uh.. um.. er.. hmm… well.

Let us momentarily shift our focus from ‘Rising Trends in Indian economy beating the odds’ – which is the primary agenda of this blog as a whole – to something less interesting called World Sports.

First up, Cricket. Rahul Dravid scored a lazy double ton against Mumbai while playing for Karnataka (home to the silicon valley of India and office to BJP/ JD(S)/President of India). Of the 5 over-the-top boundaries that he hit magnificently, one went straight in the media room and a label was found attached to the ball having this written on it:

“In YOUR face!“

But since the label was addressed to an anonymous Chairman of Selectors by an anonymous former national captain, BCCI promptly concluded that it must have been some young cricket enthusiast’s prank and that it need not be taken seriously.

But Martina Hingis had to be taken very seriously. Doping is serious affair and use of prescription or non-prescription drugs always adds up as a downward boost to one’s career, unless you are either a former Finance/Foreign minister from India or a Pakistani pace bowler who randomly keeps attacking fellow players and then compares himself to Salman Khan. And the most predictable part of doping is seen in Indian athletics. Every year, a couple of lesser known athletes go abroad to get stoned and then test positive to some random performance enhancing drug. Then they return gloriously back home claiming their innocence and blaming their coaches. Its really that simple.

So when Martina Hingis re-retired this week, many were not surprised. But when she announced that she was being probed for testing positive for drugs during Wimbledon this year, many started wondering if drugs has sabotaged another world sport under its vicious grip. Also, Hingis hired an army of lawyers who promised her to bring out the flaws in the drug testing policies of the concerned agency. But no money back guarantee there.

But Dilip Vengsarkar’s woes don’t end here. Right after he dropped the lesser known class B players, he had to take a hit when those very folks who were belittled by our colonel just two days ago smashed and destroyed others in the Challenger Series. And now this! Perhaps the colonel has done a slight miscalculation. Or perhaps, as some from Jharkhand might argue, it was a right step which was taken by keeping the future of Indian Cricket in mind. Just like Greg Chappell had done.

Coming back to dope again, Strings - the Paki band came all the way duuuu SS uuuuuuu SS uuuuuu SS uuuuuuuuuuuuu rr from you know where to IIM Indore to perform last week. The guys are okay. They’d have played more if the electricity arrangement at IIM wouldn’t have faltered and exposed the fraud that was behind it. Also, they’d have liked more if those Nanda Nagar guys didn’t say those nice things about their mothers and sisters, and also if the other folks didn’t ask for their money back. But how is this related to dope? In the same way as their mothers are related to us.

But if anybody is actually reading this, an awesome indigenous band called Grim Reapers opened for Strings, played some really good retro classics which nobody ever heard and yet managed to pull up quite a roar. So, Kudos, guys. Also, their vocal guy Digvijay is a megalomaniac having long hairs and a healthy appetite for rum and humor. I suspect he’s also a gigolo, but dont tell him please. So, if you happen to pass by Indore some unlucky day, make sure to catch up with these guys On the Rocks at Velocity. And if you end up hating them as much as I did, please do pay them.

Ciao!

The Chronicles of bekabu_balaatkari

Last week, I was having an informal ‘blog-feedback’ talk with a couple of random readers from my college. Random, as in, first I publish a random post which does not usually make sense. Then, I randomly IM/mail my blog’s URL to them, and finally I randomly scrap them on orkut with catchy contents like “If you love your parents, please read this and if you want them to live for a hundred years then please do comment. If you want them to live for another 100 years then write another comment and so on“. Obviously, they don’t love their parents, which is too bad. But all this is done in a completely random fashion. And these folks are not my ‘regular readers’, i.e. they haven’t subscribed to my blog RSS feed. I hope you get the picture.

So, here’s how it went:

Yours Truly: Please give your valuable feedback. We, at Dr. Safety First are always committed for your enterta..

Person 1: (interrupts in between and says impatiently) Why do you always write about Cricket?

YT: Clearly, you haven’t read enough of my blog. Because that is an absolutely baseless allegation.

P1: Yeah whatever. All you’ve been thinking and talking and blogging lately is how Sreesanth made monkey faces to a certain Aussie player. You must know that many people wont like it down under or down south or down in Gulf.

P2: And you must stop cracking jokes on mallus. Its not funny like it is with Sardars and Blondes. There’s a CPI run government in Kerela and they dont want no fuckin’ mallu jokes and nuclear deals.

