Anil Kumble: The true legend.

The Ultimate reason why one can be his fan.

     When I was a kid, without much knowledge of cricket, when someone asked who is your favorite cricketer i would say 3 names, sachin, kumble, ajay jadeja, i have no idea why, but i would, as i grew ajay jadeja faded away with some match-fixing scandals, everyone knows Sachin is the god but kumble remained underrated, if anyone asks me today who are role models in life i am sure i'll mention the humble Sachin and the gentleman Kumble among the few others.

     Kumble is a legend, he is the perfect example for determination and controlled aggression(which many lack these days aka sreeshanth, yuvi, etc). Kumble's attitude is the ultimate i feel, and that attitude can win many hearts like mine, for me cricket is not just a game, it's a teacher of many life qualities and lessons and one can learn many from Kumble's games. Determination, whenever i hear this word, the first name that comes to my mind is "Anil Kumble", anybody else with such a bowling action as his wouldn't have lasted for more than a series or two, but kumble survived for 132 tests and took 619 wickets highest by any Indian and also considered as one of the best modern day spinners, his action gave him no spin but bounce and pace, what made him unique was the aggression with which he bowled, those expressions of anger after taking a wicket, the pleading to bowl one more over again and again even after being thrashed by the bowler, he was titanium-strong mentally, he had a hunger for competition like no other. It was like if he was bowling he was giving more than a 100 percent every time.

     I did not see the famous 2002 India vs West Indies match where he played on with a broken jaw and took Brain Lara's wicket, but i've heard a lot about that match and seen a few videos, but that alone doesn't show his greatness, many other minor incidents were the reason for me liking him so much, he was a perfect gentleman, he had no controversy ever until the sydney '08 incident occurred, he was extremely aggressive on the field and off it he was gentleman, the ultimate qualities of a legend.

     This article by Harsha Bhogle triggered me to write this much delayed post and i am really satisfied i wrote this.  

Vijay is an actor!!!!LOL

This guy is a funny bloke.I taken this photo from someone's fb profile.

Madrasapattinam

    
     This is surely not a review, but my opinion, i saw this move some 2 weeks back and it was released a month a half back and since i can't it out of my mind. I am like an addict to watching movies, i see 4 to 5 movies per week(of course on my computer), and sometimes even movies in languages i don't understand(english sub's) and they are generally very highly rated on imdb, but this movie stands strikingly amongst all the movies i've seen recently, this is period movie based in the old day chennai, and it's a beautiful love story, arya as always tries to work for performance based scripts like this and it works for him, this movie wasn't expected to make waves or anything at all, hence it had an average opening but within the 2nd week the word spread and theaters filled up, this is the movie for every class, it just amazed me, that a tamil movie, a period movie could become a hit and still be critically acclaimed, the scenes in which wrestling or 'kusthi' fights occur, they were something different, i don't know what to write on this movie any further, cos it's beyond words, must watch and you have no reason to live if you are a from chennai and you still have not seen this movie.

An Incident

     I just felt like writing a post on this incident, i don't know what to label this as, atheism or something else, but it's also going to be about the silliness of engineering colleges.
     It was friday 16th july 2010, 8 am, i was in college sitting in my class room, waiting for classes to commence, at 8 there is an usual morning prayer to which everyone 'must' stand wherever they are, if they are walking in the corridor they must stop walking and stand, even if they are somewhere inside the campus(which is not very big), they must stop doing their work and pray, there are loud speakers on the exterior walls(no intercom speakers, great infra-structure) so that everyone hears the prayer, my college is an christian institution so obviously they only do a christian prayer, they don't care if the person who 'must' stand is a muslim or a hindu or an Atheist like me or belonging to any other religion and forces them pray their prayer. This is a college and prayer is compulsory like for a primary school kid. So i thought  who the hell are they to decide whether i have to pray or not and did not stand up for prayer and continued doing my work, the lecturer for the first hour spotted 2 other girls me and another one sitting, she is a religious person and i don't blame her, she got angry like a primary school teacher, she sent those 2 girls to meet with the H.o.D and were asked to write an apology letter for not doing the prayer, punished not exactly like in primary schools but as stupid. The lecturer asked me why i was not standing, i said i did not want to pray, she was like shell-shocked to hear that, but she continued her work just after muttering a little 'good' advice. I did not care but after her hour, when i was in the next class, i was called for by the H.o.D, she had complained and maybe the H.o.D thought that was bad behaviored and he needed to talk to me like in primary schools, i went there to his staff room where all of my I.T department staff had their seats, H.o.D is a soft-speaking good person who also teaches well, he asked "what happened today morning sir?", i said i did not stand for prayer, "why?" i did not want to pray, "why, why? what your problem, when all others can , are you trying to be a role model? why you thought it's not good to do a christian prayer huh?", i said , no sir i am an Atheist so i did not want to pray and i was not trying to be role model, i thought i can decide personally, he said "then you do one thing join "va@#$%b"(i did not hear what he said) college that Periyar college know, join that", i got positively excited when he said cos, everyone in my college in some capacity wants to join some other college or at least secretly desires so, then he said "ok first take paper and write a letter why you did that", i took the paper and happily went out the room, for a minute i felt proud, and wrote a letter, i wrote on lines of you have no right to ask me to pray, i did not do anything wrong, according to my policies praying is wrong and i won't regret doing these and these kind of things, and i gave it to him and stood there while he read my 15 line letter, he took time and said , "ok go, go and attend class", i came back.
     I don't know what had happened after i came from the room, but H.o.D came to the classes with that letter in the hand stood outside for a few secs and went back to his room, then in 4th hour which is hour of the class in-charge of my class 3rd year I.T 'B' section, she came made us stand for a while and then she started addressing the class saying she never thought we would be like this, not looking into my eyes, but i was staring at her, really wanted to know what her reaction would be like cos, she also was a religious person, then she said that don't act like what others have taught you, don't imitate them blindly(ya i don't i prefer logic and reasoning), you are just small children(oh ya 20 year old children, enough to produce children) and inexperienced to take decisions, somebody asked her why are you talking about this topic suddenly, she said "chumma i finished my portions", then suddenly she said she cried many times after joining this college(that one is common to students and lectures too i thought) and then she shed a few tears and asked "how many are absent today?" 18 was the answer, so everyone thought she felt hurt for so many bunked classes on fridays, she said no other department has such record, she was wrong in the C.S.E department 21 were absent, and it was for my reaction to the morning prayer she shed those tears, or i felt so.
      For the evening prayer i stood though, cos my class in-charge was passing by and i did not want to make her cry another time, she is on of the very few lectures in our college who had some some knowledge of what they were lecturing and was an excellent teacher. People join my college as lectures in their very early carrier just to gain some experience and leave for better colleges after they have gained the so called experience, they normally lack knowledge of the subject and don't teach well. As far as i am concerned i don't know if i'll stand up for these stupid prayers here after. This is Loyola Institute of Technology my stupid college.That pic below looks very similar to what i feel when ever i was forced to pray.

