In ancient times, Olympics were greek way of settling scores without shedding blood where Greek athletes used to compete with each other for glory and pride. Iranians always wondered how could these greeks fight their asses off for crown of Olive leaves!!!! For greeks it used to be a celebration time.
Times changed, the festival which was lost in the annals of history was revived again. Entire world would wait for it. It became the biggest celebration of human race. But some how, world's second largest population got never invited into this party. Two weeks of sports extravaganza was always used to be gloomiest period for Indian athletes (other than hockey magicians). How can you expect that when most of the times, it never figured in medal tally itself and countries with population less than Chandigarh's used to win bountiful. Initial days of hope used to give way to disgust and guilt. So near but yet so far cases like PT Usha and Milkha singh used to make even more heart wrenching and Olympic show used to only get limited to closing ceremony.
In 96, Paes broke the Individual medal drought in Tennis with bronze. Malleshwari followed it up with a bronze in 2000, entire India was kinna content that we at least registered on medal tally (ahead of Pakistan:)). In 2004, Rathore moved up the pedestal with a silver and India was again very happy. Imagine a country of billion people feeling in cloud 9 with 1 medal.
2008 Beijing. Expectations were high as that it will be special this time. Although hockey teams were absent for the first time in History but we had star shooters, ace tennis players, slew of weightlifters, upcoming archers and baddies, veteran jumper. People were expecting count to exceed.
When Bindra shot a perfect 10 to win India's first ever Olympic gold, entire India became euphoric. We had OUR GOLD MEDAL. Govts started en cashing on euphoria by announcing gifts, cash prizes which made even cricketers jealous. Initial Hysteria got over and it started sinking in that remaining athletes have started crumbling under pressure. Feeling left out, India again started withdrawing itself out of Olympics. In came Akhil Kumar like a pleasant breeze. India started believing in itself and Akhil. This guy was so full of positive energy that his fellow boxers also got sprinkling of it. All three breezed into quarters. Suddenly, three medals were in sight. Media was making Indian hysterical and Politicians were making it mad. Pressure took its toll on Akhil and Jitendar. Both lost in QF but Vijendar kept his nerves to reach semis (Unluckily he lost). In the meanwhile, Sushil Kumar in repechage style, won a bronze out of no where . India was over the moon. Three medals were the best ever showing India had. Above expectations. A show stolen by lesser known mortals. Now, kids know the names of these medal winners. Superb display.
Right now, as I write this piece, our byte hungry media is going crazy hounding each and every one related to all three medal winners. Politicians are falling over each other to award these guys. Bipasha wants to go out on date with Vijendar. Last I heard, Haryana CM has ordered approach road to Vijendar's house to be built in a night. Dont take me wrong, its very good to appreciate and award special efforts but all this reeks of opportunism. No body gives a shit what these athletes would have gone thru, what should be done to build upon this start, how can we match China. All they want is cheap publicity. Earlier it used to be cricketers, now its Olympians. Bloody glory hunters.
I think main reason behind this media circus is scarcity of real winners in Indian sporting arena. Cricket used to provide a shallow cover for our olympic under achievements. Now thats also not the case. Ever wondered why don't we produce olympic winners? reasons are aplenty. system, culture, resources are the ones more famously and frequently quoted.
But is it fair to put entire blame on politicians or system? A quick look at medal tally will show that there are so many countries which are very poor or are ruled by corrupt dictators but still have more medals than India. Ever wondered why? I agree that politicians should also be blamed but point to ponder upon is that how many of our athletes practice day and night with single minded dedication of achieving Olympic glory? How many of our swimmers practice 16KM swim on daily basis? I agree that quite a lot of people don’t take sports as carrier choice but there a lot who do (go to any local/national level competition and you will see crowds of participants. ) but how many of these athletes have taken up sports with aim of winning Olympic? Most of them come to participate and win a certificate which might land them a job in railways or other govt. PSUs. I am not trying demean these hard working athletes but I don’t think that entire blame should go to system or politicians. Athletes also have some responsibility.
