The school is close to Brigade Road, MG Road, Residency Road, Commercial Street etc. which used to be home to more than half of Bangalore’s bars and pubs. There used to be cabarets too, but they closed down a few years back. As school kids, we used to sneak into these bars/pubs, (sometimes in school uniform) just to feel its atmosphere. I never ever drank or smoked or tasted non-veg, I promise.

I attended a Rock show in Bangalore in 1990. One of the then leading bands of the city and country – “Shiva’s” led the show. They did sing a lot of popular English numbers – ‘Buffalo soldier’ is the only song I can recollect. What stunned me most was the Rock show’s atmosphere. I had been to bars and pubs a number of times and expected similar atmosphere but I was dumbstruck. This was a first for me. Live band, weird clothes, weird hair styles, a lot of ‘ganja’ (marijuana) users, liquor bottles thrown everywhere, girls and boys were closest to each other here than anywhere else.

“Yo man” someone yelled and waved at me with two of his fingers tucked in. That was supposed to be ‘Rock Salute’. I didn’t know that even I had to say “yo man” when someone greeted me that way. What on earth is ‘yo man’? I had no clue. I resorted to saying ‘Hi’ as all this seemed alien to me and they would look at me as if I were an alien. I avoided eye-to-eye contact for some time. After a bit of practice, I learnt to arrange my fingers for the rock salute and say “yo man” with the typical accent. People still looked at me as if I were an alien!!!  I was perhaps the only one wearing neatly pressed formal shirt & trousers and polished black shoes (School shoes). Shoes had collected a bit of dust and that was the only silver lining. My caring mother had given me a pullover, just in case it gets cold. A t-shirt would have camouflaged the trousers, I felt. I checked if the pullover looked anything like a t-shirt. It did to an extent. Better sense prevailed over me and I did not take the risk of wearing the sweater. I tried to find someone of my ilk, but was unsuccessful. I sheepishly made an early exit.

A few months later, I learnt through my cousin’s friend about the differences between pop music, soft rock, rock, hard rock, metal, heavy metal, death metal and how to judge the fans of each of these types of music. It varied from simple jeans and t-shirt for pop fans to jeans and black t-shirt for rock followers, to torn jeans and black weirdo t-shirts for metal fans, to piercing and tattoos for heavy and death metal clans. “Come what may, I am going to be a follower of pop music for life”, I said to myself.

“Skull Crushers” was my common reply when someone asked me about my favourite rock band. I drew pleasure from their looks. A lot of them would pretend to know the band or they would say “not my taste” to end the conversation. A band by that name never existed at that time!!!

Ramesh knew almost all of his colleagues by face but he was surprised to see that he had never interacted with a lot of them. It didn’t take much time to cut ice. “Vikram, Pushpa, Sampad, Jameel, Shubho, Joseph, Gaurav and Bhaskar”, Ramesh whispered these names to himself. He was finally able to link each of their faces with their names. Ramesh’s flat soon came to be known as ‘Club 704’ – most of the decent lot(more or less) flocked to his flat during their leisure.

The flat was a melting pot of culture. His friends came from different parts of India and Ramesh could see the cultural differences but he simply could not understand as to how anyone could watch ‘ETC’ channel for 24 hours and still enjoy every minute of it [ETC channel played a few new bollywood songs for as little as 30 seconds to 2 minutes and it would be repeated the whole day for an entire month!!!] and how could anyone have Potatoes and Panneer[Cottage cheese] 3 times a day for the whole month. ‘Laughter Challenge’ – Season 1, was the only TV program which was religiously followed and enjoyed by all the members of ‘Club 704’.

Ramesh felt at home and happy with his life in Mumbai. It reminded him of his life in Hostel as a young school boy. He remembered the days when a few of his friends would throng themselves on someone’s cot and talk endlessly for hours exaggerating everything under the sun – right from ‘I am lucky to be alive’ to ‘how much my parents struggled’ and what not. The scenario was not much different here. One fine evening, when Ramesh reached his apartment, he could see an animated discussion going on. Half the members were smoking but the ashtray was empty, so Ramesh was happy to realize that the discussion had just begun and he did not miss anything. The topic of the evening was “How I missed being a Billionaire!!!

