I had no plans and no prep. Cause MN was not in the line of actual line of total eclipse. And Twin cities have been dark all of August thanks to unexpected rains, thunderstorms and hence cloudy skies throughout. Husband and kids decided to drive to Kansas City MS, where total eclipse can be seen. I did not even think of borrowing 1 set of glasses from them. Bamm !
And when the day arrived, it was usual Monday morning for office. But at 1 PM, FOMO kicked in and watching online was not enough. So I stepped out of the office building, and great there was an impromptu Solar Eclipse Watching party was going on.
Birds were chattering and flying around aimlessly. Not something you see everyday. Nice to know this is true, after reading about it a thousand times.
Without googles, phone was handy to look at the sun directly. Clouds were helpful in reducing the glare. But for a long time could not make out anything about the eclipse. When I waved my fingers around to look at the sun, then something showed, in-between the finger gaps.
And then when light clouds moved on the sun, that's when the upside Down Banana or the sliver of the Sun showed up. Wow it was beautiful !
Here I am borrowing a friend's picture without permission. This is a great shot. This is how it looked.
It took me half hour to recover once inside the office building. It could be my cultural fear of Solar Eclipse or thanks to staring at the sky for 15 minutes, no matter how cloudy.
It's easy to dismiss a natural phenomenon, that it won't be spectacular. It will be long drawn. Can't get good picture. Oh why bother ? But even the most unspectacular one, in words or photogenic picture, has the capability to move you when experienced. And this 2017 Total Solar Eclipse is monumental. One which occurred in US after 38 years. One which brought out people across US on a Monday afternoon.
So much fun chatter online. Some really marvelous one liner jokes on Twitter. Some of it brings about the realization - something taken so for granted - that the eclipse will be at 1:07 PM and we could plan the whole day around it. That prediction is all thanks to science and how much it has progressed.
Its one year since 2016 Rio Summer Olympics and a good time to post a review of sorts. Just to see what it was, and where we are going ? (Also a good excuse to hide my procrastination, because of which this lay in drafts for so long).
Long post alert. Until I figure out how to add intra-post links, here are the sections to follow:
America
Other heroes
India
India in Para Olympics
Media
For 2020
Lessons Learned
I watched the coverage on NBC, and forced my kids to stay glued through the swim wars; not even blinking was allowed. Watching every night was inspirational and later had to compare records offline, in much detail. Too many thoughts floated on my mind.
Inevitably, I was interested in athletes from India, US and then a couple countries where some of my fav people live. In most of the sports, there was no competition among these, so it was easy to root for them. Plus winning is not everything. Records and performance matter as much.
AMERICA
It was exciting to watch the American swimmers and gymnasts go for the Gold each time.
NBC focused their telecast on American players. Camera kept its eye on the American while they prepared mentally before they began, their limelight minutes and then their after-reactions. And they did not disappoint. All of them showed thrilling performances.
Swim and Gymnastics telecast dominated the nighttime TV slot. And what a performance ! Katie Ledecky and Biles are our newest favorites.
Sarah Robles won Bronze for USA in weightlifting. She is the first athlete from the United States to win a medal in Olympic weightlifting since the 2000 Summer Olympics. I follow her on Instagram. She is an inspiration for many reasons.
And there were Indian-American siblings in USA Table Tennis team, very young but great representation in USA Olympic team. Kanak Jha (Table tennis) - someone born in 2000s !. And Prachi Jha.
Other heroes
41-year-old gymnast Oksana Chusovitina is such an incredible athlete. She continues to be a competitive gymnast at age 40 and as a mother - I don't think she has a peer in that way. In Olympics she has participated from 1990 to 2016 Olympics and represented 3 countries along the way. Read her Wikipage for the exciting story.
And Joseph Schooling from Singapore, who won Gold - the very first for Singapore. And beat his hero Phelps in 100 metres butterfly
Dipa Karmakar's medal was a narrow miss. We watched the finals telecast and she is the master of that vault, that is unmistakable.It was heartbreaking when someone edged her out of the Top 3 and pushed her to 4th position.
Lalita Babar became the first ever Indian since PT Usha in 1984 to qualify for the final round of any track and field event at the Olympic Games. She finished an impressive 10th.
Marathon runners O. P. Jaisha and Kavita Raut finished at 2:47:19 &
2:59:29. For me, the unqualified runner, these are super impressive
timings.
