Tribute to my leopards

I have been a cat lover since i was a very young. Those were the days when kids of my age felt irksome to hold a kitten. Even though not of a lead heart, i had a special liking to these mini felines.

To this very day, whenever i am in home, i used to feed my sweetie with my hand. My mother initially reluctant but now, supports this noble cause :-) . She always make sure, there are enough fish in our freezer to cater the needs. Some really enjoy bread crumbs and others pappad. just like us humans.

My grandmother and her sister's also did have their fair share in this cat business. And it passed it on to me. My wife initially not comfortable, now also has become comfortable to co-exist with them.

My cats occupy room corners, bathrooms in the summer and terraces in the night. in the daytime they will be inside the house. obviously they are well groomed. One negative thing, they are quite hostile and gets easily agitated, when small kids come in our house.

To this day in my memory i have always had lots of cats in my home. As on this this we have 2 cats.

I was prompted to scribe this, when i came to know the late discovery of new cat in the malaysian jungles named as cloud leopard, seems to be very elusive.

But out of cat packs... i always remember a couple of cats.... our oldest one pussy cat. she was born and breathed its last in our work area. it had been with us 12 long years.

So many times, i got bitten by them - over indulgence. i dont take any injection or anything like that. I think i got some resistance to cat bites. I dont complain. i dont beat them. coz i love them above and all. All of them expose their under-bellies - a symbol in the cat behaviour, showing obedience and no threat and fear from the surroundings.

So many cats have lived in my home, so many died. i personally had dig out final resting place for them, it is very sad. But still they will give tremendous love and response. i simply forgets myself when i play with.

Almost 25 years have passed, since this " cat love ". Still when i see any cat in any backyard. my attention will be drawn to it. I think i will not come out of this habit !!!! Hopefully not. What do you think ?

Come on India

As usual and as expected, we are having the same coffee in the mornings– India pathetically loses out of the World Cup 2007. Must say it cant be better than that, rather than losing out to Australia or SA in the Knockout rounds chasing a massive and impossible 300+. So we must congratulate our heroes, at least they have managed to safeguard our pride and probably saving couple of fatal heart attacks of some die-hard fans.
We have crashed the BIG hearts of lot of huge companies who have invested huge sum of cash in ads!!!. But Thanks TeamIndia you have given the priority to the Nation rather than the rest. But there are some good points because of this loss. Economic times reported BESCOM will be able to preserve 5lac+ units of electricty.
I have seen some of the suggestion put up by the BCCI think tanks… looks very promising but quite difficult to implement in india.
. Go for two team India Senior and India Blue
. Go for a more aggressive captain
.Go Seniors out of the team etc etc….
.Go for a Desi coach
.Go for performance incentives
.Go for the change in the zonal selection system
Tecchnically we were a perfect team, it was in question at the time the team was selected about the 5 bowler. Apart from that no one had a complaint about the team and it composition. Even some of the 1983 winning squad members said, this time we will make it. And a trio among them lamented in the middle of the ground ” WE will make it ” ( refere a TV ad ). I remember someone did a big pooja ( yajna ) to bolster the team spirit to win the never-never WorldCup.
Let me take the reasons later… Look at some of the pre-match comments on some cricketers by some top brass from the cricketing fraternity.
1. Sehwag has Bradman’s genius — Late Bob Woolmer (rediff )
2. Sehwag plays like Viv Richards — Sehwag’s former coach
Maybe in a given scenario when the conditions are quite condusive (” Subcontinental pitches with no crunch situation ), he is even more lethal than Sir Vivian richards. I have witnessed this some time ago in Bangalore test ( against pakistan, match was heading for a square draw ).
Similarly lot was expected from Superman Dhoni, It was for real. Everyone has seen him in most destructive form and some sensible innings with good running between the wickets and occasional big heaves. This time around not much hype was made about Sachin tendulkar, as it was in 2003 WC. He was silent just admitting to himself that he is in his twilight and may be feeling inside him, that it was quite lucky to be in squad, just because selectors did not find any palpable replacements. Not much polls were showing he will be the star of the WC ‘07, but obviouslly he was not the most hated among them. So there was everythinng in the making with dravid in the helm with a great team, millions of wishes and prayers.
We never tried to rally our cricket agaisnt the Aussies at least in a piece of paper. Not many mediamen or cricket commentators did try such a comparison. May be we were optimistic about our team and its capabilities. But everyone momentarily forgot our deep rooted frailities. But before they started to West indies there were some rumblings inside the team apart the great soourav-chappel spat. A news came in the media about the non-conformance of the standards by some team members in the team. Most of the players were putting music in their ears in the trainning sessions. Some were not present in the sessions in the designated timings. Everyone seems to have been carried away by the sound, hype and the certainity about our winning the cup. Now it the “MAFIA” approach of the senior players towards the youger ones.
Chappell’s formula looked to be simple, give chances to youngsters in critical situations, expose them to pressure situations, make them play in positions where they have not been in the past. It looked it had paid off, at times Pathan lived up to the expectations. He was henceforth hailed as the greatest all-rounder. Later he has to sent back to from tour due to lack of performance. Similar things were written about balaji, when he first entered the team.
Per each day there are around two or more failure theories sproutin up in the media. Same is the case with the corrective measures but little or no required thrust in the non-occurence of the same. Better than indulging in these non necessaties, it is reasonable to find, Why our destroyers succeeded us ? or Why australia SA can on almost on any occasion find one or the other as a saviour. Why these teams build up the most required partnerships, even they loose their endearing wickets quite cheaply. Or let us put the same thing from higher view, if they fails in both batting and bowling divisions, they jumps back by aggressive field placements, aggressive bowling changes etc.
For reasonable cricket fans, who would love the cricket played by Australia or SA, would always had thought in mind about exit of Indian cricket team in the Semifinals. No realistic mind could have apparently imagined a evening watch a India Vs xxxx in WC 2007 final and Rahul Dravid lifting the WC and after that SachinSehwag lifitng the Man of the series award. There is no particular reason we had displayed in the past prior to the WC 07, Which could make us think, Oh this time we will make it. Most of our players have shown a decrease in performance averages and consistencies in their run upto the WC07. Our skipper has shown great level of consistency and he is continuing on that. I dont think anyone will dissapprove me on that.
Being a cricket frenzy nation, if we trace our cricketing legacy, it will run so many decades back to history, having nursed so many great cricketers in past century. Apparent discontent to all the cricketers, who had been cricketing gods is quite reasonable. It is not a character of any sports loving genre, to attack houses and institutions run by them.
Comparing the players, their committment, skills and team effort shown by Australia, SA and NZ. and the emerging promininece of Bangladesh and Ireland in the cricketing arena, it wont be sordonic view to think that Cricket in india will become like Football and Hockey in the past. I remember, we used to beat Korea and Argentina quite easily in hockey at international levels, Now it is even impossible to think about this.
Former Australian opener puts in his words about the Indian team ““The difference between many teams is that Australia, South Africa and the Kiwis want to win as a team, so they play hard, whereas players from the sub-continent appear happy to play for individual performances, though with Tom Moody as their coach, the Sri Lankans are developing some Aussie-style confidence,” he said. “
But the bottomline is conspicously evident, We have a lot of distance to cover up to be a team like SA or Australia. We may have great players, who can push hard, maybe good in individual sports, but not enough to be a winner in team event. Now there is no point in blaming individuals and coach. Somewhere along the, we cease to exist as a perfect TEAM with some self esteem. That had paid the price.