PTM

It comes along every few months and each time, its effects seem to be growingly crippling. This is the fifth time I have encountered this syndrome (because technically the fourth time and fifth time were squashed into one). The syndrome I refer to is what I like to call Post-TwentyFour-Melancholy or just PTM for short. Some of you will doubtless be screaming, "Yeah? Well why isn't it called PTFM?!" The answer to that is dual-fold but fairly simple. First of all, it's my abbreviation and I'll make it the way I want and secondly, it's much catchier. Season six of Fox's amazing TV show 24 drew to a close for me last week after I marathoned all twenty four episodes in about two and a half days.

For the uninitiated, 24 is a television show starring Kiefer Sutherland, Mary Lynn Rajskub, James Morrison among a smörgåsbord of ever-changing cast members (thanks to death and all that). Each season revolves around one day, with twenty four episodes that each depict one hour of the day. The whole thing is set in real-time, complete with snazzy editing, multi-screen action as well as a nifty little clock.

Aside from all that, the program itself depicts some crazy situations, all centred around Los Angeles, it must be mentioned and some remarkably cool lines and ways of getting around problematic situations. The twists and turns of every one of the six convoluted stories depicted so far, have been unpredictable and at times, shocking, creating some seriously rivetting television. Sure, a large amount of the stuff depicted therein is fairly improbable and implausible. The violence is doled out in extreme quantities and at times, to greatly exaggerated and grotesque levels. Plotholes are rife throughout the show and some idiots will take a certain sense of pride in pointing these out, no matter how obvious they may be, just to show how cool and non-conformist they are and perhaps in their feeble minds, even ABOVE 24 and its makers they are.

Right there is where the beauty of this show lies. In its sheer ability to entertain you, if you are willing to suspend disbelief or your own predilections, the series is unparalleled and unsurpassed and will probably be for a long long time to come.

That being said, it's obvious not everyone will be able to relate to the show. Hell, at times, even I can't relate to it. But to me it represents that immersion into a different reality and state of being that has been matched to this point only by Hideo Kojima's seminal game Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and Haruki Murakami's Kafka by the Shore. The point is, when something can immerse you in its essence so much as to debilitate you entirely, leaving you numb and walking around senseless, it ceases to be a film, game or a book anymore. It becomes incredibly hard to pinpoint just what it is that was powerful enough to leave you so depressed once it's gone.

The saddest part is that that feeling can never be replicated, no matter how many times you read, play or watch that which left you so numb. Not sure where I'm going with this, but yeah...

Patriot Games

After all the hoop-la of *that* bus ride and the teeming legions that thronged the sides of the roads that the open top vehicle drove through. After all the televisual, printed and real-time imagery of the saffron, white and green to which we were subjected for as long as that Twenty20 tournament lasted and a few days after. After enduring random blasts of that infernal Chak de India song, newscasters going ga-ga about random things to do with Indian cricket, money being hurled here and there for "bringing honour to India", mastheads of newspapers being splattered with the tricolour and so on and so forth. After all that overtly cheap showiness, I find me asking myself, "Is THIS what constitutes patriotism?" Is coming together during cricket matches and high-fiving strangers when the Indian team gets a wicket, patriotism? (Note: The Australian demolition machine seems to have put paid to a large amount of the showiness, that's for sure) Interestingly, I also find myself wondering where this patriotism disappears when the team is whomped by another.

Moving away from the construct of "patriotism" in sport, where is this patriotism when pushing and shoving people to get into public transport, when selling second grade goods to fellow Indians, when neglecting roads that need repair, schools that need establishing and pretty much any basic civic duty that needs to be carried out and isn't, time and time again? Where is this patriotism and love for one's country at that point?

Where does all the gusto of the pledge I was made to (and am certain a number of others were too) memorise in school, go?

"India is my country. All Indians are my brothers and sisters. (Sisters?! A glance at any daily newspaper will say more than I ever could about *that* little irony)

I love my country. I am proud of its rich and varied culture. I shall always strive to be worthy of it. (This part never fails to make me crack up — how exactly are we striving to be in any way worthy of it?)

