INDIA & TENNIS - A quick & interesting analysis...

We just witnessed a blasting performance by Roger Federer, top one seed and current king of grass courts went on a roller coaster ride and decimated his opponent Nadal with his winners and serve's to take away the 5th Wimbledon title in a row adding one more to his belt. Also Venus williams, elder of williams sisters made another mark in the history books by claiming her 4th Wimbledon title coming out from hibernation mode being seeded as 23rd in the world.

After watching these matches for many years, one question keeps boggling my mind. Why don't we see not many tennis players from India or China which are the highest populous nations in the world?!

Tennis, yet another energetic sport that pulls attention and attracts many around the world and glues them to television during grand slams titles. With 4 major championships happening every year to entertain the fans, tennis is one of few sport which brings out real talent from an individual to spotlight the best. There are other leagues, opens or tournaments which takes place around the world and also in our metro cities.

But it doesn't seems to be one of the popular sport with die hard fans like cricket in our country. In fact, its been creating some good impulses around youngsters especially past couple of years. A new generation of fanfare starting to whirl around and follow this sport closely after Sania's Mirza came on board taking the center stage winning some open titles and adding to her crown.

It's getting more visibility and attention nowadays because of the new fan-fare. But its always been a familiar and well known paradigm way before Sania's time. It was way back when I was doing my schooling. I hear lot about Vijay Amirtaraj & Ramesh Krishna who shinned as limelight of Indian Tennis. During those times, doordharshan used to report about their feat in tennis in the news.

Then came, Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi. New generation tennis players adding synergy with their young blood. They been on the center stage since then for quite some time with some victories in Davis cup and other opens playing as singles and partners. But they never had any luck to get the Grand slam titles and taste the essence. Its always been a unreachable feat for our Indians.

With only few people who can be finger numbered to come out of the country to be successful in this sport. It puts us on a uncomfortable spot comparing to other small countries. I even had tough time answering questions by my american collegues. They ask "Why don't I see not many indians in tennis being a populous country?"

If you look at the other side like USA or France, Tennis is a very well known sport and its been taught and trained in almost all the schools. There are tennis courts all around the neighborhood and cities which has easy access to anybody. I even got my hands on the racket and tennis balls, partnered with my colleagues, trying to learn this solo act which has more technical aspect to it.

So what exactly his holding others back to try and triumph this world class tennis ?! It even has good prize money, lot of media coverage and much more. Here are few things which I feel might be

1. Cost

Cost to buy a Racket is not expensive at all. It might cost Rs.1000 or Rs.2000 equal to a cricket bat for one time to get started. Tennis balls are all over the place nowadays. We started playing cricket instead of tennis. So that won't be problem to get hold few. I feel the only problem is hiring a trainer or getting on to a training regiment/facility which might cost fortune sometimes. There is no place to start or practice since not many public schools have tennis courts too. There comes the first hurdle.

2. Training

I do know that there are one or two tennis academies exists in metro-cities but they still are expensive for the middle class family. Only few people could afford to get in there. Hiring trainer is not possible since we don't have big pool of trainers to do personal training. Also there are not many training facilities or tennis court in and around cities to atleast just get started. Only few exists in luxury areas which have limited access to public. So there is a scarcity of training courts and trainers.

3. We tend to relay on the team effort

I feel, this one plays a major role in our mental aspect. I didn't want to speak for all. But I always felt that we tend to lean on others for support especially in sports. We like team sports better than individual sport. We don't want to face the failure alone. We don't want to push hard and challenge ourselves to work alone for successful except its for money. We tend avoid stretching our limits when it comes to sport. We are more comfortable contributing as a team member than be a team itself.

4. More technical than any other sport.

Tennis is one of the most technical sport I ever seen. You have all kinds of returns. You gotta use both backend and forehand to really play a good match. Its too technical for most of us and tough to master unless you have a good trainer to guide it. You have to build your adherline to play for 3-5 hrs. You have to have good physique to run around and beat the hell out of the opponent.

5. Importance to Individual Sports

I don't think, we are trained to give importance to sport acitivities. I think its mainly because of the school system we are acustomted too. We have PT classes twice a week and we do nothing but play team sport or just pass on the time. I ever seen schools giving more importance to Individual sports like they do it here. Also there is not a lot of after school programs to encourage kids to learn things.

Taking above reasons into account, I surely see the reason why we don't see too many players from our country. Its the basic nesseccites which we are missing for us to perform well in the sports department. It should start changing in every schools in every state to give importance to sports activities and make it a compulsory act for a student to take on specialized sport and excel it.

I know we all have the WILL to do it, but just finding the WAY is just isn't that easy.

INDIA TRIP - ONLY MONEY MATTERS, BIG MONEY!!!

Like every other desi, I did carry back loads of memory (without the need to check-in the flight) when I came back from my recent India trip. Obviously most of 'em about very happy and joyous moments but it also includes some interesting and strong, frustrating scenes which still remains untainted and fresh in my mind.