Dhutee Chand fought many challenges to be here and she ran like a champ. I saw her 100m sprint on TV.
Indian men's hockey team out of Rio Olympics 2016 after loss to Belgium in quarter-final. It was heart-breaking.
Every media organization woke up to the athletes during these few weeks and coverage fizzled off after the closing ceremony. There have been numerous recommendations. Hence its heartening to know that some governing body will work on taking steps towards 2020.
Or rather comparisons to point out what India lacks in terms of preparation ?
Comparing Indian infrastructure vs USA existing sports infrastructure. There are 100s of gymnast schools that have sprouted in each school district in US. Similar number of swim pools with lessons. But so there are in Indian cities and towns. There are enough stadiums
and open grounds in cities, just not in population dense cities. So the
difference lies not in infrastructure, but in Resources. Human resources
as in parents, sport coaches, sports academies, advertisers.
In USA, gymnastics & swim pools are
everywhere. I have seen those 100s of shivering 7-10 years in swim pool, every week. Obviously some of the kids are the cream rising up, from the
innumerable kids who have indulged in this sport. Yet everyone is the winner
- some of Olympic and other medals, others of good health, healthy
pursuits and connections.
Sports medicine, nutrition & sports psychology. Not a new field in India. But it needs more new knowledge and development so India can reap the benefits. Needs to be taken more seriously.
Sports Statistics as a field needs much support in terms of tools for
data storage and media to share. There is a large scope for growth here.
For example, none of the road races in India, showcase all runner results. Only
the select top few participants, maybe a few division breakdown. Maybe the elite times are
captured and shared. But not the amateurs who follow later. For
comparison, check out the road race results on MTEC results. You can look up by name, age & gender divisions, sort them in any
way. Every finisher can compare her own performances with
others and make notes. Its useful for any newbie, when assessing a race
before deciding to sign up. She can check how many finish at her times,
to decide if she will be lonely.
Fashion designers had put in immense production value on creating the gymnast suits and swimsuits. Makeup was A-grade. Explicit shout-out
because I know of some, who feel these 2 departments are not worthy of
attention and only thing that matters is actual gymnasts. This is called
attention to detail.
TV telecast featured parent reactions for each of the athlete while they performed.Ads used parents or individual back-stories. Just
a brief reminder of all the childhood years spent by kids shivering, burning, learning their sport, and their parents who facilitated the whole
thing. How very connected parents are to everything their athlete kid is
doing, every second of that brief performance.
It helps to glamorize all athletes. Like USA media does for all sports. Like Indian media does for Cricketers. The lame headlines used in Indian media sometimes! Can they come up with
interesting things to report ? Can't they create interesting things ? Like talk about their coach, their work, strategies, school. Glamorize the players, something like this for Hockey and Dipa. Too
much work maybe. Bulk of the article headlines are judgmental. I mean
how else is a young adult athlete going to behave or say ? It's still at
the envious neighborhood gossip level - yeh aaj kal ke bache, kuch nahi
aata inko. Yet my cynical mind says, even negative coverage is good news and will bring in some needed publicity.
And finally, the goof-ups and high handedness and misappropriations of Sports officials. I can't even. O P Jaisha raised the dismissal water stop and fuel facilities during the Marathon. That s just one of the many.I have my hopes on the 2020 taskforce to reduce this atleast to an extent.
Ciao
Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among stars !
Running has been a part of the Indian movies cardio-dance sequences.
Hero-Heroine running towards each-other from the 2 sides of the wide-screen. Or running around the trees.Or slow-mo running for Hero entry scene.
But thinking about some realistic running, I feel there is no better runner than Anil Kapoor.
My favorite Mr Fittest.
This is him running in the movie Saaheb. The most real jog ever seen in a movie.
Then so was his sprinting in Tezaab. And many others.
I think there is a gif of him running in Badhaai Ho Badhaai. Very unrealistic speed for someone in bulky prosthetic. Got to look for it.
And here are a few instances of slow-mo glamorous running. I heard
there was a superstition for a long time, that any movie featuring SRK
running, was a sure-shot hit-blockbuster. Hence many showcase this.
SRK in K3G
SRK in K3G
The one in KKHH song is done right. The music tempo and running speeds match perfectly well.
