The TimePass of India

Nights like these need to live on - there are stats and there are how this night made you feel. 

I wrote about our 2007 win years ago (Read it here) and I wrote the following the night before the 2011 world cup clash - one of my best write-ups (read it here) I thought when will I write about this feeling again. Maybe it wont be as intense as 2007 or 2011 - I am much older, more accomplished - there are so many things in life that have given me joy that maybe this wont matter much. 

I was wrong. 

The way my heart sank after that 20+ run over - I felt again we will end up 2nd. Again! Then I saw Rohit's face on the screen, the pain on that face. At that moment, so many of us Indian men, bogged down by EMIs, and kids fees, working in bad companies, under terrible bosses, would give up anything to see the men in blue win. 

Kohli's last T20, can we do it for him? 

Dravid - that warhorse from the 90s, will he never be able to hold a trophy? How unfair is life on some men - Dravid is the guy who did everything right - I dont know him personally but I am sure he never gets batshit drunk, cant imagine him being late for a meeting. In fact if my wealth manager told me that he is transferring all my fund to Rahul Dravid's account and he is my new wealth manager I would honestly think Dravid would do better than my current guy. 

Then Bhumrah takes the ball in his hand. The warmth I felt at almost 39 years of age can only be described by being lost in the park and suddenly you find your dad. I knew he knew what is to be done. If my eye surgeon tell me it is Bhumrah who is going to perform LASIK on me, I will allow it. He knows what he is doing. 

I am not an IPL fan, but I would tune in to see Ab de Villers in action. The only Indian guy who is that entertaining is Surya. Unfortunately barely lasts. But that catch. What a catch. I jumped up from my chair clapping and my daughters ran in from the other room to see what is wrong with their very mild mannered dad. 

We saw Rohit cry, Virat cry, Hardik cry and Rahul Dravid punch the air - Grown men cry when does that happen! At the end of 15th over most Indian men in their 30s and 40s, accomplished or otherwise would be willing to give up whatever they were chasing in their personal lives for one chance to win the world cup. 

That promotion you were working for since 1 year? Exchanged for an Indian win

Cure to the back pain thats lasted for 10 months? Exchanged for an Indian win

My last heartbreak was the ODI world cup. We did so well, probably our best world cup outing in the history of the game and then to lose the final like that. Just broke our hearts. And the worse part was who do we blame? I wanted to give Rohit a hug, give him some pointers on life, on chance, on destiny and fate. I am older than him have seen more life than him, less cricket but more life. 

In the 15th over yesterday, I dont think if we had lost, I would have any words of wisdom for him - coz how brutal can life be? Something had to happen. Some stroke of luck. Something had to go right. And it did, a lot did. 

Rohit and team, thank you for the memories.

T20 world cup 2024 - Remember the name!

My father worked for erstwhile Indian Airlines, which later got absorbed into Air India. Now that we have that out of the way, let me tell you about my love affair with the airline. 

In the 90s, when air travel was reserved for mostly businessmen & politicians, we would fly as a family. It gave a certain sparkle to our arrival to any family event. There was certain amount of jealousy, some awe, and some general amazement at the fact that we reach anywhere in the country within 3 hours. 

I was a shy, generally under-confident kid who might have had a slight inferiority complex every 90s kid had in India, especially around English speaking cousins. I know, some of you now know the amazing me and wonder how is that possible, but let me tell you that is how 90s India was. So for that kid, ability to fly to places, and the resulting adulation gave an immense boost to self confidence. 

Indian Airlines was beautiful - everything from the logo to the seating, to the air hostesses, the flights, everything was very unlike an Indian Govt company. I would go on to say that it was probably the best Indian company at that time. And I saw it weaken overtime, I saw the quality of food go down, the quality of the crew, the general disdain amongst employees that is so characteristic of any Indian govt company slowly made its presence felt.

Then among much fanfare, it got inducted into Air India and overnight the quality went further down. Dont get me wrong, it was still better than the joke Air India has recently become. Indian taxpayers love to highlight that their hard earned money is being mismanaged - and when the say this, they are thinking Air India employees are at fault. They are like always, wrong -

When the skies opened up, so did the opportunity for the politicians to make money, India was flooded with low cost airlines, which is great for so many of us who now could reduce their travel time by 20 hours or so and at a cost that didnt burn a hole in the pocket. But what this did is, take away the class from flying. It is similar to the degradation that Indian TV programming has seen. The slums have TVs, and they like to watch Sasural Simar ka - so you are left with no programming - you have to watch whatever crap the masses are watching. Same with flying, suddenly the only aim of flying became to reach to point B at the cheapest price. 

Welcome Indigo. A Marwari bus in the sky. Now I have nothing against Indigo, I have flown Indigo so many times. And it never lets you down, it gives you exactly what you ask for, nothing more, nothing less - like a McDonalds of flights. 

I have flown numerous International Airlines from Emirates, to Lufthansa to British Airways and even at its worst, Air India is still amongst the best in my book (I might be biased). For guys who never got a chance to fly Indian Airlines (or the real Air India), let me elaborate what the difference is - 

Leg room - For a guy my height, this is important, very important - which is why for me Air India (like IA) comes so high up the ranks. They dont try to fit in a few extra seats (the local train equivalent of a 4th seat) 

Food - People dont like airline food, but trust me once upon a time AI food was amazing. Sure, we mostly travelled Business class, so there were menus exchanged and certain bells and whistles but even in economy, food was the highlight

Cabin crew: Those girls were great - ever smiling, girls who probably dreamed of becoming this when they were kids. As a guy who understands class, those girls were classy. Even their sarees were classy - what the hell happened to sarees on flights? 

Moving on...

Like I was saying, Air India was slowly but surely became a joke. I loved it, but like loving Mithun Chakravaty, you keep it to yourself. When have you ever heard anyone say their favourite actor was Mithun? I have had discussions with a close few highlighting why it was not the mistake of the employees and AI but the politicians who were making decisions that didnt favour the airline. Like all crappy companies that you might have worked at, they were crappy coz the owners, in this case - the politicians were crappy! None of my firang friends ever had anything good to say about the airline - I specifically flew firang airlines to see what the fuss was about, except the timeliness (something that was the main source of corruption AI) nothing else ever matched to the level of AI. 

When Tata won, I was glad for 2 reasons - one, it is not going to be made into another bus in the sky airline (which would have been the case had ambani or adani won), and two, it was finally out of the hands of the politicians. 

Now it seems I will be redeemed. I have in the past tried to book AI more, but always worried about delays (reason listed above) but now, I can confidently book AI.  I cant wait for India to have an airline that will (easily, if I may add) become the top 5 air lines in the world. I cant wait to ask my firang friends to take the airline and see what Indian hospitality really is! I cant wait to be a kid again. 

Air India, welcome back, my friend!

Air India, welcome back!