Miracle or coincidence!!?

Miracles happen all the time, all around us. When they happen, they catch us off guard and leave us wondering – How did it happen? Why did it happen? May be, that is the reason why miracles are miraculous.

Was surfing the channels yesterday afternoon. Noticed French open in EuroSports and that too LIVE. They were playing the first round matches. I was like, “What the heck? Weren’t GrandSlams supposed to begin on Mondays? And, today is a Sunday.” Maria Sharapova in baby pink was playing against a Mashona Washington in deep pink. Sharapova was at the verge of a first-round upset. She was down by 6-2, 5-7, 2-5. Washington was serving for the match. 40-15 and she had two match points. Washington was pretty composed and was playing pretty well. Sharapova, on the other hand, was making a lot of unforced errors.

Washington had double match points and I thought that Sharapova was about to be kicked out of the tournament. Washington was getting ready to serve. And then it happened. The messengers of miracle appeared from nowhere. Two pigeons flew by and landed on Sharapova’s side of the court. The ball girl shooed them off and the game continued. But, what happened after that incident was totally different from what had happened till then. It was as though the pigeons had landed on Sharapova’s side of the court carrying loads of good luck. Sharapova played extremely well from that point. Errors crept into Washington’s game. Sharapova saved the match points against her, broke Washington, won 5 consecutive games, won the set by 7-5 and thereby won the match.

It was incredible! Miraculous! May be, the pigeons landing on the court was just a coincidence and it had nothing to do with the turn around of the course of the match. May be, Sharapova was really gritty. May be, Washington caved in under pressure. But, to me, the pigeons landing on the court was perfect timing. Miraculously perfect timing.

To the Smokin’ Joe

Dear Smokin’ Joe*,

How are you? Well, that was just a formality, because I very well know that you are sound and thriving – as omnipresent as cockroach alone is. You follow me wherever I go. In my country I saw you mostly in men. Here I see you in a lot of women too.

I see you in a lot of my colleagues. They have this spooky habit of disappearing from their seats in the middle of critical jobs. When they reappear, they bring either the smell of mint or that horrible smell of yours with them. The good news is that I don’t get this sensation as though I am going to puke at your smell anymore. May be, I have got used to your smell. But, even today you never fail to annoy me.

I see you in my namesake at the office. She asks me to attend her calls when she does her disappearing acts. Now I am used to saying, “I am sorry. I don’t understand Dutch. Can you speak in English please?”. Well, she is a receptionist, you see and she gets an awful lot of calls. I am so used to saying those lines that people tell me that I say them even when I sleep. She has got a room without fire alarm. So, sometimes she has what she fondly calls a fag, with her doors closed and windows open, just to make sure that the fire alarm in the adjacent room is not triggered. Do you know how much I hate to enter her room during or soon after her fag sessions?

And yeah... I did notice you in those 'gori' teenaged girls at Madras airport, who were buying those large bundles of ‘Seyadu Beedi’ in the duty-free shop. I see you in all those men and women who smoke non-stop and spit all over the bus stops and tram stops.

Do you know how much I hate you? When I spot you in people near me, I stare at them so hard that they conclude that I am crazy for sure. If only stares could kill, I would be the greatest assassin humans have ever come across.

I know that people possessed by you become dumb. All they care is the thrill you give them when their lungs are filled with your nicotinic fumes. They never care about me, who hates you like hell but still have to inhale what they exhale. And then, they spit all over my sweet world. They annoy me with their thunderous asthmatic coughs. Why should I care about those morons who don’t care about me? Why should I be bothered about you leading those dumb creatures to a horrible coughing death?

Smokin’ Joe* - Smoke/smoking.

Mutants and Hindu mythology

Aren’t a handful of the mutants depicted in the X-men comics amazingly similar to the characters in Hindu mythology? I certainly think so. Here are some of the similarities I found:
Wolverine, Sabretooth – Similar to Narasimha, Hanuman, Jambavan..
Cyclops – Doesn’t Shiva have an eye that emits flame?
Storm – Indra controls nature
Rogue – Vaali absorbs other’s strength
Angel - Jatayu
A lot of characters in Hindu mythology change shape like Mystique, move objects like Jean Gray, walk through walls like Nightcrawler..

The X-Men 3 should be a nice watch. Waiting for the weekend to watch it.

Da Vinci Code

18 May 2006. Da Vinci Code was released at last. The bus and tram stops of The Hague had been full of Da Vinci Code posters for around a week prior to the release. My friends went to the Pathe in the evening. But, the tickets were all sold out. I never thought that the Dutch were so much into movies.

The next day we went to Pathe an hour before the show and got the tickets. The movie was good. I liked it. The quality of the movie and performances by the actors come nowhere near being rated spectacular. But, the theme and plot was intriguing. I haven’t read the book. May be, that is the reason why I found the concept more interesting. My friend, who had read the book, admitted that the movie was pale compared to the book.

The next day NGC was full of Da Vinci Code related stuffs named “Rivals of Jesus”. Too many theories, too many hypotheses, too many controversies. But, interesting to watch nonetheless. It is funny to see the religious institutions and groups leaping out agitated at trivial comments and remarks. Well, I agree that the question posed by the Da Vinci Code is pretty serious. But still, isn’t belief supposed to be unfazed by criticism? Be it Christianity or Islam or Hinduism, do people really think that they can run their religion by being so ridiculously volatile?

Final Destination III

A bunch of students visit a theme park (an eerie one) sort of place. They decide to go on a roller coaster ride. One of them has this vicious vision that the roller coaster ride would take them straight to their graves. She freaks out and steps out of the roller coaster, making a few others to miss the ride. But then, they discover that they hadn’t missed much, when the roller coaster crashes killing everybody on board.

That is just the beginning of the movie. The girl then finds out that those who were supposed to ride the roller coaster were destined to die and destiny would catch them all no matter how far they run away. This is exactly what happens in the rest of the movie. Spooky, isn’t it? And, I wished I hadn’t watched the movie.

By the end of the movie all its characters die. And they die more than once. The scriptwriter deserves a doctorate for depicting death in all unimaginable ways. My foot. A pair is super-tanned to death, one is literally nailed, and one is squashed like a mosquito. The screen is painted red – all blood and gore.

Worst of all, it will make you shudder with disgust at the thought of usually harmless things like fair, gym, train, roller coaster, tanning machine, etc. I am seriously thinking about skipping the entire genre of horror movies. At least, I should avoid watching them on big screen. I am perfectly content with the comedies, animations and romatic movies.

Just to get my mind out of what I had watched, I saw V for Vendetta (the Dutch pronounce it as ‘Fee for Fendetta’) in the very next show. While traveling back home, I was shocked when my friend said that Final Destination was better than V for Vendetta. Oh my God. Seems sadism and thrill are too close. What was sadism to me was thrill to my friend. This one is the third of the FD sequel. I then read that people find FD-III more thrilling than its previous episodes. Does this guarantee a FD-IV and more? Oh my good God.