On positive note, things are looking better as Indian athletes are COMPETING now instead of just participating as was the case in 80s and 90s. But its time to have bring more Akhils into system who instill belief into entire team and nurture Vijendars. Time to encourage more Sushils who are ready to work aways from media glare. Time to bring in more resource rich Bindras who dont rely on system to shoot down gold.
Do comment your thoughts as well.
Friday, 22 August 2008
Sunday, 29 June 2008
Trip down the Landra Tangori Road.
I was looking for sector 76 in Mohali. Some body told me that its on Landra Road. I got bit nostalgic listening about Landra. It was almost 8 years since me and father went down that way looking for Tangori.
A frail looking sardarji told us the way from Landra "bau ji, is raste te sidhe chale jao....kuch 20 25 minute dan rasta hai itho. Engineering college sadak de sajje paase hai ik building chhotti yahi". My dad kick started the scooter. Sitting at the back seat, I was trying to imagine my future college. My Chemistry teacher had painted a very grim picture of the college. "Tangori??? othe ye barkha pai jaye tan kishti te jana painda hai." he used to deride it like anything. Even then I had opted for this college over quite a few government colleges like Firozpur, Gurdaspur and Bhathinda (supposdely i was interested in doing Electronics and Communication engg and Mechanical was the best these colleges could offer me). My mates at Thapar had also asked me go for ECE (I had wasted my dad's money at Thapar by opting for Civil there) Its been over 15 minutes and there was no sign of the college. Couple of minutes later, we saw a building. "ohi lagda hai!" said my dad. "hai?? nahi oh tan poultry farm hai!!!" I said after a while and both of us were laughing like anything. Another ten minutes on those dodgy roads and we reached there. It was a 1.75 building college. One for classes, .5 for workshop and another qaurter of unfinished one. We filled up coupld of forms and started our 23 Km trip back to home. On our way back, we were thinking that its a decent choice which is on verge of something big. Sort of high risk high returns thing. Four years passed and I was Er. Ashish Sharma. Our college had grown with us. Now, it had 5 buildings and a decent ground. Only thing which had gone worse was Landra Banoor road. From potholed road, it had become dust bowl. I and my scooter were happy to that we don’t have to tread through these paths again. Well, at least my scooter was lucky on that front.
I didn’t realise that I had reached Landra while searching sector 76. Inadvertently, my bike turned towards Tangori. On right side, CEC was still there but loads of colleges had sprung up along with that like mushrooms. B-school, Pharmacy college, general education college, engg college. You name it, they had it in that small area. I was wondering if they have these many rooms there to accommodate these many diverse studies. After driving a while, I started noticing major differences. Road was bit wider, it had lesser potholes and loads of billboards and flags had replaced lush green views on both sides. Emaar MGF, Unitech City and pearl City. These were the names of builders who had decided to change the landscape in favour of developed Greater Mohali. Damn, these builders had bought entire stretch and beyond. PUDA like IPL had played this township card very well. They had sold the rights of acquiring these lands directly from Farmers to these modern day imperialists and had drafted these sectors out of nothing. These townships were suppose to come up in next 3-4 years and were already selling the flats/plots/villas before laying the foundation stones itself. Somebody told me that they are making this road a four lane highway. Woahh…superb business proposition. This would take that area into different orbit all together but I was felling a bit sad as well. This had taken stolen the virginity from those fields. Papa trackers were replaced with JCBs. Farmers with security guards, greenery with lines of bricks ready to be walled. Farmers I saw on the way were looking a bit down. I am sure they were small land tillers who didn’t get their chance to wash their hands in that dhan ganga which would have flooded the area. These acres were sold for crores.
