The Giant Rat of Sumatra

I am a great fan of Sherlock Holmes. For me, his stories are not just literary masterpieces but much more - a guide for leading a better life. For me, Holmes personifies the great virtues of man - intelligence, sagacity, leading by example and action, a steadfast sense of duty, chivalry and much more. He is an inspirational role model.

Dr. Watson's accounts of Holmes are a treasure trove of myriad human emotions. The many characteristics of these stories include the fleeting mention of those cases that Holmes solved but the good doctor didn't have the time or energy to pen down. Dr. Watson usually mentions them at the beginning of his stories to show the context of the times in which Holmes solved the case to be detailed in the story. Most of them have pretty bizarre descriptions. From the 'abominable story of the leech' to the 'amateur mendicant society' to the 'man who wound up his dinner by throwing his false teeth at his wife' to 'the man who stepped inside the house to get his umbrella and was never seen again in this world', these stories have always evoked an amused smile in my face.

But again, you may laugh and point out that all of them are figments of the imagination and it doesn't behoove a sane person to take them seriously.

But are they always in the realm of fantasy?

One such intriguing snippet is mentioned in 'The Sussex Vampire'. In the initial conversation with Watson, Holmes mentions about Mathilda Briggs which is a ship associated with the 'giant rat of Sumatra, a story for which the world is not yet prepared'. No further detail is given. There is no evidence of these rats in the subsequent story. It was almost as if Dr. Watson used to conjure them up to enhance the dry humor of his writing.

However, I read something very very interesting last month about the rats.

On a chilly Dec morning, the 18th in the year 2007 to be precise, I opened bbcnews, as is my daily routine and was stunned to see the following news item,

A giant rodent five times the size of a common rat has been discovered in the mountainous jungles of New Guinea.

The 1.4kg Mallomys giant rat is one of two species of mammal thought to be new to science documented on an expedition to an area described as a "lost world".

(Complete story at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/g2/hi/science/nature/7149569.stm)

Fact and fiction are entwined in strange ways. New Guinea is very close to Sumatra, both of them being in South East Asia Pacific. What an astounding coincidence! The imagination, allowed to run free, offered other alternatives. The rats might have moved from New Guinea to Sumatra, or they might have existed in both places. Or there was another explanation. Often Dr. Watson deliberately altered the true facts of a case to preserve the anonymity of the people involved. The case of Matilda Briggs could have taken place in New Guinea but Dr. Watson had changed the name to the nearby island of Sumatra and still left a subtle hint as to the geographical location. There were so many possibilities and interesting speculations...

Of course, at the end of the day, I am a sane person and can distinguish between fact and fiction. Nonetheless it gave me an overwhelming sense of thrill and happiness to read the article and imagine that Holmes had figured out the existence of these singular creatures long before modern scientists with all their modern gadgets could.

Tarapodo

During my undergrad years at IIT Kharagpur, we used to look forward to Friday evenings when movies would be screened at the Netaji Auditorium. There, apart from the cinematic experience, we reveled in other entertaining frivolities, some of which had almost attained the status of tradition over the years, like needlessly trying to squeeze ourselves en-masse through the iron gates, engaging in friendly inter-hostel banter and so on.

One of these was a particularly interesting one. The auditorium lights were turned on as we entered and as you might expect, should have been turned off just before the start of the movie. But on almost all screenings, spanning over a period of five years that I was in KGP, the lights were kept on for a good 20-25 seconds after the movie had started. Not an awfully long time - you might say, but the consistency was striking. We used to shout 'Lights Off' to our hearts content. Sometimes the yell 'Tarapodo, lights' was added to this. Legend was it that Tarapodo was the person who sat in the control room and managed the lights, projector and screening.

Our clamor wasn't out of impatience or malice. It was jovial boisterousness. Our combined shouts would often be terminated by peels of laughter ringing across the auditorium. We didn't miss any opportunity of shouting about Tarapodo at the beginning of each movie. If during the show, the picture dimmed or the screen blanked out, his name would be clamored in a similar way. However I didn't know of anyone who had actually seen Tarapodo in person! Like many of my friends, I had the sneaking suspicion that in reality no such person existed. Still the mythical Tarapodo was one of the many quaint customs that formed a part of our daily life at KGP and we were happy with it.

As the years flew past, I graduated from KGP and left India for US in pursuit of graduate studies. Life was in a fast changing lane and new aspects of existence came forth like towering waves, sweeping past many of the old ones. Caught in this tide of time, the memories of Tarapodo faded into oblivion.

However it was not all over yet. Last summer after a gap of almost four years I heard his name again but rather unexpectedly and tragically. One morning, I received an email in one of the many KGP related yahoogroups that contribute to my email traffic. The sender was a friend of mine whose father was a professor at IIT and who had been born and brought up in the KGP campus. He said that last week, a IIT technician called Tarapodo had passed away from old age and ailment. The email eulogized over his long, valuable but underrated services to the institute which, according to the writer, included movie screening responsibilities. It ended with the usual conclusion that his demise was a huge loss to IIT Kharagpur.

