Bay at the Moon

Mooi and I celebrated New Year's day in Bangalore after he bid farewell to Sai Baba's companion elephant in Puttaparti. After a three plus hour car ride to Bangalore we joined about 2million horny and decidely frustrated juvenile men (ranging from 14-59) at an intersection on Brigade Road. This is where stuff happens on New Year's eve it was said.

Mooi being out of his noggin wanted to experience the high life Bangalore style. What he did experience was Castle Draught and the ridiculous sexist antics of a town that loves women so much it banned them from being in and around Brigade road on New Year's eve.


The 'never been laid' crowd seemed hard at work to create something out of nothing. All around us was the annoying and show-off buzzing of 'poopertjie' motobikes (like the moron in this picture from Mumbai) that would be the bane of shame anywhere else.

Bangalore's brains-trust had police on all corners trying to stop folks from walking the 'wrong-way' up a two-way street. Yeah you read that right. These measures were taken to cut down on "eve-teasing" ... that's what they call sexual harassment of women in India.

See this article on the phenomenon of "eve-teasing" in India: http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm?aid=2991

"Eve-teasing" in Mumbai on New Year's eve led about 70 'Adams and Steves' or rather 'Rajeevs and Abishaiks' to openly grope and severely molest a young woman in full view of everyone and a reporter with a camera. The woman's companion tried to shield her but the 'teasers' were adamant to show the world just how women in India are treated with respect and dignity. And no the victim is not foreign, she is Indian. Sorry Lonely Planet.

See this newsreport for story: http://www.mid-day.com/news/city/2007/january/149380.htm

See this blog for discussion on the incident: http://www.sepiamutiny.com/sepia/archives/004069.html


See also http://www.blanknoiseproject.blogspot.com/ for a blog discussion of the "project" to combat 'eve-teasing."


I borrowed these pictures from the above blog to show the charged and sexist scene on Brigade Road in Bangalore.





So there I was standing on the corner while all the nerds go by with their ill-fitting acid-wash jeans and check shirts taken from the fashion-savvy Steve Urkell.


And yeah I felt like doing this to quite a few of them.


Anyway, out of the blue this bone-head cop starts waving his baton in all directions and people (well the nerds) start to split.


You should know that Mooi and I once braved tear gas and other apartheid flatulence at Rhodes so we were not about to move. After all, we survived apartheid cops. So why would we sweat some cop in Bangalore?

Nontheless, the cop rolls over to me and says something I can't understand while waving and pointing his baton. I ignore his Freudian symbol and move closer and ask him to repeat his instructions in "English please."

Oh hell I should not have done that. The post-colonial peasant gets all hostile and says: "This is India and we don't need to speak English." Then he grabs my arm tightly but I immediately pull out of his grip. He stares me down with a steel grip on the knob-kerrie and I walk away.

I hope this "no-English" genius is not representative of those the Indian government will send to the moon (this is on the cards for 2020). See Indian on the moon (would that be a Moonsammy? ... just jiving ... geez) article in Hindustan Times:
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1833877,00040005.htm

If India is going to prove it's 'emerging world power' status by going to the moon then it will have to do so in English cause Mooi and I don't speak Navajo.


Also, it would be nice if India adheres to the 'no spitting and no peeing policy' laid down by the first postman on the moon, Neil Armstrong.

A no-English India will not fit the Anglo-American ass kissing profile that the Delhi government is so tiresomly cultivating. I suggest they choose one of their overly inflated Anglo-Indian intellectuals, replete with phony English accent and tweed smoker's jacket (can you say Salman Rushdie?) to re-colonize that bonehead cop in Bangalore.


Of course, they will have to get the OK of the head Italian (Sonia Gandhi) who is really their Prime Minister behind the scenes.


If you don't believe that Sonjia rules check with the Chief Minister of Delhi, Sheila Dikshit. Yeah you read that right. See her profile at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheila_Dikshit

Now how does one explain "eve-teasing" in a country with powerful women like Sonia Gandhi and Sheila Dikshit?


Before the strike of midnight in Bangalore, Mooi found out that he needed to head back to his hotel room "as a matter of urgency." After a quick retreat he was left somewhat deflated and took to baying at the moon in front of our sleaze-bag hotel.


As I watched Mooi Bay at the Moon I wondered what his Christian and God fearing mamma would think seeing her son defile all that she intended. And nogal do so right opposite a church with a white Jesus in a nativity scene!


For articles on the construction of White Jesus see the following:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16125068/site/newsweek/ or Tim Wise's article at:
http://academic.udayton.edu/race/01race/white07.htm and see what Jesus 'should' look like according to the BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3958241.stm

Two days after the new year arrived I bid a sad farewell to the Guru from Corination. He had a flight to catch to Mumbai and I thought that Goa was where I could wash my unspirited and blasphemous self.

Now I can't explain the urge to Bay at the Moon!