Once I crossed the railway line, scene was back to normal. Greenery was back and so were hordes of buffaloes that now seem to react for your horns. Positives of developments I must say. Then I reached SUSCET. College was deserted (it was Sunday silly!). Nothing much had changed since our convocation apart from ground which was lush green now. Security guard there was bit sceptical of my intentions. “Who would come to this desert on Sunday?” he must be thinking. “Ki labda hai bai?” he asked. “kuch nahi.” I said ‘Aiwe hi apni mitti labhda aaya si’ I thought. I told him that I am an ex-SUSCETian (hope that’s we are called). I asked him “If I could I roam around?” “yaar bamb bumb na rakh dayi” he said apprehensively. That statement summed the situation. Swords which were brandished 8 years back have been replaced by guns and pistols. Year on year, quality of batches must have gone down. Rayats, landras, bhaddals seem to winning this one. These colleges either had money or power. Our college mgmnt seemed to have neither. Irony is that Tangori’s polytechnic was now more famous than Engg college. I picked up my helmet and started moving back. That moment I saw the placement board placed at reception. Infy, TCS and many others. Big names were there. May be I was wrong. May be its bad to make perception based on security guard’s tales. May be our college was on the way up. That was pretty good silver lining behind the clouds. On that positive note, I started my long journey back to Chandigarh. Uff…it still is very costly affair going on your bike alone, Keshto J
P.S. Gogs, if at all you are planning to hitch hike with Manu and Chetan, then go ahead bindaas. That Landran petrol pump is now closed down.
A frail looking sardarji told us the way from Landra "bau ji, is raste te sidhe chale jao....kuch 20 25 minute dan rasta hai itho. Engineering college sadak de sajje paase hai ik building chhotti yahi". My dad kick started the scooter. Sitting at the back seat, I was trying to imagine my future college. My Chemistry teacher had painted a very grim picture of the college. "Tangori??? othe ye barkha pai jaye tan kishti te jana painda hai." he used to deride it like anything. Even then I had opted for this college over quite a few government colleges like Firozpur, Gurdaspur and Bhathinda (supposdely i was interested in doing Electronics and Communication engg and Mechanical was the best these colleges could offer me). My mates at Thapar had also asked me go for ECE (I had wasted my dad's money at Thapar by opting for Civil there) Its been over 15 minutes and there was no sign of the college. Couple of minutes later, we saw a building. "ohi lagda hai!" said my dad. "hai?? nahi oh tan poultry farm hai!!!" I said after a while and both of us were laughing like anything. Another ten minutes on those dodgy roads and we reached there. It was a 1.75 building college. One for classes, .5 for workshop and another qaurter of unfinished one. We filled up coupld of forms and started our 23 Km trip back to home. On our way back, we were thinking that its a decent choice which is on verge of something big. Sort of high risk high returns thing. Four years passed and I was Er. Ashish Sharma. Our college had grown with us. Now, it had 5 buildings and a decent ground. Only thing which had gone worse was Landra Banoor road. From potholed road, it had become dust bowl. I and my scooter were happy to that we don’t have to tread through these paths again. Well, at least my scooter was lucky on that front.
I didn’t realise that I had reached Landra while searching sector 76. Inadvertently, my bike turned towards Tangori. On right side, CEC was still there but loads of colleges had sprung up along with that like mushrooms. B-school, Pharmacy college, general education college, engg college. You name it, they had it in that small area. I was wondering if they have these many rooms there to accommodate these many diverse studies. After driving a while, I started noticing major differences. Road was bit wider, it had lesser potholes and loads of billboards and flags had replaced lush green views on both sides. Emaar MGF, Unitech City and pearl City. These were the names of builders who had decided to change the landscape in favour of developed Greater Mohali. Damn, these builders had bought entire stretch and beyond. PUDA like IPL had played this township card very well. They had sold the rights of acquiring these lands directly from Farmers to these modern day imperialists and had drafted these sectors out of nothing. These townships were suppose to come up in next 3-4 years and were already selling the flats/plots/villas before laying the foundation stones itself. Somebody told me that they are making this road a four lane highway. Woahh…superb business proposition. This would take that area into different orbit all together but I was felling a bit sad as well. This had taken stolen the virginity from those fields. Papa trackers were replaced with JCBs. Farmers with security guards, greenery with lines of bricks ready to be walled. Farmers I saw on the way were looking a bit down. I am sure they were small land tillers who didn’t get their chance to wash their hands in that dhan ganga which would have flooded the area. These acres were sold for crores.
