Moments of Appreciation (Part 2)..

Like they say, when God blesses you, he gives you everything you need and even more! That's exactly what has happened to me - as far as awards are concerned. Here's another Liebster award thanks to my blogging friend - "The Guy in the Mirror". Thank you buddy for the appreciation. Apart from passion, appreciation / feedback is the other important thing we need to ensure we continue blogging. And now I can say I have them in abundance!

Without wasting too much time, lets directly move on to things that you think you knew about me. And I will prove that you actually did know more than you initially thought! Here we go -  

10 Random facts about me:

1. I am lazy when I am at home
2. I love watching sports
3. I (still) play FIFA 2012 (and soon to start FIFA 2013). That's the way I relax
4. I was (and still am) a huge fan of Andre Agassi
5. I follow Arsenal Football Club. Gunner for life!
6. I have stopped watching cricket matches. I just keep track of the scores.
7. I still don't understand Duckworth-Lewis calculation!
8. I read books mainly during travelling
9. I have watched all of Christopher Nolan's movies
10. I strongly feel IPL-like concept will be replicated the world over and we will move away from country based cricket to club based.. Watch out this Nostradamus' prediction..

Answer to the 11 questions asked by "The Guy in the Mirror"

1. Do you maintain a diary?

Response: No. The first random fact is the reason why!

2. Is falling in love and getting hurt really better than not trying at all?

Response: I think so. Actually, I am not experienced to answer this question. In my case, I fell in love with a girl who is now my wife.

3. Is there a person, or people that you don't want to find out about your blog?

Response: Actually no. I want anyone and everyone to read my blog - Utopian state!

4. The longest time you have spent in front of a mirror?

Response: After Holi, some 8-9 years ago. There was something wrong with the silver color paint. The skin below my eye burnt and it took 3-4 months to recover. During that time, I was in front of the mirror more than once every day!

5. The last time you said to someone "I Like You" or "I Love You" (Mention the person too if possible).

Response: Everyday. To my wife and daughter. (I think this question is aimed at a person who's yet to get married)

6. The last time you received a hug.

Response: Everyday again! And by now, I am sure you know who I am referring to.

7. Do you believe in next birth? Why, why not?

Response: No, I don't believe in multiple births. But I am a strong believer of life after death, the concept of souls, heaven. I also believe a lot of our queries can be answered through religious scriptures and concepts like NDE (Near Death Experiences).

8. Something that makes you extremely genuinely happy (non-materialistic).

Response: Once I had been to a charitable institution. They bring the homeless together and look after them day-after-day. One can donate one-time meal to about 170 of them. I was there and what I saw left me speechless! They don't have any family member, no career / money / future and yet they are so happy together. They didn't seem to have any problems with life. Unlike most of us - despite the fact that we have everything we need to survive. That moment made me genuinely happy for them and I learnt a very important lesson.

9. The best part of being single, and the best part of being in a relationship.

Response: I belong to the second category. The best part of being in a relationship - you are never alone.

10. The most extreme thing you did in anger.

Response: I am somewhat short-tempered. But am also the kind of person who gets angry quickly and recovers even more quickly. There's not much time in between. So, I don't think I have had the opportunity to do something extreme when I am angry.

11. Habit or habits of yours that others find peculiar?

Response: During college days, I used to rotate my wrist a lot. Some of my close friends know about it. In fact, they even made me realize about this habit. I think I still rotate my wrist!

Since this is the second time I am receiving this honor, I will nominate the same set of blogger friends I nominated last time! And here is that post. 

Moments of Appreciation..

Let me start by asking you a question? What is the most important thing one craves for? Money. What is the only thing one cannot live without? Money. What should you normally expect once you have completed what's required of you - at work or any other location? More Money.

And that's exactly what I got. From my blogger friend - Ramya. It's awards time, ladies and gentlemen. And I have been bestowed with the "Liebster Blog Award" (honestly, a long time ago, but I messed up in carrying it forward). I told you money is not everything. Thanks a ton Ramya for the honor. And the fact that I learnt a new word too. For those few people who doesn't know what "Liebster" is, I will help you out. Liebster is a German word and it means Favorite.

Now with appreciation comes greater responsibility (Spiderman - if you are reading this, since you are so fond of world wide web - I didn't copy your quote. My quote is totally original. And by the way, you don't even have a copyright). The responsibility here is to do one of the following:

1. Write few lines or a post on one interesting hobby you have or you have ever heard OR
2. You can choose to write a post on a person you have met or incident that has happened during any of your travel.

I will go with the first challenge. One interesting hobby I had. It was during childhood. Now I have never heard of this thing before from anyone, so I am assuming this is somewhat different. It's a combination of pen collection, cricket and mathematics. Now I know that pen collection and cricket made for interesting reading but mathematics spoiled the fun, right?

 

How it worked: This hobby started when I was 7 year old and died down (for obvious reasons) when I turned 12. I never used to throw away the pens I had / were present in my home. I used to collect them. Those were of different brands (local ones, not at all costly and some imported ones with no refills and hence useless). So they had their own unique brand names. Now, here's the weird part. I used to assign them to teams (say team A, B, C..) and used to play cricket using them. But cricket was not the main aspect of my hobby - Mathematics was! I kept track of runs scored, wickets taken, run rates, required run rates, strike rates etc.. Everything that needed to be calculated in Cricket. I also did the same when Dad and I used to watch Cricket matches on TV and was quite good at it. Eventually, I drifted towards honing my mathematics skills by watching live matches and pen collection remained just that - pen collection. Embarrassed as I am, now that I think of it, I feel this hobby helped me a lot during school and college.

 

Now to the last part of my post. Life is not about taking and keeping. It's about sharing too. So I would like to appreciate some blogging friends of mine who have supported me, read my stuff, appreciated and criticized me, only for me to improve (this is NOT the Oscar winning speech! I genuinely mean it). Thank you guys! I hereby bestow the Liebster award to my following friends (in alphabetical order).

Arti
Ashwini
Jenny
Prashanth
Rahul Sir
Raj
Ramya
Red Handed
Dr. Roshan
Saru Singhal

Tania
Vishal kataria

 

I leave it to you if you want to go with any of the above challenges. Or you can try the challenge mentioned in this post.  Or you can even opt not to go with any. I am perfectly fine with the decision you take.