A CLASS ACT

what do you want to be when you grow up? the answers for my class have been indie music singer, fashion marketer-cum-dj, medicine man, computer science engineer, englash-as-foreign-language teacher and even a celebrity. in places such as indonesia, korea, england, singapore, united states and india.

diversity doesn't get any better than this. cheers to nehru memorial international school!

TRUE COLOURS

the only thing worse than discriminating against foreigners is to do it against your own countrymen.

in discussing the recent racist attacks on indians in australia, we seem to be fixated over the attitudes of foreigners towards our fellow citizens. nobody has had the gumption to look inward and question our set of prejudices when it comes to matters of race. if what’s happening in australia is bad, what about indian prejudices towards expatriates residing in our country? the ugly truth is that indians routinely take their first impression about outsiders from face value i.e. skin colour.

that both graham staines and african-americans fell foul of our sensibilities should tell us something. but this bigoted behaviour isn’t limited to expats alone. any person who isn’t falling into the two general categories of north & south indians is either ignored, or worse disparaged. and people from the north-east of the country are subjected to both.

race relations are all about perception, and people from the north-east fall foul of appearing ‘un-indian.’ which is funny because if i had to pick the ideal citizen, i’d choose a stereotypical guy from mizoram. they have a liberal outlook, friendly disposition, resourcefulness with work and trendy hairstyles. and not to forget the best part, they’re huge fans of rock music.

to me, the clutch of separatist movements existing in the north-east prove the capability of negative stereotypes. if anything, indians need to examine the race issue within the country before peeping out. on balance, can there be anything worse than making a fellow citizen feel foreign?

THE FAST AND THE SPURIOUS

the answer to reviving the fortune of indian motorsports might just be staring at us in the face - literally.

on 2 wheels (splendor to the ‘busa), 4 wheels (nano to rolls royce) and beyond, indians have never had so much choice when it comes to cars. but this sales explosion hasn’t translated into a local automotive culture. think about it - we’re well and truly on our way to being a great motoring nation and yet haven’t developed a broad based enthusiasm for motorsports.

of course, there’s narain karthikeyan but his shine is fading fast. there are other drivers too, but the problem may lie in the sport itself instead of the players. by indian standards, competitive motorsports like rally driving are dull and colourless. where’s the drama of a cow sitting in the middle of the racetrack or the ear-splitting honking during the drive? i think the answer may not lie in 2 or 4 wheels but somewhere in between…in auto-rickshaws.

this is no joke – nothing comes close to sitting on the back-seat of a three-wheeler on indian roads. why shouldn’t it be the same for television then? plenty of rickshaw-walas are adept at overtaking manoeuvres, the racing cars will come dirt cheap and indian city roads are the perfect tracks for revving these splendid machines. it’s a match made in motoring heaven.

gladly, some like-minded people have already thought this out and started the indian auto-rickshaw challenge. it’s the bleeding best thing to hit our roads since cows became holy. so i expect the day is not far when supercharged three-wheelers will amok about nürburgring with thousands of cheering fans. bajaj vs. paggio anyone?

SMASH HIT

when a room full of 7000 indonesians start cheering for india instead of china, you know the indian is doing something right.

india has a lot of brand equity in indonesia - thank bollywood for that - but it doesn’t feature prominently in the local passion of badminton. thing is, badminton has an analogous position in indonesia to cricket in india. but lately, victory for the indonesians has been few & far between and nothing resents indonesians more than losing to the current title holders i.e. china.

enter a young 19-year old called saina nehwal. saina, previously ranked 8, is one of the most promising badminton players in the circuit and at the recent indonesian open she proved exactly why. she didn’t just defeat players ranked above her, but did it in immaculate style. this victory is huge. no indian has ever won on indonesian soil. heck, no female indian has ever won so much on any soil.

and indonesia might have played a bit role in saina’s victory. i’ve never seen so many indonesians shout “india, india” continuously for 49 minutes at the top of their voices. part credit also goes to atik jauhari - saina’s travelling coach and the reason behind the indonesian teams’ successes over the past 2 decades.

so next time i’m playing badminton in indonesia, my head will be just a little bit higher knowing that nothing will ever be the same again for indians here.

JOY HO

first came the ecstasy, then consciousness, but after a month now, these holidays have become plain dull. when i lacked a net access in college, i longed for a broadband connection. now that i have loads of bandwidth, i can’t seem to find enough uses for it. since i suspect that my college mates are tired of going to facebook, youtube and saved gtalk chats for entertainment too, here’re three sites i’ve found tailor-made for that unique indianism called timepass. happy surfing!

of all the things one expects from the grand-mommy of news services i.e. the bbc, irrelevant pointless articles aren’t one of them. but that is exactly what magazine monitor excels at – it’s an irreverent take on news, culture and everything else in between. so if you’ve always contemplated whether laughing apes sound like humans or if neil armstrong fluffed his lines, this is a must-visit.

economics is as boring as theory subjects go, so a book tackling this subject that goes on to sell millions is nothing short of a miracle. and if the freakonomics book was good, the blog is even better. sometimes witty, sometimes sobering but always entertaining, this site contains some of the consistently best reading material available online. economics and boring just got decoupled.

there are plenty of video sites available but ted produces some of the best thought-provoking speeches out there. the website contains the lectures – called ted talks – organised during the annual technology, entertainment, design conference on broad topics by eminent personalities from all over the world. as they say, ideas truly worth spreading.

