Indian or not?

In todays issue of Times of India, there is an article about 'Indian' brains manning the next NASA mission to Mars. I don't understand why we are so hell-bent on calling these people Indians. They are in the US, working for the US companies, and will aim to settle there get a green card, make sure their children are born in the US so that they get citizenship at birth. And we are the ones who are proud of them. Why??? The article also says that Sunita Williams is from India. I fail to see how, seeing as she was born in Euclid, Ohio. Her parents are from India. But we insist on congratulating ourselves for producing people who go abroad and we call them the Indian diaspora.
The emphasis is on the word Indian. Are they really Indian??

Harry Potter

Well, I feel Rowling has done really well with this book. After reading this, it feels like the last 2 were written only so as to build a platform for this one. Once one reads the last in this series, one realizes how much trouble she took to plan the entire story, because it is either that or she made it up as she wrote, which seems highly unlikely. Each and every character has a purpose, a significant role in themselves. Some people don't like this book, though I don't understand why. People are of the opinion that too much killing, so much so that it stops seeming tragic. Well in a war deaths are not unlikely. The tragedy is in the fact that so many people are dying making it seem almost mundane. It would be stupid to expect only the bad guys dying.
The most refreshing part of this book is that Harry makes his own decisions and uses his own head for a change. Luck plays a smaller part than in the other books. This is for hardcore Potter fans who really want to see some action instead of chance happenings in Potters favor, The detail of the planning done by both sides, and the ultimate confrontation between the Dark Lord and Harry are amazing.
The disappointment in the book is the last chapter, which though written with a purpose to give the note of finality, just acts as a dampener on the events prior to it. Ignore it and it won't do much harm. But read it anyway.

And then there is the movie of the fifth book. Although it lives up to the book in most aspects( ignoring the editing given that it is a huge book), the last part is not fun, the duel between Dumbledore and Voldemort is not half as spectacular as one expects. Other than that, the duels between Death Eaters and Aurors are awesome and not to be missed.

European Grand Prix 2007- Nurburgring

The race was a very exciting one, as most rain races are. This one was made even more so by the fact that the rain came not as a downpour but in the form of 2 showers in the first few and last few laps. The present breed of drivers look completely out of sorts on a wet track. With all of their traction control and other high tech systems they cannot manage to control the car in the wet, unlike the drivers of yesteryear. Massa put in superb lap times in the middle stint of the racee to pull out a 7 second lead on Alonso. But in the final stint, after the last fuel stop, the Ferrari seemed to loose its edge. Also with no Kimi to pressure Alonso, the double world champion made short work of the 7 second lead. And to make it all the more tougher for Massa it started raining. The tyre stop reduced the lead further. But when he came out I felt he was not able to handle his car at all, Alonso had a wing adjustment made which gave superior grip and handling. But the Regenmeister Schumacher would never have needed intermediates for the shower, which left a thin layer of wetness on the track which had begun to dry soon. He probably would have slid his car around and drifted all the way to the finish. Massa however allowed Alonso to overtake him and pull out a 7 second lead in 3 laps.
The only thing Ferrari can take from this is that Hamilton's lucky streak is ending


Alonso overtakes Massa

Only one way to say it. I suck at predicting. And Pooja and Deepali? What crap. I have decided to start voting after Javed Akhtar's comments. Charu well, I had predicted. But still did not deserve to be eliminated.

Round 4

Well, its goin to be hard to choose the bottom 3. Most of them sang really well. Chang outdid himself. But Prashant I felt was not good enough. Parleen and Abhishek were so-so I felt. So Prashant I will definitely put in the bottom 3.but the other two will be hard to find. Take a pick from Parleen, Abhishek and Charu.
And what is with Anu Malik badgering Prashant with the question "Are you smoking?" The guy says no and still he lectures him, hopeless!!

14 Jul 2007: Lonavala Trip

Well in the monsoons it is kind of hard to go trekking what with the mountain sides becoming slippery. So after persuading and begging we had finally managed to get together 10 people( 5 girls and 5 boys) to come. Some had told their parents fibs, others had told half truths so that they were allowed.


