Have you ever seen people using umbrellas in state-transport buses?
The condition of Tamil Nadu State transport buses is pathetic. The seat cushions are not in good shape and seats are misaligned. You can not even close their windows, if it rains. The conductor literally used hammer to close windows. The roof is not waterproof; It leaks at several places, and not surprisingly I have seen a person using umbrella in the bus. Even the buses of MP or UP or Rajasthan are better than these.

If you happen to be hungry on any eve in koramangala, bangalore, then try out "Gramin". A small restaurant, right in raheja arcade, serves delicious dishes from the rural areas of north India with the traditional taste.

There are only two possible ways to enter into my office building. Either enter through the main entrance gate or from the parking lot(back-door). The main entrance gate is a huge one and has two glass door panes. The board above the entrance proudly says "Through these doors walk the most competent and disciplined professionals in the world". Couple of days back, one of the door panes (of the main entrance gate) had got some problem, so they have put up a notice board "Please use the other door". Their actual intention was to tell people to use the other working door pane. Now, as a whole, if you look at the entrance it reads "Through these doors walk the most competent and disciplined professionals in the world. Please use the other door".

Shoppers have amazing way of publicizing there products. And most of the people always fell for there tricks.
For example, they set the price tags for products as Rs 299 only, Rs 399 only, Rs 499 only and so on. There reasoning is, 499 sounds much lesser value than 500; it gives them psychological advantage that a certain thing can be brought just under 300 or 400 rupees. People say "Ohh this is priced at 500. I cannot buy this". But when same thing is priced at 499 which is just 1 less than 500, peoples reaction is "okay let me think about it!":.
Another way is advertise in a bold print "End of season sale. 50% discount", and in very fine print just above the 50% write "upto". Or buy one and get one free or get a 20% discount on the second one and so on. The reason I am writing this is, yesterday, in spite of knowing all these tricks, I ended up buying three things instead of one.

After finishing twice at the fourth place in the ongoing athens olympics, India moves ahead into the medal tally. This time, Rajvardhan singh rathore wins the silver medal in double trap shooting event.
Overall yesterday was a good day for India at olympics. They won a silver medal, won mens doubles tennis match, and also won the mens hockey match against south-africa.
Speaking of the hockey match, I would rather say that they won it dramatically. They were trailing by 2-0 and south africa were playing superbly till the last 5 minutes and during those minutes India hit 2 goals to seal the victory. They hit 3 out of 5 penalty corners in the net and a last minute field goal to win the match 4-2. A scrore line of 4-2 gives impression that we played better, but in fact if we look at complete match south-africa had dominated it most of the time.
This time it looks like we may be able to win another medal or two at olympics.

When I say, "Of late, this man (Sachin Tendulkar) is not playing well or he is not a match-winner"; and I promptly get replies of nature, "he is a terrible player", "the people in the world are fool, as they consider him a genius", "Others are pathetic, he is still playing well", "He averages well above all others in the team" or "Get your statistics right".

Take another case: as I say; "Of late formula-one is not much interesting. As you know who's (Michael Schumacher) going to win; even before race starts" and I promptly get replies on face "Schumacher should start driving badly to make it more interesting", "Schumacher should quit racing", "Ferrari should stop improving their cars", "The rules should be changed to suit other teams in F1" etc.

I guess, I am just making a general statement. Both these statements don't have anything that suggests I am criticizing. It doesn't mean that Sachin is not a genius. I just felt it, as of past few months or so, he hasn't played an innings that you can cherish or remember. In other example, it doesn't mean others should stop racing. It doesn't mean Schumacher should drive badly. It doesn't mean Ferrari should stop improving their car. It doesn't mean Schumacher should quit racing. According to me, it simply means there is virtually no competition, no competition at all. Hence it has become boring to watch.

People sometimes have so prejudiced views that they never are willing to look from another angle. Never willing to acknowledge that this man is not playing well of recently. Is it a correct logical reasoning or I am in general "Wrong"?. When I get these type replies, it usually ends up in lots of verbal-exchange, and I can't help it. Because I think I am correct and I am not willing to take-a-back-seat either.

I get up slowly; I am slowly getting to the terms of reality. I rub my eyes to make sure where I really am. Everything comes in perfect focus, and I realize the silliness I had made. I laugh at myself when I look at or think of
...

There I see her again and happiness comes back flooding.

I go towards her and say Hi!!

She replies "Hello". She's in happy and cheerful mood. Her face is beaming with joy.

I really want to tell her something, like how I feel about her.