The email had a profound effect on me. Suddenly I was faced with the prospect that there could be a real person behind the name that we used to routinely utter. It was so weird now to hear about him in a different context. Did Tarapodo really exist? What was he like? A frail, old, unkempt but animated Bengali babu? Did he really use to sit in a small dark room and listen to our shouts? Did he feel bad that we seemed to take his name with irreverence? Or did he actually enjoy playing with us and deliberately delayed putting off the lights? Maybe... maybe not.

I wasn't grieving. I hadn't known the deceased Tarapodo personally for such an emotion to be evoked. But I was rather contemplative with a touch of melancholy. I knew not why. Maybe while going forward in life, I had missed seeing things that were taking place underneath the surface.

As I signed off my email, I wondered if another Friday evening would come when I would find myself transported back to Netaji Auditorium. Maybe a new technician had been hired there since the death of the person mentioned in the email. Maybe keeping up with modern times, the screening process had been automated. Would I then see the lights turn on and off without any glitches? Seemed like a lot less fun to me...

Football

Has there ever been a more beautiful game so naturally endowed with both simplicity and complexity? The simplicity is obvious - this is a game anyone can start playing anytime. Most other games have their set of rules that have to be explained to the uninitiated and specialized accessories like the bat and wickets in cricket. But kicking a ball between two posts comes so naturally to the human being. You don't have to it explain to them.

But the simplicity is deceiving. As one gets more involved in the game one realizes that professional football games involve so much details. As one ponders over them, one realizes that football perhaps reflects the philosophy of life itself. Consider the following,

a) Talent is important for success: Watch Diego Maradona waltz past hapless English players in the 1986 World Cup or 'little' Leo Messi do the same for FC Barcelona against Getafe in La Liga 2006-07, to know what I am talking about.

b) But hard work is equally important: Consider Greece who were the Euro 2004 winners. They were a relatively unknown footballing nation who triumphed over their more illustrious rivals like France, Italy, Spain and England. Some say they played ugly long-balled and strong defensive football always looking for the break in counterattack but no one can take away the hard work and dedication of each member of the team.

c) The team is more important the individual: If you are a batsman in cricket, your performance ideally is not directly influenced by that of the others in your team. OK, it may matter if your partner responds clumsily to a cheeky single or if he is hitting well to take the pressure from you. But thats it. But for football, the performance of a player may change radically depending on how the other 10 folks play and how he combines with them. Consider Andriy Shevchenko, one of the most lethal strikers of the world when with the Rossoneri but ever since he has moved to Chelsea, he has been nothing short of pathetic. Its not that he has suddenly forgotten how to shoot or pass the ball, but just that he has not been able to gel in with the rest of the team.

Consider teams with one or two exceptional players but with otherwise average players. The Chileans in 2002 had the potent combination of Marcelo Salas and Ivan Zamorano up front but they made little impact as the midfield and defense couldn't support their genius.

On the other hand consider Brazil in World Cup 2006. The vast individual talent of almost every member of the team didn't gel into a cohesive unit and they were booted out by France in the quarters.

d) There are different paths to success: The point is that you have to find your unique way to nirvana. Let me give an example and refrain from any pedantry. Think of a list of effective center forwards/strikers and the names of Ruud Van Nistelrooy, Wayne Rooney and Filippo Inzaghi will feature in. All three have been prolific for Man. Utd/Real Madrid, Man Utd. and AC Milan but they have very different styles. Ruud is a classical box striker who is lethal in precision and shooting if you got him the ball in the box, but otherwise is lazy and hardly drops down the field to help his team-mates. 'Pippo' also known as the 'poacher' has an uncanny ability to be in the 'right place at the right time' to tap or head in a 'simple looking' goal. Rooney on the other hand is a gritty player, often dropping deep to the midfield and harassing the opposition to win the ball.

And why only strikers? Lets go to the other extreme and consider central defenders. In England analysts often debate about the efficacies of John Terry and Rio Ferdinand. Terry is more often seen making those spectacular last ditch tackles to clear the ball than Ferdinand. Some hail it as a sign of a better defending. Others argue that it's because Ferdinand has a better sense of positioning which enables him to intercept dangerous passes of the opposition right at the inception and Terry has to make last ditch tackles because he was slow to react to the opposition buildup. The truth is that the have both been very successful for their country and in their unique ways.

e) Tactics do matter: Shall the team play in a 4-4-2 formation? Or 4-3-3? Or 4-3-2-1? Should the wingers switch sides like Ryan Giggs and Cristiano Ronaldo for Man Utd? Should the full backs be assume attacking roles in the offensive like Cafu, Carlos, Alves of Brazil? Should the midfield be primarily attacking or defensive or a combination of both? Should there be two center forwards (Rooney and Own for England) or should one central forward play just behind the other like an offensive midfielder (Gilardino/Inzaghi and Kaka for Milan)? Well it often does make a difference. This is where the coach comes in. Should he train the team play 'total football' like the Dutch did a decade ago where every player played all over the pitch? Of should the teams be like Rafa Benitez's Liverpool and Jose Mourinho's Chelsea where players had well defined roles in the pitch?

I have attempted to break the flow of the game into some salient classifications. But such an effort is as futile as breaking down a song into its notes, its raaga etc in order to understand why it sounds beautiful. Why? It's because of the Gestalt principle which says that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. A game of football combines all the features that I have mentioned above and they interact with each other with unknown dependencies and relative importances. Thats what makes the game so fascinating.