Ramesh wondered as to how this topic came about. It was amazing for him to see that almost everyone had a supposedly true story to explain in-depth on this subject. Pushpa only had to marry her second cousin to become a billionairess, but something stopped her from taking that step! Incidentally true love was more important for her than money. “I have no regrets” she says, signing off her talk. “My mother didn’t take a single penny when she married my father” started Sampad. The rest of his talk was all about ‘how rich his uncles are’ and ‘how many billions would he have had, if his mother had taken her share’. Joseph and Jameel talked about his uncles’s cheating their fathers at the time of sharing the ancestral property. “We are so rich inspite of being cheated, just imagine our wealth if we were give a fair share” sighed Jameel. Joseph was more diplomatic – “My father was not smart enough to extract his share and he deserved what he got” he said, adjusting his glasses. Shubho’s father lost a lot of money and property in a long court battle. “Whatever we have now is just a fraction of what he had a few years ago. I will make sure that we are back to where we were” said Shubho thumping fist on the table. Vikram was itching to say something. When he got his chance, he did not know where to start. He took a magazine, flipped a few pages and showed a picture and said “I initially thought this picture was captured from his maternal uncle’s farm in US. It looks so similar.” Ramesh realized that Vikram is not going to finish any time soon; nevertheless, he was enjoying every bit of it. Vikram gave a running commentary about his uncle’s vast property, palatial house, fleet of cars, the number of credit cards he has and the names of celebrities who had visited or stayed in his uncle’s house. But how did he miss being a billionaire. Ah! Here comes the point. Vikram’s father apparently refused to take any share in his wife’s property which was then offered by his father-in-law. “My father only wanted my mother’s hand in marriage” he said. No prizes for guessing what he said next. “We don’t have any regrets” he continued and ended.

There was a long silence. It was not because they were shocked at these events, but because they were waiting for the next speaker. Each one was looking at one another. Ramesh and Bhaskar looked at each other while trying to hide their smile. They were the two remaining speakers, but neither of them spoke anything. “Apart from watching and enjoying ‘Laughter Challenge’, another thing common to most of the members of Club – 704 is the fact that they all missed becoming billionaires by a whisker” whispered Ramesh to Bhaskar.

In course of time Ramesh and Bhaskar became official money lenders to the other members of Club-704. They were the only ones who had not missed being billionaires! The rest of the gang was ofcourse not billionaires, but Ramesh and Bhaskar realized that they were not even millionaires or thousandaires or hundredaires!!! They did not have any regrets!!!

Let us first thank Mr. Subhash Chandra, for starting ICL (Indian Cricket League). If not for him and the differences he had with the BCCI, IPL would not have been formed. The success of IPL led to a plethora of cricket leagues - Karnataka Premier League (KPL) and then came Mangalore Premier League (MPL) and now Kota Premier League (KPL).

Kota is a small village in Udupi District (not the Kota of Rajasthan). KPL was formed to coincide with the 25th anniversary of a local cricket club – ‘Eleven Up’. It is the brain child of Anil Hande who used to be the captain of that club. It was formed in lines with IPL – 8 teams were auctioned to prominent bidders. Players were auctioned in the next stage. 56 players were chosen from the village and were auctioned. Each team could have only 4 to 5 players from out of the Village. There was a cap on how much a team can spend on players.

The 8 teams auctioned were:

1. Abharan Challengers
2. Barikere Bushrangers
3. OPAL Savinaya
4. Parampalli Gladiators
5. Prestige Warriors
6. Saligrama Spitfires
7. Sea Hunters – Khushi Amar
8. Varamballi Eagles

It was an 8 over a side affair unlike 20 overs in IPL. It lasted for 2 days – 16th & 17th Jan 2010 which coincided with one of the most important festivals on that region – ‘Saligrama Habba’. The event was managed exceedingly well. Each of the teams had their own logo and colours. There were day and day/night matches, neutral umpires(from Mysore), 3rd umpires, live commentary and live telecast on the local cable network, DJs,  each of the teams had their own stands, VIP stand, advertisement hoardings – In short it had everything that a tournament requires and at the same time have a carnival like atmosphere.

