A Thank You Note

Dear Train I Take In The Morning,


Thank you for making me run to catch you everyday and making me pant so much I resolve to exercise more often. I get a free massage which loosens me up and also the occasional steam bath. You make ironing my clothes seem redundant. I love the live-in-the-wild look I get when I alight you. It really suits the season.


Speaking of which, I love to hang off you in the rain, the cool breeze and fresh drizzle makes me feel alive. That and the possibility of falling off you and breaking my neck.


You make me part of raucous shoving and the coming together of everyone to beat on one sorry soul. You also make me part of little kindnesses, snatches of conversations and robbed glances, making me believe in the magic and possibility of friendship.


Thank you for being the vein that runs through Mumbai. And for being the fastest way to reach work.


And the reason I love my city more and more each day.


Lots of love,
Prachi.

The Good, The Bad and The Googly

The world cup's here blah blah. Having been indifferent to cricket for most of my life, I'm barely tolerating the hype and hoopla that surrounds it. Every match of India has a countdown. Then there is the pre-analysis and post-analysis around matches. Did I spy a vuvuzela-ish instrument being blasted by sadists in the crowd? Yikes! And if that wasn't enough, the incredibly barf-worthy zoo-zoos are back.  
The only smiley in this web of  'for cryin' out loud's is that I have risen from dormancy and remembered I have an outlet, a vent so to speak. This. 


I don't have anything against the game per se. But if you talk about something all the time, on tv, in the papers; you're building it up so much that the already bored listener/viewer/reader, me, is going to think, "Um, this can't possibly be so gosh darn fabulous. I think I'll read my book now."  So I caught a few minutes of the game on Sunday while I was waiting for a friend. The most interesting thing for me was the Hindi commentary. Hilarious.


I still maintain that sport for sport's sake is an excellent indulgence. Isn't the IPL starting in April? *gnashes teeth*


I always turn to the sports section first.  The sports page records people's accomplishments; the front page has nothing but man's failures.  -Earl Warren