I Wonder...

Was Ganguly a Don Quixote?

2009-01-03T10:44:00.000-08:00

I recently read a book on Don Quixote as a part of a course on leadership in which I am currently enrolled in. Given the character that Don Quixote was on the surface, its difficult to imagine how he can be used in a positive sense to teach Leadership. For people who haven't read this book, following is the story in short.
Don Quixote, from his childhood days was interested in stories about knighthood. He is now a 50 year old man and one fine day he decides to become a knight! He persuades another villager Sancho Panza to be his squire and both of them go out to perform adventures. Don Quixote fails miserably in all his "adventures". He is physically hurt and ridiculed. He fights windmills assuming they are enchanted enemies. In the end he loses a fight and comes back home as a lost warrior. All throughout the story Don Quixote appears to be a loser, an eccentric and a person who can't think straight. Question is what can someone learn from him.

During my research on the character and the book, I came across a song which I mentioned in another blog. The song made me think and I started looking for practical examples of 'Don Quixote' in our lives and I found Don in Sourav Ganguly. Yes, according to me Ganguly was a Don Quixote!

One pertinent thing which comes out of Don Quixote is that he is a dreamer. The song to which I referred to above shows that he knew that he is following a dream which he can probably never attain. But he wants to try out. My favourite lines from the song:

...This is my quest
To follow that star
No matter how hopeless
No matter how far....

To fight for the right
Without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell
For a heavenly cause...

He wants to enjoy the journey. He knows he would fail in the end but he wants to fight it out for he wont be at peace without it. Just because the chances to succeed are almost Nil, he is not going to take a step back. Reminds me of Sourav in his hey days as the captain. Reminds me of the 2001 India Australia series. How many people actually felt before the series that it would probably be the turnaround series for India? The captain and the team knew they would need all the luck they had in their lives. Motivating a team under such circumstances is probably the greatest thing one can ever do. Ganguly did that. He swore on his own players, he irritated the opposition captain, sledged against the opposition and in spite of garnering bad publicity didn't stop. Any sane person would have known that if they had lost the series he would have been ridiculed and criticized for bringing disrepute to the team. Even Ganguly would have known but that didn't deter him from pursuing his goals. Doesn't that remind any one of Don Quixote?

To me he is one of the Don Quixotes which we come across in our lives. Teaches me one thing to stop worrying about the consequences, which is a great thing to learn and practice in one's life.

Ad we once made

2009-01-01T12:13:00.000-08:00

Some thing from an another Blog that I occasionally write. This was an ad that we designed for Nestle Munch and won the first prize :)

The Impossible Dream

2009-01-01T12:01:00.000-08:00

A nice song that I recently came across. Known as the "Impossible Dream"

To dream the impossible dream
To fight the unbeatable foe
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go
To right the unrightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star

This is my quest
To follow that star
No matter how hopeless
No matter how far

To fight for the right
Without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell
For a heavenly cause

And I know if I'll only be true
To this glorious quest
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm
When I'm laid to my rest

And the world will be better for this
That one man, scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star

Movie Review: Oye Lucky Lucky Oye..

2008-12-25T11:20:00.000-08:00

And I continue writing reviews for movies :) With the sem just started, there is not much of load and I give myself the opportunity of watching a new movie everyday. Hence continuing the series, I had the chance to watch Oye lucky. This movie set up in the backdrop of Delhi truly captures the culture of the region. The director plays special attention to the background details and makes one get the feeling of being in the capital.
The movie has established a new mark in the independent film category with a specific target audience in mind. There would definitely be many people who would not like the movie has been made. However there won't be any complains against the way the actors have carried out their acting in the movie. Abhay Deol has justified the role and Paresh Rawal playing 3 roles in the movie has shown his shades.
The thing I enjoyed most was the background score that goes well with the story. Same can be said about all the stealing sequences. The director has ensured that their is a balance of adventurous stealing sequences with the character development of all the characters. Even though I am not aware of the name of the actress, I must say that she gelled in the role very efficiently.
All in all, a nice movie, but goes with a disclaimer that many people might not like it at all.

Movie Review: Ghajini

2008-12-24T13:01:00.000-08:00

Before going to the theater, I read somewhere that the movie is a bit long. But since it was an Aamir Khan starrer, I was ready for it as I expected a high quality acting in a movie which had a nice concept(though a copied one). But I was wrong in my thinking as the plot kept on stretching without any basis. I wonder how the same person who made a wonderful movie like TZP last year could work in a movie which is overhyped, with glaring inconsistencies, full of poor acting and a plot so so so stretched that it could make the hardest Aamir Khan's fan cry out loud.

I don't know if people agree to my view but there is a difference between what people prefer in the Southern half of the country and what people prefer in the upper half. The way the movies are made, their texture, the acting, the dialogue delivery are all different. Hence after watching the movie, I could say that the major reason why people might not like this is because the director didn't keep the same in mind. He could have recreated this movie in Tamil and believe me that could have been a super hit.

A problem with this movie was that the concept of Sort term memory loss wasn't exploited properly. If we take out that from the movie, then it is pretty similar to any other damn hindi movie. The focus was mostly on the Romantic aspect and the flashback. Being a action movie with a concept, having silly comedy scenes in the movie only led to dilution of the concept. The character of Ghajini was never allowed to develop. The movie could have been a lot better had their been a thought behind the role. You can't have a owner of a pharma firm act like a gunda on the streets!

Overall, I was disappointed with the way this movie came out to be. Aamir is a wonderful actor and had not for him I would never have wasted 3 hours of my life. For the rest, I wish I suffer from some sort of memory loss and forget why I went to the movie.

Tamasha by Media

2008-12-05T10:23:00.001-08:00

Being on my vacation, I've whole day to spend watching TV and as per my habit I generally start browsing News Channels. I must say that these TV news channels have lived up to my expectations and are as stupid as they were in the last 5-6 years. You can easily browse a channel and see some person vehemently cursing politicians and some channels showing how a flop TV star was arrested for molesting a female friend. But the thing that has hurt me the most is how these News channels have launched campaigns against Terror. Though on the surface it looks to be a great initiative, I have a feeling that all that this would do is raise false hopes and help the channel with some TRP points.
I saw a documentary today on how Russians fought a Hostage situation in their country in 2002, when a group of 41 terrorists took around 800 hostages who had gone to see an Opera. The state spokesperson who was interviewed talked how Media was prevented to show anything while the Army was moving in. It helped them save many lives. Compare that to Mumbai 2008, when we had TV channels loudly talking everything about the procedure that the Armed forces were to take. Clearly, its not just Media but also the Forces who are at fault for having trusted Media with information that could only hurt their chances of a successful and a faster operation.

When Lalu gave me WWII experience

2008-12-03T10:32:00.000-08:00

Thank you Mr. Lalu Yadav for making all Indians travelling by a Second Class Sleeper on Indian Railways feel as if they are Jews living in Hitler's era. For the unfortunate who haven't experienced this, trust me, go out and make some journey on the Indian railways, if there is no plan or destination that you could think of, I suggest go out for a weekend getway to the next station and return back, only to try out the three berths which have been fitted on the side in a most amazing way to ensure a third of the people die of suffocation, the next third die of back problems and the final third are the unfortunate ones who would miss out on the fun part as because of the rising obesity in the Indian society, they would not be able to make it to any one of these berths.

Thanks Lalu, you are showing how much you care about the people and how without raising fares, you can increase profits. Kudos. I believe this is something that the Investment bankers should also try to lean from you in order to come out of the current crisis.