A selfie with Ben Stokes changed my life

I am now a marathoner. 2018 has been a revolutionary year with First 5K, First 10K, First Half and First Full marathon all in one year. This is a couch to marathon story in one year, ignited by a selfie with Ben Stokes in Christchurch, New Zealand.

It was December 5th, 2017 at Christchurch airport in New Zealand when I met Ben Stokes. Our long trip was coming to an end. With the usual lull of emotion you get when the trip is about to end, I saw a bunch of people wearing nice bright red T-shirts and black track pants. They seemed to represent a sports team. I kept staring at their jersey logo to figure out which team they represented. For the longest time I thought they were a smaller county Rugby team. However, I felt that I have seen one of them many times on television. It took me a long time to recognize him as Ben Stokes. Had to make some google searches to confirm the same. He was banned from the England Cricket team playing in Australia and was momentarily playing for Canterbury in New Zealand. I walked up to him and asked him if he was Ben. He indeed was and I got a selfie with him. I was overjoyed and instantly posted that picture on facebook and got a lot of likes too ! However when I came back home and looked at the selfie on a bigger screen, realized how fat and ugly I had become. There was Ben Stokes, fit and charming and then there was me, fat and aweful.

It was this moment that I decided to change myself. I started web searches on how to stay fit. In the process of realization, the facebook feeds from a couple of my friends on their running and triathlon adventures seemed very appreciative. This couple inspired me to do something more outdoors than in the gym. A quick phone call to my friend lead me to a path to Team Asha. Team Asha is a sports program organized by Asha for Education (Asha) that gives the chance to individuals of all ages to discover the magical benefits of physical activities like running and biking including but not limited to an active and healthy lifestyle. All that while helping raise funds for projects supported by Asha in India.

I enrolled in the couch to 10K program in Feb 2018. Prior to that I was a running for a couple of months after the trip on my own. Followed no real method. Just get out of the home, run and back. Injured my knee several times. It was odd on the first day. About 40 people met with a few Asha volunteers and coaches. Our first effort was a 2 min warm up run followed by extensive stretching exercises and then a 5 min run followed by extensive stretching and strengthening exercise. Believe it or not, it was a very tiring experience. It showed how bad my state was. We would run on our own on Tuesday's and Thursday's and meet again as a group on Saturday. Slowly the mileage ramped up. 5 mins became 10 became 20 and soon 45. The pre and post stretching exercises and rigorous strength training felt like army preparation. While the body picked up more strength, there were lots of down days when the knee would hurt, sometimes it would be the ankle and sometimes the frame of the foot. But exercises took care of most of these pains. As a part of this couch to 10K program, I had signed up for the Asha Holi Run. Every week the mileage went up and soon we hit the 5 mile mark. It was a huge milestone and a very satisfying feeling. Soon it was time for the actual 10K run on March 25th. I was nervous. Almost felt like the good old days of appearing in a school exam and the nervousness that goes with it.

I ran my first ever 10K in 1 hr 3 mins and received my first running medal. Running a 10K is totally insignificant but yet, it has a special memory for me and a sense of accomplishment. This experience taught me a lot.

