a stroll through the "maximum city"

It was not the usual lazy Saturday morning and quite rightly so. The previous night Pankaj had mentioned about his impending visit to the British Council Library and the shutterbug in me had jumped at the thought of visiting the beautiful South Bombay and making extensive use of my Nikon S3.

10:30 was the timing decided and I was as usual late, although by a few minutes only. We were lucky enough to get hold of the 10:45 fast from Thane and luckier to grab the fourth seat( only those who travel in the second class understand its importance). We reached our destination withing an hour. The strong Bombay police presence on the CST station was tangible but I wondered where did they all come from? May be they have reduced the security of some petty politician who might as well turn out to be the next target.I digress.

We reached the BCL within few minutes of touching base at CST. BCL seemed very cool to me, not for the obvious AC but for the plethora of books at its disposal. Pakya got hold of three books, one a p.g.wodehouse, another a thriller Bunker 13(which now happens to be with me) by some investigavtive journalist and the third one was a book on 'Computer Hacking'. After finishing the proceedings at the library we decided to just roam around to make use of my camera and here are those pictures.

Well there is nothing more to be written about this stroll as the pictures speak for themselves.

bhurji?

I have decided to change the name of my blog. Why? Umm..let me analyze.

The name of the blog wasn't representing the blog per se. It instead defined me as a person..a lazzybum. Hence decided to change it in such a way that it represents the content on my blog rather than me as an indivisual.
Now why the name "bhurji"? and exactly what is a "bhurji" by the way? For the uninformed a "bhurji" is a term used to describe a dry-ish masala dish which is just a mixture of stuff in small pieces - e.g. pieces of paneer,scrambled egg,tomato,onion, potato etc. As the content of the bhurji is left to the creative freedom of the chef or the cook, there is nothing unique about its taste or the texture except that it has to be spicy. A very popular variety is the egg-bhurji which also happens to be my favourite.
So what has this food item got to do with this blog? Well, a concoction that a "bhurji" is, whose contents are as varied as they could get, my blog intends to be the same. It already is but still things tend to revolve around me too much. I do not want to write about stuff that is just related to me but expand my ramblings to "anything and everything".

Lets see how tasty this "bhurji" turns out to be.

my thoughts about the football world cup

Now that the real life one month long drama has ended, I thought I might just as well sum up my impressions of the same.

To start with, I must say that I am not a football expert, neither an avid football watcher nor a hardcore enthusiast. Even after watching the tournament all month long, I cannot claim to be any one of those. My previous experiences with the game, be it watching or playing, could be best described as 'occasional'. I had intermitently watched the 98 and 02 editions of the Cup and never had any inclination to keep myself abreast of club football. I am not sure what made me take keen interest this time around, but possible reasons could be the lack of good cricketing action and the urge to remain informed about the most talked about sport in the world.

I would probably rant about two observations. Observations on the field and off the field.

Quality?
Having said about my limited knowledge of the game, I can still say that the quality of football at this world cup has been far from desirable. When we talk about football, we talk about goals and about how flamboyant and free flowing was that striker. But instead of the Ronaldos, people talked about the Zidanes, the Cannavaros and the Buffons, and all that the top goal scorer of the tournament, Klose, could manage is a meagre tally of five goals, the lowest since 1962(source:FIFA 2006 site). All that mattered was how good a midfield or how strong a defence a team had. There was hardly any good show of footballing skills beyond the half line.All this is fine, but to keep a viewer like me interested there have to be goals and goals that are breathtaking to say the least. I longed to see the Latin American artistry and arrogance.
Nevertheless, it did keep me glued to the TV set, most of the time beyond midnight, and the only reason I can attribute for that is the unpredictability of it all. Who had predicted that the Italians would take home the final honours? I bet no one, not even the Italians.In my opinion, Italy wasn't the best team consistently. Every team had its moments and the one which kept its nerves surged ahead(how we all saw zidane lose his cool during the final).

