Laughing at people's misery

If you laugh at any point in this video, you will be guilty of that.

Misery

Where X meets Y

1. Where Soccer meets FingerJuggling.

Video 1

2. Where Nintendo meets Opera Chorus.

Video 2

Of Kirtans and Tantriks

Happened to catch this story on NPR yesterday.

Kirtan on NPR

(There is a link to the audio of the whole segment if you want to listen to it.)

I must say that Pop Kirtan sounded pretty interesting.

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A few days ago I read that Ganguly is being helped by a Tantrik.

Tantrik and Ganguly

I think the tantrik was approached during lunch of second ODI.

Here is the accomplishments section on the tantrik's CV.

1. Made a team lose ODI by 1 run (started after lunch, very difficult.)
2. Made the same team lose next 3 ODIs. Woke up at 4:00 am every match day to make things easier.

3. Moving on to test series: Fought with another tantrik helping the team but won the battle eventually. I was better in first innings and he tried to catch up in the second innings but never could. Team could not take the last wicket to win the match.

4. Was better prepared for the second test and was successful. Team could not win this match either. The other tantrik is powerful but I was the winner.

5. Trying a new proactive strategy for the third test.
Windies threaten to go on strike.

Third test may never happen. Thinking out of the box here to achieve the goal of the said team not winning a test series overseas. Might exceed expectations by making them lose the series.

Why America does not care about Soccer?

You cannot help but think about it. Especially when the local food court decides to show Golf or baseball over world cup soccer thus denying me a chance to catch some action during lunch.

I have heard a lot of reasons about why Soccer is not popular here and I think I just realized a big reason today. I am sure someone has thought about it also.

Let's discuss some other reasons before.

1. Soccer is boring.

Bullshit! Just because media calls it boring and Jay Leno makes jokes about 0-0 matches does not mean it is boring. I was watchig the last few minutes of Holland Vs Ivory Coast match today and although nobody scored in that duration, Ivory Coast's attempts to level the score to avoid elimination were very exciting.

Anyway, the usual complaint is there is not much variety, it is pass, keep, pass, pass, shoot cycle. HELLLOOOOO... Basketball??

2. Lead is never swapped in one scoring play.

Trust me, this is one of the reasons I have read to justify soccer's unpopularity. This can happen in basketball, Baseball and Football but not in soccer, so it sucks.
Maybe soccer should give three points for a goal scored off a free kick, two for a header, one for a penalty kick etc. I guess that is why tennis is so unpopular also and ice-hockey and golf... wait a lot of americans are interested in these sports. hmmm...

3. Americans do not get to watch live soccer

Well that is because nobody is interested in soccer not the other way round.


Anyway, I can go on and on.

Now one point that I could not argue against.

Media controls things in US. If it hypes something up, people will watch it. If it hypes something up, people will buy it. It has reached a stage that many people watch Superbowl just for the ads. Imagine how happy the sponsors are then!

And there lies the problem.

Soccer is a continuous game, there is no timeout other than the odd quick stretchering out of an injured player. And therefore, there is NO slot to show ads other than half time. Since people are also glued to TV for 45minutes they use those precious 15 minutes of halftime break to do more important stuff like standing in line for the bathroom etc. Very low returns for a potential sponsor for a live match on TV.

So nobody hypes up the live telecast as not many companies are interested in sponsoring. No ads-no hype-no interest, no interest-no sponsorship. This cycle makes a lot of sense given how sports operate in US.

And then Leno gets more matter for his jokes and rest of the world makes jokes about America and soccer. Pump more money in the sport, make cool intro videos, get US players in commercials doing funny things, build more soccer stadiums and soccer will not only be popular in US but US will have consistent good performances in the world cups.

Nice!

He lost the first set in tiebreaker.

Was down 4-6 in the tiebreaker of the second.

Saved four match points to win the second tiebreaker 11-9.

Was down a break in the third set.

Broke back at 2-4.

Won the third tiebreaker(7-5) to win against Rochus.

He had a tough match against Gasquest too. Something seems to be not right for Roger. And I doubt it is Tennis related.

Will these two victories make me forgive him for the FO trauma? I guess not, but at least I will watch him at Wimbledon.

I watch him for his 'I might be down but I am not out' spirit. I watch him for his incredible array of different shots (someone else is very monotonous ;) ). I watch him for his ability to shift gears at the right moment. It seems he has not lost it.

In other news, Hewitt forces the dirtBike to retire on grass. His request to use a dethatcher on the court was turned down by the officials [evil grin].

Adidas Ad for Germany'06

Isn't it one of the coolest ads that you have seen so far? I think it
does the best job in catching the spirit of the World Cup.

More info on ad:
Adidas Ad Info

Better quality ad available on Google Video.

That Hurt

That hurt pretty bad.