Things did not exactly start off on the right note. The 5 girls came late,
not very but late enough. 4 min to be precise. This meant we missed the 6:45 am Intercity Express and had to take the Deccan Express at 7:10. Reaching a whole hour and a half late. Having experienced the problem while coming back from Lonavala in the general compartments before, we decided to book tickets and ended up taking tickets for the 19:25 Indrayani.


We then took a rickshaw to Bushy Dam. The place however is teaming with people, as this is the season anyway. So, we trekked a short distance to this waterfall near the Bushy Dam lake. And it was worth it. The water was COLD and it took me some time to get used to the temperature. Others were wearing wind sheeters in the waterfall. What they planned to achieve I donot understand. After that, time was spent testing the force of the water at different points. We could not even rest our backsides against the rock, it was pushed away by the water. Intermittently stunts were performed like sitting right in the flow of the waterfall where it was the strongest, I will upload the pics.
It was time to get adventurous after that. We went a little higher and sat under a cascade of around 20-25 feet. The sheer force of the water hitting my head gave me claustrophobia.
Negotiating the moss on the way down was a pain.

But it did not stop there. We went even higher. But there was no real path. Going higher meant going upstream, literally. Negotiating the moss,water, and overhanging branches was a pain. But the waterfall was amazing. Even better than the one below. Generally I am the one who does all the falling for the entire group. But my floaters were giving an unusually high amount of grip. (Although I was moving like a primate.) My role was taken over by Sweta, who managed to slip and fall pretty hard. After that she persuaded one more from our group to stay with her and as a result we donot have any photos of th journey from that point onwards. We spent some time in a small nature made jacuzzi, and then saw crabs after which we decided to get out before any crawled up our pants.

On the way down we found that the stream had gained strength which made it difficult to get back. Finally we reached the shed where we had dumped our bags and ordered vada pavs. But our order was hijacked by a gang of lukkhas who were drunk and still drinking. So we left, realizing we had a whole lot of girls with us.
Some time was spent at the lake, where a few of us chose to 'swim' in waist deep water. I chose to let myself dry in the wind, only to be drenched in the squalls which kept coming.
When we reached down, we found a shop and finally my wish of sitting in the shade and eating kanda bhajiya and having tea was fulfilled. The girls managed to find a changing room. Most of this time was spent clicking photos. Aaron ran around the room shouting "hold this pose!!" at every person he saw. And we left, reaching Lonavala at 16:30. We guys changed in the waiting room bathroom. Nice it was, what with a used condom lying at the side. Following that we spent time at the Maganlal chikki shop and did some more roaming around. But finally we were left with 1 hour and had to wait in the waiting room. We watched each of the trains go by. The Nagercoil Mumbai, the Pune Mumbai intercity both of which we could have taken.
The return journey was uneventful, I managed to sleep through the ghats right till Karjat.
Well, nothing more to write really, I missed Indian Idol, but it was worth it.

Hopeless !!

Yesterday were the results of the third round. Requirements for this round were that the contestant blend performance and singing prowess. It was important to strike a balance.
Most were not really worth talking about. And some were really bad(i felt). Deepali, Ankita, were good. But the most outstanding was Amit Paul. What singing ! And to think that he was almost out. Now, Smita was not bad either. Infact she had finally managed to sing with her eyes open. Very few of the contestants know the importance of the expression which can be conveyed through the eyes. Many try to jump and dance around and end up spoiling their song. But the audience chooses to chuck out Smita. No idea why. It was not for dirth of other underperforming contestants. Parleen was bad or rather lacklustre, Prashant was not good either and I thought Charu murdered her song 'Mehboob mere'. Emon also I thought did not sing well, felt he tried to do too much in the performance aspect and ended up losing his breath and not pronouncing some parts properly. I had put Charu, Parleen and Prashant in bottom 3. But it turned out that while only 2 were correct, the third one was the one eliminated. The system's flaws are very apparent now, especially when a candidate clearly deserving to go to the next round is eliminated at this crucial stage.
And why does Anu Malik sing??? He was making a fool of himself at the end pretending to sing the song with Udit Narayanan. He did not even know the lyrics.
Shabana Azmi was a good substiute for Javed Akhtar. Giving balanced comments and even rebuking Anu Malik for being a pain in the a**.