Once I crossed the railway line, scene was back to normal. Greenery was back and so were hordes of buffaloes that now seem to react for your horns. Positives of developments I must say. Then I reached SUSCET. College was deserted (it was Sunday silly!). Nothing much had changed since our convocation apart from ground which was lush green now. Security guard there was bit sceptical of my intentions. “Who would come to this desert on Sunday?” he must be thinking. “Ki labda hai bai?” he asked. “kuch nahi.” I said ‘Aiwe hi apni mitti labhda aaya si’ I thought. I told him that I am an ex-SUSCETian (hope that’s we are called). I asked him “If I could I roam around?” “yaar bamb bumb na rakh dayi” he said apprehensively. That statement summed the situation. Swords which were brandished 8 years back have been replaced by guns and pistols. Year on year, quality of batches must have gone down. Rayats, landras, bhaddals seem to winning this one. These colleges either had money or power. Our college mgmnt seemed to have neither. Irony is that Tangori’s polytechnic was now more famous than Engg college. I picked up my helmet and started moving back. That moment I saw the placement board placed at reception. Infy, TCS and many others. Big names were there. May be I was wrong. May be its bad to make perception based on security guard’s tales. May be our college was on the way up. That was pretty good silver lining behind the clouds. On that positive note, I started my long journey back to Chandigarh. Uff…it still is very costly affair going on your bike alone, Keshto J
P.S. Gogs, if at all you are planning to hitch hike with Manu and Chetan, then go ahead bindaas. That Landran petrol pump is now closed down.
Saturday, 26 April 2008
Tashan - the utter crap.
Couple of days back, I was longing to eat something really special. A thought came that lets cook kadhi. I googled for the recipe of kadhi pakora. Found it too difficult to cook and it was already 12 AM in India so no point in disturbing mom also. Started thinking of alternatives. Muttor paneer, paneer bhurji, veg jalfrezi. Choices were there but not salivating enough as these were now becoming pretty regular affair in our menu. Then I remembered that I had bought a pack of bhaturas. Lets cook chhole bhautre. Yummy. Chhole (the one for bhatures) are bit tricky business. So, I googled again. Found quite a few recipes and couple of those were looking very exotic. Game on. Instructions were: grind onion, ginger, garlic, chillies, clove (I added cardamom also) into a paste. Tadkafy these along with cumin, mustard and fenugreek (I added bay leaves and cinnamon sticks as well). Once the colour turns brown, add channa powder, chilli powder, turmeric powder and salt (main jeera powder, garam masala, kaali mirch bhi daala). Then add tomato paste and boiled channa and let it cook for some time. It was ready in 15 minutes. All the spices and extra ones which I added had shown their effects. It was horribly spicy and hot. I tried diluting it and even added some lime juice but spices were too many too much. My worst ever cooking since I joined "can-cook-without-burning-it" league of chefs (no wait, then second worse. worse was aaloo vadiyan). Everybody ate it with plenty of curd (I must say that it tasted pretty good with curd though). Too bad. That too on a day when I wanted to eat something really good. Ironic. Isn’t it.
Now, you must be wondering what am I writing? Title indicates that its about tashan movie but here I am narrating my sad kitchen story. Actually its been quite some time
since I saw a good bollywood masala film and I was awaiting Tashan's release especially to see Bachan Pande (AK). What was dished out by director was no different from my cooking disaster.
It looked like director Vijay acharya saw few movies (most probably some tarantino flicks) and thought lets make a similar type of Hindi one. Revenge-for-family-honour plot has always worked in bollywood. Tashan was also based on same lines. He started narrating it in Tarantino style, present-flash back-present-future. Funny don, a femme assistant, couple of jackass side kicks and in middle of this was our good old hamming saif (Somebody should ask him to loosen up. One shouldn’t always pretend to be a tight ass rock star. It doesn’t suit him. All of us adore that fool DCH Saif). First half went on a like normal Hindi movie. Straight forward story, Everybody over-acting (apart from AK), out-of-plot-but-on-exotic-location songs. Though Karina looked anorexic. She has lost too much of fat for her own good. She is too bony now. Movie was still tolerable as Akshay was introduced. What a refreshing change. Real sincere actor who gets under the skin of character invariably in all his movies (though he gets too sincere while doing pelvic thrusting dance steps).
