Idle musings

    THOUGHTS ON TRANSPORT     On the day before yesterday, I was caught in a traffic jam while returning from work. For Bangalore, this is a common event, of course. The reason this time was the Varamahalakshmi festival. Before any festival, it looks like that middle class Bangalore comes to shop in all its markets ! There were two hot spots in my route and it took me 15 minutes to cross a stretch that should have been done in 5 ! Since I was in a staff bus and the music on my portable music player was insipid, my thoughts turned to traffic and what could be done to improve it. I suppose I should have been frustrated and cursing the traffic, but for some reason my thoughts were more reflective than angry ! What could be done to resolve the chronic traffic issues in our city ?     The most commonly touted solutions passed through my head, of course ! The upcoming Bangalore Metro ( http://www.bmrc.co.in/ ) may be a panacea to some extent. Then...

CHENNAI     Last weekend, my wife and I visited Chennai.     Her brother is doing his doctorate in IIT and he booked a guest house for us. We left on the night of 4-Jul. Our tickets were booked for a train at 11:30 in the night. When we reached the station, it was not even 10:00 p.m. yet. Suma suggested that we could check if tickets for an earlier train were available. This was a master stroke ! There were ample number of tickets and we got the middle berths.     For both of us, it was a long time since we travelled in sleeper class. She had last visited Mantralaya travelling in a train while my previous trip was even earlier. In fact it was more than 18 years ago when my parents and I moved from Mumbai to Bangalore ! Not much has changed in 2nd class 3 tier coaches since then though ! There were the cushioned seats, the blue light, the emergency chain with the warning that it must not be pulled (therefore when I was younger it made me wond...

RANDOM THOUGHTS .... about the cricket World Cup, books that make me think and Spiderman 3     The dust has settled since I last wrote. India bowed out of the cricket World Cup leading to a lot of condemnation of our cricketing heroes. The Wall, the master, the Bengal tiger ..... everybody in the cricket team became objects of criticism. A lot of it was justified since we simply expect and demand more in the only team sport that we can think of being world beaters ! The World Cup went on with Sri Lanka emerging as the possible contenders for the cup. In the end though, it was the sheer professionalism and preparedness of Australia that saw them through easily. I saw a hoarding of a famous Australian beer that put it best. It simply said : "Australian for HABIT" and showed the cricket world cup ! That hoarding says it all !     What of India ? Piyush Chawla made a promising debut in the one dayers against Bangladesh, but there are still some key people miss...

MY DREAM INDIAN CRICKET TEAM The Cricket World Cup ( http://www.cricketworldcup.com ) is in progress in the West Indies and yesterday, we lost to Bangladesh. In my opinion, Dravid erred in choosing to bat. Perhaps, the plan was that we would get good batting practice for the later matches in the first innings and then we could restrict them. Of course, the Bangladeshi bowlers had other plans ;-) The morning "juice" in the wicket was rather venomous. In the early part of our innings, the ball moved around just enough to keep our batsmen quiet. It took Yuvraj's belligerence to cut the shackles loose. I wish Dhoni had built on Yuvraj's knock. I expect that the two of them will be very important for India's chances in the World Cup, particularly against Sri Lanka. In my view, Dhoni has the maturity to play a steadying role in the middle overs since he can also run well between wickets. Yuvraj and he are the two best runners when we bat. If they come to bat in the mid...

REVIEW OF LAGE RAHO MUNNABHAI     Recently, my wife and I saw the movie "Lage Raho Munnabhai" (see http://msnspecials.in/munnabhai/index.asp for details). Both of us enjoyed the movie, though my wife found the whistles and cheers of the largely collegiate crowd rather disconcerting ! The young crowd cheered loudly when the movie began and it only increased when Munnabhai and Circuit made their first appearance on screen. As the movie progressed, the noise level in the theatre reduced, but when Abhishek made his appearance as the groom of a Manglik girl, the noise level again increased !     The college crowd lapped up the movie. My wife and I also completely enjoyed it. We laughed at the antics of Circuit and Munna and empathized with them as they tried to apply Gandhian principles in today's world and age.     The story of LRM is simple : Munna wants to impress an RJ called Jahnavi and pretends to be a professor teaching Gandhism at colleg...

    MYSORE AND KABINI     Exactly last week, my wife Suma and I took Monday off so that there were at least 4 continuous holidays. We spent two of those days in Mysore and Kabini and this blog is my description of those days.     DAY 1, SUNDAY, 13-AUG-06, MYSORE     We drove down to Mysore, leaving Bangalore after breakfast at 8:15 a.m. It was the first time that I went in my car for a drive longer than 100 km. Since I didn't want the hassle of concentrating on the road and driving and also since we also planned to visit my aunt in Mysore, Ravi, a driver we know well, was our chauffeur for the trip.     Ravi has a high opinion of my car, a black Opel Corsa. The car easily touched 100 kmph and he said that there was hardly any noise from either the engine or the suspension. I thoroughly enjoyed the drive for three reasons : the primary one was the feel of the wind rushing over my fingers when I held my palm up ou...

THE UTTARANCHAL TRIP ================     My parents, my wife Suma and I visited Uttaranchal hill stations and New Delhi from 9-May-06 to 17-May-06. My impressions about our tour are written below in a day-by-day account. DAY 1, Tuesday, 09-May-06, New Delhi --------------------------------     On the previous day, I attended a training at work and came back home directly. For once, I did something right :-) The amount of packing that needed to be done was significant. As a wise guy remarked "If it were not for the last moment, nothing would ever get done" :-)) The toothbrushes, the shaving kit, the combs, etc. were packed in the early morning of Tuesday, 9-May. The Sahara flight was at 7:30 a.m. and we planned to leave home at 6:00 a.m. This meant that all of us were up by 5:00 a.m., no mean feat for me !!     By 6:00 we were more or less ready. Since the clock was ticking away, Suma suggested that I could tie my shoes in the cab that we ha...