Brand Value vs Cricket

IPL 2.0 has been full of action - both ON and OFF the field; On the field because of some hard-hitting, tight bowling and some "not-so-good" fielding and Off the field because of Mr. fakeiplplayer, "seedhi baat : clear hai" ad-s and media hype. To be true IPL2.0 did not start off on a very good note - opening ceremony was shady, matches weren't interesting and so on. At that time the only interesting thing was the controversies of KKR and fakeiplplayer. Gradually the tempo was generated and we had a few nail-biting last ball finishes ( some which went beyind the last ball as well ).



For me though ( being an ardent KKR fan ), IPL2.0 has been a major disappointment. What buchanan has done to the team reminds me of a similar scenario, when Greg Chappell took over as the coach of the Indian cricket team. Coincidentally, both the times Ganguly was on the receiving end. What was more disheartening was that a novice like McCullum was taking over KKR's captaincy. Not only that, Dada was also sent down the order. Well, I would like to meet Bhookha-naan one day and kick his bloody @$%........ let us not digress from the topic.



Most of us would be up-to-date with the latest happenings of IPL2.0. People from WB must be following fakeiplplayer and the greatbong. But, what I saw yesterday made me wonder whether IPL2.0 was really about cricket ( budding young players meeting experienced customers ), or was it more of an business idea - the long unnecessary strategic breaks might have answered my question. Yesterday I saw a person selling almost duplicates of IPL jerseys - the addition was that CSK had a picture of Dhoni, MI had one of Sachin, but the one and only KKR had the picture of ...... ( any guesses ) ..... SRK. I mean come on, even people selling jerseys on the streets have ironically shown out what kind of business has been going on in KKR. Since the entertainment value is so high, I would not like to comment on IPL as a whole, but KKR has been a base for business oriented and dirty politics. I will agree to the fact that the performance of the team as well as the players has been dismal; but when the owner is a narcissist, coach is a dictator, captain a disappointment and players, rebels - you don't call that a TEAM.

KKR has been a joke this time which is evident from the fact that other teams are weighing their chances ( to reach the semis ) if they still have one more encounter with Kolkata.



P.S. Everyone is writing about IPL2.0: I thought I might as well give a shot at it. Please click on the images to see the larger picture ;-).

Marco's Bike

DISCLAIMER :- Any character portrayed in this post is purely coincidental and do not bear any resemblance to people living or dead.


How important was the day when you bought your own 2-Wheeler - very memorable, isn't it ? Well I was ecstatic; but the moments of joy and happiness were confined to my soul self.

A bike company once asked its target audience "To Live Off the EDGE". Marco, who had been living on the edge for sometime now was certainly interested in getting one of those.

Here I present to you a small incident in the life of Marco. Marco ( fond of fish ;-) ) did not have previous experience of driving a 2-wheeler. One fine morning, Marco's parents come to know that he has decided to buy the bike. Worried as they were, this came as news to me and all his friends. Be it lunch-table discussion, coffee breaks, whatever, Marco was the center of discussion, or rather Marco and his bike were the major points of discussion.

Now since I was in the same city as Marco was, I decided to take a ride on this 150cc bike. Initially, he used to come to meet us "not" on his bike: his reasons being a minor/major malfunction in the vehicle, or his roommate has it. But, when this became a regular excuse all of us started having doubts ......... well there were a few very genuine and wierd doubts - i'll keep that to myself.

Nobody in my friend circle had seen his bike; and very recently I have come to know that he has sold it off. There goes our source of Entertainment....
The mystery still remains whether Marco really had a vehicle, or was he just Living Off The Edge.

Yo-Yo Bhookha Naan :-)

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1090425/jsp/entertainment/story_10871443.jsp

Reflections of a wandering mind...........

If you looked back on your life, what would you remember ?

Has this thought ever crossed your mind ? Interesting question isn't it ? What if I add to it by asking what would be the first thing that would come to your mind ?

First of all it is difficult to imagine a situation which will compel you to look back into your life. Even if you do your subconscious mind takes you into a world of your own; you tend to think what has been in your mind for a while.