Now that I had successfully transitioned from couch to 10K, I felt very motivated to continue the program. I extended the training for a half marathon. More runners joined the party. Some more experienced than the others. I was one of the few newbies attempting the half marathon. Never thought of a day when I would be attempting to run a half marathon. I signed up for San Francisco Half Marathon, which was in July 2018. The training for half marathon continued from April. New faces, new places, new training program. It was all out of the comfort zone. The training program was laid out for us. Saturday would be a long run, Monday would be a recovery run, Thursday would be a tempo run. After a few weeks of training, Tuesday was added for a track run. On Saturday's we would meetup as a huge Asha group to run. Monday's and Thursday's they split us all up into smaller groups and assigned mentors. Mainly because people have a difference in their preference to run in the morning vs evening and the logistics around it. I ran in the evening group post work. Emphasize on intense stretching and strengthening was annoying most of the time but helped a lot in the long run. Soon came a time when I would be itching to run. Wednesday's started to become boring. I would look forward to the runs. Saturday morning became really special. Waking up at 5:30 am, get an almond butter toast and head to the run by 6:30 am was a pleasure experience. We explored several trails in the bay area. Los Gatos Creek Trail and the Oracle Trail in Redwood City were two of my favorite trails. This time around mileage increased rapidly. My body was not cut out for 4 days of intense runs. I would really get tired. Tuesday track workouts were really good but very intense and tiresome. We would go full throttle on tracks such that the heart rate would peak to the maximum. About 16 laps of the 400m track was a normal Tuesday thing. Thursday's were upgraded for Hill training. The location was far off from my workplace but I would yet leave my work early and drive to Rancho for some hill training. Strenuous. Super Strenuous. We would do 40 mins laps of an intense slop at Rancho. Back and forth continuously. This was in preparation of the SF half marathon where there were several hills to be encountered. Soon we reach 8 mile mark and then it was 9 and 10 and 11 !. I felt a significant level shift from mile 7 onwards. Had to put in lot more effort. While training for mile 7 and 8, a half marathon seemed un-imaginable, un-achievable. We kept going and the coaches kept motivating. These were hard hard day. Self resolve, self belief and self motivation was truly tested. There were several times when I felt like giving up and call it not my cup of tea. However, running with group helps. Running group, coaches, mentors, experienced runners kept the tempo going and really motivated us.

It was time for the SF Half marathon. Team Asha had hired a bus which picked us all up at 4am and dropped us all in SF at the start location near bay bridge at 5am. It was close to freezing cold that morning for some reasons. Light showers to welcome us as well. Cold and still dark we got off the bus. I ate my almond butter toast an hour before the race, dropped off the bag. Soon it was time for us to line up. The kick off was at 6:30. I was truly nervous. Cannot describe the feeling. Its the test time for all the hard work that was done for months. I was told to not time myself and the goal is to finish. While the goal was to finish, I knew deep down I wanted to hit 2 hour 10 min mark. With all the nervous energy the race began and we were off. Running on the beautiful San Francisco streets through the pier 39, fisherman's wharf area and soon came the fort mason incline. It was funny to see the reaction from other runners as the incline was significant. All the Rancho hill training and the track workouts helped me and I crossed the first hill easily. After a couple of miles, things settled down, and I started to enjoy the run. Soon there was a good glimpse of Golden Gate bridge covered in clouds with a ray of sun passing through it. Phenomenal sight. It was a state of zen. I was running but no thoughts were going through. Soon there were more intense hills upto the Golden Gate bridge and Presidio to Golden Gate Park. I kept running and running and running. No stops, no water, no stretching. I just ran through the entire half marathon with a water bottle in my hand and a few Gu Gels. Felt the hit and lapse in energy around mile 11. Wondered why am I doing this to myself, Why am I running so much. All possible negative running thoughts crossed by. However it would be cowardly to quit at that point. So I continued to run. No clue what speed I ran, what form I ran, who I brushed by and who I did not give room to run. Along the way there was a blind man running. While he could not see he ran faster than me ! There is enough motivation in this world. It kept me going and I finished the half marathon in 2hr 8 mins. Well within my desire.

What a feeling ! What a feeling ! . Could not stop smiling. I had actually finished a half marathon ! The medal is always precious and has a special place being the first half Marathon medal. This experience taught me a lot. 

Its decision time now whether to continue with the season and for another half or a full. I was honestly running well. A lot of fellow runners motivated me to carry on for a full. It was a matter of 8 to 9 more weeks and I would be able to run the full. Have no idea what I was thinking but was seriously motivated and signed up for the Morgan Hill Marathon which was in Oct. Now its game on and its a different ball game all together. Its running half marathon twice ! Seemed impossible. I got injured after the SF marathon because I did not take a break and tried to do a 14 mile running the very next weekend. It took me down 2 weeks. Should have taken a break instead. Anyways, the training continued. 4 days were still on. Thursday's went back from hill training to normal. Every week was a half marathon now as we build up the mileage to the full marathon. Rocky movie songs were an inspiration. The video kept flashing in front of me. Training for a full marathon was extremely challenging not only physically but more so mentally. Your mind needs to keep up with your body and at times your mind helps you finish while your body gave up long ago. Had a lot of bad / challenging runs but after every run the high that I got was at another level. It motivated me to continue and go to that next level. By this time I was also comfortable with running long distance.