Second half opened in a desert when intolerable anil kapoor came riding on a desert scooter (In Rajasthan!!!! imagine). Next shot, all four stars were fighting black cat commandoes who come from no where in true NYPD style jumping from choppers and our khiladi Akshay was dodging AK 56s while jumping on drums in a sequence ripped from the free running chase sequence from casino royale. Black cats obviously got defatted but our director added a DON style twist by killing the honest cop who knew saif was a good boy (though this twist dies with this scene itself). Then, KK, SAK & AK criss-cross across Rajasthan, Ladakh and Kerala looking for 25 crores and you are left wondering why would anyone hide such amount in huts, with camel riders, with kathakalis and in boats. And then director takes us back into 80s when he ties the loose ends of puzzle where you realise that baali umar ka pyar between Akhshay and Karina was nipped in its buds when bhaiyya ji (Anil) killed Karina’s father and took over his legacy to become top gunda of Kanpur. All in front of Gudiya’s (Karina) young impressionable eyes. This instigates Karina to be cold blooded bitch and embark on a revenge mission. Wow, so damn original. (On other note, Karina is playing a real bitch in next yash raj cartoon movie.)
Then came the point when movie reached its idiotic zenith. Climax. It was "inspired" from so many different movies that you lose the count after a while. Bizli ke jhatke scene from a Vijaykanth movie (Tamil sunny deol). Akshay on free running race to dodge hundreds of thousands of millions bullets. Again. All three come out unscathed from a super powerful hand grenade attack. Then there is Break-the-pole-and-make-gundas-fly scene from Sivaji. Akhshay fights shaolin monks on electricity tower. karina kills Bhatia ji in true Achilles style. Saif burned thugs to ashes with his fire gun and then he does a "Fly the water scooter from a nala" stunt in dhoom style I suppose (and you wonder what is water scooter doing in middle of Mumbai at don's lanka). Climax was not over yet. Defeated but still alive Anil threw his final dice. He came out in true knight style brandishing double edged swords in both hands on a RICKSHAW instead of horse!!!!!!!!!! How symbolic. It was three on one. But our heroes played it fair and let Uma Thurman oops karina kill bill urf bhayya ji (Anil Kapoor) but movie goes on even after that, narrating the story after end where Saif owns a all girl call centre and Akhsay declares while holding his crotch ki uski biwi (Karina) ne ghoonte se baandh rakha hai. Terrible is the only word you can think of.
This movie is classic case of adding too many masalas, combining too many recipes but forgetting about basic theme. Director didn’t know what he was cooking. In the end what you get is a mix veg, chicken, pork, bacon & meat stew which is so terrible that you can not even taste (at least my chhole were edible with curd). They say "too many cooks spoil the broth". Same holds true when you add too many masalas as well. Songs are ok but movie is long and unending (same as this blog actually). I am thinking really hard if I have seen a movie worse then this. You expect some standard from Yashraj films but they are trying too hard to touch new lows with every release. I think this is worse movie I have ever seen. If you have seen even worse then do let me know. I would like to see that as well kyonki kehte hai ki aadmi agar ek baar jail ka khana kha le to vo kuch bhi kha sakta hai and this movie is worse then that as well. Phew!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And, for those who want to know what does Tashan means. Some say its style, some say attitude and some say sense of doing something really cool. To me, its all three and much more. Somthing which you can not really define in words or constraint it to one definition. It is.....................different :))
Now, you must be wondering what am I writing? Title indicates that its about tashan movie but here I am narrating my sad kitchen story. Actually its been quite some time
since I saw a good bollywood masala film and I was awaiting Tashan's release especially to see Bachan Pande (AK). What was dished out by director was no different from my cooking disaster.It looked like director Vijay acharya saw few movies (most probably some tarantino flicks) and thought lets make a similar type of Hindi one. Revenge-for-family-honour plot has always worked in bollywood. Tashan was also based on same lines. He started narrating it in Tarantino style, present-flash back-present-future. Funny don, a femme assistant, couple of jackass side kicks and in middle of this was our good old hamming saif (Somebody should ask him to loosen up. One shouldn’t always pretend to be a tight ass rock star. It doesn’t suit him. All of us adore that fool DCH Saif). First half went on a like normal Hindi movie. Straight forward story, Everybody over-acting (apart from AK), out-of-plot-but-on-exotic-location songs. Though Karina looked anorexic. She has lost too much of fat for her own good. She is too bony now. Movie was still tolerable as Akshay was introduced. What a refreshing change. Real sincere actor who gets under the skin of character invariably in all his movies (though he gets too sincere while doing pelvic thrusting dance steps).
