World Cup and Africa

What's so BIG about football World Cup? Why is it such a craze in spite of being a once-in-a-4-year affair? Why are these football fans so crazy? How come they can have heartache and ecstasy at the same time?

These are some legitimate questions........ for someone who doesn't get it!!

As for the rest of us, well, World Cup is the biggest thing that ever happened to this god-forsaken world, as a whole. It’s larger than UN or Olympics, simply by the sheer participation of nations across the globe.

In simpler words, it brings us closer. Just take a look at the stats and you'll get an idea how huge it is not only in viewership numbers but also the kind of impact it enjoys that no other sporting event can ever dream of. Like I said, it brings the world closer. I mean, when was the last you even bothered with names like "Slovakia" or "Ghana"?

I'm glad that South Africa got to host this year's World Cup. It’s the first time World Cup has entered African soil. That's good for both football and Africa, at large. Egypt was the first African nation to participate in a World Cup way back in 1934 which was followed by Morocco in 1970 but Roger Milla changed the face of African football with his impressive goals and even more impressive goal celebrations.

Every World Cup tourney keeps us guessing on who will be the winner and it’s always the favorites like Germany and Brazil who come up on top of guess. This World Cup saw 6 teams (including South Africa) in the first round but only Ghana qualified to the second round. For the record, only two continents have won the trophy and Africa doesn't stand a longshot at it. As of now, that is.

Whatever be the outcome of this World Cup, one thing is for sure. Its going to be memorable for all the goals, adrenaline, drama, political tidbits and the list goes on and on till the next World Cup takes place.

Five Fave Fotos For Fun!

This blog post is dedicated to BlogAdda's Travel Photo Contest for which I'm posting 5 of my favorite travel pics.

The pics I've selected for this contest belongs to the bike trip I and my friends took late December. We traveled down South and covered more than 3900 kms (how much I love boasting this figure!) and vroomed through 5 states including Maharashtra in 18 days.

Its pretty tough choice to make considering the amount of photos we clicked on road. You can check out some of the other pics here.

These are the 5 short-listed shots......


This pic was taken early morning after leaving our lodge in Solapur. The whole scenario was so breath-taking that we didn't had to signal each other to stop. We just did...on impulse and I clicked the sun-meets-fog moment!

This pic was taken somewhere near Hampi and it was fascinating to see a green chameleon literally robot-dancing its way on the middle of the road and a equally fascinated dog trying to check it out.

This mosque is located on the NH leading to Manjeshwar Beach in Kerala. The reason I love this picture is because of the contrasting green leaves against the beautiful white structure.

Traveling is lot about meeting interesting people and here you can see one such interesting guy in Ooty named Tenzing who was a Tibetan refugee but spoke far better Tamil than my amma. The person seated next to him with his mafiosi look was a local horse-rider and spoke impeccable Hindi! Diverse India indeed.

Two things are always difficult when the bike is running.....one, riding on NH at night-time and two, trying to click a snap pillion-seated! The focus is hardly there thanks to bumpy roads! This pic was taken very early morning when we left Panjim City for home!

Hope you enjoyed! Hopefully, that is. Thanks a lot for your time.

This contest is sponsored by Pringoo.