The Last Ball

...

Three required off the last ball.

It has all come down to this.

1130 pm on a foggy winter night. The pitch, a center of brightness lit by 4 towers of light.

The green grass wet with dew. The crowd silent. The air tingling with excitement.

.

Three required off the last ball.

The man in the middle, diminutive in stature, slight in build.

He, and he alone; bears the weight of this equation.

He can tie it with two. But it won’t get them victory.

A tie will be decided by least wickets fallen; and that run out on the second last ball has cost them dearly.

.

Three required off the last ball.

He evaluates his options.

The field is irregular; long boundaries straight, and short boundaries square.

The non-striker is just in, he’s fresh and up for a sprint.

There’s just enough space among the gaps for a quick two. But just two. Not three.

.

They’re lucky to be here, still, chasing 52 in 5 overs.

They were in command and winning this; until the quiet third over brought a quick fall of wickets.

The fourth over was a bonus, yielding two no balls, a wide and 18 runs.

He himself scored most of those. He’s brought them back into the game.

.

Three required off the last ball.

He sees the bowler begin his run up in the distance, left arm fast over the wicket. 

Each step resonates around the ground, heavy with tension.

Time slows down.

The batsman is still; and in his crease. His stance that of a coiled snake, ready to strike.

The bowler is in his stride approaching the pitch.

The fielders close in, inside the circle, cutting off the gaps which remained.

.

Three required off the last ball.
It has all come down to this. 

Months of practice and preparation, of 6 a.m. alarms and harsh winter mornings in the nets.
Aggression and build-up, in the days leading up to the title defense.
Fierce rivalries among the legacy teams and hard fought battles in the earlier rounds.

.

Suddenly, his mind is blank, clear. A clean white sheet of paper.

He knows what he has to do.

Things move in slow motion.

The bowler is at the stumps. The non-striker is off and running!

The batsman walks across the line and swings! Swings hard with all his strength!

The non-striker is halfway down the pitch in the hope of running three; screaming for the batsman to make a move.

.

But he hasn’t moved a muscle since he played that shot.

He knows he doesn’t need to run.

His bat hangs in the air; frozen in time. His eyes follow the ball.

He sees it sail away, over the roof, into the night! It’s SIX!

...

Metro Warriors.

Are. You. Ready.

One goal. One Aim. LPL 7.

...

In memory of Phillip Hughes (30th Nov 1988 - 27th Nov 2014) who succumbed to his injuries on being hit in the head by a bouncer in an Australian domestic cricket match. A fighter, a believer, a perennial reserve opener in the Australian test team, an underdog who fought till the very end. You will continue to inspire us, as long as there is a glimmer of hope, no matter what the odds. Rest in peace. 

For a fitting tribute to Phil by sports commentator Daniel Brettig, click here.

The Love Of Assets

Over the first two and a half years of my career, as part of the Asset Finance Group, I have had the unique opportunity to embark on field visits where assets we have financed are deployed and in operation.

Having been to huge shipyards and innocuous on-shore oilfields in Gujarat, on board Anchor Handling Tug Supply Vessels in anchorage at Mumbai and Paradip Ports, taken a tour of the tarmac and the ground handling equipment at Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport, visited stone quarries and crusher sites in the outskirts of Pune, studied Ladder Bucket and Backhoe Dredgers at close quarters at Belapur, and having observed the assembly of a 300 ton Crawler Crane from 26 different parts at a yard outside Panvel; just the sight of a simple excavator digging away on a roadside project is enough to make me stop the car and stare in wonder for a couple of minutes, overawed by the complexity of man's creation and capabilities.

A 30-ton Work-over Rig during inter-locution, at a GSPC Oilfield near Vadodara, Gujarat

A 40 Ton Bollard Pull Offshore Supply Vessel at JNPT Anchorage, Mumbai

At the time of joining my organization in the Construction Equipment Finance vertical (CEF), a lot of the terms mentioned above were a bouncer for me too. Types of machines, names of different manufacturers, make and model numbers, names of large dealers and contractors were supposed to be on the back of my hand, and it took me a while to find my feet. As a credit analyst, it was paramount to know the machines we were financing, how they worked, opportunities for their deployment, and the health of related industries.

While researching all these assets the hard way, i felt the distinct absence of a consolidated database of information related to Construction Equipment for a layman joining the industry. Thus, this part of the blog, Act V, is my attempt to try to hand down the little bit of knowledge i have gained over the last two and a half years, about standard and non standard assets, and maybe, just maybe, generate the same amount of interest, curiosity, love and respect for these assets that my ex-boss has and is renowned for, which he has passed down to me. I hope this section of my blog will eventually serve as a ready-reckoner location for tutorial for any and all types of construction equipment and as an induction to the industry. 

We are going to start off next week with the classification of construction equipment into different categories and segments depending on their application and usage. Stay tuned for more, some exciting times and interesting machines lie ahead. Cheers!