It brought back memories of March 23rd, 2003. Only this time I had hope till the last moment. He played like he had a fight with Mirka. I know Nadal played well but anyone who saw the match would be disgusted at Fed's unforced errors. It would be a bad one to recover from, not for Federer but for me.

In other news, I saw a new range of dirt bikes today. They are useless to drive anywhere except on dirt tracks. I call them Nadals.

Cars

Initial thoughts:

Not jaw dropping kind of movie, but this time Pixar decided to go for a sweet movie with a clear message. Has lots of funny moments and succeeds in invoking emotions too at times. Many of the jokes are subtle and a keen eye for all animation is recommended. Falls short on the action side but that is an unfair comment as people no doubt would like to compare it to the incredible "The Incredibles".

I just felt that the background score could have been better. It is good at times and average at other. Sound by itself does not stir you at any time. It did in incredibles. Sorry for the comparison again but even the start of the movie where it picks up as soon as Helen says "I don't think so... I don't think so" asked you to sit back and relax as something very very special is gonna follow.

I will say Cars is definitely worth watching once in a movie hall. But then, given the kind of details and efforts Pixar puts in their movies, it should be illegal not to do that.


PS: Be prepared to hear kids around you at 90 minute mark. The movie does not have continuous visual jokes to keep them occupied for 2 hrs. That sounds like an impossible task anyway unless you play 2 hrs of Tom and Jerry or whatever is popular amongst kids today.

Closing Arguments

1. Maui was definitely the nicer of the two islands with lots more stuff to do and lots more stuff to watch. Kauai has a very laid back lifestyle and with its population of less than 60000 is not crowded at all. It gets the most rains but luckily it rained only for a few minutes when we were on Kauai.

2. Kauai room was the highlight. It was an ocean-front suite (we upgraded since priceline gave us a not so well equipped hotel to offset the disappointment.)

We could see the ocean, hear the ocean, the breeze touched us and we could touch the ocean if we walked about 30-40 steps and maybe smell the air a bit too... something is missing right? What about the fifth sense?

I came across this amazing product at the Indian store, definitely the best thing since sliced naan. Masala Tea Pouches. Just boil some water and empty the contents of the pouch and stir. It has tea, sugar, masala and milk powder in it. A perfect railway station tea is ready. A book, that tea and a pool chair in front of the ocean. Paradise!

3. Our return flight was from Maui and we had to leave Kauai in the morning on the last day. Our flight from Kauai to Maui was via Honolulu(Oahu) and we found out that our flight from Maui to Chicago had a brief stopover at the Big Island. (We later realized that it was just to increase the sales of the airport gift shops). Anyway, that day we touched four major islands. We thought it was pretty cool.

4. I had spent quite some time recording some CDs for our trip and it was worth every minute. So if you don't have an iPod and car-attachment/FM transmitter, do spend some time with this.

That is it about Hawaii. As our flight attendant told us after we landed at Chicago
"Welcome back to Reality."


And now, let the games begin.



Taking good pictures of fireworks is one of the tougher challenges in photography for me. This is one of my better attempts.

And With this Single, He Reaches His 100

My 100th post! Let's celebrate with some pictures from Kauai. All we did in Kauai was relax and then relax a bit more. That proved to be a very good decision as we did not feel like we need another vacation at the end of this vacation.

I will write some more about Kauai later.



Some Pictures from the Chopper ride of Kauai



































My experiments with Automatic white balancing of my canon.






Some Flowers from Kauai

Fasten Your Seatbelts

French open semis and finals, Germany'06, Wimbledon, Cricket test matches... so many things coming up in the next one month.

And yes, Cars will be out this weekend also. And then we can top it off with a pirate.

In next 4 days lets see how Shanghai and Paris are avenged.

Needless to say I will support Vamos Boy on Friday, probably the only time I do so. I know I know I am biased blah blah blah...

Maui Day 3

Day 3 saw quite a few activities.

o Spending time at Scenic points





o Tour of Tropical Plantation

They have all the fruits and most flowers that grow in Hawaii at one place. People take pictures of mango trees. I did too.

All my life I have mercilessly broken a coconut in half and quickly collected the water whenever I sensed presence of drinkable quantity. Our guide had different ideas. Did you know that you can very easily push a (clean) screw-driver through (only) one of the three "eyes" and get water out without wasting a single drop? In India, those three "eyes" usually are not exposed but at least here I can use it. She also broke it in half in a very easy way without banging it on a concrete slab or reminding me of that public service 'use helmet' ad "marzi hain aapki, aakhir sir hain aapka"








Pake ped pe paka papita, paka ped ya paka papita, pake ped ko pakde pinkoo, pinkoo pakde paka papita
There!! What's the big deal? Sorry, I had to do it.






o Drive to the Haleakala summit.