YT: Orlritee! How many of you think my blog is turning into a cricket blog.

(all the three of them raise their hands)

YT: Orkay. Orkkk. Wait. Hey… you! I never send my blog’s link to you. How do you know?

P3: Eh.. I thought this was one of those ‘hi-five’ games you play in canteen. Is it not?

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Question: What do you do when you’re arbitrarily declared the richest man in the world, even when you’re not?

Answer: You gift your wife a shiny new brand Jumbo Jet.

Another Question: Why don’t you just buy something native and indigenous like… uh… Chattisgarh?

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Now, Some time ago, I had written about how I was working on a list of the most embarrassing things I have ever done. Well, I couldn’t finish it (you may say I didn’t finish it out of pure sloth and yet I wont take any offense). Still, here are a few of the most embarrassing things I have ever done, cited in a purely (again) random order.

• In my younger and less fatty days, I had once pissed inside a swimming pool and then told everyone about it. How’s that!
• I have earned a bad name for naming things. And even worse for naming myself with the stupidest pseudonyms. Like hunk_in_hell, pratfinder and Neon Zamboski. But now I have grown up and my taste has matured thereby reducing my miserability quotient (MQ). Hence the names and phrases like Dr. Safety First and I’m a carnivore. But yes, even these would remain in the list of most embarrassing names I’ve ever conceived
• I wrote this post with this title.

Alright fine. I suck. But thats what she said.

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The reason for my prolonged absence from blogosphere (like you care?) was because I was sent a legal notice by the blogosphere admin which read:

“Please make sense or kindly fuck off“

I had to get a restraining order against this, which basically took most of my time and money. While I was at it, I was also trying to formulate a compromise between the Khan Klan -

In the blue corner we have the defender Aamir Khan, his wife Kiran Rao Khan, ex-wife Reena Dutta (who is on the red corner in an altogether different fight) and Mommy Khan; against, in the red corner, the challenger, Faisal Khan and Poppy Khan.

I suggested the most amiable, guaranteed feasible and deterministically tangible solution – A cage match. They refused. Then I suggested rock-paper-scissor and they appealed for a restraining order against me, which is kind of ironical because that was the reason why I was in the court in the first place. However, we soon reached a settlement and I got my restraining order against the admin. Too bad the Khan thing couldn’t work out. It seems like The red Khans have won the battle for now, but the blue Khans are gearing up for the war. Phew!! Quite a Khandan – no pun intended.Oh, and yes, I was absent because we threw a party and later I was touring. I like when you ask me why I was missing for so long. It makes me feel important.So anyway, this is what I had been up to lately. With a festive vacation ahead, I cant wait to see what else is in store for me? (maybe a few comments on this post??)

Adios and bye.

Karma. Part I

It seems like that racism thing has actually started taking its toll finally. The latest hot topic of the Indian media (besides Saif-Kareena ‘thing’, which is actually much hotter) is the shameful PDA towards the Australian (lets call them) gentlemen. Adding insult to injury is the humiliating series defeat.

Somewhere in my last post, I had mentioned that Symonds had aptly, albeit bravely faced all this criticism (is that even the right word?) and replied to it with strong hands and memorable performances. He might not use shampoo and what we call hair oil in India, but he sure knows how to kick some butt without having to smoke at all.

Lets read those omnipresent lines once again. In India, cricket is not just a sport. Its a religion. And a majority. People here take it too personally. Also, the way we’re groomed learning all those history books we so ever despised makes us kind of stereotyped patriots. We all love our country, yes we do, myself included. We respect our country more than any people do anywhere in the world. What we dont do, unfortunately, is that we dont respect others. This is particularly in reference to cricket.

Stereotyped patriots. We take pride in doing things which makes us proud of our country. In doing that we forget that there’s a very thin line between being a true patriot and a phony one. We cross that line. Just like we did in Vadodara, Nagpur and now in Mumbai. This does not make your country proud. It melts her in shame. That her people have done this.

And this is not the first time this has happened. Remember that test match with Pakistan in Eden Gardens? I do.

The four monkeys detained were let off in a couple of hours. They were also fined 1250 bucks each. Punitive damages have an agenda. The agenda is not to rob people of their hard earned money. The agenda is to make them value it. And we learnt in school that you dont respect something unless you lose it for once and earn it all over again. How guilty would one feel if he’s awarded a fine of 1250 bucks when the ticket he bought was no less than double that amount?

