Its been a while since Ive written a post. I admit, I am not good at writing long posts or at expressing myself for that matter. At this point, I have no idea what I would or should write about, which is why the title is still empty.
Let me pick random news stories and comment on them.
Yesterday, there was a story on the front page of TOI saying - 'Is Sehwag now the world's best batsman?' The problem with Indian media and many Indians is that we are always so ready to jump to conclusions. What is the deal about crowning a cricketer as the best? Sehwag is a good batsman but very inconsistent, and if you ask me I would rate Gambhir higher.
A few weeks back, after India had lost the two T20 matches, media and many people started doubting India's succesful run in the past and whether they can succeed on New Zealand pitches.
Oh please! Give them some space. Any rational person would have waited to see a couple of more matches before making a conclusive remark.
India have, by the way, thumped New Zealand in the one-dayers that followed the T20s comprehensively.
Many people wrote Dhoni and Yuvraj off saying they can't perform on pitches abroad. But, they went on to play some invaluable innings and prove the critics wrong.
Well, masala news headlines titillate the readers and thus, sell.
Watch India TV sometime and you would know what I'm talking about. Majority of us would criticise the kind of news being shown there but would still watch it (Phir bhi Dil hai Hindustani..)
We Indians are like that. We love giving our opinions on every issue irrespective of the amount of knowledge we might have on the subject. Watch a cricket match with friends and you would see people making the finest observations, suggesting what a batsman or bowler should've done instead of making that silly mistake. Bets are placed and emotions run high. If India wins we celebrate it as a victory of our own, despite knowing that the cricketers earn in crores for playing and we're not going to get a penny by wasting our time.
It's no secret that cricket is the slowest game and the most time consuming (read: wasting) too. Still, we just sit idly for hours and enjoy the game. After every bowl is bowled, we enjoy the bowler's slow walk to the start of his run-up, rubbing the ball in between, chit chatting with the guy at mid-off and then running back to bowl the next bowl. And then the minute long interval in between overs. We love lying back idly on our couch and watch all that.
But the thing is that we forgive and forget. Lose the World Cup and you'd find everybody from a paan-waallah to an office-goer cursing the players, but win a three match series after that and there you are, back as our heroes!
We forget the sins committed by our politicians and still re-elect them on seeing a happy gesture by them. Remember the furore against reservations? And yet, we might still re-elect the party that implemented it. And mind it, it didnt happen decades ago. It happened only a couple of years back. How many of us still remember the cases such as the brutal Nithari killings, Jessica Lall murder, BMW case, Bofors? These are all major sensational headlines of the last decade of the 20th century. Not too long ago. Most of us have forgotten, if not forgiven. The Satyam case has already started to fade from memory.
We dont have a bad memory, its just that we are a very optimistic bunch of people. Infact, many surveys do agree with me here. Even during this time of recession where so many people are either getting their wages cut or losing their jobs, we are still the most optimistic and hopeful.
Economics depends a lot on expectations, and I hope this nature of ours will help us combat recession better than most countries.
Signing off, proud to be an Indian!
