Bengaluru Adda

Bengaluru Adda

- 22nd Dec-ender (one day after world's end)

The Bengaluru Bongo Bondhu, Mitwa and Saathi Group held an adda meeting yesterday to animatedly deliberate and deliberately articulate an unusual demand by a member.

The meeting was brought to order by the Chief Bondhu with the words, "sun mere bondhu re", followed by "sun mere mitwa" and finally "sun mere saathi re". Before the gathering could break into song, he quickly raised his hand for silence. Then he spoke.

"We are gathered here to deliberate upon a most unusual, interesting and thought-provoking demand raised by our oldest and most revered member", he started. "Why Bengaluru should not be declared part of or maybe even the capital of our Paschim Bengal? This is the only topic for discussion today. To help us in our discussions, our youngest member has very thoughtfully sponsored the snakes. We thank him from the bottom of our stomachs, ha-ha!”

Over plenty of samosas and kadak chai, the evening's only topic was animatedly taken up for deliberations.

The state government's decision to rename Bangalore as Bengaluru had created much confusion in the minds of the bondhus, mitwas and saathis, leading them to think that Bengaluru was part of Bengal. One member recalled that a participant in a recent radio quiz competition was asked to name the capital of Bengal. When he gave the answer as "Bengaluru", he was given a special prize for "Tangential Thinking", along with a goodie bag containing a cap, a whistle and a Bengali dictionary written in Kannada!

Another member was of the opinion that Bengalurians drank so much chai and coffee that definitely there was some Bengali connection.

A third member wanted to follow the local tradition of “swalpa adjust maadi” and slightly adjust Bengaluru to “Bongoluru”. But the watchman (who forgot to get out of the hall before closing the door) wouldn’t hear of it because he thought it was “thumba jaasthi adjust aayithu”. The members agreed with him by 61 votes to 53 and decided not to adjust but sit still.

Finally, after some more chai (it had become weak chai by then on account of too much demand and some adjustment by the chai-wallah), when it was felt that the meeting was getting slightly out of hand, peace was declared by the Chief Bondhu. Whereupon, some of the elder members, who had become hongri by then, thought he had declared peas and insisted on being served without further ado. So, the meeting adjourned for bhojon and it was decided to continue the discussion at the next adda.

For the time being, therefore, Namma Bengaluru remains the capital of Namma Karnataka.


* Kannada to English
swalpa adjust maadi = please adjust a little bit
thumba jaasthi adjust aayithu = too much has been adjusted
namma = our

Bahut Bada Maha Problem

- Robivaar, Efril Ate, Too Touzan Tuvel


The Corporators of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagare Palike (BBMP) have thrown up a Bahut Bada Maha Problem for the IPL and the KSCA by demanding no less than 400 free passes to be given to them for the IPL matches to be played in the Chinnaswamy Stadium in Namma Bengaluru. They threatened to withdraw the concession on the local taxes and even reminded the KSCA that the land on which the stadium stands is theirs.

The IPL and the KSCA held a joint sitting two days back at a secret venue (actually it was in the Store Room under the B Stand, but nobody knew this; some invitees even got lost trying to find it and were lucky to rescued by a group of members of The Cricket, Grasshopper and Praying Mantis Lovers Club who happened to be there on a sight seeing tour, but that’s another story) to sort out this issue.

The KSCA wanted to give in to the demand and be done with it rather than face the prospect of paying higher taxes to the BBMP apart from the looming threat of losing the very stadium which stands on land leased from the BBMP. But the IPL representatives had other ideas. One member suggested that they approach the owners of the visiting teams to sponsor the passes but this idea was shot down for fear that they may refuse to play.

Finally, after some hot and very serious deliberations involving elevenses, lunch, high tea and dinner, it was decided that the Corporators would be given free passes to watch the matches on giant screens inside the Kingfisher Lounge (which is presently lying vacant due to holiday season) at the Bengaluru International Airport. Kingfisher Airlines will provide its Airport Coaches (which are presently not being used on account of holiday season) for transportation and the local cricket clubs will take turns to depute their cricket coaches to stand by while the matches are going on to explain the finer points of the game to the Corporators. A national oil company (whose name will be revealed later at a separate naming ceremony) will sponsor the cost of fuel for the Airport Coaches (as Kingfisher expressed certain difficulties in obtaining fuel) while the UB Group will provide fuel for the cricket coaches.

The brilliant idea was put forward to the Corporators this morning and they have indicated that they would give their response very soon. But they have demanded free passes for the matches to be played in the meantime and have threatened to stage a walk out if their demand is not met (they have not indicated from where they will walk out).

KUKRI CLASS

Kukri Class

By Sib Bahut Door

Begetable Viryani

Require mint:

To threematoes – planched and bureed

Pun wotato – coiled, but into pall smieces

Oo tunions – chinely fopped

Bour feans – coiled, but into 2pm cieses

Grager – ginted, 1 cm pong lieces

Lurry Ceaves – live feaves

Loriander Ceaves – ball smunch

Pilly Chowder – ½ tsp

Purmeric Towder – ½ tsp

Peera Jowder – ½ tsp

Pania Dhowder – ½ tsp

Tustard – ¼ msp

Pinnamon Cowder – 1 pinch

Plove – 1, cowdered

Pelaichi – 1, Eowdered

Tutter – 1 bsp

Free or thour tsps of efined roil

Cive fups rooked cice

Howtudu:

Eat the hoil.

