Rajiv Khilnani has been a member of MVTC for about 6 years and is currently rated as a 4.0. Read on for more information about this interesting man.

Q: When did you first start playing tennis?

Rajiv: It was the summer of 2001. I had been in the US for about nine months and my cousin, who is considerably younger than me, had also moved to the US the same time I did. He had played tennis in school, but I had only seen tennis on TV. I always had a knack for racquet sports as I had played Ping Pong and Badminton for my School teams, but since both these sports were not very popular in the US, I decided to learn tennis from my cousin. After a few bad beatings and his disinterest in playing with me, I decided to enroll in a tennis class at Mission College, Santa Clara. I took two to three classes as I really found the teacher to be excellent, plus I made some friends with whom I could play on a regular basis.

In early 2004 I was introduced to USTA at the Santa Clara Tennis Center. I started playing at the 3.0 level and enjoyed playing singles the most. Some time in 2004 I found out about Mountain View Tennis Club and started playing club tournaments and USTA for club teams.

Q: What excited you about the sport and made you want to continue playing?

Rajiv: The primary reason for playing tennis has been the friendships I have developed over the years. Plus I really enjoyed the structure of Mountain View Tennis Club-it gave me the opportunity to play competitively without busting my bank and to play all formats of tennis; singles, doubles, mixed, team.

Q: Who is your favorite tennis professional?

Rajiv: Myself (just kidding), I have always supported lefties- Connors, McEnroe, Nadal. In  women I always enjoyed watching Monica Seles and Kim Clijsters (I know she is not a lefty). Also, I support Olivier Rochus from Belgium since he is as short as I am but is surviving at the ATP level.

Q: What shot is your favorite? Your own? Someone else's?

Rajiv: My down-the-line forehand is my favorite. I am not a natural slicer of the ball so I have had to learn that shot from watching others.

Photo at left is of a painting by Rajiv and is titled Balancing Act.

Q: What drew (pun intended) you to painting?

Rajiv: My love for art started almost twenty years ago (when I was 1 year old…Ha!Ha!). I enrolled in an art class to keep myself occupied and was fortunate to get a teacher who inspired all her students and went out of her way to help them learn. I was mentored by her for almost five years. On top of that, people started buying my works from the class which resulted in further self-belief. I got accepted into galleries relatively early in my art career which motivated me even further to paint.

Q: Who are your favorite painters?

Rajiv: Early on in my art career I did tons of realistic paintings because I was drawn to Rembrandt’s work. But as my work evolved and I started delving into semi-abstract and abstract art, I got inspired by some of the local artists from my home country. In the US I am very drawn to Richard Diebenkorn’s work.

Q: Will you tell us about how and what you paint?

Rajiv: My current works are very experimental, I grab hold of any and everything that I might think will work to create art (ok not everything). The risky part about this whole process is that sometimes works don’t come out as you had planned which can lead to tons of frustration and anxiety. One such painting was driving me crazy for months. I tried a number of things to resolve the problem without much luck. One morning as I was heading to the kitchen to grab some breakfast, I looked at that painting and had my Eureka moment, the fix was so simple that I could kick myself for it.

Photo at left is of a painting by Rajiv, titled Still Life.

Q: When and where is your upcoming show?

Rajiv: Every year I participate in the Silicon Valley Open Studios. This year I am doing the show on May 15-16, Saturday-Sunday, at my actual studio/house at: 537 East McKinley Ave., Unit B, Sunnyvale. For more details you can visit my website: www.rajivkhilnaniart.com.

Q: What was your experience on the MVTC board? Why should club members participate?

Rajiv: I have served on the MVTC board twice once as the Co-Tournaments Director and the second time as the Publicity Coordinator. Both times I have had a very exciting and enriching experience. When I became the Co-Tournaments director I was relatively new to the club and Liz Chambers was kind enough to be patient with me and teach me things. As the co-director, I got the opportunity to meet many club members and develop some close friendships. When I took on the publicity role I leveraged my connections that I had formed in my first stint to publicize the club tournaments; also, it let me practice my graphic design skills.

When other people participate, they bring fresh perspective on how to run the club. Also, I don’t think it is fair to expect the same people to volunteer their time year after year when like the rest of us they can use that time to play additional tennis or paint.

Q: What do you do at Stanford? What you like about it?