Those anguish instances when comes back at me, makes me to feel wary of the situation and pushes me to reach a bold conclusion that value for Rupee is diminishing faster than ever and at same time attraction towards has increased many times in recent years. To tell the plain blank truth(as per me), NO VALUE FOR INDIVIDUAL anymore in India unless you are big politician. Only MONEY MATTERS, especially BIG MONEY.

Everybody, talks in C's. Do you know what I mean?! C means CRORES like M - Millions are big figures. Like few years back, 10 Lakh Rupee is a big money to invest in anything but now its nothing and compared to Rs.10,000. There is no value for thousands anymore.

Why go that far?! There is nothing you can buy for a one rupee except a Clinic Plus Shampoo nowadays. One rupee which bought a couple of tea or an ice bar or good number of candies few years ago is no longer valid. There is no value for one Rupee not even with the beggars. They too expect more atleast Rs.5 or Rs.10.

Inflation and cost of living has gone up many fold in my opinion. Being a outsider visiting india after couple of years, its huge change. It might not seem a big deal for people who been witnessing this day in and out but its a surprise rather shock for us.

I have seen in many places, people are getting riped of in whatever way they can. There is no better choice than paying the extra bucks. Take the Metro bus service in chennai. They introduced different bus services like M service, Superfast, non-stop which charges many folds than usual fare but still take the same amount of time to reach your destination. There is no choice for commuter than taking these services. Few years back, you can buy a ticket of Rs.5-8 to travel to my place to Chennai Broadway(30kms) which now costs atleast Rs.15-18 and more in the special buses.

In other public places, the charges have be jacked up many fold. In order to go to a reasonable North Indian type restaurant for a dinner for two, you atleast need a Rs.500 note in your pocket otherwise you better look out for the usual idli and dosa hotel. Movie tickets are now minimum Rs.50-75 in reasonably good theatre. Its actually more than hundred rupees per head in multiplex theatres. Man, lots of things changed in 2 years.

Its even gotten worse in the temples and tourist places. When you go to big famous temples like Palani, you get riped of in the name of faster service. I was a direct victim of it. We wanted to go to Palani Hill Temp while we returning from Kodai(hill station). We didn't have enough time so we decided to take the expensive line to catch the ride in Rope/Cable car, which would cost us Rs.50/person compared to normal Rs.10 hoping to reach the counter faster. But it took the same amount of time compared to the Rs.10 line. Nothing special about it the extra cost. Totally unreasonable to ripe off taking the situation as the advantage.

Another situation which took me to the heights of ripe off that I have experienced in this trip. We had plan to go Kodaikonal for 3 days from Chennai as our escape from heat waves. We booked thru a chennai club to have rooms in the big, famous Hill Country Resort 4 months ahead of our trip. We got the letter from the club saying that we will have a big delux room when we get there. When we went, a shocking news is waiting for us. They told us, they never got the reservations from the club and can't allot any room for us. We were stranded in the street and nowhere to go.

We were so ridiculed and frustrated to hear about it. We immediately called the contact person of the club and asked about it, he doesn't care. He said, we tried our best and we got to know that we couldn't get the rooms 2 days ago and sorry to inform you at the last min. Because its the peak season, they didn't have reservation for the clubs. Myself and my father-in law went ballistic.

What are you telling us? We planned 3-4months ago and sent you all formal paper work and payment and now you are telling us its not reserved. He just stayed silent and told that he will make other arrangements. He decided to ripe us off which was evident in his answers. He then gave us a local agent who has a contract with him. This agent guy tries to put us in a media core hotel and planned to take the big money we paid for the resort. What a cheap mentality people? We got to know their plan and decided to not go with that agent guy.

We were so tired after long travel and just want to get a good place at this situation. We tried to find rooms using a different agent on road and finally able to get a reasonable place paying from our pocket. We wasted one day to get the accommodation with the 11month baby in hand and couldn't enjoy the rest of vacation well because of the hassle.

Later we came to know that its normal tactics from this club. They do these type of things all the time and we are there victims this time. As soon we got back to chennai, my in-law had a tense talk with the club folks and in one stage plan to give a compliant report in the newspaper and backed out. Nevertheless, he is trying to the get money back. Whatever it may be, the vacation spoiled is spoiled and nothing can bring it back.

I hired a magician for my Son's Birthday party. He quoted a fixed charge of Rs.1000 for a hour(lowest charge I can find) over the phone but when he got to the party. He tried on me to get more money taking the advantage that we don't have choice. But I strongly said if you want more, you have to do it. He just agreed and did the show.

People just wanna find situation to take advantage to us rip off. I had come across many more instances like this one in this trip. After being a victim and witness of few, I realized that time have changed and nowadays people don't care for others. They just care only for money and they go to any extent to ripe off others money in anyway possible. All they think about is Money and nothing matters to them. I doubt the situation will ever change rather getting worse every day. You be the judge...