I did something very satisfying after a long time, planted trees on the sides of a road in Koramangala (the regional passport office road). Thanks to Bindu for getting me into it :-)

An organisation called TreesForFree (http://treesforfree.org/) had taken up this task of planting trees in Koramangala on Saturday. When Bindu told me about it I was very excited about the idea and agreed to join her. We reached that place at 10:00 AM and waited for a while for the dignitaries to plant the first few trees. In fact we didn't wait, we just left the first few slots and started off with the rest. Bindu and I were doing something together after a long time, we were very enthusiastic! There were people from a nursery to assist us but I think they had done most of the work. We had to just place the trees in the holes that were dug up in advance and cover it with mud (two different kinds of mud) using a shovel. Ms. Janet who was leading the activity was quite happy with us and said she would let us know when they plan tree planting in other areas around Bangalore. We must have planted around 12-14 trees.

After we left the place, it felt nice to think how it would feel when walk on that road 10-20 years later :-) I was thinking about those people who planted trees in Jayanagar, BasavanaguDi etc. we owe them a big thanks.

fanaticism continues...

KIMI in my hands ;-)

Chinnu, Vinay and I assembled this racing car yesterday :-) We found the kit with tools and parts in Landmark toys section!

Kimi, you rock!!

Kimi is the world champion!! Just can't describe how it feels, had waited for this day all along...

Chak De India! Chuck chauvinism!

what effect it had on me as i watched... the movie elevated my feminist ego and the love for my country! and i enjoyed watching every bit of it :-)

it's simply a no nonsense movie made with a sincere effort to showcase the intention and emotions of the coach Negi (on who the story is based on), the Indian authorities' attitude towards a women's team, the problems, insecurities, emotions the team members go through and how a sensible coach who is extremely focused can make a big difference!

details! they have given enough time to establish each team member's attitude so that we can appreciate it when they the coach has an influence on them. there is a fine balance between the theory and the practicalities of the game, the team playing hockey looks very realistic...they haven't missed the technical details. nothing in the movie is introduced just for the sake of it or anything, it looks like everything is there for a reason, or at least i could find a justification.

SRK rocks as the coach, his focus, his arrogance, his fairness, his ability to sense the exact problem/issue with the team members...are all showcased very well, he gets full marks for his acting.

i read in TOI that he touched Negi's feet when he went to see him first, and also that he was very detailed and made sure that every technical detail was correct. Negi has also said that he was around when the last scene (India winning the WC) was shot and he had his doubts as to if someone can actually express/demonstrate the emotions he went through in reality...but when SRK performed, he was speechless and thought it couldn't have been demonstrated better than the way he did!

with all this, what i liked the most about the movie was the parts where SRK stresses on playing for India and the parts where it is shown that he never discriminates between men and women!
and my favourite scene in the movie...
when SRK proposes a match b/w men's hockey team and women's team to decide if the women's team gets to go to the WC or not, he says "lets have a match b/w your team and my team" and the other person says "yeah, a match b/w men' steam and the women's team" and SRK stresses "a match between your team and my team"! i don't know if anyone could find it special but i did! when he stressed on "my team and your team" as a means to imply his non-discrimination, i could sense the respect he had for women...it's showcased so well is what i felt!

loving people...

just a thought that crossed my mind, that i can insanely admire some people for what they are!

watched this play “mysooru mallige” at ranga shankara yday, it was a good play though i thought it could have been a little shorter. i couldn't relate to all/most of the incidents showcased on the stage but in the end i saw myself standing up and applauding, i was really thrilled! i think what touched me is the fact that the poet in the play just wrote poems cos he loved to write, nothing more nothing less! there were a few strong dialogues which stressed this fact towards the end of the play and I think they what made me admire the poet so much. he said he wrote and wrote, never had time to stop and look at what he had written earlier. he said if he had spent time on getting his work acknowledged by someone he would never have written as much as he had written now. he said he could write what he wrote cos of what he was and couldn't have done that if he attempted to become someone. think it is so true.

