1. Annoying pop-ups. 
2. Formatting is a nuisance.
3. Annoying lines turn up on the blog.
4. Cluttered layout.
5. Layout is behind the times. Refer competition (blogspot, wordpress) to understand why everyone is migrating there.
6. Comments go missing.
7. Says eight comments while in reality only four show.
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9. Need to write in MS Word before cutting and pasting. However, as links need to be done in the blog, it is a race against the dreaded timeout.

Visit my new home at

This traces its origins to this post on Mechai Viravaidya’s efforts in Thailand.

 I have been to Mr. Condom’s celebrated restaurant, Cabbages and Condoms, in Bangkok. Situated in one of the side streets off the main drag in Sukhumvit, it is so named because its famed founder wanted condoms to be as freely available as cabbages. (Go figure!)

 Since it has gained such renown, it is probably best to book, even though it is quite spacious, housed as it is in an old bungalow in a rambling garden with an upstairs and downstairs area. Despite possibly offensive content to devout Catholics and religious conservatives, it is by no means a shady establishment. On the contrary, the trees in the garden were all festooned with bright lights when we visited. We kidded ourselves that it was on the occasion of Deepavali, which incidentally was being celebrated with plenty of loud fireworks by the Sikhs who run lots of businesses in the area.

 In addition to a collection of posters on condoms from around the world (‘If it’s not on, it’s not On’), one of the more unusual wall hangings was a collection of prophylactic devices from times bygone.

 We looked hard for the khadi condom, but it is not in this authoritative collection. Therefore, I must regretfully inform you that the joke* is not rooted in fact!

 The food is standard Thai fare-and quite affordable-you can eat well for under 10 USD. We vegetarians were well looked after too.

 However the best moment is at the finish. When we heard the embarrassed laughter, astonished shouts and saw giggles behind covered mouths, we knew the Air-Lanka flight crew in the table next to ours had received their bill.

 For, at this point in the proceedings, the waiter presents each member of the party a condom instead of saunf or after dinner mints. For me, this is the highlight of a trip to C&C, watching those not expecting this surprise.

 The joke is silent on whether there was any product testing.

After three years’ moderate use, my bat’s blond-white newness was a blotchy, well-marked red, grey and brown.  

The last batsman I remember playing with an evidently old bat, twine fast around the dents and well reddened outside edge, was David Boon. Everyone thereafter took leg and middle with unblemished implements. Thus the pressure cascaded down, even at club level, to flourish a gleaming Woodworm Torch. 

There are those at my club, without much by way of mining stocks or mutual funds, who will yet commence each season with a new piece of expensive kit. Much as I persisted with my increasingly dog-eared old trusty, there came the point when a make-over was called for; at the very least to keep up with the Jonesy-s. 

True to procrastinatory form, five weeks away from the first game of the new season, I finally got around to this pleasant activity on a sunny Spring Sunday afternoon. 

A bat such as this carries the impress of various strokes, seam indentations and well-rounded toes. Many were the times I stopped to admire one of several stains. This beauty, in the middle of the sweet spot-was it that unforgettable tippy-toes drive through mid off early in the game against Sydenham-Hillside? 

Sanding a bat takes patience. Despite what the sander advertisements would have you believe, the dust does not fan out in graceful arcs leaving behind pristine surfaces after one pass. The red lacquer from the ball gets ingrained and needs spot sanding. It boils up and loads the sandpaper. Eventually though, all blemishes disappear, and under progressively finer grades of paper, the willow emerges-whitish and smooth. 

The first rub of bat oil darkens the surface bringing forth the lovely broad grain’s detail. One begins to appreciate why paeans are written to fine timbers like Huon Pine and Rosewood. A couple of light coats before returning the following weekend. 

A light, fine sand precedes two more coats of oil. A new white chevron grip, toe-guard, extratec and there, we have a rejuvenated bat!  

After all this attention, it seems almost criminal to bash a cricket ball with this luminosity.  

But, it carries promise anew, of music when a hard new six-stitcher meets its middle, before the ball’s flight, hopefully over the fence.  And, perhaps, more runs than before?     

