Tuesday, March 31, 2015

My Experience of covering the Cricket World Cup 2015 for Crictracker.com

Hello people.

First of all greetings to you all and here is the link to my Author page at India's fastest growing cricket website, Crictracker.com, give it a look. 

My Crictracker.com Author Page


I started writing for them in January,2015 and since then it has been a wonderful experience in writing about a sport that I love, I have passion and knowledge of. I got the freedom to write in a way where i could express my thoughts and passion in any way.

I wrote news rewrites, stats based articles, opinion pieces, top 10s, top 5s, tributes, career recaps and everything under the sun.  Wrote about IPL-8.

I wish to continue writing about cricket but on a fulltime and regular basis.

Please do visit the page and give a read to my articles.

Ciao!!


Friday, February 20, 2015

10 things people assume when you work from home.

Working from home is a something only few people do, especially in India. This seems to evoke much curiosity amongst your relatives and excitement in your neighbors. 
If some one works form home, these 10 things are always assumed about them by people who don't know what working from home is.


1. You nap and sleep in late all the time.



Source:Giphy
yes, I do sleep whole day and its heavenly...you should try it some time..Oh no you can't
you have to go to the office..too bad.



2.You get to do whatever you want all day.

Source:Giphy
Yeah..mostly...sometimes...not always.... you get the jist...


3.Since you’re free all day, you are available for any random errand.

 source: emotinggifs.com
beta kuch kar toh rahe nahi ho, jaake bazaar se yeh samaan le aao..

4.At least you don’t have to deal with a commute.


Source:Giphy
Ohhhyeaahhhh....I agree with you on this point...


5. When you say ‘working from home’ you really mean chilling right.


Source:Giphy
Seriosuly... thats what you think i do...??


6. Do you ever miss being in a real office environment?


Source:Giphy
NO, the only Office I miss is this one...


7. You’re probably so productive since you don’t have any distractions.


Source:Giphy
I think you missed it, but welcome to the age of TV and internet....




8. It must be amazing being your own boss.


Source:Giphy
i am also my own butler, my own mail guy and my own maid


9. So, when are you getting a real job?


Source:Giphy
When you wake up from this you idiot. 


10. Wait, so, you really like it. 














Source:Giphy
 Ofcourse I do... wouldn't you?


Saturday, February 14, 2015

For all cricket lovers

Hi to all,

I am writing this blog post to tell you all that I will be writing about the ICC World cup 2015 on Crictracker.com.

So all the cricket lovers kindly visit the following link to follow me and get all the Cricket updates, news, articles, stats and everything under the bright yellow sun and shiny moon.

My profile link on Crictrcaker.com


So don't forget to visit the profile and get your daily World cup dosage.


Ciao.,,,

Monday, February 9, 2015

9 Types of Indian Cricket Fans we come across during World Cup season

In a cricket crazy country like India, we come across billions of fans. But they can be easily grouped into categories thanks to their peculiar properties.  

 

Here are the 9 types in which you can divide yourself and your friends into (Tell us what kind are you?) : 

 

1. The Retired fan : This species became exticnt with the reitrements of the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman and Sourav Ganguly. They come up with gems of questions like "Yeh Murali Kartik kab se commentary karne laga?" 

 

2. The Stats Guy: These people are the people who give you statistical quotes like the average of that unknown Zimbabwean player or the best bowling analysis of the East African bowler in 1975 World cup. These are the ninjas of EspnCricinfo Statsguru.

 


3. The Overly Attached Fan: Known to support just one player in the whole team and that too like crazy fanboys. Also called "Rohitians", "Viratians", "The Walls" etc.

 

 

4. The Commentator : Gives their own "vishesh tippani" over everything that is happening in the game. They probably harbor a dream to become the next Aakash Chopra or next Arun Lal. Every action on screen is replayed with comments from this person. You just want to say...


 

5. The predictor : The "Maine kaha tha na" guy. Predicts everything from the toss to the nature of the pitch to the cheerleaders' costumes colors. And if some things goes correct, they shout their favourite phrases to you.

 

6. The Pessimist: The one who doesn't think that the team will win even if they have 10 wickets in hand and 2 runs to get in 10 overs. Will always think and say that "Kaash Yuvi hota team mein" or "Dada captain hote toh aisa nahi karte".

 

7. The Optimist : That one person who still knows that India would have won the 1996 World Cup Semi-final form 120-8 chasing 270, if Clive Llyod had not  awarded the game to Sri Lanka.Kuch bhi ho jaye, India jeetega... yeh match nahi toh agla hi sahi... par jeetega zaroor.

