Notre Dame A Raging Fire in Troubled Times

Notre Dame is of the most iconic churches I have ever seen in Paris. In a city that’s completely studded with churches, Notre Dame’s unique architecture and breathtaking glass paintings made it stand out. It was thus devastating to see it ravaged by fire this year.

Fire is all consuming, and while it was heartbreaking to see parts of the church succumb to the fire it was also heartening to see a new innovation in firefighting emerge. For the first time, I saw that a robot called “Colossus” was being used to put out the fire.

Robots have been increasingly popular in many fields, but never heard of it in fire safety. This particular robot was critical in helping to put out the raging red flames inside parts of the church that wasn’t safe to access by human firefighters. Damage to physical property should be contained but never at the cost of human lives. Noble firefighters risk their lives daily putting out fires (with many injuries affecting them later in life too) and this is an excellent innovation that could very well be the future of fire safety!

As the resurrection of Notre Dame begins, I hope this ushers a new era in fire safety and helps firefighters without them having to pay the ultimate price.

Elections in India – Social media, the most powerful tool

Elections in India – Social media, the most powerful tool

The world’s largest democracy, India goes into elections this month. Spanning over a month long, split in 7 phases it is crucial in determining the new parliament and who it elects as the next Prime Minister.

The sitting government helmed at the Center by Prime Minister Narendra Modi is from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He faces the main the opposition party the Congress, who is currently projecting Rahul Gandhi as the next Prime ministerial candidate. Rahul Gandhi comes from a lineage of former Prime Ministers of the country including Jawahar Lal Nehru the first ever Indian Prime Minister.

Not only is this election crucial for India but also for the entire world. India has long remained friendly with both Russia and the United States of America and is key to developing stronger relations in the region.

In 2014, the then opposition the BJP capitalized on the anti incumbency factor plaguing the Congress party. They discovered the use of the Internet and various social media to spread awareness within the people about the various scams indulged in by the previous govt.

This time around, social media has undoubtedly emerged as the most potent campaigning tool for all parties involved. While big political figures use Twitter to directly connect to their followers, others have come to use both Facebook and Whatsapp for furthering their message across the masses.

In these troubled times, Democracy is emerging as a privilege in many countries. On May 23^rd, the peoples mandate will decide the next government for the world’s largest democracy.

Commonwealth Games Delhi....bad start, decent follow through!

When you think of sports in India, cricket is the one thing that comes to mind. Such is the overwhelming popularity of the game in India, that quite unfortunately other games do not even feature in the larger scheme of things. Fortunately though, we seem to be experiencing a change of climate. Today its encouraging to note that other sports

are emerging into the limelight even though cricket still remains miles above the rest.

The Commonwealth Games sure did stir up a whole range of issues. First came delight and pride that our country was going to host them.Then slowly and steadily came the claims of corruption the terrible accomodation conditions etc and there was no visible end to all the allegations. At one point it did look like it was all over. In a surprising turn of events, things seem to salvage themselves and the Games took off to a brilliant start. The opening ceremony did a lot to impress, though I must say that we have always been very good in the entertainment business havent we. And please to all who swoon at the brilliant fireworks display, c'mon dont we burst similar crackers from our terraces during Diwali?

Matching up to the good opening show, our athletes have been doing a good job. One thing I always like about the Commonwealth Games is that unlike the Olympics, where we can hardly look forward to a maximum of 5 or 6 medals overall, these games board actually have India faring much better. India this time have 15 gold medals (upto the point of writing this blog) and are still in running for a couple more!Way to go for all these athletes. Atleast our sportsmen and women have redeemed themselves which brings to light the more crucial factor that India is slowly developing a sports culture. It may be premature to decide that we have made big progress but still its a start nevertheless.

In any case, given the current situation we should end up second to Australia in the medals tally and its nice to see players like Somdev, sania and Saina enter the finals of the singles tennis and badminton respectively.A special mention has to be made for Saina Nehwal who has been making huge waves in the badminton front for the last couple of years. Sadly, as the whole country was gung ho about sania Mirza and her less than satisfactory performance slam after Grand Slam, we havent even given 10 percent of the credit for this brilliant yet unassuming performer. Hope that will change as she has brought way more accolades and is currently world number 3.

Archery and wrestling have always been India's strongest chances for winning medals but I was more impressed that we won our first Gold in the Gymnastics section. Way to go Ashish Kumar. Boy for a 19 year old he does have a great postive attitude. Hope this is the beginning of many more achievements.

