Bhagat-ism et al

A few minutes past 1 PM by my laptop clock… Has been a couple of hours since I left home… bus to Delhi from where I shall board for the city of joy… Kaivu, amongst others in my mind, who wept while bidding me adieu… Donno when I will meet him next, maybe at my wedding along with his mami… the kid screaming at the seat behind me reminds me of his laughter… thought of sleeping but his laughter comfortably made his way into my day-dreams too… so finished my last chapters of "The three mistakes of my life" to divert my thoughts… bus stops at a Dhaba… everybody stoops for a tea and smoke… I go for a beer… back in the bus to Delhi… To keep all emotions out of my mind, I write on Chetan Bhagat…

Love him or hate him, you can never ignore him. I have never been a big fan of Chetan. His style of writing is one of the worst ones for a freak like me who prefers Shakespeare to Sheldon on any given day. But I am surprised with myself on how I find something good in everything that I come across and tend to ignore those I do not like.

Yes! What might be surprising to most of my friends and critics, I really liked the book. The book, as expected, aimed to be a "commercial" success and facts say, that it has really achieved what it was meant for. Bhagat's books really touch you where you want to be touched. Bhagat selects his niche, and writes for them. I have been an IIT-ian, been the best of friends with people working in a call center, been an appreciator of Gujarat as a state as well as cricket as a sport, and I am really appalled at how an i-Banker not staying in India has been really close to the situation to write on the topic. Bhagat definitely chooses a theme that has an appeal – T3MOML is no different.

I hate reading books and watching movies that contain slangs (especially the 4-lettered words). They are not "Literature" and books that are not a part of "Literature" come in the domain of "Trash". Five point someone, One Night @ The Call Center and The 3 Mistakes of my Life; all come in the latter one. But the way that Bhagat presents his themes is really appreciable. Bhagat exactly reciprocates the mind of the characters that should have been there, doing that. The state of mind of an amateur businessman, an NDA dropout and a priest's son has been perfectly described in the text.

Being a quizzard by passion and a testing resource by profession, I always tend to find out mistakes in texts that I read and statements that I (over)hear. Thankfully, I have enjoyed my failure in this book. I wiki-ed on the chronology of events – The Bhuj earthquake, the India-England Test Series, The India-Australia Test Series and everything fitted well. The incidents of Babari Masjid, rule of the "Suck-ular" party (in Omi's words), facts about cricket have perfectly suited the timeframe that has been mentioned. In all my senses (One beer does not change your thought process), I will definitely rate it as a "must-read" for anybody who has a lot of time over the weekend or travels a lot. People who have other things to keep them busy can happily ignore this book.

A Complete Failure of the System...

Disclaimer – It appears, of late, that I have become a great cribster. In other words, this blog is only being used as an opening to let out my frustrations in life. So I request my readers to have faith in Hamlet. He shall return with good posts soon.

Disclaimer 2 – Since Kolkata is my “karmabhoomi”, this post might give an impression that I am somewhat biased towards the King’s men. All critics in this respect are welcome, as the comments are not moderated, as always.

Well, the match is over. We strolled down from The Eden Gardens to Park Street, and are currently at Barista. Sebin is having is favorite Cappuccino while I am enjoying my Latte mug. The chatterbox is on. Afridi is on fire. He has taken the wickets on Sachin and another one in the same over, and I am least interested in knowing who the other batsman is. All I am thinking about is what happened in the match that just finished.

Though it was not one of the Best innings that the Knight Riders could have played, but I was optimistic about the target of 150. It wasn’t a tough one, but considering the Eden, it wasn’t an easy one as well. The opening pair of the Super Kings looked in shape, but cricket’s always a game of chance. At the time when it was most unwanted, in came a gust of Kalboishakhi accompanied by rain and the match stopped. At 7:50 P.M. IST, it was announced that Chennai Super Kings have been declared winners by three runs in accordance with the Duckworth Lewis method.

This followed a lot of speculations – 3 runs!!! What if Ashoke Dinda did not miss the catch? Since the main parameter of the Duckworth Lewis system is “Resource Left”, one wicket down could have easily resulted in a sweet victory for Kolkata. What if Agarkar had run a few more inches to save a boundary? What if Dada had at least scored one boundary before saying adieu in his home ground? What if the dependable Hussey had had lasted for more than a ball? What if the match was scheduled at 8 P.M. instead of 4 P.M.? Umpires would have waited for more time before declaring the results. But the truth is, that all this DID NOT happen… and speculations don’t count…

In a match that would decide the fate of the semi-finalists, one has the right to expect that the best team should win. What Hamlet wonders, is “Was the best team given a chance?” Well, to me, the answer is “No”! Even before the rain came, play was stopped due to Bad Light conditions for about 15 minutes. Why is it that the flood lights in Eden Gardens always have to malfunction? As a spectator on the ground, I realized that rain stopped 45 minutes before the results were declared. Why did the ground staff take SO long to take off the covers? There were just two cars available to clear off the water logging and even they did not look interested in completing the task. And THESE are NOT speculations. Sad but true, one of the best cricket grounds in the country has no contingency plans to handle obvious situations. Kolkata lost tonight – but the undigestable part was that they were not given a chance to fight it out.

How I wish this ended in a nail biting finish where the team from the City of Joy had a target to stop the visitors…

Was it a bad performance, or a bad ground management, that cost Kolkata the match? Hamlet wonders…

The silver lining is that hopes never die. Nor does keeping hopes cost you anything. Fans of Dada can still dream of a remote chance of making it to the semis by winning the remaining three ties. And even if that does not happen, I will still recite a line that’s close to every Bengali’s heart –

“Aasche bochhor abaar hobe”

A small loss to India – A great loss to the game

Australia won the second test of the Border Gavaskar Trophy ’07 at Sydney today.

Hearty Congratulations to Ponting and his boys. They achieved what the great Steve Waugh and his team had achieved a few years back – 16 Test Matches in a row! But this victory did not come without a cost. If Australia won, someone lost too.

Was it India? No Way!!! I insist that India DID NOT lose this match. This was a great loss to Cricket – The name and the spirit of the so called ‘Gentleman’s game’.

There was a time when Top Cricketers used to “Walk” out of the field in case they knew they were out, even if the umpires index finger rested at its place. Today, players feel proud to make a mockery of the game by announcing it to the media after a couple of days – “I knew I was out, but I was lucky enough not to be given.” LUCK??? Is this the game? Oh well, I thought it was a game of skill.

There was a time when the umpires asked the third umpire in case of an decision. Yesterday, Mr. Benson asked the captain on field. A simple question to Mr. Benson – Why did the captain appeal at all if it was a not-out? Sorry Sir, but this is something beyond my understanding.

I believe, There IS a human instinct to the game. But what kind of an instinct is calling 7 wrong decisions? ALL – against one of the teams?

Australia is probably a great sporting nation, but sorry mates, when it comes to the sporting spirit, you guys manage at the bottom of the list। You can call all incidents, right from Ian Chappell’s “underarm” ball in 1981 to date, are not “illegal”, but then, Cricket IS different from robbery, right?

With a great grief (Not because India lost, but because for Cricket who was ruthlessly raped and barbarically murdered),
Hamlet