i recently read Bill Watterson's graduation speech. he said the only significant thing he did in his first year was that he painted the ceiling of his room. he finished painting it towards the end of the year only to wipe it off by the year end as agreed! but he said that was one of the most satisfying things that he had done! amazing!

yeah, one kind of people... their passion is in doing things that they love/creating things they would want to create without spending time no anything else. there are some whose passion is in doing good to the rest of the people. there are some who are just principled. so many people to admire, an interview with Ratan Tata on a TV channel excites me so much...knowing that Rajani kant returns money to his producers/distributors if his films don't do well delights me.

coming to the people in my own life, i do insanely admire them for what they are! not just the people who are close to me but it could be someone who i interacted with for a very short period of time. once in the malleshwaram govt. school we asked the kids to write down what they wanted to become when they are old. one of the kids wrote that he doesn't know what he wants to become but he only knows that he wants to build a lot of orphanages and help all the orphan kids in his country! he touched a deep part of me by saying that, i really admire that kid.

i don't know if i can write what i am thinking but it’s something like i tend to love some people... the way they are, the things they do, the things they say, everything about them excites me, delights me, inspires me...

have no idea if am doing anything with all the inspiration from these people but it’s a special thought/feeling for me :-)

something i did recently out of passion and inspiration.

This was inspired by a picture taken by my friend Sainath :)

surpriZe!

A radio station here had a contest last evening where the host asked people to make a funny prediction of the movie Guru's story and she would give away two tickets to the first day's evening show as the prize! I never participate in any such contests but yesterday I was just thinking why they came up with such a contest. I listened to a couple of people who made funny predictions and won the tickets. I thought I can't make a funny prediction of a movie like Guru and just tried listening to some other station. But it somehow disturbed me and I decided to send the following message to them.

"Sorry.. Can't make a funny prediction of Mani's movie, am a big fan and am expecting the movie to leave a profound message -Ashwini"

After I sent it, I thought I sounded arrogant. But to my surprise, they actually called me and told me that I can collect my tickets!!
So, may be radio station guys also like Mani and his movies! Cheers to Mani!

proudly presenting my student Arvind's drawing :)
no, i don't teach him drawing... we teach him english but am really proud that he has the talent to draw pictures really well!

talking silently!

It's the opposite of thinking aloud! I am at office with nothing much to do and no one to talk to..So, here I write...

I am wondering ...do people stay silent, unexpressive because they are mature, composed or because they are not confident or because they are not passionate about any particular thing in life?

A part of the office here has a glass ceiling, its like working in natural sunlight...its designed in such a way that there is sunlight but we get to sit in shade...I think it's a wonderful thing...I love it!

I met this lady in the airplane who is a resident of Vancouver for the past 16 years. She was returning to Vancouver from India. She told me that Vancouver is a beautiful city and all that. After a pause she said she liked India better and continued that her kids and her husband don't prefer living in India. I also heard that my manager who was working in the US decided to settle in India because his wife preferred living in India. This is the case with two of the couples that I know well...the girls prefers living in India, the guys don’t!

I think I am religious... because I believe that a religion brings in discipline in an individual, it keeps us on track. Say I happen to stamp on a paper by mistake, I make sure that do the "touching the paper and then touching my eyes" thing every time (Paper is considered to be God Saraswati according to the Hindu religion). I do that because I know that it will make me more disciplined, it helps me in being committed on the things that I do. It is true with all the religions. Nowadays people don't seem to believe in a religion... that is definitely good considering the unity it brings in among the people irrespective of their religion but at the same time would it encourage people to be not hesitant in doing the wrong things?

