CFM Goa

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Prakash Francis
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Robber Dad

It's saturday and here I am wearing a Brand new T-shirt, all ready, to leave for office-when my daughter comes up and say "Appa, you look like a robber". I didnt have to guess too long as to where that came from, but she nevertheless gave me an explanation - Mr Bean wears this suit in an episode where he breaks into a milk bottling plant.

You never know what thought processes get triggered by some of your routine actions.

PTM's and Camels

Parent Teachers meeting at my sons' school today.  Nothing major just a one on one meeting with the class teacher.

He seems to be decent at studies so the teacher had nothing untoward to say about him.

Just was wondering about this concept of having computer science for kids. I have'nt gone through what they cover in this subject . Possibly define the parts of a computer, and maybe give a tour of windows.Probably.

How does it help the child ? What does he learn? And spending more than a period every week on something which might not even exist when they pass out. Forget passing out - we might not have computers the way we know them even in the next 5 years.Atleast the pictures of computers seem to filled with CRT monitors and CPU and the odd laptops.

Would you like to have your children study about cars, bikes , the various parts or  how about cycles. Why not music systems - or why not mobile phones? they have more computing power than the computers shown on the books of these kids.

Who comes up with such ridiculous curriculum? Beats me! One can easily see the work of a committee here. Leave a committee to come up with a design for a Horse - they will come up with a Camel. I believe theres a quote to that effect.

Talking of camels - few of them were seen outside the school - taking children on short rides.
 

Thou shall not covet thy enemy's wife

Life ends, if you do so.

Well, atleast that is one moral you could take away - after watching Mani Ratnams latest offering - Raavan(Tamil).

Good to see Ratnam in action after a long wait. Wonderfully engrossing movie. Locales(wow), the camera, and acting. Vikram's facial expressions literally carried the movie.And Aishwariya was at her beautiful best and well within her acting capabilities. That alone speaks volumes for Mani Ratnam.

Wonder, what the location was - could be Coorg or Kodai. But, such original locations never before seen on screen - I haven't. Almost the entire movie has been taken in rain.

If you want a proper movie review you could read this, and don't miss the comments.

I would not like to comment on the hindi version, because I have not seen it, and well , I don't intend to.

I guess that can be taken as a comment.

Just for the records - I am a great fan of Abhishek.

Runs

Another month inches to a close. Sometime its hard to believe that 2010 has already run past the half way mark.
Talking of Runs - my morning runs have been steady the past 2 months. I must be doing over a 120 kms per month. Every day I am running  5kms now - barring the days it rains or when I travel.

have wanted to raise it to 6-7 kms atleast once during the week - but the route is so set - that once I start its habitual for me to take the same turns.

Yesterday an interesting thing happened. I met an acquaintance and made a positive comment on his dress. He took it as a comment on his fitness and remarked that his daily morning walks of 5 kms are the reason for it.

I didnt want to tell him about my schedule - wonder what he would thought. Perhaps that I was pulling his leg.

I guess its about time I ran atleast one Full Marathon. Been running half's for quite sometime now. Raise the bar..

Trip tp Velankanni

This Evening I am off on a Trip to Velankanni. this trip has been overdew by a few months. Actually I dont remember when it was the last time I went.

Generally I manage a trip every once in six months - this has been over a year I guess. Its going to be very short just planning on an 8 hour stay before I start back.

If the weather happens to be very good I will stay one more day probably.

Peas and Carrots

Last week we attended a Rock show by Peas and Carrots a local rock Band from Bangalore. They were playing at reliance Time out at their annual Rock Fest. .

Tried placing a comment for the above article but coudl'nt do so. Captcha kept returning invalid. So am pasting my comment here

I was their at the show with the Kids. They enjoyed it to some extent but I enjoyed it more. Especially the older numbers from Beatles & Simon & Garfunkel.

Siddarth has a great voice and he came up with some excellent guitaring. One of the renditions by sheela was supperb. dont remember the song. Claude was great on the Keyboard - providing some cool accponiment.

Want to Thank Reliance Timeout for coming up with this format. Great to get to listen to some wondeful home grown talent.

Peas and carrots - Wish you all the best

Hope to catch you guys at your next show.

Nalini Nadkarni Trees Prisons

Dadomatic

Was going through the blog Dadomatic started by chrisBrogan .

wondering if we could start something like that. I personally know people who would love to contribute.so what if they were in different parts of the world.

We could share situations we face as Dads. About the episodes we have with our kids. The challenges we face with our respective "better halfs".

Would be fun no doubt.

