I never thought I’d get into this. The IPL frenzie, I mean. Too much of pompous marketing hype, and a proof of what would happen if cricket was more than cricket and added bollywood and cheerleaders to the mix - thats what I thought. I had initially gotten some tickets from a friend, and had passed it on to some friends who showed more interest than me in the game. But when a couple of tickets were offered by a close family friend with the best seats in the stadium, it was a bit tempting to say yes, than to put it down and Yes I said.

This is the first time I am watching a live cricket match in the Chennai stadium and I am no sports reporter. So I hope the readers of this blog will be lenient should this fall short of an actual coverage.

The game was to start at 4pm today, but the ticket said that folks would be expected there a good two hours beforehand. Knowing how our folks have no sense of time these days - or are just enjoying an extra hour or so lazing on a saturday - we decided to play the first mover advantage and head to the stadium early. We reached there at around 2:45. The sun was still out. It was fairly hot, but a couple of folks - Mirchi Suchi, Benny Dayal etc were trying to keep a few people occupied and entertained with their live music.

At around, 3:30, the teams started coming in, and were going about their routine of stretches and excercises, and ten minutes before the game, the coin was tossed and Kolkata won it, preferring to bat.
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A truck is their stage and the passerby on the noon hour their audience. Never mind that horns and all other daytime noises nearly drown thier audio… you can still hear these men and women sing poplar film numbers, makeing heads turn and putting a smile on people’s faces as they rush by.
The mobile orchestra of the visually challenged can be spotted in Luz, Mahalingapuram and elsewhere on any given day, come rain or shine. Performing with a PA system whioch is not too loud..The singers perch on a stool and give a mix of both old and new numbers.On occasions people stop by to request a song or two, and the minstrels are always obliging. Contributions are voluntary. As a shop keeper I spoke to in the vicinity said, “The singers put all of us in a good mood, and give us a break from momentary tensions.”
Chennai on a song. :-)
PS: Sorry about the poor qulaity of the picture taken in Luz.. my celcam acted up…

Truth is neither myself or any of my relatives or friends who belong to this cursed community reveal our cultural identity in a public space. Not that we care to do it is a concious effort to ensure that our religious identity is not revealed at any cost. This is the case with most brahmins in the city i have interacted with and there is a reason why.

Before you judge me as a BJP or an RSS supporter i will kindly remind you that im an atheist of first cadre and the BJP or RSS/VHP did no good for than the Congress for the Kashmiri Brahmins during their reign. So forget the losers and lets move on with our discussion….

Note: I could not figure out quite how to put this from a third person perspective so i addressed it as “I” which is a easier thing to write. Read it as from a common man/3rd person perspective.
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The finals of the Merchants & Banker’s Regatta were held last Saturday at the Madras Boat Club with prizes keenly contested by several teams: JWT, Madras Hauz, Element K, LionBridge, Sify and O&M. The finals were a roller coaster ride for the teams with all the usual excitement, tension, joys, thrills and spills. The Regatta was sponsored by Vodafone with Sify and Parrys being the co-sponsors. Kumar Ramanathan, CEO of Vodafone in Tamil Nadu was the chief guest at the event.
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I am not the type who goes to a movie in the first week of its opening. But the hype created in the print media, FM and the TV created an urge to go to Sivaji.

Two days before the release of the movie TV Channels like CNN IBN and Headlines Today were having editions on Sivaji running for 2 hours with live coverage of interviews with the fans spread across the metros. I found Rajni also has fans in Lucknow who was arguing in favour of Rajni. A college student at Mumbai, in spite of not knowing Thamizh recited the dialogue “Naan oru thadavai sonna nooru thadavai sonna mathiri” from Basha
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There are so few people who are pleasant, thoughtful and courteous in public places that it makes sense to appreciate them to encourage more such behaviour. I’ve come across policemen stopping traffic to help an elderly person cross the road and have given them an appreciative smile. You should see their faces light up in return, knowing their act of thoughtfulness was appreciated. You can be sure that they will do it again! Similarly, there are so few people being thoughtful or courteous on the road that it will absolutely pay to appreciate a good turn. Think I’m exaggerating? Next time you’re driving, or riding your two-wheeler, stop for some pedestrians who’ve been waiting a long time to cross the road, and see their response! Most will look at you in total shock and suspicion, but there are a few that will smile at you in appreciation. Do enough of that when appropriate, and hopefully it will encourage more people to do the same. In a bus, get up for an elder and see the respect you will get, even if the elder, embarrassed by your generosity, just looks sternly out the window! More than anything else, rest assured you’ve brought some relief and happiness into someone’s life by these little acts of kindness and thoughtfulness. That will certainly count in the here after don’t you think? More than anything else, if it results in a slow adoption of similar behaviour, can you imagine what Chennai will be like? After all, that’s what makes a city livable- a sense of community and caring. Call me whatever you want- an optimist, a romantic or what ever, but just try it. Please?