I shall love and respect my parents, teachers and elders. (Meh. It COULD happen)

To my country and my people I pledge my devotion. (Loosely worded sentence that helps no one in any way whatsoever. I could be devoted to violence and carnage and could pledge the delivery of that to my country and its people. In other news, Gujarat elections are just around the corner)

I solemnly pledge to work with dedication to preserve and strengthen the freedom and integrity of the nation. (Gujarat. 'Nuff said)

I further affirm that I shall never resort to violence and that all differences and disputes relating to religion, language, region or other political or economic grievances should be settled by peaceful and constitutional means. (Aaaaand with an unprecedented, hat-trick of references... that's right, it's Gujarat again! If this were Neo Sports, we'd cut to an ad break just as I said "that's right")

In their well being and prosperity alone lies my happiness. (And the Easter Bunny will be participating in a Hungry Hungry Hippos Showdown with Santa Claus, a leprechaun and Shaft... John Shaft at the Wankhede stadium on October 19. All ticket proceeds will be donated to charity by Niranjan Shah)"

Amid all this, have any of us actually examined the concept of patriotism? "Love and devotion to one's country" is a great definition and answer to give a school teacher at the age of 5 and receive a round of applause from the class. But what is it, really?

Looking at it very very objectively, doesn't it seem like a bit of a stupid concept that one patriotism requires one's love and devotion for a land one was born in with no choice whatsoever? It's not like one had any means of selection in terms of which country to be born in and which people one would have to refer to as one's brothers and sisters. So by virtue of pure dumb luck, I was born in a country home to a pluralistic society, without any prescribed religion or way to live (minus the "don't be homosexual" which Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code states, but the Fundamental Right of Life and Liberty under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution contradicts). Call it freedom. Call it tolerance. Call it secularism . Call it whatever the hell you want, but it’s the bedrock on which this nation was founded and from which we stray at our peril. It’s what has defined us as Indians and no flag-waving, chest-beating nonsense will act as a substitute for.

As far as something one has no direct control over goes, patriotism seems to me, to be a very personal concept. I can choose not to be patriotic, just as easily as I can choose not to. If I complied with the former, I could very happily put up with "anti-national" and "desh-drohi" jibes from people, if I knew inside that I did not believe in the country or what it stood for. Similarly, I could choose to be "patriotic" and brandish my face paint, my flag and my appropriate headgear every time a sports event came along, as a number of those people with the "desh-drohi" remarks do, I suspect. OR, I could choose to be patriotic (not the lack of inverted commas here) and actually live according to the tenets laid down by the constitution and in essence, be a good person, thereby, be a good Indian.

Exhausting as this diatribe was to put down and I'm sure will have been to read (read: Moid), it is nowhere near as exhausting as it was to watch the absolute unashamed exploitation of little children on the altar of "patriotism" on the blog of a ermm... person some of us have had recent interactions with. Children, barely 4 or 5, being made to sing "patriotic songs" and being exalted as being brave for being Kashmiri and singing that. You think those kids even had a clue as to what they were singing? I refuse to endorse such exploitation and will not be linking that travesty. Although you are most welcome to look it up yourself. (Hint: Numerous hints as to the blogger's identity are liberally strewn all over this page).

To bring this sporadic, free-form and fairly stream-of-conscious spray of words to a close, I'm not sure what level of patriotism I find myself on, if any. But I do know this — patriotism to me does not represent bringing Pakistan down at any opportunity or getting all worked up when Narendra Modi is denied a US Visa.

Pictures courtesy:
Kwik Essential
Benjamin's Worldview
Worth 1000

What Steady Eddie says and more...

Steady Eddie says a lot.
It matters not whether you pay attention to him or not.
He just harps on and on about the virtues of consistency, moderation and steadiness.
Maybe he has a point — who's to say he doesn't?

At the end of the day, Steady Eddie, aside from being an Australian comedian and a stupid looking toy truck, is only a device I'm using to illustrate a point. He's merely a pleasant and happy enough mascot working for an evil corporation (in this case, my blog and NOT the good people at Disney), if you will. But I digress... Steady Eddie feels, as he mentioned earlier, that consistency and steadiness are man's (or woman's — Eddie's no misogynist) best friends.

I find it hard to disagree with him. For the exclamation point on this theory, I only have to look as far as the jingoistic celebrations after the Indian cricket team returned from their triumphant campaign at the ICC World Twenty20 Championships (or whatever the bureaucrats like to call it to avoid calling it a "World Cup"). I need not go into the details of the five-hour open-top bus ride, the hordes that thronged for a glimpse of their "all-conquering heroes", the insane hold-ups in traffic that Dhoni later expressed immense pride about achieving and the ridiculous demonstration of political hob-nobbing executed by Sharad Pawar and his buddies to curry favour with the masses.