People typically drive here at 2:30, *AM*. And then you have to fight cold temperatures and enthu-overflow-specimens who are riding bicycles. We drove there during the day time and had nobody in the front or back and still I had to be very careful. I have no regrets for not watching the sunrise from the top. I have seen one such sunrise from a flight. Otherwise, I will find one on google images or pbase or wherever.

Driving 10,000 feet up unnecessarily gives you a sense of achievement. The road ensures that you remember at it as an adventure. Somewhere at 60% elevation we drove through the clouds for some time. The temperature dropped from 75 degrees to 65 degrees within a minute. The coldest temp in the clouds was 63 but if you are in a convertible you can feel it after sometime and you look forward to getting out of the clouds. My ears were blocked while driving down and the thick clouds around you give you a claustrophobic feeling with visibility about not more than 50m at times.

This was definitely one time where I was extremely happy with Jeep wrangler. It just has a safer feel in such conditions.

Cloudy View from the Top

Tower Blaster Game

This game can tell you what is meant by "Calculated Risk".

People have very interesting ideas when it comes to making such simple games.

Tower Blaster Game.

Maui Day 1 and Day 2

Day 1:
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* Submarine Dive:
Good Experience. It is just like watching fish in an aquarium (you have better chances of seeing colorful fish in an aquarium) but the whole submarine experience is worth doing once. If not for anything, the instruction over the speaker that your submarine gets "DIVE DIVE DIVE" sounds cool. Our guide had a lot of jokes up her sleeve and I mean lot, people stopped believing her even when she was serious kind of lot.



* Luau:
This is the Hula dance show with a dinner buffet. Nice way to spend an evening enjoying a cool breeze from the ocean. Again, this is not something you would do more than once, mainly because of the ticket cost, just like most other things in Maui. I wore an 'England' jersey that I have and coincidentally we sat next to a British couple. It was their 4th trip to Hawaii. We had a nice time discussing Rooney's injury and Flintoff's Ashes. Next day we met them at three different landmarks on our road to Hana.

Here is a pic from Luau.



We have lots of video of our stay in Maui and when I get time, I will upload short clips. Video editing is a very time consuming thing but the last clip I uploaded got a huge response (115,000+ hits) but then it was related to cricket :).


That was the end of our first full day in Hawaii.


Day 2
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* Road to Hana

This was the only activity we did on this day. At Luau the British guy told us to first imagine how much time we would take to do this 57 mile one way drive and then he told us that we should then triple it and he was spot on. This drive is so beautiful that you cannot help but stop and spend time at various scenic spots. Google(images) for "Road to Hana" to get an idea what I mean. Imagine how nice it is and then triple it. You have to pack your lunch as there are no Burger Kings on the way. The only things that you are sure to find are hairpin bends and one lane bridges. And yes, you have ocean on one side, mountains on the other and these mountains have a bonus of rainforests, other than the waterfalls that you see on the way ofcourse.

Let me summarize this drive in bullet points as it is almost 2:15 am.
o We wanted to leave at 7:00am. We left at 8:00am.

o We took a turn to fill up the Jeep and as a pleasant surprise found a cafe, Cafe Des Amis, that had Indian veg wraps. There was no Indian in that restaurant, not even the chef. So why were they selling "authentic" Indian food? As we all know, Kohinoor is not the only thing British liked about India. The owner of this restaurant is British. The food(btw, I had some chicken crepe), I must add, was better than some of the Indian restaurants I have been to. This type worked out great as there was no danger of getting charged for spilled curry on the back seat.

o The next stop was at twin falls. The highlight was not the mango/guava/papaya trees or even the falls. The highlight was the sugarcane juice with lemon juice that put me right back in late 80s and early 90s, a period when I have enjoyed 90% of the total sugarcane juice I have had so far. *exact* *same* *taste*. And I stress this as we had it at another place where it was somewhat different. Anyway, I will give this juicewala bhaiyya at twin falls a 9/10. He loses that 1 mark to extra-cleanliness and using a machine to squeeze the lemon.

o Garden of Eden is where we relaxed, had our lunch, relaxed more, interacted with most colorful parrots I have ever seen in my life. $10 per person entry fee was totally worth it as we saw the part of the ocean and rainforest that featured in the opening sequence of Jurassic Park and they had clean restrooms.

You can check this out at Maui Garden Of Eden. And yes, don't forget to triple what you see.

o Then we drove, stopped, drove and drove back. Also the remotest gas-station that we saw had the cheapest gas for $4.29.

The first picture is just before we started the road to Hana, first scenic point. And the next two were somewhere on the way.





I doubt any drive can beat this one. We reached back to Kahului at 7 pm. Spending 11 hrs driving, walking, taking pictures, looking for restrooms etc and and not feeling tired at the end of the day is the best thing about Hawaii!!

Day 3 coming up