Karma is a funny thing. You do good things and good things happen to you. You do bad things and bad things come back to haunt you. And the next time when they will come back, the other half of this post will show up.

That Amazing Race!

Breaking News!! Andrew Symonds was racially attacked in Vadodara on last thursday’s India v/s Australia game. How? Monkey chants were hurled at him while he was fielding at the boundary. Now, I am with the Australian monkeys on this one. Our Indian monkeys, at least those at vadodara, are really a cheap lot. Perhaps they shouldn’t have been taken out of the zoo in the first place. Or perhaps, the folks at ICC shouldn’t have allowed the Australians to play inside the zoo at all. Monkeys, like Kangaroos are territorial. Alas, if only you’d have seen some National Geographic in those school days…

Monkeys are known to be over enthusiastic all over the world. Like when the superior Australian breed mocked BCCI chief Sharad Pawar last year. This time, our less superior ones were at the retaliating end. True as they say, “Each monkey has his own day”.

Enough monkey business for now, because racism and monkey chants aren’t the only things that have occupied Symonds lately. The other being: You guessed it! Kerela Boy S. Sreesanth. I personally think these two can be really good friends given the amazing face making abilities both of them have been gifted with. (Symonds can also be good friends with master-of-words captain Dhoni, but only if he decides to use more shampoo and a little of what we call hair oil in India).

So, it all started in Kochi. The competition. Sreesanth bowls a yorker. The ball hits Symonds’ pads and flicks. Sree decides it was a leg before. Sree begins his talent show which when analyzed after numerous viewing and reviewing of slow-mo replays can be essentially divided into 3 different classic acts:

1. Thumping your hands right in the middle of the pitch, which gives the impression that you’ve been taken by Satan.

2. Raising your index finger and gesturing it repetitively to both the umpire and the batsman, so that the former realizes that he has made a terrible mistake and takes the umpire test all over again, and the latter packs his bag and catches the next flight out of Kochi.

3. Showing your dental jewelery right into the camera and try to lure Colgate – Palmolive to gamble on you for their next brand campaign.

Symonds also spoke a few ‘vocal’ words with Sreesanth during those happening moments. I am imagining the conversation would have been like this:

S. Sreesanth: “(To Umpire) He’s out. (To Symonds) You’re out. (To Camera) He’s out. (To captain) He’s out. (To the croud) Nee uru vattan aaN, Ingre Varu nyanaan. He’s out!!!”

Andrew Symonds: “I know what you’re saying. My gloves might appear to camouflage it, but trust me, I am also showing you a finger, mate.”

S. S: I bet you can’t shake your booty like I do.

A. S: Yeah I’m sure I will make up something before you tour my country later this year kiddo. I will see you in Australia, mate.

S. S: Oh yeah!! And I will see you in Dubai. And near my tea-stall in Palakkad, if you ever get the balls to show up there.

I am wondering what is it in my South Indian debonair (no pun intended) brothers which gets them so worked up? A few other examples from the past and present include Venkatesh Prasad in his more lively and unmoustached days, M. Karunanidhi and our very own national divorce lawyer HD Devegowda. For those with lesser GK, Mr. Devegowda’s resume boasts of many achievements like divorcing the third front, Congress, BJP, Janata Dal and less recently, 40 MLAs of his own party. That marriage, fortunately was saved in the nick of time due to his dedicated apetite of daily sleep of twenty hours.

Coming back to Cricket; more specifically to Symonds – Sreesanth rift, as I was saying Sree has three specifically mastered moves to answer his enemies/professional opponents (with a twist of sarcasm). And he can use them in exactly (3! =) 6 different combinations. Symonds, on the other hand, knows only two, i.e. 50s and 100s (too bad) and can use them in only four combinations (3 x 50, 1 x 100). Still, that turns out to be more humiliating than all the fun combined at Kochi, Vadodara and Nagpur. How? There’s no way to know.

And there’s also no way to know what is in store for both my heroes in tomorrow’s game in Mumbai. Keep checking out this space for more updates taken directly from cricinfo and compiled in a miserable attempt of humor only for the three of us. (Yes, my blog now has three feeds, including mine.)

P.S: Suggestions invited for a new name of this blog, and an associated new tagline. My search engine stats indicate that the name of this blog gives a false impression of a database of Paedophiles, Hermaphrodites, Necrophiles, and Frustoos. I wonder why?