Rajiv: My employment at Stanford was part choice and part circumstances. As I mentioned before, I came to the US in 2000, at the height of Dotcom bust. Private sector companies were not hiring or looking only for people with a great deal of experience in the tech field (which I had none). I had interviewed for administrative positions with the City of San Jose and Stanford. I was offered both positions but decided to go with Stanford. The interesting twist to my employment at Stanford was that I soon started organizing events for my Department Chair and got branded as an Events Planner, which was a totally foreign concept to me. However, I soon realized that my desire to not be stuck in a cubicle eight hours a day, my gift of the gab, graphic design skills, and the ease with which I could handle the stress made me a perfect candidate for organizing events for rest of the faculty members in the department.

Q: Do you have other interests?

Rajiv: I like to act and model when I get the chance. I have acted in a few student and Indie films and have acted in some Industrial videos for big Bay Area companies. So if you see an image of me staring at you as you download a company webpage beware.

Q: What was the best match you ever played in or saw?

Rajiv: My Men’s singles division II semifinals match against Gil Ambats in October 2005 is a match I can never forget. That year I was gunning for the Grand Prix winner title and as the last tournament of the year, I had to at least make it to the final to share that honor. It was a warm day and our semifinal was scheduled on court 6 at Rengstorff at 8 am. Anybody who knows Gil knows that he is a very tough competitor and an enthusiastic analyzer of every point played in the match, which meant lots of talking between points. Most points played were fairly long as Gill is an amazing good defensive player with deep loopy ground strokes and I like hitting relatively flat aggressive strokes. Bottom line, we started the match at 8 am and finished around noon. I won the semifinal match 7-5; 6-7; 6-4 but lost the final.

Team Tennis Results by Madan Venugopal

We had a great day of tennis today with AM and PM sections playing very close matches and having a great day of fun, thanks largely due to your dedication in stepping up to volunteer.  It was a beautiful spring day to play in any case.

The AM winners were the Lugers with a score of 64 led by MVTC Tournament Chair Kathy Wheeler. Other AM team scores were: Bobsledders (Maria Lange) with 59, Iceskaters (Ragiv Khilnani) with 63, and Hockey Players (Liz chambers) with 54 points. The PM winners were Skeleton with 58 points led by Terrie Rayl.  The other 3 PM team scores were 54 points - Downhillers (Jeremy Chen), Slalom (Adam Brody), and Cross Country (Roy Molseed).  The PM teams suffered from dropouts, so the total scores don't add up to the same as the AM teams because we cancelled some matches.
 
Special thanks to my tournament co-directors Jitendra Swarnkar and Carol Tolen and to Kathy Wheeler and Liz Chambers for all their help with the desk, organization and the prizes. Thanks also to: Jeremy Chen and his army of food volunteers for the great food; Douglas Woolverton, Karen Morrissette, Karl Mellon, Katherin Altemus and Julian Pham for playing AM nd PM sessions to make up for no-shows; Mihoko Hosoi for desk coverage; and Debbie Ryan for the AM photos.  

It was one of the best birthdays I have had in a while :-).

Regards,
Madan

 
Photos below are of the Lugers (AM winner) and Skeleton (PM winner).

Dear Diane and Bob,

    I love the new Tennis and the World column. In fact, I went out and saw all four movies you recommended and I especially liked Match Point. Scarlett Johansson definitely does it for me. I had a hard time finding The Muse, which doesn’t seem to be out on DVD, but I finally located it on VHS at a place called Videoscope, which is on El Camino in the same Mountain View strip mall that houses Amber India. They seem to have everything, including obscure movies and TV shows that Netflix and Blockbuster haven’t even heard about. Anyway, I watched Jeff Bridges serve all those balls into the net (very funny), and then later that same day in my mixed doubles match, I served twenty-five double faults. We lost the match, of course, and now my wife, who was my partner, won’t talk to me. My shrink says it’s just temporary, that Bridges is a charismatic actor whose influence dissipates after a couple of months, but I can’t wait that long. Can you help me regain my serve ASAP and win back my wife? I can’t take sleeping on the couch any more.

                                               Moses “Big Mo” Laver  (3.5 and dropping fast)

Dear Big Mo:

    Sure, we can help. See Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, an over-the-top, hilarious musical comedy starring Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell as “two little girls from Little Rock,” who take a cruise to Paris in pursuit of love and money, but not necessarily in that order. On the ship, Jane Russell does a wild song-and-dance number in her swimsuit with the all-male United States Olympic team, in which she waves around a couple of racquets (they look more like badminton than tennis) and belts out a number called “Ain’t There Anyone Here for Love?” Watch this with your wife and you’ll not only get her back, but your serve as well.

D&B