Second half opened in a desert when intolerable anil kapoor came riding on a desert scooter (In Rajasthan!!!! imagine). Next shot, all four stars were fighting black cat commandoes who come from no where in true NYPD style jumping from choppers and our khiladi Akshay was dodging AK 56s while jumping on drums in a sequence ripped from the free running chase sequence from casino royale. Black cats obviously got defatted but our director added a DON style twist by killing the honest cop who knew saif was a good boy (though this twist dies with this scene itself). Then, KK, SAK & AK criss-cross across Rajasthan, Ladakh and Kerala looking for 25 crores and you are left wondering why would anyone hide such amount in huts, with camel riders, with kathakalis and in boats. And then director takes us back into 80s when he ties the loose ends of puzzle where you realise that baali umar ka pyar between Akhshay and Karina was nipped in its buds when bhaiyya ji (Anil) killed Karina’s father and took over his legacy to become top gunda of Kanpur. All in front of Gudiya’s (Karina) young impressionable eyes. This instigates Karina to be cold blooded bitch and embark on a revenge mission. Wow, so damn original. (On other note, Karina is playing a real bitch in next yash raj cartoon movie.)
Then came the point when movie reached its idiotic zenith. Climax. It was "inspired" from so many different movies that you lose the count after a while. Bizli ke jhatke scene from a Vijaykanth movie (Tamil sunny deol). Akshay on free running race to dodge hundreds of thousands of millions bullets. Again. All three come out unscathed from a super powerful hand grenade attack. Then there is Break-the-pole-and-make-gundas-fly scene from Sivaji. Akhshay fights shaolin monks on electricity tower. karina kills Bhatia ji in true Achilles style. Saif burned thugs to ashes with his fire gun and then he does a "Fly the water scooter from a nala" stunt in dhoom style I suppose (and you wonder what is water scooter doing in middle of Mumbai at don's lanka). Climax was not over yet. Defeated but still alive Anil threw his final dice. He came out in true knight style brandishing double edged swords in both hands on a RICKSHAW instead of horse!!!!!!!!!! How symbolic. It was three on one. But our heroes played it fair and let Uma Thurman oops karina kill bill urf bhayya ji (Anil Kapoor) but movie goes on even after that, narrating the story after end where Saif owns a all girl call centre and Akhsay declares while holding his crotch ki uski biwi (Karina) ne ghoonte se baandh rakha hai. Terrible is the only word you can think of.
This movie is classic case of adding too many masalas, combining too many recipes but forgetting about basic theme. Director didn’t know what he was cooking. In the end what you get is a mix veg, chicken, pork, bacon & meat stew which is so terrible that you can not even taste (at least my chhole were edible with curd). They say "too many cooks spoil the broth". Same holds true when you add too many masalas as well. Songs are ok but movie is long and unending (same as this blog actually). I am thinking really hard if I have seen a movie worse then this. You expect some standard from Yashraj films but they are trying too hard to touch new lows with every release. I think this is worse movie I have ever seen. If you have seen even worse then do let me know. I would like to see that as well kyonki kehte hai ki aadmi agar ek baar jail ka khana kha le to vo kuch bhi kha sakta hai and this movie is worse then that as well. Phew!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And, for those who want to know what does Tashan means. Some say its style, some say attitude and some say sense of doing something really cool. To me, its all three and much more. Somthing which you can not really define in words or constraint it to one definition. It is.....................different :))
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