Carter Emmart demos a 3D atlas of the universe | Video on TED.com

Carter Emmart demos a 3D atlas of the universe | Video on TED.com

Solitude and Leadership: an article by William Deresiewicz | The American Scholar

Solitude and Leadership: an article by William Deresiewicz | The American Scholar: "thing that made the study different from others is that the researchers didn’t"

Human Resource Executive Online - Story

Human Resource Executive Online - Story

Secrets of Success of Saina Nehwal � Inspire Minds

Secrets of Success of Saina Nehwal � Inspire Minds

Talent is Useless

This post is from my wordpress blog. Harsha Bhogle on Excellence.

Yesterday I was watching a video of a talk given by Harsha Bhogle in IIMA a few years ago. Wonderful talk, longish, but worth the time. Here is the complete video Part1 , Part2 .

He mentioned that Indians are big on glorifying Talent. And he was primarily talking about the Indian cricketers. Talented stars in India are feted till they get turned into arrogant Divas who make big dollars but no runs. ( He didnt say all this – it was my addition, its my blog yaar – come on) .... readon

Driving in Rain

an emergency trip to chennai turned out to be quite eventful.

while on the way the tire blew up - first such experience for me and I thought the car would disintegrate. I was going at around 90 kms/hr when this happened. But, could I believe my luck when the car stopped right next to a automobile garage.

I just couldnt beleive it-here I was somewhere near ranipet - and apart from this garage for atleast another km on either side there were no buildings. But, I just got it repaired right away and moved on.

The real challenge wqs while we were returning. It was a night drive with rains from Ambur onwards. the rain was not torrential , but bad enough - the visibility was bad. Infact a few times I felt the car slide sideways maybe a few inches not more - but that was enough to bring down the speed to around 60. There were quite a few cars whizzing by at 100 even in that rain.

I guess they had very good tyres.

Dhoni

Yesterday I sat through the India / West Indies match - right upto the 18th over and even until Harbajhan Singh batted I was counting on an India win. 16 runs look big but I feel it was quite close. Now as India seems almost out of the tourney - there doesn't seem to be any point in picking hairs as to why we did'nt make it.

But, I hope before the next tournament starts - the Indian team is able to bounce back. The team desrves it - on a good day when even 2-3 of our batsmen are playing to their potential we can beat any team in the world.

I guess the one reason for this supreme confidence in the Team is - Dhoni.

The way he leads the team is like a running lesson in Leadership. The various learnings that can be had and more are listed here . Dhoni is truly and inspiring persona.

One of the things which stand out are

• The ease with which he accepts the result. If its a win - he is gracious in his praise and if a loss he accepts the mistakes takes the learnings and moves on.

There is no blame game.The match is over buried - another match a different day start afresh.

How has a manged to distill such traits at such a young age. He is not 30 yet.

He doesnt mince words and takes his critics head on at times but mostly he sticks to being a cricketer - without getting distracted by the entrapments.

Here is what Albie Morkel his csk team mate mentioned recently about dhoni “He is calm and relaxed. If he is upset with something or any player, he doesn’t go out and rebuke them, but goes to the coach. He soaks pressure and brings the best in every player.”

He soaks the pressure. Not many cricket captains come to mind who deal with on field mistakes the way dhoni does. The max is a glare. Thats about it. Time just move on.

The ability to live in the present even in the pressure cooker situations. At any given time it almost feels like he has an aerial view of the cricket field while still being in the thick of the action.

The volume of praise coming his way is not going to end soon . A loss in one tournament is not going to make any difference. Infact, it was just a week before that Dhoni and his men finished a marathon 45 days plaing 59 games amongst themselves as part of the IPL. The players in the indian team were pitted against one another as part of different teams. It would take some time to get back the right dress room atmosphere. Coming into a 2 week event where loosing 2 games in a room can mark an end to your chances .

So lets say it was good the Team got out . Gives us a much needed break from cricket for sometime. Before we again get immersed in the next tourney the championship league - whenever it happens.

Running Update

Been two full full weeks running 5kms daily and 10kms on sundays. There was only one day when I didnt run and that was yesterday. Feels real good.

For sometime now I have been thinking of forming a Running Group in this part of Bangalore - Banaswadi/ Kamanahalli. There are a few regulars - not sure how many of you are on RFL. If you are why not lets get in touch and work out something.

The idea came up as I was unable to go for the Sunday runs as it clashes with my other schedules for the day.

So I end doing the 10km circuit alone. Not that I am complaining. But, I guess it would be more fun with company.

Here is the scanned version with the route highlighted and key stations mentioned below.

RFL has also called out to people interested in starting a local chapter in the respective areas. Around 20 are needed to make it.

Auroville Marathon -2

The race day

Reached certiude at 5:40Am. A small crowd had gathered maybe a 100 or 200.
I hogged half a dozen bananas and finished of the electrol.

