Vandalized Indian hopes...

So the grand finale for India has already got to a halt much before it has even started. A humiliated drubbing by the minnows and then a fiasco against their neighbor, has really defaced, "Men in Blue". They have come down from the cover page of “Page-3” to the main pages of almost all daily newspaper. And these days, no matter what, you just click to you inbox and you can see number of mails with new joke on our “beloved” Indian cricket team. Well all those stories will go away with the next series win for India (probably against their current competitors Bangladesh, right after this World Cup), but can we/they (Indian team) really wait for another 4 years for the next grand Finale.

Probably in next world cup Indian team will be come on the stadium with some new faces and the "Masters" will be either watching the game from 15 rows back from the ground. I mean from the stands OR probably they will be giving their expert comments sitting next to our hip-hop sexy lady Mandira Bedi, where nowadays Arjuna Ranatunga and John Wright are enjoying their World cup sessions. Well, If I go by the words of my colleague's then the only good thing they liked in the Indian matches, perhaps every match, then it’s only those first 2 hours before the match, then that tea-break after the first inning and finally, Extra-Inning at the end of the match. No need to tell the reason why!! :).

I have heard many TV interview of so called "Experts" of the game in past one and half week, read many news columns on the same old story, and every time, some way or the other, each and every line goes against the Indian team. Well, it should be, even I think the same way, I am not an exception either. But have we ever given it a thought in a healthy environment, probably by doing so will give a clear picture that only few Critics talk sense on TV, only few reporters write sense on those columns. There were mistakes, mistakes at all level of games, right from the scratch, but according to them the mistake has started much before someone can really make it as a reason for the defeat of Indian Team. They say, “It starts from grass-root-level. (GRL)”. Let it be the selection procedure or more importantly the effort made by the players at state level tournaments excluding those who really play well but could not make it to the team because they don’t have much political support behind them. Otherwise who can believe that in past 4-5 years there were many new faces but none of them really matches with the international level of cricket which is being played nowadays. Well everything has its own story for the contribution to the selection of this final team.

I may be wrong somewhere in my perception, but I am just jotting down the facts I think can really make next World Cup a better one for Indian. OK let's start from the first level, as they said it, GRL. Where do these players come from? Well it’s not a gully-Cricket which leads to such players who can represent Indian on an international stage. If someone really wants to be a cricketer, he has to start at the age of at least 10-12 years. Then comes the District Level cricket, then the State level Cricket and after some couple of recognized state level tournaments, these players are actually selected for the team. So far so good!!

Now come down to the basics, do you really think that out of those 50 K people who actually start at age of 10, and then among them 10 K who actually end up playing the district level Cricket, and then around 5 K who appear for the State level cricket, and finally some 500 who are selected all over India for representing their State, there is still a crunch of selecting 11 top players amongst them, who can perform better than the country who is having the team with the average age group of 22 years. Whatever may be the case, this was never possible, but as they say "Cricket is a game of uncertainty", this has happened in this World Cup where the "Masters" on the papers were ripped apart.

I really think that there are many such cricketers in the state level cricket, who didn’t even get a chance to be nominated on papers for the Indian team even though they have performed much better than many others, OR better then our new discovery, young & talented, “Robin Uthappa”. Then why are they not selected? Why don’t we even know their names? Why have they not been ever taken in the limelights? Well, nothing to say much about this. Reasons speak themselves. Ok! Let’s even assume that the system is fair enough to keep a watch on the selection criteria which is being followed by BCCI, even then the problem lies right here at GRL. If our assumed 50K people start playing cricket to pursue their carrier as cricket only, then why can’t they seriously do the things according to their plans? Why can’t they increase their level of cricket right from their practice matches they play for their district or their states? Why they only perform their best only before they are selected in final squad of Indian Team. Well, now the fingers will starts pointing on to the current advertising market which has become a lucrative reason for some who want to become cricketers “Get into the team and get an advertisement free” as the bonus of 1st year in Indian team. No good reasons to smile on!!

I am impressed by few of the past interviews of Kapil Dev who have repeatedly related his religion with Cricket in all his media appearances. He says “If you are playing for India, then you representing India as country (that’s a big enough reason) and then you representing rest of 1.2 billion supporters for you sitting in India. If this is the level of responsibility you have then this is not a mere game for you, it’s a religion for you and you have to fulfill you responsibilities for both, your country as well as your country mates”. And I really agree on that.