Full marathon now became more of a challenge to myself. Can I really do this. I sure can. Train. Train. Train. Soon it was mile 18 and 20 and 21 !!. Believe it or not it was 21 already. Nilesh our mentor and a good friend Sarthak were instrumental in making these training sessions easy. It helps when you have god run buddy's who run a similar pace as you do. 

It was time to run a full marathon ! The same nervousness was back again. Felt like a kid going for a school exam. Started at 4:45 am for the 6:30am run. Ate the customary almond butter toast and light stretching. Ready to go in the wee hours of morning, we kicked off the race. It was dark and cold, running through the streets of Morgan Hill. Felt real strong and positive. My friend Sarthak Grover and I ran pretty much the whole race together so that made it much easier. It took us 2 hrs and 21 mins to complete the first half of the marathon. We felt really good and strong and the motivation and positivity was sky high. I felt that I could complete the full marathon in 4 hrs and 45 mins. However, we hit our first challenge. The race had messed up the water station location. For full marathon runner, they missed a water stop so there was nothing to offer from mile 11 to mile 15. This made it very challenging. The second challenge was that the terrain changed and we found ourselves running on the side of the main road where the cars were passing by. It made it very difficult and we were scared that some car would run us over. The third challenge was that sun came out by then and it started beating hard. Fourth challenge was that now the terrain got hilly from mile 16 onwards. These hurdles cumulatively took a bad toll on me. The hills were strenuous. Had to slow down and get to a run walk method. I ran partly and walked the hills. I was still doing great on time. Completed 21 miles in 4 hours and 5 mins. However by this time, my body started to give up. Back started hurting. The biggest challenge I face was my glutes gave up. I had a lot of pain in my glutes. Never got one in training but in the actual run it came down hard. Started to face some kind of a wall. All the negative thoughts I got while running half marathon repeated themselves. It was time for the mind to take over the body. Body had given up by mile 21. I ran a few mins, walked a few, stopped in the middle of the road to sit down and stretch out the glute. Get up, run few, walk few, sit and stretch. This cycle repeated over and over untill mile 24. The water stations were like an oasis in the dessert. Small little milestones made a lot of sense and we would try to hit those small milestones. Sometime in terms of distance, sometimes time, sometimes some marker that we see far out. Finally, it was mile 24 and just 2 more miles to go !. I was back. While not running fast but I know I was running strong ! We ran the whole 2 miles. Ran in to a last min challenge as we took the wrong route to the finish line.
A lady guided us back to the race route. This added 0.4 more miles. Running even a step extra at that point is challenge but never the less, we did go back to the race route and finished the race strong with smiling faces.

I give a lot of credit to Sarthak for all the hard training we did together and most importantly the support and motivation he gave me through my struggles running the marathon. It took us 5hrs and 30 mins. Big thanks to Sarthak, coaches and Team Asha and most importantly my wife who supported me for all the time I spent training.

I am now a marathoner. A fitter, better, more confident than ever before, happier person now. Its feels even more special to see my wife and family take more pride in my achievement.

Running marathon teaches a lot. These lessons are not new and one can find them in several books and many other means. However, when you learn these teaching in practice or action, the means lot more and bring in a different level of understanding and acceptance of these teachings. Here are some of them that I can list. I am sure there are more that I dont even know that I have learnt in the process.

- Discipline of time management and following a training plan.

- Hard Work to success.

- Art of preparation.

- Self Belief to go beyond your capacity.

- Self Confidence to overcome any challenge.

- Breaking down complex problems to smaller milestones.

- Helps learn your own health and body.

- Healthy eating.

- Positive impact of stretching, strengthening and exercise in general.

- Anything can be achieved with proper plan and training.

- Knowledge can be acquired.