It's Kimi’s birthday today! I already wrote a mail to the group about it, told people here about it! I also completed one year in my second company. No, I didn't plan it that way! It was just a coincidence... his birthday and my joining date. And yeah, I like to be a fanatic :)

I don't think I can survive without Indian food. I can't enjoy food anyway but I can't eat food that is not Indian. I am glad nature has a strong influence on people when it comes to food, if not the living place. People might like to go live in a different country but when it comes to food, they prefer their food :)

I really like the Sunidhi Chauhan song "beeDi.." from Omkara! Have always admired her powerful voice!

Sound of WordsWorth!

The Basavangudi school kids repeating the new words that we taught them was our music for the day on Saturday, when we continued with the WordsWorth session that we had started the previous Saturday.

We were seven of us (should i say the seven notes)- Divya, Ganaraj, Praveen, Shilpa, Shwetha, Vikram and myself. It actually reminded me of the do-re-mi song from sound of music :). I was trying to recollect the song but just couldn't get it untill I called up Rashmi the next day and got the lyrics!

We covered around 20-30 words (mostly fruits and vegetables). We noticed that a few kids picked up the words sooner than the others. Some kids were hesitant in say the words if they didn't find it easy. We were thinking of making smaller groups from next time onwards so that we can make each kid repeat every single word that we teach.

Thanks to Vikram for getting this going and to all the other volunteers :)

And the song ...
Do, a deer, a female deer,
Re, a drop of golden sun,
Mi, a name I call myself,
Fa, a long long way to run,
So, a needle pulling thread,
La, a note to follow so,
Ti, a drink with jam and bread,
That'll bring us back to Do -
do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do!

the thin line between 'misssing it' and 'doing it'

the thinner the line, the deeper the disappointment!

yes, this is about Argentina missing it and Germany doing it.
it was a close one as both the teams were in very good form and it was a well fought game.

the line was thin for sure but it came into existence because of few significant issues -

taking off both Riquelme and Crespo - that was something unusual to do after a 1-0 lead. Argentina would have definitely won if Riquelme had continued on the field, the coach's decision was not good at all

Abbondanzieri's retirement -it was unfortunate is all I can say :(

the referee favouring Germany - yes, there were a lot of incidents where he favoured Germany but I can mention at least two glaring ones, Sorin's yellow card and Rodriguez' yellow card. they both were booked for no fault of theirs!

hence the thin line and it hit us hard when there was no Riquleme or Crespo to shoot the ball and all we had was a substitute goalkeeper to save during the penalty shootout!

Argentina had to miss and they did...
...though they very well deserved to win!
It was hard to accept it as they played a better football than the Germans yesterday :(

last WC, I was backing Germany after Argentina was knocked out in the first round. but after watching yday's match, I don't think I want to support Germany.

Chilli said that this wasn't his good year when it came to sports and him and it looks like the same is true with me too...Kimi hasn’t made it to the top step of the podium yet :(

okay am writing this as jaggi has tagged me...i should be writing five weird things about me...but seriously, i don't quallify to do this at all as i can't write such things humorously, i don't know why you tagged me :(

while riding if i have to stop, turn or slow down, i keep my right foot on the ground if it is necessary to keep a foot on the ground to balance. my brother keeps telling tht one should use his/her left foot but i just can't do that!

most of my dreams are feature wild animals like tiger, llion (and no i wouldn't be photographing them like wildlife photographers but i would be running away from them and they would be chasing me)!

giving gifts to my near and dear ones makes me more happy than receiving gifts from them!

i don't/can't enjoy food!

and finally, something that is not really weird...
i liked the movie 'the da vinci code' very much and i watched it twice as i thought i couldn't concentrate on all the details in most of scenes when i watched it the first time! and i don't have any compliant on tom hanks/robert langdon's blandness in that movie beacause that was how i had imagined that character when i read the book and also beacuse it wasn't an actor-centric movie but a plot-centric one!

throttle vs brake

showing the highs and lows of my first live formula 1 race experience, malaysian GP 2006...more details later.
formula 1 live is just out of this world!

blessed to work with the kids

After getting a go ahead from the padmanabhanagar govt. school head, I was going to start the classes from 26th nov 2005. I had requested the teachers to pick 20 students with whom I could work with, for the 30 sessions (first step in the Theatre In Education - TIE activity that I am involved in).