The icing on the cake was that the nail biting final was decided on the last ball of the match between traditional arch-rivals Parampalli Gladiators and Barikere Bushrangers. Parampalli Gladiators defeated Barikere Bushrangers by 4 runs. The winners received the trophy and a cheque worth Rs. 150000/-. The runners up collected a cheque for Rs.100000/-. There were attractive awards for the best bowler, batsman and man of the series. At the end of the day, the most important thing was the fact that the tournament was a grand success. The entire village needs to be commended for its success as the sponsors, volunteers and the local crowd supported the event.

There isn’t a Bangalore Premier League but a small village of Kota has its own league. I don’t think there is any village which has a cricket league of its own. KPL may have created history of sorts. Kota could be the village which will set the tone of things to come. In a few years time, almost every city, town and self sufficient villages may have their own cricket leagues and our village of ‘Kota’ would be the shining example which started this revolution.

 “Both of you three come here”

 “Can you see the colourless yellow solution?”

 “Allow the fire to burn first.”

 “If you are interested, get out.”

 One of the lecturers was introducing himself in the first class. “I have two sons, both are boys”

 While taking attendance, one of the students misheard his number and said ‘present sir’ for roll no 28 instead of 38. When he apologized, the lecturer remarked – “Can’t you imagine what 28 and 38 means”. The whole class erupted in laughter at the sentence formation. A few moments later, even the lecturer started laughing. He apparently thought that he had cracked a joke with that sentence and that’s why the all the students were laughing!!!

 “Open the windows. Let the atmosphere come in”

 One of my English teachers trying to scold a student in hindi – “Tumhaare andar akal nahin hein. Sara matthi hein, bas”

  “It is so small that it cannot be seen with a naked man’s eye.”

 There were a lot of monkeys in our college campus. There were times when monkeys would climb up to our classroom windows and all the attention would shift to the monkey. That’s when one our lecturers remarked “Why are you looking at the monkeys when I am in the class!!!”

The answer perhaps lies in our culture and tradition. Indians have always liked long and elaborate forms of recreation – be it festivals, tours or family functions. A full-fledged Hindu marriage lasts for about 4 days. Any other ceremony or ‘Pooja’ lasts a full day or more. A simple house-warming ceremony will consume 2 days. Short ceremonies are simply not palatable for traditional Hindus.

Most Indian movies last for two and half hours. A 90 minute movie would seem like a loss of money for a lot of Indian viewers. Song and dance could make or break a few Indian films. This has to do with our modes of enjoying leisure before cinemas came into existence. A lot of plays, dramas and folk events are laced with song and dance sequences which lasts for hours together and in a few cases like ‘Yakshagana’ and ‘Kathakali’ it would stretch the entire night.

India is home to two of the greatest epics – ‘Ramayana’ and ‘Mahabharata’. Apart from these epics, India is also host to a lot of other ancient texts like the Vedas, Upanishads, Bhagwath etc. A lot of stories are taken from these books and adapted in the plays, dramas etc. ‘Hari Kathas’ and ‘Bhagwath’ can stretch to a few days or weeks or even months. Indian famous festival ‘Deepavali’ lasts for 4 to 5 days, ‘Navaratri’ lasts for 9 days. There are not many countries which can boast of as many festivals as Indians do and no one is complaining.

When it comes to traditional tours – Whew!! This would be one trip planned for a lifetime. The ‘Char dham’ yatra, Kailash Manasarovar, Amarnath, Vaishnodevi etc. can take up a few weeks of our time. A lot of Hindus consider visiting a few of these places at least once in their lifetime.

When all these were so long elaborate, sport was one thing which did not complement the other recreational activities. Cricket was able to fill that void. Indians then, must have been so happy to see the sport which would keep them busy for 5 full days. Even the shorter form of the game will consume an entire day. We did take time, but it is no surprise that, at the time of writing this post, we are the World no. 1 in longer format of the game – Test Cricket.