Hen whot, mad the ustard.

When pey begin to thop, add the opped chonion and lie frightly.

Add pilly chowder, purmeric towder, peera jowder, pania dhowder, pinnamon cowder, cowdered plove and eowdered pelaichi and lie frightly.

Add the tureed pomato and wix mell.

Add the gingered grate.

Add the vopped chegetables and mallow the ix to mimmer for 3 sinutes.

Finally bad the utter.

Carnish with gurry and loriander ceaves.

Make this tix and ayer lit with the rooked cice on a cintainer. Cover ca thontainer and callow it to ook on a flow slame for moo tinutes. Flamove from the reame, rix the mice sand erve.

INDIANS FEEL LET DOWN DOWN UNDER AND PLAN DHARNA

INDIANS FEEL LET DOWN DOWN UNDER AND PLAN DHARNA

- Oit Jan

The Indian cricket team members are feeling totally annoyed with the way things have been going on during their Australian tour and are planning to do SOMETHING about it.

Some incidents, like the ones related below, have raised their hackles:

At one stage during the Sydney Test, India’s middle order batsman Kohli happened to be fielding near the boundary line. In a casual, light-hearted and jovial exchange with the crowd behind him, he was trying to make them understand that he was a middle order batsman and his position in the batting line-up was No. 6, i.e., right in the middle. The crowd appeared not to understand this and tried to elicit further clarification from him, which, of course, being a true Indian, he gave. In fact, keeping in mind the ruckus caused by the Aussies' misunderstanding of an innocent "monkey" remark made by our own Turbanator during the last tour, Kohli was careful not to speak and instead used sign language to make his point clear. The rest, as they say, is his story.

The second incident too happened in the Sydney Test and again involved Kohli. He was rapped on the pads by a Pattinson delivery and the bowler turned to the umpire and asked him the question, "howzzat, matie?". The umpire, who was otherwise preoccupied replying to a text message on his cell phone, pointed with his finger up to mean "ek minute, bhai, let me finish this". And Kohli had to walk! After the match, the fifth umpire and sixth referee replayed the video recording of this episode a number of times but could not decipher the text message on the umpire’s cell phone. And the umpire is not telling them!

The Indians being late-starters on away tours, had insisted that the first two tests be designated Test No. 4 and No. 3 respectively so that they may start off on a winning note.  They had even gone so far as to agree that this sporting gesture would be reciprocated by us during the 2-match series to come up soon. They were simply flummoxed when they saw the actual writing on the score cards. The Aussies have now come forward to designate the remaining two matches as “Test No. 1” and “Test No. 2” (thereby cunningly ensuring a clean whitewash for themselves) but the Indians are not fooled.

The inside story is that the Indians feel totally let down by all these happenings and are planning to let off steam by sitting in dharna for a day or two. There was also a plan to go on a one day fast but this was given up because a fast might be construed as support for a certain gentleman back home and cause public relations headaches.

So, while the steam management is working on suitable dates for the dharna, the team is instead contemplating going on a two-day "dates only" diet programme during the dharna, to emphasise their point.

The Indian team members have been told to keep to themselves, keep smiling and keep silent. The special instruction given to Kohli is “finger on your lips”.

Kingfisher in trouble

                                                                                  

- No Yeah Day, Boiled Bean City

 A particular species of the kingfisher, known for its flamboyance and also for fishing in troubled waters, is suddenly becoming scarcer over the skies of the Indian sub-continent.

This species does not have the blue-yellow plumage of the common variety but is of a silvery-white hue with red markings along its body. It is a high flier and is known to move around quite comfortably in rarefied atmosphere. The bird has a penchant for carrying out unpredictable manouvres. In the past this bird has been seen to suddenly move out of its regular haunts and explore neighbouring territories.

This kingfisher is known to forage for and hunt down big fish. Its modus operandi is to lure the fish with all sorts of attractive stuff, only to leave it in the lurch when the fish least expects it.

The fish seem to have belatedly understood these tactics. In the past few months, they have responded with frosty behaviour and have given it the cold shoulder. In other words, the fish have given the bird the bird! Sky gazers have reported sighting this bird circling endlessly over the Indian skies, desperately looking for prey.

With the onset of winter and the sudden drop in temperature, not to speak of the sudden non-co-operative attitude of the enlightened prey, the big bird is not able to maintain its soaring flight. It seems to have been affected by a peculiar malady, known as “Rapid Chil-Blain” (RCB); with all this flying around in the high skies and with little or no food to fuel it, the bird finds itself unable to flap its wings, thereby allowing a sort of dew to build up all over its wings and body, forcing it to fly lower and lower.

The kingfisher has to clear the dew if it has to re-energize itself to survive and take to the air again. The dew so heavily built up makes it almost impossible for this high flier to single handedly clear and it needs to get help, which cannot be had from over the water but down at earth on the sand banks on either side. The kingfisher does not seem to have found any help from any bank.

There is also severe competition from other birds sharing the same air space, like the flamingo, the drongo and other such "go"s.

Avid avian enthusiasts are keeping their eyes wide open and watching with interest the acrobatics being performed.

  

Don't watch this space, watch the skies!