 

8. The Critic: The "would have been" fan. A former cricketer (chahe gully cricket hi ho), this fan who criticizes everything on the screen. From the toss, to the playing XI to the field placements and the bowling changes. This fan is impossible to impress and have a better alternative to everything.  


 

9. The Aggressor: If you want to know what this type is, ask Maria Sharapova. These friends are not to be messed with, they will burn dummies of you if you cross them.

 

Tuesday, February 3, 2015

AIB Knockout of Ranveer Singh and Arjun Kapoor: Do roasts of celebrities need this much vulgarity?

Ranveer Singh and Arjun Kapoor promoting their movie GUNDAY.


As they say you need to experience something to have an opinion about it, so I watched the AIB Knockout of Ranveer Singh and Arjun Kapoor. It had Deepika Padukone, Sonakshi Sinha, Alia Bhatt and likes of Anurag Kashyap in attendence.

NO, I didn't like the content at all. I was not offended by it, but seriously, since when you need to use foul words to generate comedy even in insults?

In an attempt to copy the "Roast format of comedy" showed on Comedy Central, AIB just filled their insults and jabs with crude words and gaalis unnecessarily for "comedic"effect.To roast someone do you really need such filthy language and  their requisite of giving a disclaimer that people who are mildly and difficultly offended should not watch was a nice bait to gather views.

Apart from 2-3 jokes/insults, rest were crude attempts at insults using gaalis. Personally, I was not offended but rather saddened because millions of young people look upto both Arjun Kapoor and Ranveer Singh as their idols and watching them act like an idiot and speaking all the expletives that is there in Hindi and English will leave a "great" impression on them.


A person has filed a FIR against AIB for the content on the show that was uploaded on AIB's official channel. Though the disclaimer is shown that the shown is filthy and people who are offended should not watch away, it is more so of an enticement for someone visiting to click on the video and watch.
The content is really filthy as they claimed and they have lived upto their claim.

What disturbed me was the comments of viewers who loved and liked the show dissing the comments of people who disliked it. Comments such as "People should be more worried about rape and corruption rather than this." or "Kisne bola dekhne ko, jab likha hai toh kyu nahi padha.".

Some called the attempt as brave since nothing of this sort has been tried in India before. But do we really need to hear C***ya, A****le, B****d, M*****rF***ker etc 2-3 times in a line of joke? And its very nice to see Arjun And Ranveer taking the insults, but will the joke get through to their millions of fans that they should not use the same language and this was just a comedy act. The jokes on Ashish Shakya on his colour, on Tanmay about his weight were really toeing even the crassest of the lines. Yes Deepika Padukone, Sonakshi Sinha and Alia Bhatt

I read a post by Facebook group BhakSala founder on a blog. The comments here also asks you to be open minded and not narrow minded, I dont think people saying this know what open mindedness is.
The so called "Liberal minded" people are applauding the show, I would like them to do the same if Raju Srivastava and Kapil Sharma crack the same jokes in Hindi, Punjabi. Just because AIB used English for cuss words and brought the Town people like Karan Johar, does not make their attempt at "Roast" sophisticated.

I do hope when someone crack similar jokes on their family members or on them, they remember to be open minded. And it would be funny to see their children call them C***ya on daily basis after watching such "comedic" attempts, they still remember being open minded.


When did watching clean comedy became not hip and people who appreciate good humor, who are offended by such shows are asked to return to Comedy Nights with Kapil and Pogo or Cartoon Network on public forums like Facebook and Twitter.


If you are really open minded, instead of watching a poor attempt at copying western brand of humor and presenting it with loads of gaalis (unnecessarily), please go and help at a real charity.

Saturday, January 3, 2015

My experience of using a Windows phone 8.1 OS based smartphone. NOKIA LUMIA 525


Nokia Lumia 525


This blog post is about my experience of using a Nokia branded phone running on Microsoft’s Windows phone operating system.
 
Windows phones have started to gain market share slowly but surely in past 2 years or so. Nokia made a decision in 2007 to go with the newly launched Windows Phone operating system instead of then launched Google's Android. Rest as they say is history, a very terrible one for Nokia to look back.

In Just 4 years, the company which had ruled the mobile handset world was bought by Microsoft and now in 2014, the brand of NOKIA is dead. But Microsoft has made sure that they carry on the legacy of Nokia in form of highly durable and phones made of highest quality.

