[door Rick Thorburn]
Hello Ram,
Firstly may I welcome you and your family to the Amsterdamsche Cricket Club. I have heard from Ujwala Bukane that you and your family recently moved to The Netherlands and that your son Aneesh Papatla is playing in the ACC-1 U11hb. For a number of years I have conducted interviews with club members which adds some interest to the ACC website.
Ujwala suggested that you were an ideal candidate for ‘Langs de Boundary’ series of interviews and asked me if I could arrange this with you.
Please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about yourself and your family?
Thank you for the opportunity. This is really cool to be part of the publication with Langs de Boundary! I am 45 years old and my wife Neelima and son Aneesh live in Amsterdam. We moved here about a year ago from India. Prior to India, we’ve stayed in the USA for 15 years where Aneesh was also born.
Why did you come to the Netherlands and is it your intention to stay here for a long time?
We’ve moved to Holland due to a new employment opportunity and yeah, we are glad we moved here. We’ve started to soak up the living in Amsterdam and hope it is a memorable home for the foreseeable future.
Are you a keen cricket fan and can we expect to see you playing the game for ACC in the coming years?
Yes, I was an avid fan when I was growing up and played years of Gully cricket. My connection with cricket has depended again with Aneesh’s interest for the game. I don’t think I will play for ACC, but happy to volunteer or warm up the U11 team before a game.
Do you have other hobby’s besides cricket?
Good question - I am not much of a sports person, but I do enjoy cooking.
How and who introduced you and your family to the Amsterdamsche Cricket Club?
I was thrilled to be given the opportunity to represent Booking.com at the ICC - IND vs SA game. Awarding man of the match for a big game was never on my bucket list, yeah, it is a big deal.
Below is the link of the video of the award presentation.
https://www.icc-cricket.com/video/1236818/cwc19-sa-v-ind-player-of-the-match-rohit-sharma
Where do you and your family like to go to on holiday?
We are pretty flexible and are happy that we get to spend time together and experience so many new things. We’ve been visiting Europe over the last few years and are enjoying the art and culture. Recently, we visited New York and saw the Yankees game at Yankee stadium and it was special.
What else is a big dream of yours? What would you like to achieve or do in the future?
I would like to see a strong representation of women in our workforce. We’ve made progress, but not enough. I spend a lot of time mentoring women at all stages of their careers and I am happy to give back. I’ve always been a minority since the time I did my undergrad in the USA. As a minority what I found is the power of people - network, the power of learning from each other is a good recipe for success.
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Ram: Thank you so much! We are so glad to be associated with ACC and watch Aneesh learn and grow in this wonderful environment.
Rick: Ram also thank you very much for supplying me with this interesting interview.