Our tigers are old now, they did their best at their time, and even we have appraised them at their best time. But now let the next generation of tigers to come in the jungle and learn hunting before the old tigers eventually die. There is a transition phase for each generation rather for each individual and Indian Cricket team has surpassed both of them. If we do not start introducing new faces or more specific young faces in our Cricket then one thing is for sure, that when the time will come for these old tigers to say good-bye, there will be no one behind them to take the crowned with the tag of “Masters”, nobody will be left who can wear the t-shirt number “10”and then Indian team will remain masters only in the story books for much longer period of time.

To finally wind up all my extra profound feelings after this World Cup disaster, I think I have rightly put down all the points I have in my mind, and now the inference can be easily made out. I guess few people will agree with me and other may not. Fair enough!! All have different perception and these ones were only mine. Well feedbacks and discussions are always welcomed. So you can also contribute to this discussion as well, through the comments section :).

Anyways, no hard feelings now. Whatever happens happened for good. But we can learn from our mistakes, we can make things better, or better to say “don’t repeat our old mistakes”. It’s the best time to revamp the team ladder along with our R&D expert “Greg Chappell", and this World Cup result was a buzzer for that.

Few last words to end this, from my "tuti-footi" shayari :)

"Har raat ko ek subhe ka intzaar hota hai,
Har tilism ko ek chirag ka intzaar hota hai

Badalne ko to, hum bhi badal sakte hai duniya,
Bas har kisse ko, sahi waqt ka intzaar hota hai"

The time has come. Let’s start before it's too late to even start with!!

Most memorable Day @ SAP Labs!!

After waiting for one complete year the day has come when our team has planned to go out somewhere!! No matter it was a team effort not funded from our team recreation fund. Destination was WonderLa! They call it the best place to spend a complete day and that’s the reason why we all have opted for it.

We have booked a “TATA Star” bus for the tour and all have to meet at a common meeting point "Garuda Mall". We all reached that place at around 9:30 am; and were still waiting for the bus to come. Finally it came at 10:00 am and we boarded it. The journey started off with the Bread and Jam as the breakfast, thanks to Venky who brought the stuff. Well thanks to Reena and Tiyasha as well who actually prepared those bread slices evenly spread with fruit jam!! Yummy it was.. :)

We stopped in between to buy some water bottles and cold drinks. I, Sudeep and Satish has decided for 2 games ("Hot-seat” and “dumbs arts") which we could play in the cab but not have yet started either of them. Almost 1/4th journey already over. Well again I have to start some stupid activities to make them start playing something and it started with "Raju Srivastava" show!! I acted for one of his comedy show and then finally we started Hot-Seat. I guess no body would have agreed to it if I would not have offered myself to be the first "Bakra" of the day!! Questions were fired on me..

And it started with the very obvious one!!What’s the name of your girlfriend whom you went to meet in Delhi?

Woops!! I met someone and I don’t even know that :), anyways I fooled around everybody with that questioner round, giving all fake answers!! Sorry guys..

Then it was turn for the newly married guy from our team.. Our Hero! Uday.

Sudeep: So how was the experience??
Uday: It was good.

Rajeev: What do you suggest to unmarried people about whether to marry or not!
Uday: Ya it really good to be get married..

Sudeep: Was it a Love marriage or arrange??
Uday: Love cum Arrange!!

Sudeep: Love first or Arrange ??
Uday: Love.

Suresh: So how long do you know each other??
Uday: 6th Standard..

Me: To ye sab pahele se chakkar chal raha tha!! Hummm..
Suresh: ok ok!! So you love each other since 6th!!
Uday: No man!! I proposed her in college.

Suresh: And what made you do that??
Uday: I feel like proposing her so I did that..

Sudeep: How did you proposed her??
Uday: @##$%^&)(*&^#$%^&*()_)(* Well!!! I said I LOVE YOU

Whole Team: Clapping!! :)

Ok it went away like that!! Next was Satish who was very clever in giving his answer perhaps "SERIOUS ANSWERS"!! Giving no room for us to crack a joke on him!! Probably we will catch hold of him next time :)

Anyways, finally reached WonderLa! OR (WONDERLA BIRD SANCTUARY for Boys!!), Ticket counters were still not opened so we starting doing our work :) Bird watching!! After all that is what Bird Sanctuaries are meant for :)) We have a little photo session and then after 11:00 am; we took the entry tickets. It was good to see that more n more birds were migrating from different places to this Sanctuary!! BUT THE BEST ONE WAS BLACK WITH PURPLE TOP :) Right Sudeep!! Well no comments in general, because different hunters have different choices :).

