First Great Western - A disaster waiting to happen

Commuting daily between Bath and Bristol for the last one year has given me a deep insight into how First Great Western (FGW) manage and operate a busy intercity link.

The regular signal faults, jam packed trains, 'late running' services and just plain bad luck always seem to add that extra twist to my daily commute. The unpredictable and expensive FGW buses are almost boring in comparison.

If that was not enough, FGW have no way of monitoring how many cycles are brought on board. The cycle rack allows for 3 cycles on the Portsmouth harbour train for example. But more often than not one can find up to 5 cycles blocking the passage (see photo).

Not only can the extra cycles hurt someone in case of emergency breaking but they can also get dislodged and block the exit.

Keeping all this in mind I am curious to see what FGW can do with the Great Western Line and with the massive upgrade being planned in the Bristol-Bath area.

I guess the only thing they can do is increase the fare and enjoy hefty bonuses.

The S in iPhone 4S

The other day I realized what the 'S' in iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4S stood for.
It stands for 'Stable'.

There were so many issues with 3G version which they solved in 3GS. Similarly there were so many issues (remember the antenna issue) with 4 which were resolved in 4S. ;)

As an ex-3GS user (which was an excellent phone!) would definitely say wait for the S version of iPhone 5 if you want to avoid a lot of anguish... unless they release a 4SS (super-stable) :D

A little bit of everything...

That is what life is about. Not excesses but moderation. Not the edge but the middle.
That is what drives the great engines of our times.
Economically speaking it is not the poor or the rich who make companies like Apple rich. It is the middle class trying to become the edge-case.

Socially speaking we admire the edge-cases. People who give up life in the middle and go out there to the bleeding edge of society to try and make a difference. That may be something like what Gandhi did or it could equally be something like what Steve Jobs did.
But we are afraid of leaving the middle. It is one thing reading Steve Jobs' biography and another to do something that makes writing your biography worth it.

Even animals prefer to be in the middle. Life on the edge is tough and dangerous! The penguins at the edge of the cluster can freeze to death and the dear at the edge of the herd will be pulled down by the tiger first.

Sometimes I think the sole responsibility of those in the middle is to produce the edge-cases.

The same way that old skin is shed for the new layer to emerge.

As long as the soft middle keeps producing edge-cases, it is protected. The same way as long as our body keeps regenerating skin tissue the sensitive inner tissue remains protected.

For this protection the middle is defined by the edge. Controlled by it and dominated by it in certain cases.

What will happen if human society stops producing the edge-cases? Some kind of utopian society where risk taking is not required. This is a much explored theme in the realm of science fiction!

What will happen to the middle? It will be scattered like a pile of ashes, that is what will happen.

So let us give credit to both kinds of people. The middles who go through life with their head down looking up now and then to buy a sports car or a Rolex. Now and then producing an edge-case.
The edge-cases, who take the risks and take the road-less-travelled to provide some semblance of protection for the middle.

:)

RTE: Smoke and Mirrors

People of our generation are getting a masterclass from the politicians on how to stay in power without doing any serious work.

RTE is another episode in the series.
Watching a debate about  25% reservation in all schools for poor children was a revelation on how to take the focus away from something under public scrutiny.
The state has very calmly turned the attention from the dismal condition of Govt. schools to private schools requiring to reserve 25% seats in class 1 for 'poor' students.

The lesson: hide your failings behind a controversy.

Explicitly single out poor students and thrust them into the middle of a 'rich' private school. The RTE hopes this will lead to 'sensitisation' and a 'dialog' between children. Maybe this will also lead to world peace and an end to war!
What this is likely to lead to is resentment and a high pressure atmosphere for all the children. I am worried especially for the children of the weaker segment as this can lead to creation of deep rooted complexes.

Instead of forcing all schools to have 25% reservation the Government should open new or upgrade existing Government schools and make the centers of excellence. A school with facilities at par with a mid level private school, concentrating on education, providing a conflict free atmosphere for children to learn. In such a school all the seats should be reserved for children from the weaker segment.
Centers of excellence at the school level, reserved for the weaker segment.
What I would like to see is everyone else demanding that this 100% reservation is reduced and normal segment students can come in as well.
:)

Cardiff 536

Firstly its a train. To be precise the 5.36 pm First Great Western service to Cardiff from Bath Spa.

I take this train back home everyday and as luck would have it, in my humble opinion, it is also the worst performing rail service in the Western world (I joke not!)

