The Commonwealth Games - As I Would Remember Them

October 14, 2010

The Closing Ceremony of the 19th Commonwealth Games. That the Games took place at all could be considered a success given all the negative hype which was surrounding it. It may have been many things to many, but this is what I would remember the Games for (my perspective maybe quite limited because I am sitting in Mumbai while everything went on in Delhi)

• The pre game fiasco. Not on time, things collapsing, dirty, atheletes withdrawing, corruption everywhere, even the theme song. As a public relations disaster dont think there have been many on this scale.
• Then came the opening ceremony. In my opinion the perfect showcase of India. And this went a long way in removing most of the earlier fears. The closing ceremony was a bit off a letdown though except for the marching band (Or maybe my expectations were much higher).
• The crowds. We always do things in extreme. Either the attendance was poor or there were complaints from atheletes getting distracted by the noise from the crowds.
• The joy of getting to sing the national anthem many times.
• The two hockey matches. India-Pakistan & India-England semi-finals. Awesome atmosphere and fantastic performance from the team (that we received a thrashing in the final is a different matter)
• The 4X400m womens' relay team winning the gold. And the noise was well unbelievable. And this had to happen almost simulataneously with the hockey semi-finals.
• Sushil Kumar's wrestling bouts. He came, saw and conquered. As simple as that. Winning a semi-final bout in just 9 seconds. No fuss.
• Paramjeet Samota winning boxing gold. Somehow I saw all his bouts live.
• Archery finals. Saw them both. Dipika Kumari's perfect 10-10-10. The men's medals ceremony was alongwith Sachin Tendulkar hitting his 14,000th Test run.
• Attempting to understand Lawn Bowls. Now this was one weird game. Though seemed fit for people of all ages.
• The India-England ding dong battle for the 2nd spot. Saina Nehwal won what could be considered the most important badminton match in history to win gold and take India ahead of England on the last day.
• There was a theme song made by A R Rahman specially for the Games. I think a modified Jai Ho would have been the better choice. Anyways Jai Ho was the song which played more often.
• Overall India achieved its target of 100 medals and overall 2nd spot. A better reflection of how much India has improved in the sports arena will come in the next month's Guangzhou's Asian Games.

As an aside, the Commonwealth Games also managed to distract attention from the Ayodhya judgement. We should be thankful for a safe games. And hope this increased awareness continues to give good results in the future.

And now that the Games are over, its time to nail all the jokers who almost turned this into a huge fiasco.

Time to nail the corrupt.

The Games Have Begun

The spectacular opening cenremony for the Commonwealth Games have shown once again the power of the last minute work. There were fears that the games may not take off at all, nothing was ready. Once the ceremony had begun, all such fears proved to be unfounded. The old philosophy of doing the waork at the very last minute prevailed.

Here are my thoughts on the opening ceremony.

1. The show looked good, or rather would have looked better if not for DD's coverage. The show began live and turned out to be deffered live as ad breaks came in between. Other "breaking news" & twitter were far ahead of the "Live Telecast".

2. The highlights of the program was definetely the aerostat (blimp's big brother).

3. The march past of the atheletes. Here is a confession.Apart from Bindra I had not heard of even a single flag bearer before. The cheers when Pakistan marched in was, well, amusing. We love to hate them. And it was a great feeling to see the huge Indian contingent march in. England's Nehru coats were also interesting, as were the Kiwi's angavatrams.

4. Speech time. Kalmadi booed. President, Prime Minister & Prince Charles - nobody cared. Huge cheers for India, Sheila Dixit & APJ Abdul Kalam. Couldnt have been a better popularity index for our leaders. It was nice of kalmadi to mention Atal Behari Vajpayee in his speech though.

5. Gandhi, Indian Railways, Folk Dances, the many drums, the tiny tabla player, Hariharan's welcome song and Rehman's Jai Ho to finish it. It was a perfect showcase of India without trying to Bollywoodize it.

In the end the Games got off to a rousing start. Twitter & Facebook timelines also suggested the same. Lets hope for a fantastic games as well (on the field).

P.S. In the euphoria of the spectacular opening ceremony, lets not forget all the corruption scandals. The guilty better be punished.

Ayodhya

The Ayodhya verdict is slated to come out tomorrow, 24th September. Things are already tensed up as the verdict is awaited. I have faint memories of the Babri Masjid demolition in Decembe, 1992. And the understanding of the situation at the time was even fainter.

The controversy had simple origins. There was a mosque in Ayodhya, standing for at least a few centuries. However it was claimed that it was situated on the very site of an existing Ram temple. Some people wanted the temple to be built back at the very spot. Now these are controversies in which the matter of people's beliefs comes in. Facts get merged with mythology. And to be honest there is no clear cut response. There was a massive agitation. The BJP became a political force leading this. Rath Yatra, Kar Sewa were the terms which hit the headlines. The atmosphere was really tensed up. On December 6, 1992, the masjid was demolished in the agitation. Riots followed in the aftermath across the country. There were commissions of enquiry. But as is the usual case, no results

Since then the whole situation is stuck in a limbo, which somehow seems to be the ideal situation for this kind of controversy. Let time take over and the matter may get buried. I mean whats the point of raking up the matter again in trying to find a solution when solution is not going to be accepted by all parties. Court rulings cannot decide on matters of faith involving millions of people.