I reached the school at 2:30pm on the 26th, saturday and I was given the list of sudents --> class V -Ananthalakshmi, Harshita, Naveena, Varsha, venkatesh class VI -Anand, Arun, Lakshmi, Santosh, Shilpa class VIII -Deepak, Kiran, Sharanya, Shwetha, Srilakshmi class IX -Chetan, Divyashree, Harish, Nutan, Shruthi.

We started the class by forming a circle. I just briefed them as to what was the whole idea was, what we would be doing in these 30 sessions etc. We started the first session with a shloka, "saraswathi namsthubhyam..."We then played the first game...simple one where we have to keep passing the "pat" to the next person in the circle by saying out a number in the order of 1 to 10. If we are about to say 10 and pat the next person, he is supposed to escape the pat. If he succeeds in doing so, the person who was supposed to pass the pat would be out and if he fails to escape, he would be out.

After this, I split them into 3 groups and asked them to show the mysore dasara picture to some visitor using themselves..It was interesting to note that one of the kids had devi bhuvaneshwari with 4 hands! the other group had a pujari performing pooja as the procession proceeded. in the other group, they had 2 people form one elephant as they wanted to show that it is huge!!

As I noticed that they enjoyed this very much, I asked them if they wanted to try out more and the answer was yes! So, the next topic was bangalore...this time I asked the other teams to interpret their representaion. it was fun...they were all enthusiastic to come up with new things. One thing that I observed was that they were not keen on doing it very well or perfectly...should be okay as they are kids and it was something very new for them to concentrate on such things!
After this, I tried one of the playback activity...I passed a book and asked each one to assume that the book was in a particular state and asked them to act accordingly...book being hot, cold, light, heavy etc...I did ask them to think of a state and act but I noticed that they were not able to get the meaning of state...may be i didn't convey it properly as some of them started reading the book! later, i gave them the myself like pricky, sticky, slippery...but atleast some could pick it up as one of them assumed that the book had a bad smell and acted it out...atleast on ecould catch it ...not bad!!

After this was dumb charades...I split them into 4 groups, gave them each a personality/phrase to act...pollution, gandhiji, lawyer and police... they were not all that good in guessing or probably the game was too new...I was concerned if they weren't thinking fast! I should find an answer to this...

We played the last game...stamping the balloons...I split them into 4 groups again...gave them colored balloons, yellow, orange, green and blue...they had to tie the balloon to their left/right leg. This was a timed activity...they were expected to start on time, stamp the balloons of the other team and at the same time guard their team balloons and stop when they were asked to stop. I bet they would have enjoyed this game like no other game...but they didn't stop on time :-) may be I didn't think of it...it took something for me to stop them!

At the end when I told told them that we will meet on next sat, I could see the happy faces :-) ...its amazing that kids get used to someone so soon!! and they just say it out without caring for anyone!

Also, some kids were treating me more like a friend than a teacher, they were taking me here and there holding hands, asking me to do what they were asked to do...when we formed a circle, they were fighting as to who should stand next to me ...may be beacuse I made them play a lot of games but it is true that kids accept you so easily :-) and what suprised me more is, expression of the acceptance...think it is very easy for the kids!

kimi also won the "drive of the year" for his monaco drive :-)
F1 racing magazine said --> “No drive in 2005 better combined steely strategic nous and outrageous talent than Kimi's victory in Monaco.” [source: f1.racing-live.com]
and this pic was taken with my nokia 6600

kimi is the driver of the year!
this is the pic of my car (thanks to akshay and vinay)...and chinnu took the pic :-)

hope

"wish you all a very happy children's day! it's a day dedicated to you all and it's all yours...feel special about yourself and have great fun!"
these were my final words of the speech that i gave as a judge for the in-house drama competition in a school called APS public school. it is kind of strange, i felt that until recently i was used to listen to someone on a children's day as a kid i was on the other side this time!
may be i never thought i would address a bunch of kids on a children's day 10 years later, in 1995 when i was in class 9.

