voices in the wind

Summer is drawing to a close. There is a slow breeze blowing in from the west. This is the breeze that will soon bring the monsoon to Kerala. This must be the breeze that billowed the sails of Vasco da Gama's ships as he sailed into Kappad on May 27,1498.

On this hot afternoon, I sit in the shade of the mango tree and feel the light breeze on my back. If I listen carefully I can hear the excited calls of the Portuguese sailors as they approach land after almost a month on the sweltering seas.

Did they walk through the streets, gaping at the bare-breasted Malabarese women carrying baskets full of mambazham to the weekly market? One of the sailors must have picked up a yellow fruit from a bamboo basket and bitten into it and felt the warm juice soak into his scurvious gums. 



              According to Merriam-Websters dictionary the origin of the word mango:

              Portuguese manga, probably from Malayalam māṅṅa

              First Known Use: 1582

Sachin Tendulkar: 99 is enough

Why is everyone so afraid to say that Sachin Tendulkar must go? I have just been watching a Karan Thapar interview of Bishen Singh Bedi. Even the otherwise outspoken Bedi just wouldn't come out and say it. Instead, he says: Sachin must be allowed to decide. If he does not make the decision, the Board must decide (to drop him?). When cornered by Karan, Bedi takes recourse to statements like "we are just pygmies compared to Sachin" or "imagine what he has done for the country."

Exactly what has he done for the country? Did he make some great sacrifice? Did he risk life and limb in the service of the country? Did he sincerely grind away at some boring government job so that he could take home a few thousand rupees?

All he did was to continue doing what he enjoyed most--playing cricket. And, what is more, he got paid for it. He earned not a government employee's salary but unmentionable sums.

Ask not what he has done for his country, but what his country has done for him. May be it's time for him to retire and coach youngsters. To give something back to the country that gave him everything.