Two decades of a master

(Article dedicated to the biggest icon in the world of cricket)

It was in the winter of 89, when a curly haired 16 year old boy made into the headlines in India, when he played a test series against Pakistan in Pakistan. 20 years later, he is still around, although past his glory days but still he is the best among the lot. Yes, it is Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar, a name synonymous to cricket in entire India. As they say, Cricket is a religion in India and Tendulkar is God. I feel gifted to have witnessed this guy's heroics in last 20 years. 

Over the last 20 years he has remained the same guy, although his game has gone under some change. He is the same shy guy, who is so humble. There is no arrogance in what-so-ever he does/speaks on the field or off the field. In this era of "breaking & faking" news, he has provided the news for all right reasons & never for any kind of gossips. Kudos.

Here are some of his performances/incidents which is difficult for me to forget even in my dreams:

• He was just 16 year old, probably playing his first one day match (although it was an unofficial exhibition match). He hoisted Abdul Qadir (who at that time was one of the leg spin greats) for 3 sixes in a single over. Wow, it was the first impact of Tendulkar on me.
  
• Tendulkar getting hit by a bouncer in the nose & bleeding profusely & walking back without any expression of shock/angry/pain. He was just 16 years then & the Pak legend Imran asked his bowlers to target Tendulkar with bouncers to scare him off. 
• Little later, back in Newzealand, Tendulkar was on 80 not out in a test match, on day 1. He just needed another 20 runs next day to become the youngest ever cricket player in the history of Cricket to score a century. I almost had a sleepless night that day & woke up early morning to find out that Tendulkar was out for 88. Oh what a disappointment.
• The first test ton in England, when he was around 17 years. Amazing, I still remember those radio commentary when he scored the first century. It was just the beginning. I have had the opportunity to cherish more than 85 such instances in last two decades.
• Some years later, back in Newzealand again, Tendulkar changed the name of the game. Those were the days when a 50 run made out of 80 balls was very respectable score in a one day match. In one particular match, Tendulkar decided to open the innings & scored 84 runs from 48 balls. Wow, the commentators were going crazy, this was something they had never seen & never thought it as a possibility. 
• Kolkotta, 1993. SA touring India. SA needed 4 runs to win with One over to spare. Tendulkar bowled a magical last over to give India an unimaginable win.
• Tendulkar going back to England soon after his father's death to play in the world cup & come up with a Century. It was almost like a Pete-Sampras once winning Wimbeldon crying through the match.
• Best players reserve the best play against the best teams. Tendulkar has never let a chance to outplay Aussies, be it in India, be it in Dubai (those two consecutive centuries back to back), be in Aussie itself. 
• Just imagine, Tendulkar has played with greats like Kapil for a long time and now he is playing with players who were just born when he entered into international cricket. No wonder he is called the Grandpa of cricket now.

I can go on, on & on. There are also critics of Tendulkar, but it has made him only stronger. Let there be more critics, let Tendulkar become even more strong and let him play for many more years to come, which the ardent fans like me will enjoy. He is truly once a generation player & I want to watch him play many more times. Thank you Tendulkar for all your magic.

The "Missed" call

With almost everyone having atleast one mobile phone, getting in touch with each other is very easy. Just give your friend or family members a call on their mobile or just send an SMS. At the same time, there are many many innovative ways evolving in communicating with each other. With many operators having a " per minute" billing, people started communicating with each other without making a call OR sending an SMS. Just use a beautiful feature called - "missed call". There are many use cases of this "missed call":

• One "missed call" indicates you are waiting near a particular place, two missed calls indicate a different place so on.
• Give a missed call so that other party will call you back :-) Way to save your money.
• Give umpteen number of missed calls to annoy someone, if you are really angry with that person.

This whole "missed call" business is so huge that some people are already "expecting" the phones to indicate them if they just got a "missed call" OR they really missed an intended call. Uh..

Just today, I came across a totally different use case for this missed call. When I called up to get the replacement cylinder for our LPG, the lady at the counter asked me to just give a "missed call" to a particular mobile number. I just followed her instruction and I got an automated SMS thanking me that I've used their "Missed call based booking system" and the LPG cylinder will be delivered soon. Just wondering if by mistake I give a missed call to this number, then what happens? And how do I cancel the request? Giving two missed calls? Ah, talk about the use & misuse of technology.

Poorvi's Birthday

October 31st is Poorvi's birthday. We are getting ready to celebrate her birthday. Its going to be a small party at home, with all Poorvi's near & dear friends. Poorvi is already looking forward to this day eagerly and has started the count down. For her, it is a day full of love, getting all the attention & getting pampered. 

As we grow older, our birthdays are limited to the cursory wishes either on SMS or on facebook :-) The real joy of this special day is when you are really young, when you get so many surprises - either in the form of some special food or in the form of gift, with all love & care from parents & friends.

Poorvi is getting a special gift this time from us. It is a all-new looking her own bedroom with special bed & study table alongwith bookshelf. Room is also painted new & Poorvi is all excited about her new room, just waiting to show it off to her friends on Saturday. :-) It was almost a month long effort to look for proper furniture, catching hold of painter, getting the furniture fixed etc. Finally it was all ready yesterday night & Poorvi in fact has already started using her new study table for completing her homework. 

I hope Poorvi will have all the fun on her birthday & we are all looking forward to a great day too on October 31st.