- Take the first step to the impossible.

- How to place mind over body.

- Compassion and care towards others.

- Nature appreciation

(Believe it or not, while running through scorching heat, it were the trees that helped, the gentle breeze from the bay that helped and many many more instances to appreciate the beauty of this nature)

A selfie with BenStokes Changed my life.

Luck O'The Irish

2016 has been a year full of ups and downs. One of the high moment was a trip to Ireland. Thanks to my employer, I had the opportunity to visit Dublin, Ireland. Its a tiny little country but it has deep roots and hence there are more Irish outside of Ireland and chances are high that you already know someone Irish or someone of Irish descent. I hold the Irish in high regards, especially after reading this CNN article - http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/17/football/eurocup-irish-fans-trnd/. In the times where some fans across the globe behaved like hooligans, the Irish fans made the event memorable. Never the less, with this article being my only reference, my wife and I were very excited to go on a trip for 10 days to Ireland. It was a work cum pleasure trip as I had combined 2 weekends with a work week and a day off :)

A nice flight from San Jose to London with connection to Dublin.  Stop over at London was not convenient as we landed on terminal 5 and the connection to Aer Lingus was at terminal 2. Had to walk and then take bus and walk again followed by security and immigration at London. Took sometime but we managed to make our connection. We reached Dublin on a Friday evening roughly around 5:30pm. The taxi stand is very obvious and convenient. We took a taxi to our hotel Morrison in Dublin city center. I was looking forward to the tai ride as I was told that the Irish taxi drivers are fun and they strike conversations and make you feel comfortable. However our taxi driver was not Irish and he could not understand my accent. He would not talk to us at all and I was not even sure if he was taking us in the right direction. So the start to my trip was not the most comfortable. Finally we reached our hotel. It felt good to check in after a long trip. The hotel was right in the heart of city center by the Liffy river. The city feels like a mix of Amsterdam and Paris.

We went in for a stroll on O'Connell street on the first evening and grabbed dinner. Since we did not know our whereabouts we ended up eating pizza at La Pizza. *Do not* recommend it. We learnt our lesson on the first day itself to go in a bit more researched on the restaurants. Shortly after dinner jet lag kicked in and we had to retire for the day.

Next day was Saturday and I had intentionally left it open to spend time in Dublin City. We walked around the city center and our first stop was St Patrick's Cathedral. We have celebrated St Paddy's day for years in USA but this was the moment when we were at the source.

We spent sometime in and around the Cathedral. From the inside it is very similar to some of the other Cathedral's around Europe. Peaceful, artistic. This one though had some really old flags that we possibly used during the war time. We grabbed a nice meal at a hole in the wall place that interestingly served noodles. As usual being a vegetarian, I cannot do justice to local cuisine and hence have to pick places that server vegetarian food. We extended the stroll in the city center and soon reached temple bar area. This area is a tourist hotspot and a busy area. Lots of restaurants, bars, stores and people.

It was lively. Seemed like a fun place. Further along the way we reached the Trinity college of Dublin. It is one of the biggest colleges in Ireland. As passionate as I am about Liverpool, we walked up all the way to Woolshed Baa and Grill to catch the Liverpool game. On the way back we walked by the famous Ha'Penny bridge. Since Liverpool is very close to Dublin there are a few Liverpool fans around and hence they telecast most of the EPL games. It was a lot of fun. Reminded me of the Liverpool game in Amsterdam. Post game we strolled around Jarvis shopping center. It was a nice busy area with lots of shopping around. We walked a entire day in Dublin city and it was a lot of fun. Have never done this in any other city. It was time for dinner and again we had not researched on the restaurant. So it was a hail mary effort. Thankfully this time we stumbled on to the Arlington hotel. It might not be the best place to eat from food perspective but it turned out to be the best place where we could be at that night. Live Irish band performing some great music.

Every single soul in the restaurant was clapping and singing and having a great time. It is very unique of the Irish clapping during the songs and it adds on to the fun and ambience. Great fun. Great time. The food also did not seem as bad by the end of the meal. The Irish Coffee here is FANTASTIC. That sealed the long "walking" day.

