Animals sensed tsunami

There are reports from Sri Lanka and India that animals escaped the disaster caused by the recent tsunami. Could they have sensed it coming? Is there some hope for using them to aware us of such comings?

Cattle, dogs, elephants and more fled inlands before the seas roared. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4136485.stm

Its a mystery and not worth shrugging it off as a coincidence.

Aid for tsunami affected people

The recent tsunami accounted as one of the worlds top-10 natural disasters. You can make your own contribution to the relief work at:

https://www.redcross.org/donate/donation-form.asp

A high school friend of mine, Anand Mahato, is aboard INS Sharda contributing to relief efforts in Sri Lanka. Anand, you do us proud.

Sports

I have aching knees and hurting shoulders. I skied for the first time yesterday. With good snowfall couple days ago, it was a perfect time for it. My buddies and I made the plan the previuos night and set off at 8:30 in the morning. Reached there, put on the ski gear and stumbled on the white to learn by falling. After a few skids and falls we knew how to fall. Then we had our hour-long training lesson. It was helpful. Picked up the basics - balance, wedge and edge. That followed by tougher slopes and more (worse) falls. A few friends gave up, couple tried harder and one pushed the envelope. With every descend from the slope I was getting better (or atleast I thought so). End of the day all the falls were worth the fun.

Well, whats the point? It highlights the beauty of sports. I believe that sports is the best teacher. Any sport - group or individual has the ability to better our skills and general attitude in life. Try hard, fall, learn and acheive. Team sports instills decision making ability, strategy-making skills, compassion, leadership and teamwork. All so important and yet so hard to teach. These are the elements that comes in most handy in life. Yet, sports is a miniscule part of most education systems around the world.

Respect and promote sports. Push kids to the playground and let them learn the essentials on their own. Kids of all ages can learn from sports.

Legal Battles

The whole world seems to be blogging so today I jumped on the bandwagon. Let me begin with a disclaimer -

"The view and contents of the blog are my personal. I have no interest or intention to represent any other's opinion but my own in this blog. I am not responsible and not liable in any form for the accuracy of information on this personal blog and for the use of such information in any way. ."

What a waste of 2 minutes to write that thing down - I share the same distaste for such clauses as all of you readers. But take a look at this - http://www.stellaawards.com/

It is insane, it is hillarious, it is ridiculous, but it is true.