P.S. The Commonwealth Games fiasco has done one good thing. Most of the media focus is on the Games mess. Otherwise our 24X7 news channels would have been harping on the verdict, creating more unrest and uncertainty.

Engineer's Day

Take a look at the picture above.

An optimist will say - "The glass is half full".

A pessimist will say - "The glass is half empty".

Whereas an engineer will say - "The glass is 2 times the required capacity".

Happy Engineer's Day to all engineers

- From an ex-engineer.

Rain Rain Go Away

Sometime back in a not too distant past, I had wished for rains. My wish got fulifilled. And I celebrated the occasion with a post dedicated to rain songs. I had heard of rain dances (e.g. Ted Moseby in HIMYM) and rain songs (e.g. Tansen's Raag Megh Malhar) to start the rains. Did not know that a blog post could have a similar effect. It now September and its still raining. And I am tired and bored of it. Now just wondering, are there any methods to stop the rains (it can shift to the other parts of the world if required). I know of a nursery rhyme though. Not sure if it will work.

Rain Rain Go Away

Come Again Another Day

Little Johnny Wants to Play

Rain Rain Go To Spain

Never Show Your Face Again.

Ok the last bit can be deleted. Why make the Spaniards suffer. And it should definiteley show its face again.

Oxymoronic Feeling

Jobless in Overtime

Now can anything beat this depth of oxymoronic feeling @#$%^&

India @ 63

Tomorrow is Independence Day. This time August 15th being a Sunday it does not give the usual holiday feeling also. And continuing with a tradition which I started in 2007, its time for my annual review of all things India. Or rather what happened in India as I saw and remember it. (Previous editions are here: 2007, 2008, 2009)

The last year was bad. Thats the easiest way to describe it. From the Naxal/Maoist problem, Telengana issue, Inflation, Foreign policy fiascos specially with reagrds to Pakistan. Railway accidents, Monsoons, to the Commonwealth Games fiasco, nothing went really right. Somehow get the feeling that the country is getting increasingly misgoverned. I had more hopes from UPA-2, given that it was free of some of its allies. But the government has been disappointing. And worse than the government is the opposition. And with no elections around the corner, this has led to a scenario where the government is highly stable and still not doing anything.

The worst memory of the year would be the massacre of the CRPF forces in Dantewada. The country is effectively at civil war which somehow people refuse to acknowledge, and most dont care about. And the less said about the intellectuals supporting the Naxal cause, the better.

The business scenario is doing fine irrespective of all this. We got a new national symbol. The rupee symbol does look good.

On the sports front, cricket rules. The team is now no. 1 in Tests. IPL had its big scandal. Other sports are messed up as usual. Hockey India elected an 83 year old lady as its head, before sports ministry derecognised it. There was an incresed awareness about hockey with India hosting the World Cup. But havent heard anything about the team since then. In football, our loyalties are divided between Argentina & Brazil in the World Cup with India no where in the picture. Individual sportspersons provided some joy. Saina Nehwal without doubt is the sports person of the year. Vijender was ranked no. 1 in boxing. While Leander Paes is still going strong in doubles tennis. Rohan Bopanna's partnership with Aisam Qureishi has also been noticed. Tejaswani Sawant won a Shooting World Championship.

As for movies, it was the year of 3 Idiots. Music front was ok but nothing really memorable.

Television continued to scare. News channels seem to have gone worse. Reality shows are becoming increasingly unreal. Movies & Sports (when they dont show WWE) are the only channels worth watching left.

On the social networking front, Twitter ruled. With more and more celebs joining twitter, there were a few controversies (led to the resignation of a union minister), fake ids etc. There were some dedicated reporters whose job description seemed to be noting what celebs said on twitter.

So this in short was the year that went by for the country.In fact I am myself surprised that I could not put in positive thoughts in this post. (maybe i should be thankful that there was no repeat of the 26/11 incidents).

Praying for a much better & positive post next year.

P.S. read somewhere that I should be thankful that I am free enough to be able to post this unlike some other nations.

Just Wondering

The world is saying Thank God Its Friday while me is saying "हे भगवान्, अभी फ्रायडे ही है!" The angst of working (correction - going to office) for 6 days a week. Sitting all alone in a conference room, which is getting colder with every passing moment, waiting for a meeting to end in the next room, cant help but wonder

"Am I going to get bored to death or will I freeze to death?"

Not sure which is worse.

The Weather Forecast

Weather forecasters are a much maligned lot. Nobody says that they are ever right. When they are right, nobody notices. When they are wrong, everybody does. Yet the profession has still survived. And people do check the weather forecasts. 

Mumbai residents though do not need any weather forecaster. They can safely say, "It will rain the moment I step out on to the road". (during the months of June to August).

Here is a picture of a weather forecasting stone in England (found this via a forwarded mail)

The Language of India

A little conversation today made me wonder what is really the language of India.

I was approaching Raghuleela Mall (Vashi, Navi Mumbai) when I was stopped by a lady in an auto.

Lady: "Excuse me, is this the Inorbit Mall?"

Me: "No, Inorbit is on the other side." (while pointing towards the general direction)

Lady: "Thanks"

Now, there is nothing much said here. But the entire conversation was carried out in English, not Hindi nor Marathi. Two Indians in India holding a random conversation asking for directions in a foreign language. Just made me wonder "Is English now becoming the preferred language for general communication in India.?"