Sundogs spotted in Chennai.

     A friend wrote in his blog that these ring formations around the sun are called as Sun dogs, occurred in chennai, 11th july 2010 at about 11 to 12, for more info on sun dogs go to this link. Photos taken from a 2mp mobile cam atop my house.

Shutter Island

     Thanks to piracy i was able to watch this movie, this is not a review it's just my opinion. Shutter Island is a  very good movie according to me, directed by Martin Scorcese this movie lived up to the hype that it created after it's official american release, normally the hollywood movies are not very fast the suspense movies i mean, there is some part of the movie which will get too boring yet meaningful but this movie somehow managed to keep you in that mood and yet was logical, there are enough twist in the plot to keep you hooked, this kind of a narrative style resembles "Fight Club" which almost never allows you to doubt the hallucinated person, one thinks that character is real almost till the climax. Di Caprio as always did a fine job his role is of an U.S Marshall and then of an schizophrenic ex-U.S marshall.

     There is a significant part of the movie where Di Caprio seem to get hallucinations of his wife and a small girl, these scenes looked really good, a strange feeling creeps through during these scenes, unlike in "Fight Club" where "mayhem" is caused late after the lead starts to hallucinate, here the lead hallucinates only because of previous emotional issues with his wife. This mental disorder schizophrenia is an amazing thing have seen a similar movie recently, similar in the sense of mental disorder concept nothing else though , the movie is "Karthick Calling Karthick" that was also pirated and very thrilling feel-good movie.Then another movie with a similar concept is "Donnie darko" and somebody please explain that movie to me.   

Height of Fanaticism

    
     I have nothing personal against that guy. I have an uncle who is a fan of a telugu actor Akkeneni Nageshwar Rao, so he automatically became a fan of his son Nagarjuna and his son Naga Chaithanya and also automatically hates Venkatesh and his family (some family problems between the two stars). A few days back i was outside with the uncle in his shop, somebody asked him what movie's he has seen recently and his plans for the newly released movie's he said he saw most of the movies running and was particularly NOT interested in watching Vedam (the only proper movie, but that's his taste i respect it), he said pointing to the poster of vedam "Those two guys on the poster, roam on trees, i don't watch their movie's"( for aussies: that ain't racial vilification mates), those two guys were Allu Arjun, nephew of Chiranjeevi and Manchu Manoj son of Mohan Babu.
     Extreme fanaticism leads to some stupidity, a few days prior to the quoted statement, he said "Yem Maya Chesave (telugu version of Vinnay thandi Varuvaya) showed all the power of naga chaithanya", now look at that guy, naga chaithanya is one of the ugliest looking actor, or at least compare him with the other two guys, he surely is uglier than both, this guy NC when he opens his mouth the trouble starts, he looks are fairly ok if his mouth is closed but if it is opened wtf, my first impression was that he looked like a gorilla, from what I've seen his dialog delivery is bad, his acting i don't know i saw only a few scenes, dance was ok, looks devastatingly ugly, he walks like he has a hunch, comparing other guys both actors tell dialogs with grace especially AA he has a unique style, acting both are good MM's acting was good in Vedam, dance AA's special attribute is dance any person will be amazed looking at dance absolutely amazing dancer (vijay copies his step's and get's the credit for doing an "original" step), MM is an good dancer, looks both are not very handsome but not ugly by the first impression, AA is lot better than the two others in the looks department.
     If the other 2 guys can be monkeys NC should be a gorrila, ok let me end this post i am not trying to make  NC look ugly, i don't care how he looks but i was just showing the height of fanaticism.