One of the most popular sore points is the decline in the Indian men's hockey team. Despite being the national sport and India's most consistent medal hope of the yesteryears, it seems even any medal is a distant possibility. Ruthless as they are, Australia are still hot favorites after thumping wins. Speaking of which, while everyone is raving about India's lead over the third placed team getting ever bigger, people are conveniently ignoring the fact that Australia still are miles ahead of everybody that has participated.

Over the years I have been wondering as to why Australia are amongst the most superior countries as far as sports is concerned. As usual, I have been coming up with excuses that they are stronger as a race etc etc..but the fact still remains that we can also be as good as them if there were better infrastructure and overall a positive attitude. Most countries already treat the Commonwealth Games as obsolete these days anyways but good to see that its a start of international events being hosted in India. Hope the trend continues, then we can even host the Olympics(or am I getting way ahead of myself!!.....Only time will tell).

Signing off guys....hope you enjoyed reading this.....Any feedback is welcome!!!

IPL 2010

Well, I've been meaning to start blogging for a long time(a year actually) and I'm glad that I got down to it finally! Thought I'd just pen a few thoughts on the just concluded IPL....I know its a bit late but here goes!

Cricket has been one of my favorite sports for as long as I can remember....but lately havent had a chance to watch India's games as much as I used to....there used be a time when I wud sit in front of the TV and watch Test cricket for pretty much the entire 3 sessions. I missed most of its evolution into the slam bang mini-est(if thats even a word) format; atleast for now because I wouldnt be surprised if they bring a 10 over version. So far the IPL is the only time when I watch 20-20 cricket and I love the experience....the fact that CSK have been the most consistent team have helped matters but still I am just hooked on to it. Who'd ever thought I would be cheering Haydos when he walked to the crease rather than cringing at his very entry!

The whole of last month started with the ritual of getting up, opening cricinfo on the lappy to check the score and last but not the least, updating my status message on facebook(only when results were favourable to CSK!). It went to a point where I joined the grp that was attending "Funeral-Mumbai Indians" . Initially I was shocked at the title then as my friend said "oru gethu kamikanum la!" and it was that!All the while I was praying for a good result for the CSK so that I wouldnt look like a fool...my backup plan was to just channel the thoughts of my better half who said that watching these matches were a waste of time as it all depended on how many C's transferred hands! If the Mumbai Indians won I would have supported his theory. As it was, we won and my dear friend actually shared my husbands sentiments saying that the odds of an upset victory at an away ground would have generated a lot of money in the betting process itself(she was supporting Mumbai! as was the rest of the country) Even in Chennai many fans were torn at having to choose between Sachin and CSK

When the auctions first started I was ashamed to see that we had no icon player from the state....unless you could play super seniors like K Srikkant...ironically the only iconic Tamil player right now plays for Sri Lanka(hope this statement doesnt generate controversy!) and we atleast managed to rope him in. This year though....it has been nice to see players like Ashwin, Vijay and Badrinath. It helped that Balaji was sidelined as he would have been a player who could have lost it all.

I had been thinking that Ganguly was the best captain that India ever saw but have been proved wrong. Dhoni has outclassed every other Indian captain that I have seen atleast. Loved the punch he gave his jaw at Dharmasala but he has just been phenomenal when it comes to playing it cool even after he finished victorious in the final. His team has been the one with least publicity, not so great in form players this year, and not marred by controversies such as mysterious bloggers, ideological fights between coaches, captains and franchise owners, tweets adn sulking former captains and my favourite- an incident when a player got slapped!Instead it has been the team that enjoyed playing as a bunch. Lets not forget that this is a team owned by one of the biggest bureaucrats(ok I had to look up the spelling!) of Indian cricket who happens to be the luckiest businessman in all 3 editions.

As for the difference that IPL made....the game has added even more entertainment that it usually does when played in India....I love the team songs, the sight of Siva Mani banging his drums for CSK and best of all I love the zoozoos. Admittedly each concept for the IPL is a copy from other countries..examples being the IPL itself being mirrored to the EPL, cheerleaders from Australia/America. I know lots of people who would watch it for them.

Its not a surprise to hear that there's a lot of tamasha off the field revolving around Lalit Modi but I would be sad to see him go. Hope it all gets sorted out but once again I was coolly reminded by my better half that this is just an eyewash...as for me, I just want to see the IPL bigger and better than ever next year! If anything it has revived my interest for the game, I still jump for joy when the team I support wins(which happens very rarely).

I think this is enough for now.... and people please feel free to post your comments!Dad...please dont use the term verbal diarrhoea!Should be back with more !