PRG's Thoughts

Since this is the first year of my blog, I have never written a year end blog before. I figured why not join the rest of the world and make lists. So here are my awards for 2009... Politician of the Year- Rahul Gandhi I am still at odds on whether I like the man or not, but what can you say, he got it done this year. The Congress dominated the national elections and there is no doubt that Rahul Gandhi's tireless travels played a huge role in their clear cut win. Since the win he has not stopped being in the news either. His "hanging with the people" strategy is interesting and fresh. I still can't tell if it is genuine, political, strategic or actually something revolutionary in our country. Whatever it is, it caught my eye. Will be interesting to see if the current fall out in Andhra Pradesh hurts his party and more interesting to see if he continues to reach out to the people in 2010. Honorable Mention- Kapil Sibal (For the revolution he is starting in education. If

"Kotla pitch shames BCCI, nation" says the Times of India. One week from now the Times of India will not be covering this story. Or if they are, there will be a small snippet hidden somewhere in the sports section. However, you will still find articles on how India is the # 1 Test Cricket team in the world. At the end of the day, no one really cares for sports in this country. That concept does not exist. We care about a victory, a great innings, a world record and a number one ranking. But we don't care about sports. There is a difference. What happened in Kotla was in line with expectations so don't get angry. As a country, we will never be a sports nation. India has never been a sports nation and in my life time I don't think we ever will be. We have memorable victories, we have super stars, we have small inconsistent successes but we are not a sports nation. To be a sports nation we need a full proof plan for talent and facilities development. We need a vision

It started of as a terrible scare. I received an email from BBC News alert at about 1:30 in the morning saying that Tiger Woods was in a car crash. At the time they said he was in critical condition. Then we heard that he was released from the hospital and sent home. This is the point where it should have ended. But as we all know, the circus came to town. Rumors of affairs and scandals started flowing and the tabloid world got to pick on a new priceless victim. Here is my take. There are people out there who say that they can never see Tiger in the same way. The high standards and expectations he set as an individual have been shattered. They say the perfect athlete is flawed and they can't accept that he turned out to be the way he did. If you are one of these people then I can confidently say that you never understood the man in the first place. As evidence from my earlier blogs, I am a die hard Tiger Woods fan and after all this nonsense, nothing has changed. I don't care i

In poker the term is called being on tilt. Wikipedia refers to it as "a state of mental confusion or frustration in which a player adopts a less than optimal strategy, usually resulting in the player becoming over-aggressive". If any of you have played poker you probably have been on tilt at some point. If you haven't played poker, analyze the behavior of the Shiv Sena over the past few months. To me, it defines tilt. In fact, they are tilting so hard that they might just fall over. Read the definition of tilt again and you will see what I mean. In poker there are many things that can put you on tilt. Losing to a bad beat, playing a hand badly or even the verbal bashing of an opponent can set you off. The Sena haven't done extremely well in the elections, they have lost some supporters to that guy who left the party and suddenly when that other guys party won a few seats in the state election, the Sena went on tilt and boy have they exploded. Whether it be the 'lo

Whew!!! That was some cyclone. The winds were blowing at 75 kmh, the rain was belting down, trees were uprooted and I think I even saw a small house fly off Oz style. Its a good thing we shut down schools and offices, and created a little panic. In today's Times of India front page article on the cyclone it is written in bold "heavy to very heavy rainfall has been predicted over the next 24 hours." Here is my suggestion, if you go out, take some sunblock. Now, I am all for the 'better safe than sorry' as far as weather is concerned, but how is our MET so off so consistently? And yes I know that a lot of people suffered terribly a few years ago during the Mumbai deluge, but it has created such a fear mentality that at the drop of a hat people panic and the MET department doesn't help. I guess their attitude is that we better issue a warning because if we don't we are going to be criticized. I wish better safe than sorry changed to more right than wrong I w

Wow its been so long since I have blogged that I almost forgot my blogspot password. The reasons for no blogs vary from lack of interesting topics, lack of motivation and little bit because of the lack of time. But then last night suddenly a topic hit me in the face. This is probably something I would have blogged about the day the news came out but for some reason I never got to it. It is the entire Andre Agassi fiasco that is going on. For those of you who don't read the sports page, Agassi admitted to using crystal meth and then lying to the ATP about it. This revelation has shaken the tennis and sports world. Here are my thoughts on the story. While there are many things one can discuss on the crystal meth controversy, I have chosen three points that have either bothered me or that I have discussed with friends over the past few days. The ATP - What were they thinking? Let me see if I get this straight. Andre Agassi fails a drug test and is informed of the violation by the ATP