Statistics won't allow me to say it is late 10/10 times but I will still say it, if only to release some of the anger. ;)

Often the train has tiptoe room only (great if you are a ballerina) because First Great Western are facing 'an acute shortage of rolling stock' in these 'difficult economic times' (sob sob).

I don't know whether this is a problem of privatization or a simple case of some manager in FGW not doing his/her job.

:D

Rahul Dravid - a cricketer and an idea...

Rahul Dravid in his final 50 over match, against England, at Cardiff (September 2011). Photo (c) Azahar Machwe

It is said that a man may pass on but his ideas live forever.

Rahul Dravid, the man, ended his cricketing career today (9th of March 2012). Rahul Dravid, the idea will live on. The idea is embodied by four words: commitment, professionalism, class and willpower.

In this day and age of T20s and IPL it is very difficult to find these four qualities in any one new player. Don't get me wrong, it is not because the players do not have talent. It is just that the shortest version of the game does not require these four qualities, in the same measure as the longest version, for a successful career.

As a player he had a slow start to his career. When he entered the international arena the Indian cricket team was going through a post-World Cup shakeup. The world of cricket itself was changing and the game was becoming faster. Jayasurya was giving a master-class on rapid-fire run making and all of a sudden 300 was no longer an impossible target to chase.

Rahul Dravid stepped into the middle of this whirlwind. He found it tough going in the one-day format where he was quickly labelled as a 'slow and defensive' batsman. Being solid in his defense, which accounted for his success on bowler friendly pitches outside India, also earned him the nickname of 'The Wall'. The nickname was not all positive, it was also a reference to his slow and defensive style of play; that is why he was never happy about it.

But his style of batting paid off in the five day format of the game where he quickly racked up the runs and ended his career as the second highest run-scorer of all time.

Later in his career the nickname 'The Wall' also stood for his fielding in the slips and his stint as the wicket keeper. His fielding ability is highlighted by his world record for the most catches in Test cricket. Imagine the commitment to fielding over a five day period!

Even a quick glance at Dravids' statistics for the period before December 2009 shows how he, along with Tendulkar and Laxman, took up the responsibilities of a senior player. This payed dividends as the cricket team, running on all cylinders, reached the number 1 rank in Test cricket.

Being a part of the 'general public' what I learnt from Dravid is that you loose only when you give up, if you have the willpower and the commitment to carry on in the face of tough opposition, then you can never loose.

I don't want to make this a long winded piece about Dravid, his achievements are already known to all who enjoy cricket. I will just end this with something a friend of mine said (which I happen to agree with):

'Now when India looses one of the openers we won't be able to comfort ourselves by thinking we still have Dravid to follow'

:)

The Con of Don and Randomness of Ra-One

"Apne aap ko hamare hawale kar do!"

This dialog has been ringing in our ears from Mumbai, 1978 (original Don) to Berlin 2011 (Don 2). But something that added to the suspense yesterday, only made the audience laugh today.

Unfortunately the same has happened to good old Shah Rukh Khan.

Both the movies were over-hyped under-prepared offerings, much like a cake that is burnt from the outside and still raw from the inside.

Both were about Shah Rukh Khan the actor and the ego, definitely not about the story. One had super-glamour of Kareena Kapoor and the needless magic of special effects (some of them really good!). The other had Priyanka Chopra trying her best to give her best in a bit role, playing second fiddle to 'Don' SRK.

Finally both were seeking to bring in a new style of film-making into Bollywood.

But I think they failed badly. In case of Ra-One we were unable to find the common ground between a Hindi family drama about a woman loosing her husband and a sci-fi thriller about the fight between good and evil. Maybe such a common point exists, but definitely finding it would not be aided by all the attention going on a super-star actor playing the lead role.

In Don 2 things are bit more different. There the movie is about one person and everyone else plays second fiddle. There is a lot of forced style injection, most of it at the wrong place. All the 'action' sequences are old by about 3 years (even for Bollywood).

We can go on bashing both the movies but one common factor responsible for the failure of these movies is Shah Rukh Khan. He has grown too large for any role.

So what he needs is to destroy his own reputation and do some meaningful cinema. Which means (to put it simply) stop hyping his movies, concentrate more on the script and NOT his part in it. Something similar to how we cut a rose plant to encourage growth.

Maybe the first thing he needs to do is watch some of his older and more 'honest' works like Raju Ban Gaya Gentleman, Darr and Chak-de India.

Good luck SRK! Hope to see you back at your best in 2012!

:)