It was Sunday morning and we had to wake up really early as I had booked a day tour to Belfast and Giant's Causeway for the two of us. These places are considered in the Northern Ireland and hence technically it is not Ireland. Northern Ireland is ruled by the UK where as the rest of the island is governed by Ireland. It was a cold chilly morning and we were on our way to the Upper O'Connell street where were had to assemble for the trip. It was about 10-15 min walk from the hotel. In the wee hours of the day, it was pretty chilly. We had layered up to stay warm. Soon we found our bus and were on our way to Northern Ireland. The bus driver played authentic Irish music all along the way. That tune still runs in my mind. Within 15 mins of drive we were into the famous green pastures of Ireland. Ireland is associated with the green color and after the 15 min of drive out of the city center, we understood the reason why. There is endless green land and it is beautiful. We stopped after an hour or so to grab some breakfast and most importantly to buy food and load up as the currency would change from Euro to Pounds as soon as we enter Northern Ireland. The change was subtle as there are no hard borders. But the changes in the flags was apparent. Most of the homes had a British flag in front of them. The roads had subtle changes too. From a solid yellow line, it changed to broken white line as soon as we entered Northern Ireland. Our first destination was Belfast where we had a choice between Titanic Museum or a Black Taxi ride of Belfast. My wife and I both unanimously agree on the Black Taxi ride. Belfast has a strong history and it is as recent as the late 90's. It was an active war zone untill the late 90's. The situation is tensed till date. The taxi ride would drive us through the troubled areas of Catholics and Protestants. Catholics favor the Irish and Protestants favor the British. Our first phase of the taxi ride was the Protestants side of the city. We saw the famous murals of Belfast.



It is the wall art that depicts the day to day life and says a lot about the real life situations. At the time of the war these murals were used to send out strong messages. There is a documentary on Netflix which does more justice than my write up. Recommend it to learn more about the recent history. The two communities within Belfast are divided by a 40 foot wall.

After the wall we entered through the gates into the catholic area. The difference was apparent. The homes looked different. The streets looked different. The wall art looked different. Interestingly enough there was a wall full of people  and their pictures who were murdered in this war. It was astonishing to know that these murders happened all along and as recent as some in 1998.
The taxi drivers were very passionate to describe the truth. The drove the taxis in a group of 3. One of the driver was a Catholic, the other was Protestant and the 3rd was a neutral. At each location the expert would provide his commentary. It was very enlightening and heart felt. A must do while in Ireland.
Soon after the taxi ride we drove further north to Giant's Causeway. Along the way we saw the castle of Grayjoy from the Game of Thrones. Shortly we reached the Giant's Causeway. It is an area along the coast of 40000 interlocking basalt columns created naturally due to a volcanic eruption. It is extremely pretty and unique. It has been declared a World Heritage Site. We spent about an hour and half there. The ride to Giant's Causeway is fabulous.

We had one more destination to explore before we would head back to the city center and that was the rope bridge. The bus drove us to the location where we had a bout 20 mins walk down to the location of the bridge that was made out of rope and wood connecting two cliffs with water underneath. It was windy and the bridge was moving.  Fair bit of adventure on the trip.

 
That was the end of a long trip to Northern Ireland. We grabbed a burrito bowl to go. A day well spent.

Following day was a Monday, Oct 31st, 2016 but luckily it was a bank holiday in Ireland and hence we lucked out. We decided to spend another day in the Dublin city itself. We saw the Dublin Castle. It represented a lot of art and history. It has a significant place in the history of Ireland as it was built by King John and as recent as 1922 was used for government by the UK. It reminded me of the Palace of Versailles. After the castle we walked further ahead to the Dublinia museum. Its the museum of Medieval era and the Vikings era. The Vikings had invaded Ireland and this museum gives a good history lesson on the same. Post Dublinia, we walked a lot to reach the famous Guinness  Storehouse. It is the home of Guinness beer and it is one of the element for which Ireland is famous for. Its beers. We took a tour of the Guinness storehouse where they went over how the beer is brewed. It is amazing to know the number of steps involved in making Guinness. It was a good experience to see the storehouse. After the brewery tour we made the long walk back to the temple bar area. It was buzzing as usual. Lots of light, color and buzz. Since it was a Halloween night it was even more special. Lot of people had come out on road. Dressed up for halloween it was a festive atmosphere. We ate pizza at Milano. Highly recommend and then stepped into Temple bar as well. They were playing some lovely Irish music. It was an experience to cherish. Visit the following links to listen to the music that I captured while at the trip. https://youtu.be/v_hzJ9-ZQUA
https://youtu.be/tovqWdZHC-w