I feel bad for Shahrukh Khan. I really do. When I get a off a flight all I want to do is just get the hell out of the airport. To be detained for two hours, questioned and not allowed to make a phone call, it must be painful. But at the same time I have to say that in the terror filled world that we live in, sometimes, each and every one of us has to go through this. Even beloved Bollywood superstars. I don't have an issue with SRK's anger, I would be fuming too. I don't have an issue with the media coverage of the event. SRK is a huge celebrity and press coverage was expected. The area that I have an issue with is when people say what happened to SRK was wrong. I firmly believe that superstar or no superstar, each person has to go through the same random checks as we all do. Today it is SRK and so people are upset. What if tomorrow it is some random celebrity from some obscure country that no one knows? At that point we would all say, what is the big deal, he should have b

For those of you who have not read the sports pages recently you missed how Somdev Devvarman shocked the tennis world number 15 Marin Cilic in the Legg Mason Classic tennis tournament. It was a fantastic and impressive win and hopefully will become a stepping stone to a promising career. Before he becomes a sensation or a thing of the past I thought I would write him a letter. Here it is. Dear Somdev , Congrats on the big win vs. Cilic . While you lost in the next round, no matter, you got your first big win. This will hopefully ensure a wild card to the US Open and may be you can continue to make your mark in New York. I had a few thoughts that I wanted to share with you as you begin your journey. This may be arrogant of me since I am completely inexperienced in the art managing sportsman but I would like to share them anyway. 1) Settle down in the United States. Remain an Indian citizen but train, practice and live outside India. We do not have the facilities in India to help yo

There is no question that Facebook has become an integral part of most people's lives. It is addictive, easy to use and entertaining. We use it for a lot of things like keeping in touch, remembering birthdays, checking out pictures, organizing events etc. etc. But when you actually break it down, the thing we end up reading the most are the often hilarious, often ridiculous and mostly useless status updates. This post is about the Facebook status update and how our friends (me included) have made it into this complex set that can be classified in to various categories. Here is my analysis of them. Firstly let me say a few things. 1) I am probably guilty of having an update in each one of these categories. 2) I am going to be using random names as examples. These examples are not based on anyone living or dead. Any similarity is a coincidence and if it happens to be you, too bad. 3) While I mock most of these, the truth is that I enjoy reading them 4) I am sure I have left out some,

It has been going on for quite a while now, the debate, Tiger or Roger, Roger or Tiger who is the greatest? Is it harder to win 14 Grand Slams in golf or 15 in tennis? Can they even be compared? I have struggled with these questions for some time now but never had any convincing arguments to push me in any direction. This past month though, I had a breakthrough, I found logic in an argument and am now convinced. And so while we are fresh of a memorable grand slam victory of my favorite sportsman in the world, here is my take. I have a sinking feeling I am going to get trashed for my views (or the fact that I even had the guts to compare these two legends). More often than not I would say that you probably can't compare achievements in two different sports. How do you compare golf to tennis? The games are so dramatically different. One has multiple surfaces, the other multiple clubs, one has 7 rounds in a grand slam, the other has 4. But here we are not comparing tennis to golf, we

Random thoughts with no real focus, the slapping member of Parliament, Saina, ODI's, Indian Boxers, World Series of Poker.  Don't know how many of you caught the news of the member of parliament Manda Jagannadham slapping a bank manager . Check out the video here and you will die laughing. The best part is our dear MP's statement. He said, if it is proved that he manhandled the bank manager then he will apologize. Err....proved?? He claims he was trying to put his hand on the bank managers shoulder and by mistake he touched the manager's cheek. I wish you could see me right now because I am holding my stomach in pain with laughter, if you saw the video you would know why. What an excuse, this guy is a legend.  A few other notes. Saina - A little late write up from my end but how about Saina Nehwal winning the Indonesian Open. This girl is going from strength to strength. Yet, Sania Mirza gets more coverage when she reaches the second round of tournaments. Sorry but I

Friday's 5 random thoughts with no real focus. Indian football, Shiny Shiney, other Indian sports, rain, and other stuff. Enjoy Indian Football- Disgusted is not the word on reading the tirade by India's football coach Bob Houghton in today's TOI. Get this- the Indian football team is going to Dubai for training because there is not a single location in the country where they can train. Our facilities are so bad that we have to fly to another country. We are an embarrassment. I know there are far more important issues in the country like poverty, power, clean water, health care etc etc. but this is about sports and we are pathetic. Would keep rambling on but honestly, there is not much to say. MS Gill probably doesn't care and frankly after today's article in the paper, there probably wont be a follow up article till some other controversy comes up a few months later. No point in me getting high blood pressure over it. Other Indian Sports- While I know that no int