Think of a situation where your life is coming to an end. When you now go into a flashback mode what will you remember ?
I am giving you a few options. I hope I will get an answer to this question.

1)Family ( any member in particular )
2)Better Half / spouse / girlfriend / boyfriend
3)Your corporate powerplays / walk up the corporate ladder
4)any life changing incident ( do describe the incident )
5)your favourite possession
6)money you earned
7)any regrets
8)unfulfilled dreams
9)food
10)Others....please specify

I hope you will take some time off from your busy schedule and answer this question. Please leave a comment how do you want to Reclaim Your Life.
I will update this post as and when I get comments.




P.S. - Inspired by Tata Safari Dicor advertisement.

Random......

Random - what does this word mean ?
According to http://www.dictionary.com "random" means 'proceeding, made, or occurring without definite aim, reason, or pattern'. So I can also call it aimless.

What does "blog" mean ? Dictionary says 'an online diary; a personal chronological log of thoughts published on a Web page; also called Weblog, Web log'. The word chronological determines that it is an arrangement / order of events. My personal idea was that a blog is an online diary where you can opine.

Now you must be thinking what is the context; or is this one of my other "DADA-isms" - not really.
I have started blogging recently and am an ardent follower of a few blogs ( written by my teachers, friends and relatives ).
Coincidentally, three of them who are regular bloggers have the name "RANDOM" attached to their blogs. I presume its coincidence as they created their blogs without each others' influence.

What initially baffled me was how the three of the "very-recent" bloggers had the random keyword in their blog. But as I kept on pondering I started getting into micro-management. "How can a blog be random ?" was the first question that came to my mind. If you arrange your assorted thoughts what you get is a coherent idea. Of all the blogs I have read, none seemed aimless; in fact they all portrayed the perception of the author. When you tend to blog what do you do - do you think of the title first and then describe it, or do you get a chain of thoughts and you tend to confine it within certain boundaries to suit your opinion. But, in both the cases you are trying to capture your thoughts and defining them into your perception.

"Randomness" is endless, so how do you define your chain of thoughts as random........is a question I am still asking myself.


Have my "random thoughts" compelled me to play a "random stroke" ? Whatever it was it will certainly create some "random noise"..........




P.S. Credit goes to Shobhit, Supriya and Avik who's blog I follow very diligently :-)

Are you going to finish strong ?

I got this link to one of the most inspiring videos I have seen off late from Vaibhav, and I could not stop myself from writing about it.

Here's the link : http://www.maniacworld.com/are-you-going-to-finish-strong.html

This person called Nick Vujicic starts off with a few jokes about his missing limbs and arms and the deliberately falls down. He asks a question to the audience how he should get up. Gradually his tone becomes serious and he asks the people in front that whether he should stop trying to get up.

What happens next is something you need to watch to get the feel of it. It reminded me of the story of the spider who tries to build its web, but every time falls down for some reason; but, it never stops and climbs up again and again till the cob-web is finished.

Something to really ponder upon........

Things to DO !!

The title is mainly dedicated to the movie Dasvidaniya. A subtle and sensitive drama with some sparkling performance by Vinay Pathak. The depiction of the common man (or the living machine) who, bogged down by his same old routine, subdued by his boring life, lives life based on his "Things to do" list every single day. His life takes a U-Turn when he comes to know that he has very limited time in the world left and suddenly realizes that he has so much to do. He regains his long-lost vigour and starts to live life with a renewed enthusiasm and spirit.

Well that's the story in a nut-shell. If you read between the lines, this small drama of a common man has so much more to tell. It mainly highlights the 'perspective' in which you see life. To this man, life was a routine before he realizes its worth, and later becomes beautiful dream. His priorities had changed with a list of "TODO's" that he had forgotten his own existence, but he gradually understands how to realize his dream.