https://youtu.be/v_hzJ9-ZQUA

Then came the working time. I met my teammates at work. All of them are great. In general Irish people are friendly and fun to hang out with. Had a good time with my team. Went out on one of the nights for team dinner. The restaurant was called the Winding Stairs. I have no idea what I was eating but I was told it is vegetarian. haha. Never the less it was a traditional Irish restaurant. The highlight was the dessert. It was some kind of Bread butter pudding. One cannot imagine it, you got to try it to believe how awesome it is. Days passed by and it was Friday already. Wrapped up the day with a dinner at Milano and Irish coffee at Arlington.

Following day was a long journey to the West Coast of Ireland. We started early and reached the bus stand by 7am. The destination was Cliff's of Moher and Galway. We drove through the lush green pastures for roughly 3+ hours listening to fantastic Irish music. It was a very scenic drive. Cliff's of Moher are the really huge cliff's that are about 700 ft. deep at the Atlantic Ocean. The weather was really cold due to the wind. It was difficult to walk in the wind but the scene was really beautiful. The cliff's ran for miles and it was a different feeling to see ocean at a few feet distance from 700ft height. Then we drove away to Galway. It is a nice little town on the west of Ireland. It has a very pretty town center. Lots of small shops and restaurants. It has an ancient look and feel which makes it very memorable. We had a nice traditional Irish Galway vegetable soup. It was delicious. We walked around the area for sometime and then boarded the bus to return back. It was another good day spent. We returned back and had dinner at a thai place followed by stroll at the temple bar area. We stepped in again to hear some music. This time it was rock music. The feel of the place was the same. Happy people, singing and clapping. Loved it.

It was time for the last day trip in Ireland. We made a relaxed trip to Wicklow and Glendalough. Our bus driver was really good and he drove us around the city for a while. He showed us the Victorian and Georgian architecture buildings. Very insightful. We also drove along the coast south of Dublin city. Probably it was a suburban area near Wicklow mountains. It looked very beautiful. In the land of green there was a distinct blue color of the ocean and bright sun shine. We reach the Wicklow mountains. This trip was not a destination but a jouney through the Wild Wicklow. The movie Braveheart was shot here. So if you remember the movie, it has a very very unique landscape. If feels as if you are on an extended flat mountain. Its hard to explain. Here is a picture. We took a break at one of the Irish restaurant. This was truly where I struggled as there was nothing vegetarian. The only good thing for me was that I could catch on a Liverpool game ! That was some experience. Somewhere in the wild in an Irish restaurant watching Liverpool play. Shortly after we moved on to Glendelough. It was pretty but for some reasons I could not enjoy as much. Probably it was too cold for me. Never the less we did see all of it. That was the end of the trip. We drove back to the city center. Grabbed a very good Mexican dinner at Cactus Jacks followed by the last moments at Temple bar. We walked back to the hotel with a heavy heart as it was our last evening.

The bags were packed and the taxi was ready early morning. It was time to go back home. We were on our way back to San Jose. Dublin and all of Ireland including the lovely people and the music left a strong impression on me. One of the memorable trips.

The Day I met Jurgen Klopp

Its been 18 years supporting Liverpool Football Club. Grew up watching Robbie Fowler, Steven Gerrard and many more great players of the past. Always aspired to see them in person. Meet them. See those splendid goals from the team and the players you support. Days have gone by and the players became legends. The kid in me still supports LFC. It still sings You'll Never Walk Alone nearly everyday. The team has changed. Players come and players go but the club still stands tall and I support it with all of my heart.

