaries. Yes, he delivered an admirable speech in Cairo in which he called for "a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world." Yes, he has called for a world without nuclear weapons. But all of these initiatives are, to use a polite word, aspirational.
By contrast, other political leaders have received the prize for real accomplishments .Be it Woodrow Wilson for the foundation of League of Nations or Jimmy Carter for his role in the Camp David agreement. It's hard to escape the impression that Obama was honored because he is so different from George W. Bush .And his dynamic image does signify America’s return in the hearts of people around the world. That's an admirable trait, but it doesn't entitle him to a distinction Alfred Nobel said should be conferred on "the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses." And somewhere down the line we suspect that Obama would agree.

Simply TENDULKAResque...................

I was born roughly two years after Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar made his test debut.Right through my childhood,time and time again,just like one billion Indians ,I have been enthralled by the opus of this seemingly peerless five feet run-conjurer. Just turn the clock by 19 years and I witness the ultimate ODI innings ,this time not at the tranquil environs of my home but a more delirious hostel common room which sends the country into reverberating paraoxysms of elation .Having been a cricket fanatic all my life i just had to pen down my adoration for an individual,who continues to mesmerise timelessly....
Suresh Menon, an Indian cricket writer of repute, had covered Tendulkar’s first tour, in Pakistan in 1989, where he had watched him being hit on the mouth by Waqar Younis — and battle on regardless — and strike Abdul Qadir for several straight sixes. His abiding memory of that tour was of a peculiar complaint of the team manager, the old Indian cricketer, Chandu Borde. Borde had been assigned a hotel room immediately under Tendulkar’s,and had been woken up at dawn each day by the boy knocking practice balls on the floor of his room.
Nevertheless the intensity of the Tendulkar cult in India is about much more than just cricket. In the words of cultural author Mike Marquesse,Tendulkar has always found himself at the epicentre of a rapidly evolving popular culture shaped by the intertwined growth of a consumerist middle class and an increasingly aggressive form of national identity. National aspirations are poured by millions into his every performance. It's a tribute to his strength of personality that he has somehow risen above the swirling incompetence ,the straitjacket of corruption engulfing him and a parasitical media craving for blasphemous sensationalism.

Like Tendulkar, Roger Federer and Tiger Woods(Don't intertwine infidelity with excellence) dominate their chosen sports both statistically and stylistically, and like Tendulkar they are a source of joy to fans of every stripe.Jordan, Woods and Federer may cross more boundaries, but nowhere do their performances carry the weight of expectation that Tendulkar's carry in India (and among the Indian diaspora). Nowhere are they the focus of the kind of fervour that greets Tendulkar when he strides to the crease at Wankhede, Eden Gardens, or the Chidambaram stadium.The above photograph of 8-year olds forming a 200 at school in tribute to Tendulkar's double ton at Gwalior accentuates the essence of our pride in him being an Indian......

Sometimes you can only feel a peculiar sense of sympathy for the other great batsmen of this generation.I was having one of those rare chats with dad the other day and we did agree for once.We discussed whether Ponting was to Tendulkar what Walter Hammond had once been to Don Bradman; a truly great batsman forever condemned by the accident of birth to live (and play) in the shadow of an even greater one.
Like Roger Federer and Tiger Woods, Sachin Tendulkar dominates his sport comprehensively, but unlike them he is the sole focus of an entire nation and its quest for identity.For lovers of sport like me,watching Tendulkar play is so much more....... for it brings with it an unadulterated joy, a joy that transcends human barriers of culture and location,a joy that bears no cultural or nationalist overtones,a joy as someone aptly said is so intimately personal,yet so transparently universal .........

PS: Ayaz Memon writes what I truly view as the definition of Tendulkar's greatness:

If Tendulkar were to retire tomorrow, a long queue of the game's greatest batsmen would await him near the dressing room: Hammond, Hobbs, Hutton, the three Ws, Richards, Gavaskar, Dravid, Sehwag, Ponting, Lara, Chappell, Miandad, et al. And at the head of this queue would be Bradman, first to shake his hand and say, "Gosh you little bonzer, I would have loved to play an innings like that!"

Taking the plunge......

From the teeming buzz of Cuttack to the surreal tranquility of Goa.....from the exuberant school boy to the naive engineering entrepreneur....Life has traversed quite a circle-with some perplexing summers,some sombre autumns ,some whimsical winters and of course not to forget the rejuvenating vernals .Yet the essence of words continues to mesmerise... ......Writing has always been a riveting pastime.Even finding a Parker pen in my dad's drawer as a kid felt like discovering the celebrated sword of King Arthur... Delving deep into the frustum of words has always been a sempiternally arousing passion .And the insatiable need to express emotions in words to a wide diaspora of netizens meant that the amateur ambitious writer inside me had to take a plunge into the world of blogging......