Alma Mater - Part II

Foreword: This is a post i had written a while back (August 2013), and is a follow up to Act V, Scene I - Alma Mater - Part I. In pursuit of continuity, you can read Part I before scrolling downward.

As a student, i always hated the late - night Alumni talks, when corporate honchos who had graduated from college a long time ago, dropped in on campus only to be pampered by the Placement Committee, demanded an interaction with the students, intruded on your post-dinner-relaxation time / hanging-out-with-friends time / late-night-badminton time / fifa-counter-strike time, to impart tit bits of knowledge which din't really affect or better your chances of getting placed in a company and profile of your choice with a higher than average package (every MBA aspirants goal)

And so, after a long day of clambering up an down ladders on an Anchor handling Tug at Paradip port, with a broken finger and plaster to boot, covered in coal dust from head to toe, when most people would have staggered into a hot shower and straight to bed, i found myself in the familiar environs of CR-6 (now called CR16) at 10 p.m., a perfect embodiment of all that i hated when i was a student.

What an amazing experience it was. Just to be able to present in that class again, with rows upon rows of students rising before you like a giant Roman amphitheater, and actually paying attention (as opposed to chatting among themselves in a fairly noisy classroom during college presentations); with the usual late comers knocking on the door every two minutes; with those same old curtains on your right (hopefully washed at least once a year); with the podium right next to you and the presentation on the screen behind; as usual not making any sense whatsoever, and quite like college times seeing it for the very first time right then. Complete nostalgia.

PS: Thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and hope to be able to visit the college whenever possible. Also felt great to meet some friends old and new. Finally met @Tom_Babu in person. This guy is an absolute twitter celebrity for me. His posts and links about finance related news and happenings from around the world is absolutely amazing and anyone who is remotely associated with the wonderful world of finance should follow his twitter handle. College photo courtesy Bibhav Behera Photography

Year End Closing

Its been quite a while since my last post on 31st August 2013, and since then there have been only a couple of updates in my life, nothing major.

Work related first - I shifted from the Asset Finance Group to the Corporate Finance Group in October, within the same organization, and also managed to secure a promotion to go with it. Thus, all asset related posts hence forth are going to be pretty much nostalgia about what I did for the first two and a half years of my short three year career.

A change of vertical also meant a new team to fit into, new colleagues to bond with, and a change of the most important person in one's life (for unmarried people that is) - a new boss. Fortunately for you, i am not going to continue rambling on about work here, and by God's grace, the title of this post isn't related to work related targets at all.

So, on to the fitness front then. Since August 2013, I ran two half marathons - The Bangalore Midnight Marathon in December 2013 (in 2 hrs 7 mins 19 secs); and The Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon in January 2014 (in 2 hrs 0 mins 35 secs) (will definitely be a post on this soon) Here's an image from the Mumbai Marathon, courtesy the amazing photogs at Marathon-photos.com

Continuing the sporting achievements, we (the Metro Warriors) successfully defended our L&T Premier League trophy in February, becoming the only team in the LPL's six year history to qualify for the final four times and win thrice (a post is due on this one too) On the way to the trophy we also swept the Player of the Tournament, Batsman of the Tournament, Bowler of the Tournament and Most 6's trophies. Here's a photo of the winning team

Thus, all targets for the current sporting season were surpassed with flying colors and 'Exceeds Expectations'. Now the hard part, setting targets for next year after such a stellar performance.

The sporting calender kicks off in September 2014 with Athlos 6.0, the annual sports meet of XIMB. Team XIMB Alumni made their debut in Athlos 4.0, finishing with a solitary gold and one silver medal. We fielded only a token presence Athlos 5.0 and this September, we return to campus to put right past wrongs.

On the running front, I could try a full marathon, the absolute definition of fitness in today's corporate world. After some contemplation, I've decided to give up on the superhuman effort and work on improving my half marathon timings with a 1 hr 45 min target. Although the midnight marathon was an interesting experience in itself, i'll probably try a new route this year. The Goa Beach Run next February looks like an attractive option.

On the cycling front, a week-long road trip to Goa remains the dream in winter, subject to leave from office. Intermediate goals on weekends include 100km in a day and then 130km (personal best currently is 62km - Thane and back)

Last but not the least (and probably the toughest) - I'm going to set myself a personal weight gain target of hitting 65 kgs by September, and 70 kgs next March. Going by my history of maintaining 55 kgs for the last 10 years, it does seem like a tall order. After all, what are targets if not impossible and un-achievable anyways. Cheers!

Pushing The Limits

After a three month monsoon break and a dislocated finger, and on barely three hours of sleep, i din't think doing a 40 km ride was physically possible, but we did it. Okay, so we've done longer rides before. We've been all the way to Borivali, Vashi (both 50k) and Thane (62k), and even climbed Malabar Hill thrice on a single ride. Okay, we had a pretty long break at our destination waiting for the rain to stop, before riding back. But, much to my amazement, even after deciding the return journey was beyond us on just the first day back in the saddle, after trying to get back by train (and failing miserably due to the crowd) and after promising to go easy on the pace, we still rode back in record time.

