Naming talents

My daughter seems to have this uncanny ability to give the most perfect names to our pets. This includes animals that we have just rescued or she has just met. She would not know much about their personality by then but she still does it every time!

She names one of our husky rescues 'Diva', the very first day she came home. Even if I had sat with a book and made notes I could not have come up with a better name. She truly was and is a diva and her forever family made no changes to her name after they adopted her. She could never be anything but  a diva!!!

Few weeks ago we rescued a family - mum and four pups from the streets of Doha and my daughter named one pup 'Cheeky'. Again a truly fitting name for the cheekiest monkey I have ever met! :)

My LG seems to have a natural talent for naming pets and what perfect names :D 

Disappointing reaction

Tennis superstar Serena Williams lost the semi-final match in the Australian Open against Naomi Osaka. 

Her reaction of bursting into tears during the post-match press conference leaves me baffled and disappointed! Any sports person, let alone someone who has won 23 Grand slam championships, would be expected to handle a loss with more sportsmanship. 

It was clear that she was disappointed in herself, but losing a match should be treated just as that - losing a single match. There are always good and bad days for anyone in any profession, especially demanding ones like in sports or any performing arts. 

Such reactions might teach younger girls and all youngsters really that losing is bad. Which is not what you want them to learn. Celebrities in such positions especially have the responsibility of behaving appropriately in public and setting the right example. So, while I admire Serena, this is highly disappointing behaviour indeed.  

I hope easily impressionable youngsters and others see this for what it is - just one day's loss and a poor choice of reaction owing to probably many factors. Failure is a big part of any work that one takes up and should only teach better methods of approach and way forward with lessons learned. 

India, COVID-19 status and my theories

When COVID-19 reared its ugly head last year, I was petrified. Not for myself living in another country but for my fellow countrymen and women living in India. With such a vast population, diverse cultures and people at all rungs of the social ladder, it is impossible to implement any kind of measures and expect to handle all this with our less than perfect public healthcare system. 

Or so I thought.....the government and administrators, irrespective of party affiliations, did an admirable job of containing the spread in initial days. While the economy did suffer and is yet to recover as in most parts of the world, and we did lose many lives, the statistics and status are so much better than what I feared! Of course I am not celebrating yet as we are by no means out of the woods and we are yet to deal with any mutating variants. Just saw a post in news about how it will be another seven years of living with the virus at current rates of vaccination around the world! But there is still the mystery of how India fared as well as it has.

I agree with common expectations but immunologists such as herd immunity, but I do have a theory of my own. I cannot help but attribute a good percentage of these numbers simply to the food we eat as Indians. The sheer number of vegetables and fruit we use is mind boggling. I often tell my daughter she is lucky she was born with Indian roots as she would never have heard or experienced some of the food otherwise. How many of her friends from her international school in Qatar would even know of ridge gourd, snake gourd or flat beans! Don't even get me started on my all time favourite Sundakkai or Turkey berry as they are better known. No dish in the world would beat Sundakkai sambar for me and I have many delightful memories from my childhood associated with this dish. The list of course is endless and I am barely scratching the surface here. Let us not go after the new superfoods only, but also remember and use native /indigenous products from our own countries. India has long used millets and lentils which are recognized superfoods today and there are so many more that need to be revived. 

So my fellow Indians and others from various parts of the world; don't fall into the trap of eating processed food and regular veggies only. Go back to your roots and use other less used veggies and fruit. Eat healthy as much as you can and of course exercise. Good immunity is what we can aim for and work hard on. I am sure our bodies will be in a great position to fight this and any other diseases in store for us in the future. 

Web series - "Delhi Crime" my review

I like good web series but am not a crazy fan of television to watch series after series. This might be a reason why I have just watched the series "Delhi Crime" almost two years after it released on Netflix!

I must say I really did love the attempt. It gave me a fresh perspective on many issues regarding this case. I was one more citizen watching with absolute shock as this case was reported on news channels in 2012 and supported fully the protests by fellow citizens. However, I realised how fast this case was actually solved by the police and against potentially how many difficulties. How could it be simple to track six rapists in a city of 17 million plus surrounding states from where most of the culprits were? How could the police have possibly prevented such crimes when the ratio of police to regular citizens is so low? 

The kind of political and social pressures while dealing with an emotionally draining crime was fascinating to know more about. The actors of course going by the ratings, had done a fantastic job and the series kept up the pace and involvement of the audience through all the episodes. Kudos to the director for the background research done and the extremely good presentation.