but for some reason, i was so happy to see the kids perform...they did a great job. i also remembered how it used to be when we used to do plays in school. man, we used to think that it was everything...i could see the same in these kids too...they were completely into it and it was so evident that it meant everything to them.

there were 4 plays presented by one each house of the school. the theme was "social evils and superstitions". we judged the plays based on three criteria, creativity, presentation and the content, of course with the other sub criteria like, expressions, energy level etc...it was good to see that the children were so creative. there were children from class 6 to class 12 in each house... and everyone had come up with their own scripts. it was surprising to see how well they had planned for it.
one play even had a flashback where they waved the dupatta and went back to the age where the lead actress was still a kid!
the best play was on superstitions... it had various incidents where in kids encountered with superstitious beliefs and how they were resolved...i want to quote one incident wher a kid goes to her grand dad and asks him as to what is a lunar eclipse and why shouldn't moon be seen then? her grandpa says that it is because the two demons rahu and ketu eat up the moon and so he disappears. the kid goes to the school and tells the same thing when the teacher asks "what is a lunar eclipse?" then the teacher gets 3 kids, one representing the earth, another one the sun and the last one the moon. he makes the kid playing the moon revolve round the kid playing the earth and this kid playing the earth is made to revolve round the kid playing the sun. and when they all come in a straight line, they show the sun casting a shadow on the moon and the teacher explains that hence people on earth cannot see the moon then!! it was presented so well that i was really impressed and the captain of this house had selected all the class 6 students to do this and they did a wonderful job!
there were a lot of interesting stuff...in one of the plays, one kid was hit by his friend and within no time he had black patch painted round his eye! very impressive... i thoroughly enjoyed the event.

it was hard to judge but we had to select a best play, best actor/actress and the best script...so we did that... but told them that they all had performed very well etc (typical judge stuff). as i spoke to them in the end, i was all excited about the fact that they are our future generation; they could make our country proud! this had never happened before...i was so happy for them ...for being the kids they are and for being the hope :-))

sunset in hampi...

another one!

one of my favorite pictures from the amarnath trip

dear coach

i have just started reading "tuesdays with Morrie" by Mitch Albom, thanks to my pal dhi, who gave me this book as my bday gift. I think this is a great book and that I will like it a lot. Some of Morrie's words sound very simple and at the same time, very much reasonable.

he talks about the tension of opposites where in he says "Life is a series of pulls back and forth. You want to do one thing, but you are bound to do something else. Something hurts you, yet you know it shoudn't. You take certain things for granted, even when you know you should never take anything for granted. A tension of oppsites, like a pull on a rubber band and most of us live somewhere in the middle." and when the author asked as to which side wins, Morrie's answer is "Love wins. Love always wins."

also he says "The way you get meaning into your life is to devote yourself to loving others, devote yourself to your community around you, and devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning".

i haven't read the book fully but i have a reason to write this post before i do so, the reason is the word "coach"! The author addresses his teacher as "coach" and the moment i read it, i could think of just one person, vinay a.k.a. boda. he is been a "coach" for quite a few people... some of whom i know and a lot of them that i don't know. i just wanted to let him know that i was all glad to realise that i have someone like him to guide/support/assure me when i need it.
thank you very much pal :-) you have always stood by my side, seen me through the hurdles, inspired me to take up a lot of activities, assured me of my decisions.

as i look forward to read more of Morrie's lessions (which I am sure will make me think more and will be happy to do so), i would like to tell my coach that he is one amazing dude who has made a big difference to my life. dear vinay a.k.a. boda a.k.a bods a.k.a. bored da, you simply rock!!