But wait, that wasn't all. The board and individual state governments lavished tax-payer money all over the winners, showering them with cash, cars, property, the works! This after threats of cutting their pay after a lousy World Cup... Honestly, these guys should write a book on parenting. How to beat the living daylights out of your kids when they screw up and buy them a Rolex after performing one good deed by the BCCI! Hell, I'd buy a copy of it. Still, that's not all bad, considering the fact that renowned (erm... honestly insert own word here — communal instigator, mass manipulator or just a simple cocktail of expletives; take your pick) Narendra Modi was humbled into giving Irfan Pathan and his brother Yusuf some sort of a monetary gift. So, all's well right?

Well, not entirely. Look at the braying idiots who danced alongside the bus and spared no opportunity to yell out, "Chak de India" (more on that later). These very idiots were the same fickle minded oafs who burnt effigies after the World Cup campaign in the West Indies earlier this year. They were the same ones talking about how the whole team should be sacked. They were the same morons lining up to burn down the houses of people whose only fault was being outclassed, outperformed and outdone in a game. That's right, a game. So they were defeated, big deal. I'm sure they were plenty disappointed themselves without having to face the misplaced wrath of millions of fools vicariously living their lives and ambitions through the fortunes of a sports team. That may seem harsh, but if you look at it really objectively, it really is that way.

As for Chak de India; a fun movie, no doubt about it — the "misfit team with a disgraced coach" Mighty Ducks construct meets socio-cultural differences a la Saturday Night Lights meets the phenomenon of match-fixing like Mean Machine or The Longest Yard meets the fish-out-of-water antics of Cool Runnings. Mesmerisingly confusing, non? Anyway, the film is about hockey and women's hockey to be more precise and heralds the coming of age of a team of prima donnas, recluses, violent apes and many more as they take on the world in a sport that is being smothered into remission by cricket. The film takes some brilliantly scathing potshots at cricket and this nation's obsession with it. Marvellous stuff! What is silly is that the film chose to promote itself via the India-England cricket series. What is ridiculous is the fact that the title track from this film blasted throughout the aforementioned Twenty20 series (and the Ind-Eng one) whenever the Indian team did something applause-worthy. But what is downright idiotic is the way the song has arguably turned into India's official sports (read: cricket) anthem. The film is about bringing another sport to life and this is how these idiots use it? (Editor's Note: "Use" is very apt in this context) Not only does the original message of the film get downplayed, but the BCCI unwittingly (and now I am convinced they have no wits, only sackloads of money) uses a film with a message like this for their jingoistic "cricket spirit".

Steady Eddie, therefore, recommends a lighter touch.
With overly extravagant adulation comes borderline (or in some cases, real) psychotic criticism. Steer clear of both and find some middle ground. Let the boys enjoy and savour their (that's right, THEIR) win and provide constructive criticism when they lose, in a forum conducive to discussion and debate and not a witch hunt (which means, Bishen Singh Bedi can count himself out).

But Eddie's not done yet... Alongside a call for greater discretion, moderation and restraint from the board, politicians and "fans" (yeah, fans of a "W" in the result column and not a team), he almost forgot to mention the need for consistency and steadiness from the main actors in this, the theatre of cricket — the players themselves.

Far too often these days do we witness the ugliness of a bowler gesticulating, mouthing off and generally going way over the top with his on-field antics. Certainly, a bit of fiery aggression is always healthy, but when it turns into a spectacle — whether crude, unsportsmanlike or just plain immature — and overshadows the game, it turns into a problem. A problem like the one we're witnessing at the moment with a few players in the Indian team, including but not restricted to Shanthakumaran Sreesanth and Harbhajan Singh. Both bowlers have snarled, glared and indulged in various amounts of posturing with little to no gain in this current series against Australia (so far anyway). Truth be told, they've been overtly aggressive ever since they started playing in the team. Sreesanth's already felt the burn of fines and warnings from match referees during a number of series. As for his effectiveness, it's clear that his accuracy and abilities are being undermined by his shenanigans. Whether or not he can bring out his A-game in this series remains to be seen. But what is certain, is that if Mr Sreesanth fails to incorporate Steady Eddie's views on moderation and restraint, we can look forward to seeing him warming the bench a whole lot, as he serves his match bans.

More on aggression and its practitioners in the next post...

Pictures courtesy:
The Hindu
www.cricbuzz.com