The disgust at India's exit from the T20 is keeping me up blogging at 1:30 in the morning instead of getting a good nights sleep. We were terrible. Every time we lose a match people throw out questions. Here are 5 that cropped up in my mind. They are brief, confusing and frankly, don't have any answers from my end. Please help me answer them because I am struggling. Firstly, hats of to England. I think Naseer Hussein put it best when he said that England were tactically beating India. They studied our eternal weakness of the short ball and exploited it beyond belief. Now for the questions 1) Why drop Irfan Pathan and keep Ishant Sharma? In the match against the West Indies Irfan went for 4.5 runs per over in his two overs and took one wicket. Ishant on the other hand went at 10.33 in his 3 overs with no wickets. Plus this gives you an extra batsman. Ishant went for a nice 9 runs an over today against England. It just seems that Ishant has not come to terms with this form of

Another post filled with random thoughts with no real focus. Australia (Cricket not violence), Roger, Tiger, Lakers, Leander etc. Enjoy Saw about 200 status updates from friends on FB rejoicing in the early Aussie departure from the T20 cup. I love the Australian Cricket Team. I have loved them since the Alan Border's days and are my second favorite team, after India of course. They are aggressive, talented, play hard (I don't have issues with sledging) and are winners. Fine Fine, I will agree they have lost their invincibility for sometime now but they are still the team every other team wants to beat. Choosing between them and say an Ireland in the Super 8's, no question, I would want Australia. Even if you hate them you have to admit, the matches they would have been involved in make for more interesting entertainment than Ireland's matches. No disrespect to the Irish of course.  Anyway, let the comments attacking me for liking the Aussie Team begin. Oh and please d

I always thought MS Dhoni was a good captain. He is ice cool, leads from the front by being pretty consistent with the bat, inspires his younger players, can be a risk taker and takes every win or loss within his stride. But after what he did in the press conference in England to display team unity, I think he might be the greatest captain India has ever had.  For those of you who have been unaware, there have been articles and rumors that there is a rift between Dhoni and Sehwag . To have a cold war between the captain and vice captain of a team right before the start of a major tournament is never good news. The press of course lapped this story up with joy. In fact the day the story was published I had 6 different conversations with cricket fans about the rift. The alleged cold war was slowly growing in to a full blown battle. That was before Dhoni stepped in. The press conference on Friday can only be described as a stroke of guts, grit and genius. Instead of having the usual p

Some stuff going on in the news. Saeed, T20, Federer, Xbox. Real random thoughts with no real focus... Lahore High Court lets Saeed Out . Can someone please explain to me why we are playing a warm up match with Pakistan today? Yes Yes I know it is not the players fault and all that nonsense. But we banned South Africa from cricket for 21 years for apartheid and 60 countries boycotted the 1980 Moscow Olympics because of the USSR's insurgence in to Afghanistan. The Olympics which is an event that comes every four year and a once in a lifetime chance for most athletes that participate was boycotted. Those countries took a stand. I think if we are taking a stand we should take a firm one. We should not even play them in the world cup if we have to. We should boycott the match in protest. If that effects our chances to win it then so be it. If we really want to get the message across we should take bold steps. That's just my view but I am sure you have plenty of opposing ones. Yuvra

So, Nadal is out of the French Open in the 4th round. I think we all are shocked to say the least. You have to hand it to Soderling, he played phenomenally. Anyway, this post is not about the match, I hardly have the qualifications to analyze what went wrong with the world # 1. This post is about the chatter of the tennis world for the last year on how Roger Federer has "lost it" and the maddening analysis of Roger's demise from # 1 all the way down to # 2, a huge drop. I have had my views on this for some time now but never written about it. Something about Rafa's loss (on clay) today inspired me to sit and type it out. Firstly, let me say that this is probably the only great rivalry where I have not hated one of people involved. I am a die hard Roger Federer fan but can't help liking Nadal as well. His game, movement on the court and some of the shots he hits leave you stunned in amazement. The best part about him is his attitude and the respect he shows every p

I read a friends status update on Facebook that said that he doesn't follow football but still hates Manchester United, and he didn't know why. Where does that hatred come from? Why do certain teams or sportsman create that level of hatred among sports fans even when they don't follow that particular sport? There is no clear cut explanation but I am going to try to offer my view on it, please comment and offer your own. The first point that I can think of is the Dynasty Factor . Sports fans either hate dynasties or love them. Teams that have historically won, been champions repeatedly, and basically always dominated manage to build a brand of hatred. Take the New York Yankees or the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, people love to hate these teams. Why? Because irrespective of how these teams seasons are going, they will be more in the news than your own team. Fans of other teams whine, "Who cares about Notre Dame, they suck this year." It doesn't matter guys, they w