The babu who ran the Great Wall marathon
Y OU’VE GOT MAIL
Vijay Mantri, an IAS officer now, says running gave him a sense of freedom as a student. He returned to running after a long gap, which he says is a meditative experience.
For many people, running a marathon is a bucket list accomplishment. Amongst running communities, there are rare breeds who aren’t so much concerned with the distance they run — it’s more about where they run, who they meet and the memories they make along the way. For adventurous runners, there are dozens of epic races and routes around the world to simultaneously treat the running bug and satisfy wanderlust.
He Who Has Never Been to the Great Wall Is Not a True Man is an old Chinese saying. Ask a random sampling of people about their bucket list destinations, and virtually all of them will mention the Great Wall of China, probably near or at the top. Built more than two millennia ago to keep invaders out of the country, its main function today, ironically, seems to be to inspire people to visit China. While many come just to marvel at this astonishing feat of ancient engineering, others see the wall as a challenge to be conquered.
He was an avid runner during his childhood. Later, education and work replaced his passion for running. Vijay Mantri is now an IAS officer working for the government of India. “Running gave me a sense of freedom during those days,” says Vijay. “Due to work commitments there was a long pause and I again started running couple of years back. Running is a sport where you are with yourself throughout the run. I never feel bored while running. In fact, after I run about 15- 20 km, my mind b e c o m e s m e d i t a - tive. It h a
Tdelightful French saying Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose says it all. With email, the more things change, the more they remain the same. Over the last four decades, the basic email has been through several changes but the drab home page listing mails in chronological order ( unless, of course, the user changes that), still attracts the eye. The sense of curiosity of who has ‘ mailed’ regarding what is never satisfied until the eye rolls over all the little windows.
Email lives in a different world today as various devices have overtaken the old desktops and laptops as the primary source of access to the internet. Even so, a glance at the mail app on the phone is inevitable, even if the number of visits don't match the number of times WhatsApp is opened in a day.
A study of emails reveals that 3.7 billion people use it on the planet sending 269 billion emails every day and possibly a few from the international space station as well.
It’s not as if attempts were not made to kill email as technology went through generations of changes. AoL instant messenger may have been guilty of the first strike at email. Then came MySpace, Facebook, Symphony, WhatsApp, and HipChat, even as the Gmail provider Google joined the trend in adding Hangouts. But no app or programme has managed to quite do the slaying act on the old favourite of modern communications.
A gentleman from Tamil Nadu says he invented the term “email” along with a ‘ sorting office’ like the Inbox, the Outbox and so on. The claim is hotly contested in Silicon Valley. But, then, we know that the very raison d’etre of the original ARPANET ( Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, an early packet switching network and the first network to implement the protocol suite TCP/ IP) was for military communication, which then evolved into the Internet as we have known it for decades.
The beauty of it all, at a time when serious arguments are cropping up over net neutrality, is that email has always been an open standard. No one ever owned the protocol used to send email or the POP and IMAP standards used to check it. There is no exclusivity to it and you didn’t have to belong to one email service in order to send or receive mails. Much like a distinctive mobile number, an email account is a mark of identity. This is like the old global mail system, but one which does not even need a stamp to send the mail, merely an email account and an internet connection or mobile phone with access to the net.
Maybe it is the stunning brilliance of a universal mailing system that seamlessly moved to wherever in the world the user resides, or is travelling to, that has enabled email to remain the world’s most used communication system, even if second to mobile phone now.
The greatest convenience is that email gets the work done and it doesn’t really overwhelm, unlike the communication and social media platform apps in which everyone in the group is bombarded with messages leading to the famous syndrome of compulsive phonechecking every few minutes.
There are issues with emails. First, the security of emails is far more suspect, the weak links in its architecture making it vulnerable. And then there is spam mail that tries to sell you everything, including a longer penis or larger breasts. But then marketing gimmicks are not unknown in the world of the mobile SMS either. They are trying to make mailing an even better with artificial intelligence suggesting replies suitable to the subject matter received in the mail. Pro forma replies may come with a touch of danger but then we are not yet so robotic as to hit an option just because it is there.
Email’s clients are working overtime to try and improve all aspects of how we address our mail boxes. Inboxes are getting tidier, even smarter in prioritising mail. While Gmail with about 1.2 billion users is the world leader now, the mobile experience in Outlook has improved by leaps and bounds. Yahoo mail is hanging in there, while the pioneering Hotmail disappeared, to be subsumed in Outlook. While it is appreciated that email providers are sweating day and night to improve the experience, the stunning simplicity of email remains its greatest charm. The thought is email ain’t broken and so there is no need to fix it. The very fact that people still say “Can you send me a soft copy” proves the point. also helped me learn the art of patience which is so necessary for success in all aspects of life. Both mind and body have unfathomable depths and we experience it when we do endurance runs.”
One the world’s most d i f f i c u l t marathons, The Great W a l l Marat h o n , gives athletes the opportunity to run through one of the most iconic monuments in history. Participants p a s s over thousands of stone steps and cross stunning landscapes and scenery which makes for a truly unforgettable experience. Vijay is one of the few Indians ( and even from running communities across the globe) to have savoured this epic running adventure.
On his experience of running the Great Wall of China marathon, he says, “This is the toughest marathon I have run so far. The route contained more than 10,000 steps with an altitude gain of 3,000 metres. It was more like Great Wall Climbing. Certain portions of the wall slope at more than 45 degrees and require use of hands as well. But the beautiful scenery all around keeps you going. It challenges you physically and mentally. It is one of those experiences that you will tell stories about for the rest of your life. It was a privilege to soak in this once- in- alifetime experience.”
Just a few thousands have ever run the marathon on the Great Wall, beginning in 1999.
Run where few have ventured. Run in the breathtaking splendour of majestic locales and create your own journey through time. Make the very best of the limited time any of us have on this amazing planet.
The writer can be reached at gs. sudhakarrao@ gmail. com