Indian Women and Football
We have all heard stories and jokes about how women hate sports, particularly when their husbabnds/boyfriends tend to neglect them as the result of some "happening" sporting action going on somewhere in the world. I pretty much had the same impression until recently when the conversations with my fellow female friends started with the 'F' word i.e 'Football'. As they began discussing the tackling skills of the Italians and the dribbling skills on the Brazilians at length, I wondered if I had something to contribute to the discussions. Astonished by their knowledge and interest, and ashamed by mine, I thought it was high time I start watching the game seriously. :D. Women did watch football but I always thought it was just an eye-candy for them than anything else. Never knew that they actually had good enough knowledge about the game. Now I know how to strike of conversations with females, an activity which is as tough for me as is using the cricket bat for Ashish Nehra.

To conclude, I must say it was a good worldcup, less of brilliance and full of shockvalue. The final was an icing on the cake, a cake which wasn't as sweet as expected.

kahn they do it??

Just saw a humdinger, the quater-finals of the FIFA World Cup 2006, where the Germans were playing against the Argentinians, and I must say that it turned out almost as I had expected it to.Though a disappointment for me as my Cup favourites Argentina lost the game, it was a treat to watch, as is any game that goes down to the wire.

Watching the Germans kick in one penalty after another with so much precision and authority, I have developed an opinion and it is that this German team definitely has the character to hold their nerve in a cracker. I could easily see it in their eyes, the killer instinct, the strong desire to win for their country. Naturally after this strong win, the Germans must be oozing with confidence and have emerged as the strongest contenders for the Cup.

But the questions remains. Kahn they do it??

awe-inspiring

Picture Courtesy:This blog
Some images are inspiring but a very few are Awe-Inspiring as this one.I wish to be among them one day.

football fever

FIFA 2006 has kicked off and the football fever is running high everywhere.It is so infectious that it has affected me, a die-hard cricket buff, who rarely watches football.

I just saw the Sweden v/s Trinidad&Tobago match and was quite surprised by the result. Sweden,one the biggies of the football world, was competing against T&T, the one who have the distinction of qualifying last for this world cup finals. With stars like Larsson and Freddie Ljungberg, the Swedes were expected to make mincemeat of the Caribbeans. Also T&T had to play their reserve goalkeeper and was reduced to 10 men at the start of the second half. What do you expect in this scenario? A Sweden win, right?
But No !! The minnows had their own plans. With their grit and determination, coupled with a tinge of overconfident play from their opponents, they successfully gained a point. The 0-0 scoreline must have kicked of celebrations in the island country with calypso music in the background and heavy introspection in the Sweden camp. I wonder how many such unexpected results are in store ahead ..??

Next up, just a few minutes away from now, is another mismatch from the Group of Death, that is Argentina vs Ivory Coast. Ivory Coast have qualified for the first time ever in the history of the Cup finals, but with star stricker Drogba they cannot be underestimated. We just know what happened a few minutes ago, don't we ? Nevertheless, I am supporting the Africans for the match because somehow I enjoy supporting the underdogs.


Update: Sadly, that was the only point T&T gained in this world cup and were the only team to do so without winning a single match.

a new word added to the dictionary.

Fanaa(noun,adjective)
1:Nonsense.
2:Subject matter, behavior, or content that is foolish or absurd.
3:Matter of little or no importance,usefulness or entertainment.
Examples of various usages of the word in our daily life.
1:Please do not talk fanaa. OK?
2:Arjun Singh made a fanaa analysis of the reservation issue.


P.S:If someone is thinking what this crap is all about then for them let me elaborate. Fanaa is the recently released Bollywood movie, which I happened to watch yesterday when I was suffering from a mental disorder of sorts. My mental state got worse at the end of the experience and might take time to heal. The only good part of the experience was the Kabul Express trailor that they showed during the interval. Kabul Express seems promising. To cure myself of the disorder I need to watch some good old movie, Hollywood or Bollywood. Fanaa is highly unrecommended.

it drizzled.....and then it rained.

Yes, It did and I can already sense and enjoy the freshness in the environ.