British Grand Prix 2007-Silverstone

Awesome race, finally Kimi is finding his feet. Superb driving, especially the part where he did scorchers to increase his lead on Alonso who was fresh out of the pits, with a heavy fuel load and hard tyres. He was taking second on each lap. Massa was unfortunate with the engine, but the come back was superb. He went like a hot knife through butter while overtaking the cars on his way from 22nd to 9th. If he had started from 4th, it would have been a different result.
By the way did anyone notice, Kimi had a part of the shield( which they put on the wheels, to reduce air resistance), broken, so much for the importance for aerodynamic parts.
Hamilton made his first mistake, finally!! That too in the pits. It's an interesting championship this one.

Flaws in the System

What do I say, my friends finally managed to find time in their schedule to get together. It was a bit hurried, but all the same, it happened. All plans seem to work if made fast, on the fly. If you plan extensively, then it never works.
Now, Indian Idol gala round is not turning out as impressively as I thought it would. Emon has become overconfident, Prashant's weaknesses are becoming apparent. Charu is struggling to find her feet and Chang is frankly not up to it I felt. Deepali and Pooja improved. Smita, well now she does nothave an excuse any more, what with the makeover and new wardrobe.
After watching Friday's episode, I thought Jolly Das would probably go out. Smita deserved to be in the bottom 4, but Emon and Deepali, damn !!! The reason this is happening is, they are criticizing them more. Look at Parneel. Seriously, "Your the best"????. What crap !!!! That guy was damn flat. And Prahsant, "Aap trained nahi ho, phir bhi itna accha gaate ho." Audience thinks "maan that's impressive." Not being trained does not entitle one to become Indian Idol.
My favorite part was when Ankita was singing. The others were green with envy. They cannot bear to see that an untrained singer can perform and manage to stay more or less on key.
Emon tried to do that but when he held Pooja's hand she did not play along. It backfired. May be he picked the wrong girl.
Let's see what happens next.

Die Hard, Read harder

Am getting bored sitting at home. My friends never seem to organize themselves. 4 years of engineering and our group of 6 has not gone for one single movie together. dhikkar hai !!
So my friend Ranade and I decide to go for Die Hard 4.0, which has just hit the theatres. What an awesome movie. Poora paisa vasool. The action sequences are amazing. As are the special effects. And Bruce Willis rocks and does the 'cop who is caught in the wrong place at the wrong time' routine perfectly. The one liners are to die for. The villain is far more high tech this time, it's all about computer hackers, explaining the '4.0' in the title. To top off the superior movie, the theater was awesome too. Starcity has improved its seating, and overhauled it's entire wall paneling for better sound absorbers. Also has a sofa section in case you want to take the special someone.
The downside is they charge double on the popcorn. 30 frigging bucks !!! Didn't eat during the movie.
Other than that have been reading books. No no, not those self help books, or those spiritual philosophical books. Just the plain old fiction thriller, by Lee Child, called Persuador, in which the bad guy ends up dying..slowly...painfully...well, it's a real nice read. So much so, that i got another one by the same author, called Killing Floor, and the protagonist is the same as the first one.

Formula 1 French Grand Prix - Magny Cours

Finally a good race weekend for Ferrari. Seems like the testing done at Silverstone paid off. They were clearly the quickest cars. On the qualifying day as well as on race day. Massa is still giving Raikonnen a run for his money, but finally the Finn has managed to claw a victory, although it was owing largely to backmarkers holding back Massa on Kimi's in lap. But he requires all the luck he can get.
McLaren meanwhile had the first mechanical hitch this season, with one of the cars having a gear box problem. And unfortunately for Alonso, it was him. Starting from 10th place on a 2 pitstop strategy did not pay off as cars in front of him also switched to 2 stops, negating his advantage. He could not blame the team this time around though. His attempts at overtaking Heidfeld were hilarious, and he did not succeed till the end, even had Giancarlo Fisichella finish ahead of him.
Hamilton continued his point gathering and came 3rd. This fellow is turning out to be a huge threat to the senior drivers. He is currently 17 points ahead of Massa. The law of averages should catch up with him soon.
The best overtaking in the race was by Fernando Alonso, when he overtook Nico Rosberg to go up to 7th place.

Race moments, check them out.

1. Albers leaves the pits, with the refueling hose.


2. A coupla laps with Kimi.


3. Even Hamilton is not perfect.