Somehow, while watching the movie, I found a cogent similarity with the character being portrayed in the movie, not in his look or the way he dresses, not in his eating and drinking habits, not in his profession, not even in his sense of humour, but in his "list-making" ability. I am a person who likes to make a list of most of the things I do and then tick them off. Since they are mostly short term, it often gives you a gr8 feeling at the end of the day to see all the tasks getting struck off. Well you might have a question, what if..............what if the tasks are not done at the end of the day, either due to unavoidable circumstances or otherwise. For all those who have seen Dasvidaniya, or know me well, you are correct, start the next day with a new list and feed these as your backlog. This ultimately leads to procrastination and in the long process ignorance.

I mentioned the movie to point out a very poignant perspective towards life. I am not trying to say that making list is bad. It is not fake and certainly not a waste of time. In other words you may call it "Micro-Planning". In fact, I was motivated to make a fresh list now - a list which might just go a bit offbeat; a list which might be made with a single stroke of the pen, but struck off after a few years of perseverance; a list to bring a smile to your face; a list to point out your aim in life; a list to INSPIRE.

"If you do not DREAM, you will never come to know what lies beyond your DREAM !!"

DADA - As I know Him.

"Ganguly can have his Kolkata mansion, billions of rupees, 111 Tests and 7000-odd runs and counting, and the record as India's most successful Test captain … his biggest accomplishment has been getting up the noses of a team that succeeded in getting up the noses of everyone else - Australia." - The Sydney Herald.

With a century in his 1st innings and a "golden" duck in his last, a fairy tale career came to an end today, a career full of ups and downs, a career with peaks and falls, a career with controversies and praises, a career with fightbacks and comebacks, the career of one of India's most successful captain. People, hoping for a dream ending expected dada to leave the cricketing field with a bang, but that was not to be. He left rather meekly scoring a duck of the first ball he faced; well as some might say, even Sir Donald Bradman had a duck to his name of his last innings, and that too not a golden one :-).

As far as I can remember, it was someime in June,1996; West Bengal was talking only about one thing "Banglar Gaurav, Amader Sourav"; which means Sourav is the pride of Bengal. Well that was the day when DADA had scored his maiden test century on debut, and from then onwards there was no looking back. India had found one of its gems and West Bengal, its talisman, its true son of the soil. We have Cricketers from different states who play together as one nation, but a prominent cricketer from the "cricket-crazy" state was the answer to the prayers of the people from the land of Eden-Gardens.

I come from a staunch bengali family, and when Sourav came to the cricketing forefront my dad and uncles were all praises for him. I was the one who could point out his mistakes, but how can you beat obsession. I grew up watching dada play and for me there was hope even after Sachin. The chants "Banglar Gaurav, Amader Sourav" again came up in the year 2000 when dada was selected as the captain of the India cricket team. Cricket is a religion in India, and at that time in Kolkata, Cricket had become something more than a religion. His aggressive approach to the game, no-fear attitude and shrewd captaincy led India to the World Cup 2003 finals. But, slowly the responsibility of captaincy started affecting his batting form, and after a number of controversies ( major being the chapell-ganguly row ) he was stripped off his captaincy which ultimately led to him being dropped from the team. But, the world did not come to an end after this. He continued to perform in the domestic circuit and was determined to return to international cricket. He was recalled in the ICC Champions trophy 2006 and what a comeback it was. He inspired the players with his "never-say-quit" mantra, his perseverance and his sheer desire to play cricket.

Today ( 10th November,2008 ) was his last day and what a memorable day it was. Exactly 8 years ago on the same day Dada had begun his tenure as the captain of India. Dhoni gave Ganguly a chance to make the same day, 8 years later, more memorable by offering him to lead the team for 5 overs ( as a farewell gift ). That was a fabulous gesture on Dhoni's part. India finally managed to wrap up the series 2-0 and the Prince of Kolkata ended his career on a winning note.

Ganguly made valuable conributions to his last series and when asked about the last match, this is what he had to say - "I was disappointed with the 85 I got. I was so close to getting a hundred. That was more disappointing than the first-ball duck".