THE FRENCH MIRACLE

the french then. what good have this lot done for this planet except for an imprononçable language and onion soup?

quite a bit it seems. turns out that the french have it in them for speed – lightning fast speed of the record breaking kind actually. the fastest production car in the world is french, and the same goes for trains and commercial jets. of course, bugatti is really owned by ze germans, the japs have made a faster rail prototype and the english had a hand in the concorde. but i digress.

the link between france and fastness is indisputable, and the time is ripe to introduce the country’s latest innovation in the field of mass rapid transport to the world. contrary to what you might expect, it involves the human body and is christened parkour. now those of who’ve seen db 13,damien walters or even top gear know what i’m talking about but if you haven’t, investing some time on youtube should help.

defining it as l'art du déplacement sounds like a load of tosh, but it’s only when one watches those fluid body movements artistically overcoming one obstacle after another that real understanding starts to gather. which brings me to the true genius of this idea. in an age when internal combustion is becoming uncool, video games take precedence over physical sports and public transport is bursting at its seams, the panacea could lie in relearning the way you move your body.

so to summarise, global warming – check. mass rapid transport – check. fat bellies and obesity – check. coming to office on time and impressing your boss – double check. and all this, thanks to the french. viva la france!

THE FINAL SALUTE

this song was recorded on the last day of college (what better time) in a hostel room (what better place) by students of the 2005 batch (what better batch). this is a dedication to birla institute of technology mesra by my batchmates, a home for many of us for the past four years. songs are meant to be shared, and if you like what you hear, please do pass it on.

college ke, yeh din yaadgaar, aayenge fir laut ke naa.

socho toh, kaise beete din hazaar, aise mein kyun naa soche hum yaar.

teri yaadon ke saaye mein gujregi ,zindagi apni yahan.

jab bhi sochenge tere bare mein, hoton pe aayegi sadaa.

bit tujhko salam…

kaagaz ki kashti pe sawaar, aankhon mein sapne the hazaar.

kabhi main jeeta , kabhi gaya haar, gaam nahi sang mere the aise yaar.

jo bhi hua tha lamhe the yaadgaar, saath mere harpal the aise yaar,

jab bhi sochenge tere hi bare mein, hothon pe aayegi sadaa.

bit tujhko salam...

credits: animesh (music, words, vocals, lead guitars), rohit (words, bass guitars), vivek (words, background vocals, rhythm guitars), arnab & vivekanand (sound engineering)

UNITED WE STAND

growing up, you can change friends, food habits and fashion sense but not your football club.

in sports, it doesn’t get bigger than football and in football, it doesn’t get bigger than manchester united. man-u, as it’s popularly known, is a global phenomenon and nobody generates praise and revile in equal measure quite like them. as a t-shirt wearing fan, it’s hard to wrong with the red devils.

so how do they do it - season after season, player after player, trophy after trophy? hard to say, but the man-u brand stands unique in the sporting world. their success is a lesson in recruiting the right people - from manager alex ferguson, to world player-of-the-year ronaldo. they have renowned facilities- like old trafford - and a celebrated scout programme. and their popularity is not just a by-product of match wins, but the outcome of a wildly successful global marketing offensive.

but most importantly, man-u has taught that success in football cannot be bought, no matter how much money your owner - arab sheikh or russian oligarch - is willing to shell out. though there are more decorated teams, pricier players and richer clubs out there, nobody has been able to match their consistency in top-flight football over the past 15 years. and though they’ve lost the recent champions league final, they’ll always remain winners for their legions of fans worldwide.

may the reds march on…

THE ROMANCE OF TRAVEL

so when was the last time you travelled by an airline and actually enjoyed the experience?

when i was young, sea travel was already non-existent and automobile use had achieved critical mass. only air travel remained a class act, making pretty much everything about flying beyond cool. airports, airlines and airhostesses were the stuff of fantasy and travel by air lingered as the last abiding medium (after land and water) romanced by the millions.

the situation could not be more different today. the combination of low-cost airlines, discount fares and budget terminals has led to an explosion in air travel worldwide. airlines are no longer a preserve of the rich and famous but at the same time, you feel neither rich nor famous flying them nowadays. unless one flies first-class, flights have transformed from being a pleasure trip into a quick ride between two points.

which is a real disappointment and here’s why. the airline business has been reduced to a numbers game - ticket fares, paid onboard-meals, legroom - and competitors vie for passengers by juggling this same set of tangibles. however, i suspect what passengers are really looking are a few intangible qualities - quick check-in, an attentive staff, a quality cabin - which cannot be calculated yet make all the difference during travel.

for me, nothing quite beats the excitement of a ride in the skies and i lie in wait to fall in love with air travel all over again.

BREAKING THE RULES

if you’ve ever wondered if the second law of thermodynamics holds true, a look at delhi traffic is all it takes.

new delhi’s roads are a mess and getting worse by the hour which, by the way, also proves the law of inertia. objects don’t move until they’re forced to and whatever is in motion never seems to stop. in fact, give me any law and i’ll prove it using delhi’s transport system. except for one place that stubbornly refuses to follow any law or norm of the land – the delhi metro.

the metro sets a bad example for the rest of the city. take punctuality for instance. the metro is never late, shamelessly substituting the indian stretchable time for the indian standard time. whole new tracks, tunnels and lines are completed ahead of schedule which gives other infrastructure projects an inferiority complex. the system seems to be warped - running in its own time zone.

but that’s not the worse bit. it’s the feeling you get of not being in delhi that’s so unnerving. no paan stains, no honking and shouting, no chaotic ride. the envelope of an air-conditioned calm which surrounds all activities is a danger to delhi’s loud reputation. and i know exactly who to blame it upon: a soft-spoken, honest man called e sreedharan who has single-handedly spoilt the image of sarkari babus in dilli.

so maybe we should outsource the entire delhi government to dr sreedharan. for once, nobody will complain when the rules are broken.