Nice little place

We were in Indiranagar over last weekend, trying to find some cot & bookshelf for Poorvi. It was a nice evening, entire Indiranagar looked like sleeping (deepavali day, may be people were really sleeping after a sumptuous meal). After we visited a place called - "Kids Kouch" (a nice place, will probably write a blog later on this), we wanted to get a good coffee & some light snacks. As the roads were completely empty, we just went around in the car to look out for a good place to have evening snacks. As we drove down on 12th main in HAL 2nd stage, we happen to pass by a lovely home which had the board "Daddy's Deli Cafe & restaurant". We went in to check the place. Ambience was just good for the evening, to sit in their front garden & sip coffee. We ordered Mawa cake, Bombay Bhel, Coffee & Masala Chai. All the items were very well made. We were quite impressed with the Mocha cake & ice cream accompanying the same. I tried their filter coffee, which was really good. Overall, we did not expect a great deal, but were thrilled to get such good stuff. This is the charm of Indiranagar & some other places in Bangalore like Koramangala & Ulsoor. There are so many small yet good places hidden in the residential area. A big bungalow in these locality are transformed into nice hang-out place.

Daddy's Deli also have a Parsi restaurant in the first floor. We will probably go back to them sometime to try their authentic Parsi food. Anyone game for it? :-)

If you happen to be in Indiranagar & want to try out a good place for snacks/meal, visit "Daddy's Deli", you will not regret. Average price for snacks/coffee per person would be around 100 Rs. They have all-day breakfast menu, which costs around 200 Rs/head.

Address:

Daddy's Deli, Executive Inn, 3289, 12th Main,HAL 2nd Stage,Indiranagar, Bangalore-38

Directions : 

If you are coming from Airport road on 100 Ft road, take a first left turn after BBQ nation, go straight for about 1.5 to 2 Kms, you will get 12th main road, take a right turn, go for about 500 mts. This place is on the right side of the road.

Chikmagalur - Driving on the edge

(Article dedicated to the jeep driver who did a fantastic job in taking us to safety in those trying conditions)

We are all back (in one piece) from an adventurous trip to Chikmagalur. For the entire part of this trip, we did not see Sun even for one single minute. Most of the time it was raining heavily. Other times, it was still raining, may not be so heavily. The whole place was completely covered with fog throughout the day, making it hard for us to guess the time. Added to this, the whole place was filled with so many leeches, making us difficult to venture out.

A nice cottage at "Nature Nirvana" (see picture-2) was our home for 3 days. This place is about 35 Kms from Chikmagalur, amidst a 250 acre coffee

plantation. For the first day of the trip, we just sat in the room, enjoying the view around the estate & playing cards. How long can we sit like this, especially on vacation. So, we decided to venture out on the second day (after having lunch) to "Mullayana Giri" (highest peak in Karnataka). This turned out to be one of the worst decision & one of the most adventurous part of the trip.

When we reached the peak, it was around 5 in the evening & conditions were already challenging. Whole place covered with fog, wind blowing at around 30 to 40 KMph. Poorvi & Abhay could not even get down from the jeep. Kummi, Veena & Amar decided to climb those 450 odd steps in these conditions. They had to hold each other and climb, as the wind was so strong. While sitting inside the jeep here alongwith Poorvi & Abhay, I thought this was the most adventurous part, but soon I was proved wrong.

We started our journey back to the resort & soon we realized what a deep trouble we were in. It was dark, completely foggy, hard to see the road ahead, add to this the narrow road in Ghat section, with deep valley on one side. Muddy road, occassional rains did not help our cause either. Our driver switched on the lights of the jeep only to realize that the conditions are much worse if lights were on. Light was getting reflected back & he could not even see even 1 meter ahead. So, what is the solution? Turn off the light & drive!!! Wow, what an idea. Imagine doing this stunt in complete dark in that ghat section, in a jeep that does not have wiper!!! For few minutes, I could not even realize what was going on & I was in shock to speak anything. This drive continued for about 5 to 6 Kms. I was so scared that I had to ultimately ask the driver to stop the vehicle. Driver was calm, he said that he had been driving on the same roads for past 45 years & he knows each turn by heart. Wow, that was really something, but even then what if he missed one turn? What if a vehicles comes from opposite direction? I really had to leave rest everything to fate & kept on praying for the driver to take correct turns at the right moment at the right place. After another one hour of this torture, finally he took us safely to our cottage. Uh, what a relief. I cannot forget this drive for rest of my life.

Some more pictures from this trip below:

This was a small waterfall in "Nature Nirvana".

Mullayana Giri Peak, Steps to the temple is somewhere at the front of those cars parked.

Single tree braving the wind & fog. In the background of this tree is a deep valley, covered with fog completely.

English Memsab

This post is to capture some of the lighter moments of Poorvi, when she was trying to speak in English in her own way. This is not to ridicule or make fun of her good & bold attempts in English speaking, but just for some good laugh. I know, within few years from now, she will be correcting mistakes in my English & will have a much better vocabulary than I do for sure. Already she corrects the mistakes which is very common for us Kannadigas/South Indians (like M pronounced as "Yum" and not "em", X pronounced as "Yucks" rather than as "ex", "coast" pronounced as "coa-SH-t", "west" as "We-SH-t" and sometime almost sounding like "Wa-SH-te"). Poorvi is able to catch these mistakes & correct it. That's the good part.

But Poorvi's biggest challenge comes when she has to frame a sentence. About 6 months back, she had a small tussle with her friend in the apartment. She wanted to convey to him that "she will not go to his house and even he should not come to our home". She put it in her own sweet way - "You are not my house is come, I am not your house is come". Best part was that the other guy understood what Poorvi was saying and fighting went on for some more time.

Recently, Poorvi wanted to convey "Plan does not sound good". We tried a lot to correct her, but she insisted on saying - "Plan does not sound not good". Well, she is not a negative attitude person, but she wanted to emphasize that the message had as many (k)nots as possible to convey her dissent clearly. Matter of time, I am sure she will overcome these small hitches of English language soon.