I was using a Samsung Galaxy S II for 3 years before Samsung decided to discontinue Android support and updates to it. I then turned to a Sony Xperia C smartphone but was terribly unimpressed with the phone. The MediaTek processor was unable to handle the 5 inch screen and the overall working opf the phone. There were many other problems with the handset apart from the one I mentioned.

I tried finding a decently mid-range phone for around 15,000 INR, but the processors etc were not good enough to handle the tasks and the battery life was just abysmal. Fed up with this search , I turned towards the options of Windows based phones. My search in them found me Nokia Lumia 525, a sub 10k smartphone with a Snapdragon 400 processor and 1GB RAM. It had a 4.3 inch screen with corning gorilla glass, 8 GB internal memory and expandable memory up to 64GB.

I bought one in June 2014 from a retail store and was surprised to see the performance of the phone in just couple of days usage. The OS was buttery smooth to use and was very fluid. The display was crisp and the 5 MP back camera was capable of capturing fleeting moments perfectly for my liking. The Windows 8 app ecosystem admittedly was behind the Android app ecosystem, but it had all the apps I required such as M-Indicator, SBI Freedom, Whatsapp, Facebook etc. July brought the Windows 8.1 Cyan update to my phone, which transformed it into a very capable phone good enough to beat Android phones in 15k category.

Windows phone 8.1 or Cyan brought a host of goodies with it. Features like the action center or the notification bar, File Manager for Windows, capability to install apps, games, photos, music, movies directly to the SD card without having to move them everytime was a boon, which Android still doesnot allow its users to do.

It also allowed users to uninstall any factory app which came with it. It saved a lot of internal memory for me and it also made multitasking a very easy job on the phone.  Call quality was superb and the data connection was just wonderful to work on. The option to directly connect to a 3G network instead of searching for 2G by default was nice one. The list of settings on the phone is a long one and I have heard some Android users, who have experienced this to gripe about it, whereas they want more options in Android.

The user experience is a refreshing coming from Android to Windows phone. The apps are arranged in a long list to better facilitated one hand usage, but it can be sorted out alphabetically also. The 1GB RAM was more than enough to handle highend games likes Asphalt 8, FIFA 15, Dead Target and regular games like Subway Surfers with ease. The wonderful contrast ratio on the phone lead to beautiful display experience.
This was about how it felt using a Windows phone for the first time. It takes some days to get used to the interface, but once you do, it is an experience which you will never forget. Personally, I felt that the argument of the app gap between Android and Windows is now a moot point, since most of the essential and daily use apps are present on the Windows store. Unless you are an app junky and try every needless app, you will be quite satisfied with the app selection on the phone, which is still growing. For gamers, it is a hard wait, but developers are slowly realizing the growth of Windows phone and are releasing game titles on a more frequent basis.

I would say I didn’t regret my choice to go with Windows based Nokia phone and would continue to be a Windows user. Unless Smartphone manufacturers come up with a way to give a Samsung Galaxy S5 or Nexus 5 like experience in under 15k. My only concern is the very low resale value of Windows phones in India. A 10k Windows phone with 6 months warranty was sold for just 5500 INR, whereas a similar Android phone would have gone for 7500INR.

But if you want to experience the no lag experience and wonderful screen in your mid-range budget, go for a Lumia phone. You will love it.  


Friday, August 9, 2013

MADRAS CAFE MUSIC REVIEW


MADRAS CAFE
Music Director: Shantanu Moitra
Lyricist: Manoj Tapadia, Ali Hayat Rizvi


Shantanu Moitra brings a new life into soul of Madras Cafe.
His compositions are very mild and soft on ears, but powerful at the same time.

The Album kicks off with Maula sun le re, sung by Papon.A soft outing by Papon which is similar to his Jiyein Kyu.

The next song Ajnabee is sung by debutant Zen, who has also written its lyrics. The pensive song sticks to the theme of the soundtrack.

Though the song is easy on ears, one does feel that for a film like Madras Cafe -- which is expected to be a fast paced action drama -- songs like Sun Le Re and Ajnabee are better kept short so that the narrative isn't impacted.
 Khud Se has Papon returning, it is a song which has a sad beginning to it but sounds interesting as it progresses. One can sense a trademark Shantanu Moitra touch here in the way this song is composed. This song is the best of the lot.

The way the song has been designed, with a good voice and lyrics (Manoj Tapadia), makes it the kind you want to listen to again and again.

The whole soundtrack is a bit unusual, but fails to cater to the theme of Madras Cafe, a racy spy thriller. It could have done with atleast one fast paced number to increase the heart rates of the viewers watching the movie.