For much of the return journey, i was in the the zone. Head down, pedals kicking over as if driven by a mechanized motor, kilometers flying by. The zone, that amazing period of time when its mind over matter, pain is taken out of the equation, and all that is visible is the destination. When you don't realize how far you've come until you sit back and take a look behind, and when you take a moment to think about it, you can't quite come up with how you achieved it.

Which got me thinking.. are we really pushing the limits in our everyday life? Have we really explored how far we can be stretched? If we think about any of our past achievements, can we say beforehand that we had it in us, and the result was guaranteed? Isn't each milestone a new discovery of having been stretched beyond the limits we thought we were capable of, and setting a new benchmark for ourselves?

Loads of questions. Loads of unknowns.

PS. For those unfamiliar with the geography of this beautiful metropolis of Mumbai, a nice map can be found here.

I map my rides using an amazing app called Strava, a running and cycling GPS tracking app that automatically maps your rides, and provides analytics for speed, elevation and comparison against other online athletes.

Also, a photo of the beautiful Gokuldham abode of Lord Krsna from today morning. 

Hope you all had a safe and pleasant Janmashtami celebration couple of days back. Until next time, Jai Shri Krsna!

Finger Little, Plaster Big

A bit of a delay between posts owing to my travel schedule, and the fact that i've been pretty much left handed since last Monday, which really affected typing speed and slowed down work. This is what my hand looked like for the better part of last week.

I've realized typing one handed is much faster on a mobile device than the laptop, so i wrote this one, alternating between my phone (Galaxy Ace) and my moms Galaxy Tab 2 and switched back to the laptop for links and photos. The blogger app is quite frankly useless in this regard. At best, its a notepad for drafting future posts while on the move, and needs major improvement.

Also, i've learnt to do a few more things left handed since the day i broke my finger. Quite a learning experience this, being one-handed. Bathing, shaving, driving (yes, one handed!) climbing up and down ladders on anchor handling vessels, editing screenshots etc All the usual everyday stuff. I even got an opportunity to drop down to my college, Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneshwar, on the day of my Paradip trip, and i grabbed it with both hands, plaster and all

The good news is that the plaster came off yesterday, and the minute i got to flex and bend my fingers and wrist, i was reminded of this scene from Terminator 2: Judgement Day, the part where he peels off his external skin and reveals his metal skeletal structure underneath. The way he flexes his fingers at '0 min 37 sec' is *exactly* what i did with my hand the moment i was free of plaster. (one can nowadays find absolutely *anything* on the internet i reckon)

Alma Mater - Part I

Wow, what a packed couple of days its been!

Thursday afternoon saw us at Paradip Port, on an Anchor Handling Vessel we recently financed, to be deployed for SPM Maintenance and Operation off the Indian coast. If some of those terms went completely bouncer, lets switch back to regular English. I will translate the terms and explain what such a vessel does in complete detail in a later post. Meanwhile this is what it looks like. Its absolutely beautiful to behold, and much bigger than what the photo suggests.

This was my first visit to Paradip Port, or to any port for that matter, and it was an amazing experience. Paradip is one of the 12 major ports in India, situated on the east coast in the state of Odisha, at the confluence of the river Mahanadi and the Bay of Bengal, about 100 km from Bhubhaneshwar. It mainly handles bulk cargo of iron ore, coal and crude, and has 14 berths with a max draft of 14m, capable of accommodating bulk carriers of up to 100,000 DWT. This is what it looks like from an aerial view.

Just to put it in perspective, here's a screen grab from Google Maps. Its amazing what all you can do on the computer nowadays using the internet and some simple software.

The port was a beehive of activity, with 10 bulk carriers, either offloading coal, or loading iron ore. All were geared vessels aided by on-shore material handling cranes. Amazingly, the website maintains up to date information on exactly which vessels were berthed where, and the exact amount of cargo transferred on each day, available the very next day. Impressive information management systems for a govt. enterprise. We were incidentally right next to MV Jag Rani and MV Monica P  

The port is equipped with broad gauge electrified railway line of East Coast Railway (ECoR) right up to the harbor, which allows the cargo to be loaded / unloaded directly onto railway wagons, or alternatively, taken via tippers to high stacking piles covering several square kilometers and surrounded by screens to prevent coal dust and fines. The slowdown in iron ore export was evident, with ore-filled trucks lining two entire lanes of the Chandikhole - Paradip Highway NH 5-A up to a distance of 30 km from port.

So, this post is threatening to turn into quite a long read. You must be wondering by now why this post is titled Alma Mater. Well the trip wasn't just about a port visit, a vessel inspection, and a day spent away from my desk. I also grabbed the opportunity to drop by my alma mater Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubhaneshwar, for a post dinner QnA with the 1st and 2nd year students. More about that in the very next post. Cheers!