The countdown started 5 minutes before and sharp at 6:00 AM we were off. There was a bit of a melee during the early part , it cooled off after the first km or so. then on, it was mostly each man to himself. Everyman running to the beat of his own drum. This time my strategy was to preserve as much of my energy as possible for the last 2-3 kms as that is where we waste a lot of time walking, when running deserts us.

I kept a slow pace but maintained it till almost 14-15 kms. Also I took brief rests whenever I saw a water booth. From 50 feet or so before to another 50-100feet after i just walked as I drank the glass of electrol and banana. This provided brief rest periods and i guess all that paid off in the end.

This time since I was running with a time target in mind I missed out on the scenic beauty of this marathon. Running through mostly unpaved muddy paths filled with clay and somtimes a half buried rock - makes this a alltogether different experience. I remember passing the "Grace" , The "Tibetan - something " . While passing grace I was thinking about "Amazing Grace" i dont know why? The birds sang their usual numbers, the drummers beat their drum like last time - i had actually intended to take a lot more snaps along the way but my mobile just hung - so I turned it off - thinking it muast have been due to some sweat seepage. But luckily no such thing happened.



Self Portrait @ 10km mark

Between the 18th and the finish line there was a stretch of open ground which was, I felt the toughest part of the race - as by then the sun was beating down - Managed to walk run that strech and the last km or so was a dash. Entered the certitude at almost max speed with lot of clappings and cheer and as I crossed the finish line received a fantastic hug from a grey haired pony tailed gentleman and got garlanded by a pretty lady with the medal ribbon. ( would'nt mind if it had been the other way round too).A few others congratulated and WOW! the race was over - was I happy!!!. Not the least for the Hug at the end .

Then I was surrounded by family . The kids were witheir story of how they participated in the 2km race and finished it. I collected the T shirt and had my leg massaged by a Sikh co marathoner. Well , hats off to his spirit. I did'nt get his name. It felt great after the massage - though the toes got a trifle crushed in the process.

We had a short wait in the que for pongal and Vada followed by a much longer wait for Dosa / Sambar. Both waits were well worth it.

Sat around and Chatted for another hour or so before we left for the room as I wanted to catch some much needed sleep prior to the drive back to bangalore.

Today the times came in , I did the half in 2:14:45 and placed at 94. Not bad at all. Target is to finish the next half marathon inside of 2:00 hrs.Achievable.

I am running the 10km "strides for life" run on Sunday. Hope to find some familiar faces.

Auroville returns !!

The auroville marathon lived up to its expectation. After missing out on the Mumbai marathon - I was intent on going for it and all the planning paid off. A wonderful run and my best in a longtime. Our Original plan was to go by train but the return options from Podi to bangalore had dried up. No trains on Sunday and no buses available.

Packed our selves up in our beatup Santro and off we went leaving home at 2:15 pm. The drive was our first on this route and I had not planned on the night driving on a 2 lane road with no dividers . It was a tough experience driving at 9:oo pm on such a stretch. Luckily in the Thiruvannamalai - Tindivanam stretch I latched on to a Maruti who drove at a manageable speed and just followed him . From Tindivanam it was just another 40 kms and its was done in as many minutes. By the time we checked in it was 10:45pm . 8:30 hours we were at it except for a brief stopover for dinner at Tiruvannamalai. Now that was another experience - food was great absolute home made food except that the restaurent turned out to be a single bedroom house. Sudarshan A/c had one small room 10ft by 10 , with two tables and an aircon.
But we were not complaining as the food was great and had it not been for the fact that we were entirely out of change we might have tipped the waiter luxuriously ( by thiruvannamalai standards).

We straightaway crashed and were still asleep at 8:00AM when my sis called to say that were on the way from chennai and would be reaching by 9:30. After a quick break at Nallas and brief stopover at our room were we placed sis and families' luggage we were off to brief visit to Pondicherry town and then to Auroville to collect the bib.

A Bullish start to the New Year

A Lusty Bull , a not so lusty cow, WOW! My foot!! & me on all fours.( The above picture is quite misleading)

Thats what happened as missus and I came out of a More outlet. As I stood by the bike putting on my helmet there was a mild commotion behind - the sound of empty wooden boxes falling - I turned around to see a bull mounted on a cow - the typical mating pose and the cow heading for us - 3 feet away. My wife as usual froze and I had to push her and myself out of the way. In the process landed on the road with the helmet taking its own route to the other side. Managed to escape with only a trampled foot-Thanks to the hooves of the cow.

As I picked up myself and the helmet missus was very concerned about my kerchief which was right under the cows nose and tried picking it up.

The episode got over as quickly as it started and I only had one bloody toe to show for it. One passerby indicated to me that it was my red T shirt that attracted the cow to me and I very patiently tried to explain why that was not the case.

Eventful start nevertheless - what do you think?