Vikram’s mother, Shyamala had been in Dharwad ever since she was married She always dressed well whenever she would step out of the house. Being a primary school teacher in one of the best schools in Dharwad and being active in drama and performing arts gained her automatic respect among the local folk. Almost every shop owner knew her by name or by look.

Shyamala approached a lady who was selling ‘barekayi’, a typical small fruit available in that region. The lady told her that each fruit would cost her 15 paise. Shyamala was not the one to buy without bargaining. She said she would buy if she can get 6 fruits for a Rupee. Vikram and Ravi looked at each other rather amused. The lady was not the one to give in so easily either!!! She said, no way she will part with the fruits for so less. ‘I am not reducing it by single paise’ she asserted. ‘The fruits don’t look fresh. Six fruits for a Rupee is all it is worth’ said Shyamala. ‘These are the best available in this market. You can check for yourself if there is anyone selling for less than 15 paise for a fruit’ pitched the lady. Amidst this great bargaining, Shyamala’s mother entered the scene to take her daughter’s side ofcourse. ‘If you sell the fruits at 6 a rupee, we will buy fruits worth five Rupees, else we will have to buy from someone else’ said Vikram’s Granny. ‘You can buy 10 fruits for a Rupee and fifty paise and nothing less’ said the adamant lady.

Shyamala and her mother looked at Vikram and Ravi who were almost laughing at the scene. They didn’t know why!!! They felt something should be amiss and moved away from that place. Shyamala and her mother realized their folly later in the night when Vikram narrated the entire incident in front all the family members at the dinner table. All had a hearty laugh. Shyamala reiterated that it was indeed a good bargain as she didn’t get what she bargained for!!!

We were on our way from Porbandar to Dwarka and all of a sudden, I exclaimed “Wow”. What do I see? ……… “INFINITY”!!!

Towards our right – Lush green fields with no end in sight!!!

Towards our left – The Arabian Sea with no end in sight!!!

In front of us – The endless road and the beach running parallel to each other towards Infinity!!!

On top – Clear blue sky which seemed to meet with the sea at one end and with the green fields at the other end!!!

There was not a soul on the beach. It was for the lucky six of us. We were at the right place at the right time. We feasted on this rare glimpse of nature for a few minutes until it was dark and carried on with our journey.

I will never forget this day – the day I saw “INFINITY”

India did perform well in Asian games and Commonwealth games, but on a global scale, the achievements are minimalistic. India’s performance in the Olympics – lesser said the better. We have participated in 22 Olympic Games and we have won only 20 medals in all. That’s way too less for a country with population exceeding a billion people. On a population to medals ratio, India is first from the bottom.

Let’s take a look at all the sports where India made a mark in a truly global scene. Horse Polo, Hockey, Billiards, Shooting, Tennis, Golf, Wrestling, Badminton, Boxing, Air race, Cricket … are some of the events.

Take a look at the above list. We will find it rather strange that a lot of sporting accolades India has received belong to rich man’s sport. India’s GDP and per capita income today is far ahead of what it was at the time of her independence. But the performances of the India’s rich man’s sporting glory dates back to independence or even pre-independence days when India was really poor.

Horse Polo – Indian team or the team from Jaipur is credited with winning every tournament which existed between 1930 and 1938. That’s 9 consecutive world titles – which is more than India’s gold medals in Hockey at the Olympics.

Billiards – This is another rich man’s game which produced Independent India’s first World Champion. Wilson Jones won it in the year 1958. India has since produced a lot of great players who went on to become world champions in Billiards.

Shooting – India has produced several world champions and an Olympic champion.

Tennis – India did come to winning Davis cup a couple of times. India has been able to win Grand Slams only in the doubles event and an Olympic singles bronze medal.

Golf – In the recent past, this rich man’s game has witnessed keen interest among all classes. Jeev Milkha Singh won 4 tournaments in a year in 2008. This was the best show by an Indian in this sport. This could just be the beginning.

Air Race – Vijaypat Singhania, Chairman of the Raymond group became the world’s first International Round the World Air Race champion in 1994.