Ganguly had made his decision to retire before the series started, but today, when the feeling dawned upon me that this is officially dada's last day, the feeling didn't sink in. I still could not believe that dada had announced his retirement from international cricket. He was the topic of discussion at any public place back home, coffee joints, pubs, bars, marriage parties, rallies, get togethers, even durga puja pandals............ suddenly everything seems to have faded into the oblivion. Everything seems to be a dream, a sad reality - the end of an ERA. Miss You DADA and Thank You for all that you have done to Indian Cricket.

"At the start of the millennium, Ganguly started the journey to "raise Indian cricket's profile overseas". For 10 minutes this afternoon just before a famous triumph was clinched, the past and future were intertwined. In so many ways, Dhoni is the best man to carry forward the Ganguly flame. These could well be the best of times. " - Cricinfo

Nandi Hills

Right from the moment I had landed in Bangalore I had heard about Nandi Hills; and a lot of stories along with it as well. Stories like, the sunrise is awesome, the place is scary at night as the nearby place is dacoit infected, the best part is the journey on bikes to the place at night and reaching right before sunrise and what not.

Well for the past 6 months I along with my friends have been trying to plan a trip to Nandi Hills on bikes but every time our plan turned out to be a failure.
But, finally on 5th of April, 11 Roadies on bikes set out for their long "planned" trip; and this was possible because this time we didn't plan (irony I presume).
Nobody knew the way, only heard that its a straight road. After a tiring week every one was tired but the desire to realize our plan and the tempting 80 km bike ride at night helped us overcome every barrier and any kind of hesitance.

The ride was awesome, empty roads ( which you seldom see in bangalore ) ,6 bikes and weekend. The only strange so called obstacles in our way were huge mountain like speed-breakers which gave a few of the bikers a momentary feeling of flying (literally) on their bikes.

Though we just missed the sunrise, the ride was awesome to cover the loss. The view from there was awesome and the feeling of the morning breeze was too good and refreshing.
But the journey back was equally tiring, especially when we entered bangalore. Though that day we spent the whole morning sleeping, but the previous night was worth the effort......

CONFUSED

Its been quite sometime I have been wanting to do "SOMETHING" which is different; different from what i do in normal day to day life. My main motive being to get rid of the stereotyped way of living life.

I enjoyed my college life to the fullest and came to bangalore with renewed vigour, pumped up enthusiasm, new ideas and lots of plans in my mind. I had sort of fantasized that job life would be a lot different and to make it interesting I will have to add the extra bit of spice and walk the extra mile.

Life here started with lots of excitement; New place , new job, new lifestyle; everything was new and so very different. I was earning, enjoying the freedom which I had just found and simultaneously thinking of ways to utilize my leisure time for some useful and productive work. To cut a long story short "Add Value to my Life".

For the first couple of months everything was new and exciting, but as time progressed life became pretty much like a computer program which goes into an infinite loop. After having exploring the "interesting" places of bangalore, having seen all the overpriced and uninteresting movies every weekend, having visited all the pubs I didnt find anything else worthwhile to do....and my huge appetite made me into a glutton and in the process i started becoming obese.

I was slowly becoming a lazy goose; in fact an obese and lazy goose. It was high time I did something different to please myself, so that every night before going to sleep when I would reflect upon what i had done that day.....I would always have something valuable to tell my conscience.

So I decided to start off by doing what I really like. Since childhood I always wanted to learn a professional dance style. I decided to make this dream come true and started off by joining dance classes and learning the Latin style. I intentionally took the weekday classes to keep my weekends free and believe me life became different. It was not only a dream come true, it actually acted as a stress buster. There have been inumerous times when I came back from the office in a wild and sour mood, but that one hour of foot-tapping swung ur mood by 180 degrees.

Now after having engaged my weekdays; I find that weekends are still free and that is the time when often I find myself going out and doing something which is not stereotype. And herein comes the confusion. Right now on pondering upon what to do I find most of the things are restricted to staying back at home and utilizing your time; not by staring at the "idiot-box", but say by grabbing a book, writing a blog, sketching or maybe sleeping. That sure makes me relaxed and through books and articles I can see the world in a nutshell. "But I want to do something different ! " - this is the same thing that I keep on hearing in the back of my mind and i am yet to figure out "WHAT !!!".