Then there was the day I met Jurgen Klopp. I saw the 2016/2017 squad. I am still awestruck and unable to believe that I saw the LFC players and the great Jurgen Klopp. Liverpool is touring USA for the 2016/17 pre-season and their home base for the tour was Palo Alto, California. The location is barely 20 mins drive from where I live. I was not aware of the schedule but thanks to my membership on the facebook group of LFC San Francisco Supporters club I saw a few fans had posted pictures that they took to welcome the team on July 21. A bunch of fellow supporters waited outside the hotel to welcome the team. It took me sometime to figure out which hotel are they staying but finally I got to know via some facebook messages. It was Four Seasons in Palo Alto. I was very tempted to see them and hence I left early from work to head to the hotel. I was hoping I could catch the players at the hotel lobby but unfortunately I could not find anyone. One of the LFC admin told me that the players have gone to San Francisco to visit Alcatraz. It was a little disappointing but there was also some more information on when I could get to meet the players.

It was July 22, and I I drove to Four Seasons early in the morning. I was there already by 7:15am. Wearing the red liverpool jersey and the red scarf, I was ready to meet my team. I was told that the players would head out to the Stanford training center at 8:00am. Hence the early start. I was the first one to arrive infront of the hotel. They had placed a fan waiting zone across the main door of the hotel. They expected the fans to visit the team and I was the first one on the day. One of the security guard gave me a thumbs up and indicated that I was standing at the right spot. Within 30 mins we were handful of us. All in Liverpool colors. Some had a football, some with jersey's, scarfs, banners etc. One of the security guards walked up to all of us and gave a message. I was hoping it would be a good one but unfortunately he said that the first sighting of the players would be around 9:45am. This was almost 2 hours out. We decided to wait it out. Thankfully we did. We had our first sighting at 8:45am. It was GOD who was standing out on the main door. Robbie Fowler.
I was over-excited to see him. HE walked out and was heading towards the parked bus. The fans called out his name several times to catch his attention. He saw us and walked towards us. He was kind enough to spend some time with the fans signing autographs. A lot of us took selfies with him as well. Shortly we saw Luis Garcia. The man who was instrumental in beating Chelsea in the 2005 Champions League campaign. It was a thrilling feeling. Also was amazed how short and thin was Luis. Did not expect that.

Then came the man of the hour, Jurgen Klopp, he came out to talk to some of the admin staff. The crowd was excited to see him and shouted his name multiple times to catch his attention. He waved at us and the moment was enough for some of us to feel accomplished. Klopp is a legendary manager with the kind of success he has seen with his previous club Borrusia Dortmund. Making a team with no stars and finding success defines Jurgen Klopp. He believes in building a team rather than buying stars. Which is why he is a real fan favorite. After a while he walks up to the fans, with his wide smile. You can tell how happy he was to see all of us greeting the team and him. He started off with kids first. He loves kids. He went all the way to the left of the fanzone and started signing autographs, shaking hands, interacting with the crowd and also gave us all a nice selfie each. I had mine too. Klopp is humble and humorous. My camera froze while taking a selfie. When it comes to stars you better be quick or they move on. I said sorry to him asked for a couple of seconds. All he said was "I am around take your time". It was very heart felt and shows that how he cares for the fans. Will never forget this moment.

Post his departure, the players started coming out of the hotel main door. We saw the England crew first, James Milner, Henderson, Lallana, Coutinho, Sturridge, Klavan and a few more. I got my selfies and autographs from each of them. I missed Milner as he stayed put at one corner and hopped on to the bus. Then we waited for 45 more mins to see the next set of players. This time we saw Firmino, Lovren, Markovic, Sadio Mane and more. Very exciting. They all greeted the fans and took some good pictures.

Finally we also got our group photo for the memory. Inspite of meeting so many players, the highlight and the memory goes to only one thing - The Day I met Jurgen Klopp. Hope he wins with Liverpool. GoodLuck to him and the team. Go 2016/2017.