F1 – Not many gave India any chance in this sport. India haven’t yet produced a champion but have produced a driver who raced in F1 a few other drivers who are waiting in the wings. F1 is the second most viewed sporting event in India after cricket.

How did India begin is bonhomie with these rich sports? A lot of it has to do with British. How is it that India took Cricket so seriously and left out Rugby and Soccer? One word answer to that question would be ‘Fitness’!!! One look at the list and we can see that apart from Tennis and to some extend F1, none of the above sports demand astute physical fitness. Apart from Tennis, the other sports are played in a handful of countries. In other words, India has done well where there is less competition and requires less physical fitness. India is nowhere near the world’s most popular sports – Soccer, Athletics, Aquatics, Hockey, Basketball, Rugby, Volleyball, etc. Cricket is the only popular sport where we win matches regularly. It is followed and played by a lot of people but very few countries actively play the game.

India dwindled in hockey once a lot of countries became active in that sport. It will not surprise me if India begins to stumble in Kabaddi once a lot of other countries take interest in it. But the rich man’s sports continue to bloom. A lot of youngsters are taking keen interest in horse riding, golf, tennis, gokarting, shooting, snooker & billiards etc. If these sports become Olympic events, then we may see a few more medals but there is a flipside to it. If they indeed become Olympic events then a lot of other countries will take interest. In that case, will India’s hegemony in these sports be questioned?

He had his dinner and had a comfortable sleep and he was happy to note that the train was on track to reach Gulbarga on time the next morning. Everything was quiet and he began to listen to a few songs through his I-pod. All of a sudden he heard loud noises, a lot of commotion inside and outside the train. The train stopped at ‘Shahabad’. Shahabad is a small town in Gulbarga and it is common for people to travel to and from Shahabad to Gulbarga every day for work and studies, which is about half hour journey.

A lot of students entered his coach and they started occupying all the vacant seats and berths. Raveesh was indeed happy to witness all the commotion after a lot of peace in the train. He was observing the college crowd. A couple of them started playing songs on their mobile so loud that it simply awoke all the people in the coach. Raveesh had to switch off his I-pod as he could barely hear the songs through it. The two guys were trying to outshine each other through their mobile. It was sheer chaos for all the 5 minutes they played simultaneously. Thankfully one of them got a call – he was speaking in broken English interlaced with kannada. He was telling the person on the other line that he indeed called him at the right time as he was free at that time and that he is able to hear properly this time as the new mobile which his cousin got for him from US is so good. Raveesh wondered if the phone call was staged!!!

Amidst all this, a couple of college kids were going up and down between upper and lower berth atleast a couple of times. Well, they wanted to show-off their new, branded or semi-branded shoes. They sat in one place only after someone commented on the “great” shoes. Raveesh gazed around and saw the each and every one had their own unique style statement. If a couple of them wore embroidered jeans, another few would show off their huge designer bracelets. If any one had those monster belts, they better show it off by tucking in their shirts. Goggles were cool to one of them even in a crowded train compartment. Gold chains are meant to be seen by others – Raveesh learnt from the Shahabad College crowd that the best way to show it off is to unbotton the top two buttons of your shirt. A few were combing their hair every five minutes but a few others dare not even touch their hair. They have to show their ‘Ronaldo’ and ‘Bekham’ hair styles to the eves of the college. T-shirts, jackets and caps had all kinds of pictures and statements – pop and rock stars, basketball and baseball teams’ logos and players, etc. Raveesh wondered if they even knew which sport do ‘Chicago Bulls’ and ‘NY Yankees’ represent.

These college kids were the first to get out of the coach upon the arrival of Gulbarga station. Raveesh was wondering as to why not a single person behaved normally. He wondered if this is the case with all the college freshers in small towns. Do they feel like kings when they don’t have to wear uniforms, carry mobiles and don’t have to carry too many books to their classes? Raveesh pondered to check if he was like that. Nah – he was never like that. He came to a conclusion that these kids either had inferiority complex or superiority complex. If they are normal then Raveesh felt, he is definitely abnormal.