Scorching May’s torture has given away to a slightly merciful June. Among other things, I’ve finally found a few minutes to breathe, after having spent two months running after … kids. Why, you ask? It’s the season of Summer Workshops, of course.

Holidays can be a rather indeterminate time. Gone are the days when parents simply let the kids loose, just telling them half-heartedly to “play in the shade” - not that anyone was going to listen - and let it at that. Come hell or high-water, it was kid-business after that, and parents could go hang. I myself, have known the joy of rolling around filthy streets and returning in the evenings, smelling like an orc. The city, however, has other ideas. What with schools vying with each other to satisfy parents’ demands about producing child prodigies that have to develop an IQ of 187 and find the cure to cancer, AIDS and other life-threatening diseases or blow up this world … the poor things desperately need some time off. After all, as one parent eagerly put it to me, it’s not all about studying, is it? A child needs to be well rounded. There needs to be some Value Addition. Children have to take back something deep and fulfilling within their hearts. To do something actually worthwhile, without running mamas and papas ragged, or feel guilty as hell that they aren’t devoting enough time to him or her. They have to learn pottery-making, papier-mâché doll-making, puppet-making, shadow theatre, mat-weaving, karate, judo, take back home clumps of activity sheets - and have fun besides. Tough job.

The answer: Workshops.
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After the IT and automobile industries moved into Chennai, there’s another that’s been slowly creeping in without much song and dance. It’s most visible at traffic signals, parking lots, outside ATMs, restaurants and on busy commercial streets.

The begging industry.

And it’s not old people seeking help. Young, healthy women on most occasions carrying sleeping babies, are the ones contorting their faces in an attempt to tug at your heartstrings.

Trust me, it’s hard to refuse.

But I’ve heard enough of kids being kidnapped and forced into begging. Sometimes even maimed (handicapped kids apparently earn more). I’ve heard of infants being drugged and put to sleep so they can be easily carried around.

From what I’ve seen, the problem is too widespread and therefore beyond repair in Mumbai and Bangalore. Chennai still has a chance to contain it.

It was at Chennai Central. I had boarded an AC compartment whose air supply was yet to be turned on. Sweat was pouring down the faces of passengers. Some used hankies for mop up operations, while others used magazines to generate temporary relief in the form of a breeze. In the middle of all this, ironically, a railway employee was distributing pillows and blankets. His state was no different. Only worse for the physical activity he was undertaking.

As he tossed bundles on to the upper berths, he delivered a rather angry commentary on his state of affairs as an employee. He bemoaned his working conditions and the increase in quantum of work without any change in compensation. “They’ve introduced 4 extra special trains”, he said, “but no extra hands to handle the work”. His tirade carried on along the length of the coach. And on course he took a special affinity for his boss, the honourable Minister for Railways, whom he described in anything but honourable terms.

I couldn’t but help feel sorry for him, as he laboured on to finish his job. Is this an insight, I wondered, on the performance turnaround of the Railways? Was the lowest cadre the hardest hit, and paying the price for the profit margins of the company?

And while Laloo’s case study makes waves in management institutes, the man on platform has a different tale to tell. Sadly, in the glow of the Railways’ success story, I don’t think anyone is listening.

The blogosphere has been introduced to the Blank Noise Project for quite some time now and people from Chennai have also recounted their experiences of this city in relation to that. On my recent post in Chennai Metblogs “Madras by Night“, long-time reader and fellow-blogger Govar made an astute comment that “Just by virtue of sex, we men are probably insulated from 95% of the security issues in India”, which I keep getting reminded of, whenever I leave office at odd hours and take an auto home. It is true that as men we hardly experience what women go thru when out in public spaces, with other factors like time of day, type of dress and whether alone or in company get thrown into the mix to create wildly varying feelings in them. But, my daily auto ride itself gives me an occasional glimpse into the kind of things a woman is typically exposed to. On some days, when the auto comes to a stop at a traffic light with some space around it, a two-wheeler would also pull up close to the auto and the driver or his male companion or both would immediately look into the auto to see who it is. If their imagination had been fired up on some kind of expectations, before they had a chance to literally crawl their way into that space and finally pull alongside the auto, hoping to see who this “party” is, one has to see their faces to understand their disappointment when all they get to see is this guy with a five o’clock shadow :-).

This scenario that keeps playing out on occasion stirs up at least some empathy in me regarding the plight of the womenfolk on our roads or other public spaces, and how much the victims have to put up with unwanted attention or the real-life enactment of the “male gaze” that they are subject to constantly. Will things change as per what some of these participants in the BNP hope for? I don’t think so. Not in the foreseeable future. The people seeking change like to believe in their power to make a difference. I believe in Genetics. What is hard-coded remains that way. Or to put it another way, no one has been able to restore the world to a previous version (of its software) after Pandora’s box was opened. And no one ever will. That is the bitter truth.