OK finally, we made Tiyasha and Reena as our guide and they have to decide upon the rides we have to go for. They first decided to go for the Dry rides and thus the first one was “WONDER LA BAMBA“, it was a good one to start of with. Then we went to “TERMITE COASTER & TRAIN“. I guess it was more for the kids rather than us!!



Next was among one of my favorites “DROP ZONE“. It was really a horrifying experience, imagine you are pulled up to a height of 100 ft like a cool and calm journey on a plane and then suddenly dropped from there as you see in Tom & Jerry shows (plane crashed and still you are moving and suddenly when you look down your complete body falls and your head is still in air), it was somewhat same experience!!

Well, after this ride most of our team mates decided to play safe :) Next one was “MIXER“, again a body-stromer!! We were hanging upside down and were moving in all direction by that damn “juicer”, finally we managed to come safe out of that MIXER- “grinder“.




Then we went for “TECHNO JUMP“, it was again a good ride, somewhat like “Marry-Go-Round” (We have that in Appu Ghar!!). Robin dared to join us in that and then finally he decided not to go for any of those after that :)

We went down to the next level of difficulty, through the rope mesh (“NET WALK”) where we can easily figure out some sandals and shoes lying under that mesh, proofs of past calamities.. The next one in the queue was one of the most dangerous, for each one of us!! “MAVERICK“. It was the most furious one, the slide has made us hang totally upward down and then it rotated us in 360 degree with a force that if our safety belts were not there, we would have thrown somewhere miles away from it.. I guess you can easily figure out that from these pics.


But the show of the day was still to come and it was named as “INSANITY“, I have never ever been to such kind of ride. You just sit in a very good looking chair, well designed and then once it start you got to know that this hurricane can rotate in all directions randomly and with a speed of you would have never expected. Well that really proves it name “INSANITY“!! Obviously after watching to the demo some more from our group decided to join hands with Robin, but frankly telling if you have been to WonderLa! and went away without taking a ride on this one then you have really missed something!! But it really takes a big heart to take this ride and point to be noted is I took this ride 2 times :)

This was enough for us, to call off for the Half day!! We decided to go for lunch and after a nice lunch and a Corentto after it, which made all of us feel sleepy!! So what was the best way to wake us?? Water rides?? Ya!! That’s the next destination.

First one to choose from the list was “LAZY RIVER“, and our whole team has just made the antonym of that name given to this ride. It was not at all “lazy” for us!! Especially for our main victim Venky. Well, the fun was to give a somersault to the person who is nicely and well settled on those round plastic air tiers. It started with Sudeep as the first victim and god know on which it ended up. The guard was behind us as we have already taken 1/2 hour for a 10 min ride and still playing in water. We loved this part the most and so we decided to go for it once again.

After this we all went for “RAIN DANCE“, we enjoyed there for around 45 min, it was a full of energy session, really a good experience to dance in rain and laser lights all around. Well, after that we all were feeling very cold, so we had snacks/coffee/Tea session and then was the time for the next major attraction, “WAVE POOL“, we spend a nice time there swimming in the waves and some of us joined in the competition, as of, who will be the person, who can be in water for the longest period of time, don’t really know who won the battle but yes of course it was not me :)

It was already 5:30 pm so we decided to complete our left our rides. We all headed towards next water slides; in the row was “UPHILL RACER“, “FUN RACER“, “HARAKIRI“, “WAVY FALL” and “VERTICAL FALL“. The most difficult one was the last one, no doubt it was marked with the “WARNING” sign in the WonderLa! Map :). This slide was inclined at the 60 degree angle and you are dropped from the height of around 100 feet then what all you can hear is Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!! splassshhhhh!! That was it..

We all ended up all this fun at around 6:30 pm and then finally after a hot water shower we assembled to go back at around 7:30 pm, we had some fun in cab as well, few videos & snaps were taken, on the way back, it was also decided to go for the dinner together before we are back to our respective places, so the next destination was another bird sanctuary “Garuda Bird mall” !! This new name for Malls etc is now copyrighted by our team :) We all had our dinner there and then finally were set to go back. Well, it’s already 9:30 pm and that was the happy end of a beautiful and memorable day!!

THANKS A LOT TO ALL MY TEAM MEMBERS FOR MAKING THIS DAY AS ONE OF MOST MEMORABLE DAY OF MY LIFE!!