Beware men in turbans telling fortunes

The strangest thing happened to me as I was leaving work today. As I strolled through the arcade area of Southbank a Seikh man, in a turban, approached me. First I thought he was a tourist about to ask directions then he muttered something about my “excellent” forehead. I thought he was going to say I was a dead ringer for Indian cricket star MS Dhoni, but then he said my bonce was perfect for telling my fortune.

When he said “I have advice for you” I thought he was going to say “psst, don’t go to Chadstone on Saturday, know what I’m saying?”

But then he wrote something on a post it note, scrunched it up, put it in my hand and told me not to look at it. He then asked my favourite flower and how many people, not including myself were in my family. I answered Rose and 3.

And fuck me if that’s not what he wrote on the bit of paper!

Monkey see …

 

Usually the bullshit off-field sports stories come before match day because the press needs something to fill sports pages with.

So now that we’re in the throes of one of the best one-day international finals for ages isn’t it time to drop the whole Harbhajan versus Australia thing?

Matthew Hayden’s silly remarks last week about the Indian spinner being “an obnoxious weed” served no purpose other than to deflect the much deserved attention of Allan Border Medallist Brett Lee, one of the true good cricket stories this year.

Before winning the medal Lee denied there was any tension between the Australian and Indian players only for Hayden to contradict him, unprompted, on radio by a couple of FM jocks who couldn’t believe their ears.

Then, instead of concentrating on Sachin Tendulkar’s  brilliant century to put Australia one-down in the finals, the media, led by the Fairfax press, went ape shit over false claims that Harbhajan made monkey actions to a bunch of drunks in the crowd.

First things first, if Harbhajan is guilty of anything it’s Worst Monkey Impression Ever!  

Make effigies, not war

Unless you live in a cricketing nation, that is a country which considers cricket a national sport, as opposed to one that reveres members of the Gryllidae genus of insects, you may not be aware that war has broken out between Australia and India over a game of cricket which ended amid accusations of cheating, racism and bad hair.

Normally a war between a nation of 1 billion and one of 22 million would be considered a mismatch, but fortunately for Australia the Indians are a peace loving people who have the perfect solution to demonstrating unbridled violent anger without actually killing anyone – burning effigies.

As people of Latin origin like to let of steam by swearing, throwing things and having rough make-up sex, and Americans like to express their angst with automatic assault weapons, our friends on the subcontinent like to burn dummies that represent the object of their ire.