Indy Telecom & Industrial Media

Yesterday, we were at the WTA Tour Cincinnati Women’s Open semi-finals here at Mason, OH.

The first singles match was between Akgul Amanmuradova of Uzbekistan and Akiko Morigami of Japan. While it did look like Amanmuradova was a shade more skilled, she gradually seemed to grow weaker as the match progressed and lost to Morigami. The final scoreboard read Amanmuradova-Morigami: 7-6, 4-6, 3-6.

The second singles match was between Sania Mirza of India and Anna Chakvetadze of Russia. While Sania was seeded #3 and ranked #38, Anna was seeded #1 and ranked #8.

Sania won the toss and elected to receive — which made sense as the game progressed because Sania did tend to have a lot more faults and hit the net a lot more often than Anna did. So, she was indeed better off receiving rather than serving.

Sania did play a decent game, but unfortunately she lost to Anna in the end. The final scoreboard read Chakvetadze-Mirza: 6-2, 5-7, 6-3.

Unquestionably, Anna was the better player — she seemed more talented and it looked like she was making Sania run every which way on the court. Also interesting was the fact that Sania’s serves were nowhere as fast as Anna’s and she had far fewer aces than Anna. She also seemed to have a much better temperament than Sania, who seemed to question half the decisions the referee was making.

Right after she lost the match, Sania threw her racquet on the ground and stomped off. She seemed rather grumpy, and in fact refused to even sign autographs for anyone.

While I went there supporting Sania, I was rather shocked to see her behaviour - true, she’s a human being too and she has emotions, but her attitude and game-play was probably the worst of the four that I had seen playing that day.

At the end of the day, I think Anna Chakvetadze just earned herself a new fan. Besides, she’s way prettier, too. =)

And oh, here are some more pictures from the tournament for those who are interested.

Update: Anna Chakvetadze won the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour singles title of the year here in Cincinnati, while Bethanie Mattek  and Sania Mirza won the doubles.

I had the good fortune of landing on a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows a few days before its official release.

And to those fans who have been waiting for it, let me tell you this — it is more than worth it. It’s a fantastic piece of work and you will truly relish every single page of it.

The Good

As with all of the Harry Potter books, the Deathly Hallows is a deeply engaging book and you will find that just about everything that’s happened in the books have happened for a reason. For those of us who grew up reading Enid Blyton, consider this as the coming of age for the Famous Five or the Five Find-Outers.

It’s a wonderful piece of fiction that keeps you wanting more, especially towards the very end. I was so distraught when there were no more pages left to read.

And to those of you that have unfortunately come across the spoilers, do not worry. None of the deaths and none of the short snippets really matter. This book is like a journey, and nothing other than reading the whole thing can really spoil it for you.

The Bad

The Harry Potter series has been a really engaging one, but it would seem unlikely (although not totally implausible) that there would be any more books in the series. And this is not necessarily a bad thing, either (and this statement will make more sense after you’ve finished reading the books).

And I must say that while I most certainly liked the ending, I only wish the gang had spent a few more years in school.

The Ugly (i.e. minor spoilers)

Warning: This section of the post may contain spoilers. Do not read ahead unless you want to read them.

Chaplains from various faiths and religions are sometimes invited to provide the opening prayer for the US Senate. While traditionally this has been done by a Christian Chaplain, this Thursday was unique in that it was the first time a Hindu Chaplain was invited to say the opening prayer in front of the US Senate. Unfortunately, this was marked by protests by some religious Christian folks who shouted down the prayer and kept interrupting it periodically. A video of the incident can also be viewed.

And as a side note, it is interesting how the right seems to want more religion, but only if it were their own. It is rather unfortunate that for a religion that is supposed to teach tolerance, its most fervent followers seem to be showing very little of it.

Sometime yesterday evening, my friend Rebecca asked me (out of the blue, if I might add) if I wanted to go to the pre-screening of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

Happy Fourth of July and all that. I was out last night with my family and Lana to watch the balloon show at Coney Island Park here in Cincinnati.

It was pretty but a bit of a let-down when the balloons did not take off. On the other hand, the fireworks were fabulous. So, here are some pretty pictures (of the balloons). Enjoy!

Here are some pictures of Lorikeets from the Aviary at the Newport Aquarium.