When it started drizzling, I was mid-way on my way back from work, sitting pretty listless, as my bus edged past bulky trucks and speedy cars, pushing its way hard through the, previously rough and dusty and now wet, Ghodbunder road. As soon as I opened the window, the wind pushed some drops in along with the aroma of the wet mud which is so peculiar to the first rains. I could see some lightning, surprisingly it didn't make much noise or may be the bus made too much. The Southwesterlies had stamped their arrival in Mumbai.
The idea of getting drenched in the first rain of the season excited me. Little did I care for my leather shoes or anything else. It was still raining as the bus screeched to a halt at my stop. I usually take the autorickshaw from the bus-stop to my home but had other thoughts today and hence walked along ignoring the usual hint from few hopeful rickshawwallas willing to drive me there. As I treaded on the wet and slippery tar road, carefully evading the puddles and the occasional mud splash due to a careless speedy vehicle, my already wet shoes took my attention. I decided against ruining them further and sensibly enough hinted to the passing rikcshaw. I reached home.

As I write this post, I see it has stopped drizzling and started raining and may be it will continue the same the whole night. I pray it rains well for the next few months and keeps Mumbai cool and wet minus the heavy outbursts of the last year.Amen.

!! No more heat waves !! No more dusty roads !! and No more sweaty shirts ! Yoohoooo!
Life just cannot get better.

in retro

It indeed has been a very long time since I blogged the last.
A few things have happened since then.

I put in my papers @ work a few weeks ago. With no other job in my hand, my alliance with my employers will sieze to exist from July.
If I look back at my decision(I do not enjoy doing this but..), the only reason I find that compelled me to do so was boredom, a sense of dissatisfaction resulting out of uninteresting work. I think I love programming but unfortunately it had become a seasonal affair, pretty much like mangoes in the summer. Most of the time my work involved cleaning someone elses shit(read bugs). I understand that most IT work in India involves maintenance projects and pretty much every IT guy/girl spends his/her time doing what I do. But I realized that this is exactly what I do not want to do all my life.
In short, I was not at all enjoying my work.
As a direct result of which I was not giving my 100% to the job and not giving it enough justice as I used to when I had started out.Things had become so predictable and mundane that going all the way to work seemed as a punishment. A punishment let out by social pressure.A pressure to stick with a secure job. A pressure to earn money.Parental pressure.Peer pressure.

Life is surely going to change after this. I forsee the so-called good times giving way to difficult times.You know it from the reactions from the people around you. The kind of reactions I get back when I happen to tell my quit-story vary from bafflement to empathy. Some say it is a silly decision and some happen to plaud it by terming it as a bold one.I feel it is a mixture of both.Its a silly-bold decision :). Anyways coming back to all seriousness, I know I need to ignore the negative vibes and carry forward the positive ones. I also am completely aware that it is a risky affair to quit without any other job in hand or say when having a future as uncertain as a Bollywood movie but I say what the heck !?! If I am not taking risks or for that matter following my heart @ this age then when??? I am happy I did it and must say that I am one lucky ass as currently I do have the freedom to do my own thing thanks to the fact that I do not have to support my family as such.Touch wood.I know many people who do not love their jobs and want to quit but just cannot with all the attachments.

What next?? This is a big question and answers still evade me.Although currently Army aspirations are running high in me and I have an aim for the next few months i.e to clear the CDS and then the SSB, the future still seems very hazey. As the selection process takes a while to complete, I need to find out what I want to do in the meantime and or rather full time if I do not clear it(unfortunately I just have one chance to get through to Army).Do I want to go back to IT or rather the corporate world? Rationality tells me that I am equipped to do programming and that is what I am best at currently and hence should go back. But somewhere down the line I do not feel like doing so and living the cubicle life all over again.
There are two things I find my interests pinning down to. To work for a startup firm which has an informal work culture and a real zest for cutting edge technology work. A workplace I could feel attached to.Never felt that attachment with TCS. Second thing would be to work as a travel writer or rather just as a traveller. Writing travelogues for magazines coupled with nature photography and the freedom to explore the whole of India would be ultimate fun.I know I am not a great writer or something but I also know that I am not bad one either. Also I have an eye for photography and hence think that something of this sort would give me more satisfaction.
But yes, I would contemplate on all these only if I do not get to the Army.Army is the place I want to be. A mere thought of going for the SSB gives me that adrenalin rush. Man!!!! I just want to be there.
Lets see whats in store ahead.....

Would like to end this post with a very profound quote I recently read.
"A short cut to riches is to subtract from our desires". How true!!