The schools we went to in small town India seemed to be particularly ahead of their time in demanding well-researched projects of us students. In a one Library town with no encyclopaedia, research was a hard task.

 Buying an encyclopaedia was out of the question, not least for the fact there were no salesmen in our town. (There was also the bagatelle of being able to afford it, but nevertheless..)

 My father cut this Gordian knot in a unique way.

 He brought down all the Readers Digests from the attic, took them apart and began classifying the articles. He discarded articles that would date and kept those that would stay relevant.

 Eventually he had about fifty different classifications and the pile of paper grew and grew. We kids helped no end by stopping by to pull out articles that grabbed the eye and leaving them lying around.

 When the classification was finally complete, he drove a large needle, usually used to sew together 50 kilo bags of rice, with twine to bind each volume. The fruit of this two week long task was a sixty six volume home made encyclopaedia that we grew to love and curl up with at all times.

 There were of course those that we did not open unless required, such as Anatomy (I am John’s retina).

But Armchair Travelogue (we got the joke when Jimmy Carter mentioned the Aegean sea, but reporters called it the IGN sea in dispatches), Drama In Real Life (striking illustration of the Pan Am and KLM 747s crashing on the runway in Tenerife, Canary islands), World War-II (a funny story that will be the subject of a future entry) got pretty dog eared indeed.

 The incidental compilations, Humour In Uniform, Laughter Is The Best Medicine and Life’s Like That were the source for a reputation I gained later in life for clean, original and funny stories.

 Then there was the instance when a teacher was stumped by something that my brother presented in a project. When questioned, the tabling of evidence left the teacher speechless and earned my father a commendation.

 Nowadays of course, if we need to look something up, there are any number of sources online and off.

 However, that hand made encyclopaedia has earned its soft spot. Thanks Dad, for the labour of love.

 Happy Father’s day.

With the cricket season almost upon us, Rags and I were of a mind to go into the outdoor nets and get the eye in. However, the pale winter sun setting around half past five of an evening forced us to book an hour at Shaun Brown’s Indoor nets. 

Against the bowling machine, a bumbling young Pimples was fumbling as the dimpled ball swung late from a good length outside off. The pro was saying-‘It’s simple, you pampered romper-stomper, don’t sample the vamp !’  

Sorry, no, I am getting carried away-Aussies are far more direct. 

It must be said though, he departed the nets in style-the gloves deposited into the Albion as it came off and the pink handled Gray-Nicolls held by the blade, sweaty blond locks fetchingly plastered to his forehead. 

As the pro walked him and his dad, dispensing Hitopadesha all the while, we truly lucked out. 

As I walked in, I saw that the video was still on. Evidently young Pimples’ dad had paid for video analysis and the pro had still left the camera on. 

The video monitor was set on a delay, so that after the shot was played, you could straighten up and watch how you blew it.  

I will always remember the first time I saw myself in the hall of mirrors at the Birla Mandir in Delhi.  That’s not me! I have a fine Roman prow of a nose. Not a capsicum! An incipient paunch and rounded shoulders?? Noooo, I have a six pack and cannonball muscles! 

Thus it was with Video Analysis.  

Previously, on the odd occasion that I had driven into the V, I had fancied that the technical brilliance of my high left elbow and balance would have Sanjay Manjrekar intoning, ‘He reminds me of myself’. 

Sadly, the video I saw proved that my front foot drive to a ball on off started with the bat waving in in an arc from 2nd slip and finished with the toe pointing to widish mid-on. 

My head fell away when it should not have and it was painfully clear that I had reversed the dictum about ‘top hand tight, bottom hand light’. I was also overdoing the wristwork. Clear that VVS had also begun crowding the narrow confines of my skull. 

Suffice it to say that I walked off a shattered man, my mental image of a Manjrekar clone disabused and my resident Walter Mitty exorcised.  

Sanjay, your reputation for technical purism is not in threat. I have many a mile to walk before I approach your exalted peaks!