In order to get going, I gather some courage and ask how's your work? That's the usual question, even I know all about her work, how it's going; but nothing could I do. I want this communication to continue, to go on an on as long as possible.

It's going on, as it should be.

And how is that?

Does that matter? You wanted to say something isn't it?

I take it; it's going on smoothly. I am trying to stretch the conversation as far as possible.

She replies teasingly "Yes! And what had you expected, a trouble, a disaster. And then you can offer me help to clean up the mess?"

I almost feel like I am a fool and I look here and there.

She's still there, smiling, in the pleasant mood, cheerful mood, with a questioning face as to what I really want to tell her or ask her.

We chat for sometime, cover wide variety of topics, almost all what we can think of. Right from the state of roads to the politics, from art to films, from present to past, from places to traveling, from money to Business. I look at my watch; it's almost two hours now. No I am not in hurry, or I want to go away from her. But the main thing that I wanted to tell her is still untold.

Then suddenly she asks me, you wanted to tell me something special, well what is it?

I find myself completely at the loss of words. I suddenly get hundred's of questions, How do I start this? How do I tell her? What happens if she gets angry? What will she think?

Some time passes in utter silence. I can hear the sound of falling pin somewhere. I hate this silence of uncertainty. An uneasy feeling creeps in. I am almost glued to the place I am standing. Somebody has stitched my mouth, or cut my tongue. I can talk about hundred's of things but just could not talk about it. I look at her; she's still waiting for me to say something.

She tells me finally, she has to go now, and it's late for her art class.   I am still standing at the same place, as if I am frozen and looking at her image, which is moving far with every passing moment towards the setting sun.

When she's no longer visible, I start to walk towards my bike. I start my bike. I am still thinking, about the meeting. I still think perhaps I would have told her how much I love her and then waited for her reaction. I think that she knows this, but she's waiting for me to tell her. I don't know when I fell.
...

I get up slowly; ... I rub my eyes... everything comes in perfect focus. I realize the hard fact that I have in fact not fallen from my bike. I smile, and then I go back again; again to the world where everything's possible, who knows she might be back again to hear what I really wanted to say, to the world filled with sweet dreams.

I thought india did bowl and field well, to restrict sri-lanka to a total of 228. Then when it was chance for indians to bat and score we required 229 runs to win the match, my dear, it was an hopeless chase. India going in with seven recognised batsmen (five of them termed as better batsmen in the world) never ever looked as if they will win the match. It looked as if 228 is a huge total. The biggest let-down to me was sachin himself. He wasn't prepared to take any risk at all. Playing as if he is playing a test-match. He looked more like an ordinary batsmen, though he scored 74 odd runs, but he should have been trying to hit the bowlers all over the park. He knew others were struggling, so he should have started playing shots freely, and he has ability to hit any bowler in the world. And still dilshan gives him "khunnas" and calmly takes his wicket also!!.

And yes, as far as scoring is concerned, tendulkar even now score's runs at a better strike-rate. It was the demoralizing effect that he used to bring with him, when he used to come earlier on the batting crease, that works most of the time. Take an example of sharjah for that matter, even bowlers of the caliber of shane warne used to fear him. And it is obvious, for how long a bowler will maintain his line and control under pressure. Tendulkar (the one earlier) and sehwag now are more dangerous than sachin as he is now. Look at australians, Do you think hayden, gilchrist or ponting would have played defensively as sachin is playing now? No for the matter of fact, they would have gone for a kill within 40 overs. India on the other hand managed to score barely 100 runs in 30 overs.

If your partner is not hitting bowl all over, you have got to take chances. That means you are at succeptible to lose your wicket as well. It is sachin who can play shots with huge amount of success rather than other batsmen. Agreed, all other batsmen failed, but the target wasn't any huge. And if tendulkar had been hitting the bowlers right from the beginning, maybe we may not have had lost those many wickets, and perhaps we could have won the game. Most of the wickets fell, because there weren't any runs on the board, and tendulkar wasn't taking any risk, and then they had no choice but to swing there bats to score runs quickly.

Overall if we look at the match it was a pathetic performance by indians. I am glad that they didn't give man of the series award to sachin inspite of scoring highest runs and taking second highest number of wickets in the tournament. He was bowling better in the series than batting. Attapattu really did a good captaincy. He rightly deserved man of the match award, more for his captaincy than his batting.

I wish, i could tell him he needs to relook at his batting style, what we crave for[from him] is not a innings builder [singles/doubles man] like Bevan or Dravid etc., but a destroyer and annihilator of bowling attacks, a demoralizer, a wizard with the bat, a man who pulls the game from the scruff of the neck!.

Happy Friendship Day to you all.