If you have not watched this, I highly recommend that you do. But before that do expect to continue to be shocked by this crime as that is never going to go away!  

Thank you 2020 and welcome 2021

Happy New Year everybody. Wishing you and yours good health, happiness and success in 2021.

I am as happy as anyone else to see 2020 go. But in all honesty I cannot say it was all bad. Don't get me wrong, 2020 had enough sorrows and created desperate situations for me as much as anyone else, however there were enough other 'firsts' that make me appreciate it as well. 

For one thing, and if nothing else, it gave me enough time to stop and think. To stop and slow down by force. That created new avenues to channel my energy and talents. Thus were born some new and long- pending ventures.

So, if we are alive today, having survived 2020, let's not complain too much. Let's take those experiences, the good, bad and ugly and take it all forward in 2021 to the best of our abilities. Let us focus on positivity in life and be useful to ourselves and others. That might be the single best and common goal for all mankind. 

All the best wishes for an excellent year people. Lots of love.

Catch-up

A long gap again!

Life suddenly got busy again in this eventful COVID-19 year. I became a student again at none other than Yale University and what an experience it has been!!! Deserves another post in itself.....

Following this I was invited as a Guest of honour and key note speaker for the 53rd Engineer's day event organized by the Institute of Engineers in India, Qatar chapter. The selected theme was one of the best I have spoken on - Self-reliant India. 

The event had such an impressive line-up of distinguished guests and eminent speakers including 

H.E the current Ambassador of India- Dr. Deepak Mittal, 

Prof. K.K Aggarwal, Chairman, National Board of Accreditation, India and

Dr. Mylswamy Annadurai (Moon man of India), Chairman of National Design and Research Forum, India.

I thoroughly enjoyed the event and talks and leave you here with some pictures :)

IPL 2020 and Thala Dhoni :)

The Indian Premier League is the most successful cricket league in the world and is usually held during the months of April and May. But this year being this year, the IPL obviously was affected too. Finally the IPL is being held now and the venue has changed from India to the UAE. I am very partial to my home team, The Chennai Super Kings! They are also one of the most successful teams in the IPL and have been in more finals than any other team. In spite of being suspended for two years, they won the title three times so far in the last eleven editions and were runners-up a whopping five times! That's just a little background for people not familiar with the IPL and CSK. 

Moving on to the only Captain that CSK has had so far - Mahendra Singh Dhoni. Dhoni is also former Indian National Team captain who led the Indian team to the elusive Cricket World cup victory in 2011. Dhoni, in my opinion is a walking Management legend on his own and you can learn so much from just observing him in action. Nicknamed 'Captain Cool', most of his fans have never seen him lose his cool, however in the very rare occasions that he has, we have pitied the one at the receiving end of it! His run chases are legendary and we live to see him hit beautiful boundaries in every match. 

Now obviously Dhoni is not in his prime now and pushing 40 is not a young age for a sportsman. However, he has never disappointed and has so far done justice to his multiple roles in the game. I am only very surprised at some fans and even cricket experts who start hammering him specifically every time India or CSK lost, no matter how good the game. For instance, this IPL 2020, CSK have only played two matches so far, won one and lost another. The match lost was a high scoring match and the total put on the board was only less than 20 runs short of victory. The total is in no way representative of a poor performance at all. Maybe the bowlers could have done a better job in controlling the runs given away to the opposition batsmen, but nevertheless it was a good game that any cricket fan should have enjoyed watching. I don't have a problem with half baked regular fans criticizing the match or captain, however what about the so called experts, or commentators of the game. These comprise of other former cricketers, so you would expect them to speak with some practicality. Does one expect to win every match? Is Dhoni to be singled out every time for a poor or even great performance but with end result of a loss? The same people will laud him shamelessly during the next match that CSK will win. 

In the midst of all such bad articles and tweets, I finally found a good article by former cricketer Sanjay Manjrekar, who actually analysed the decisions made by Dhoni the Captain and Dhoni the batsman. Makes an interesting read and here is the link

https://www.hindustantimes.com/cricket/ipl-2020-ms-dhoni-is-the-ultimate-realist-he-has-always-been-that-way/story-1qcIVV0vS2d3qYZAmQgPCI.html

In another instance, another team, the Royal Challengers Bangalore, lost very poorly. A former cricketing legend took a dig at the Captain, Virat Kohli and of course dragged his poor wife along in his comments. This as well is a common underlying theme in India - blame the partner! 

Looking forward to the rest of the matches this edition, tolerating more of the good/bad articles and just watching our Dhoni in action!