Don't be sour grapes!

We are told that responding to stupid remarks on our online posts is not worth the effort. It is a known fact that most of the people who make these nonsensical rants are a minority but are loud enough to cause embarrassment. In real life, they would be too timid to say anything 'on your face' but gain Dutch courage through the cloak of anonymity and bang away their keyboards with impunity. While most of their shenanigans do not amount to much more than a storm in a teacup, it does excite the feeble-minded, which may describe the majority. Then there are paid trolls who kick dirt to keep a topic alive or plainly bully. 

When the Malaysian Sport and Youth Minister was caught posing with the Olympic Badminton Silver Medallist, she was chided as being unpatriotic. The Silver Medal winner, a Thai player, had earlier defeated our player. So, to pose for a photograph, praise his game and label herself as his fangirl was, in the troll's opinion, bad taste and adding insult to injury. This went on for a few days without any rebuttal from the Minister. I was waiting patiently for her to reply.

Her comeback statement was killer. It turned the tables to paint the Minister as a true patriot, which took me by surprise. She reiterated that as a Sports Minister and a Youth Minister, she had a moral obligation to show the true meaning of sportsmanship. One should not be a sore loser but respect his opponent for his talent and tenacity. Admiring the opponent's skill does not make one less patriotic.

Still on the topic of the Olympics and our national badminton team, our ladies' pair of Pearly Tan and Thina gave a sterling performance despite their eventual falter to the World No. 1 pair from China. Instead of commenting on their never-say-die fighting spirit and the insanely long rallies that never seem to end, a netizen thought it was brilliant of her to highlight the pair's un-Shariah-compliant attires. That is the trouble with the democratisation of thoughts. An idiot has that 2-minute fame in the limelight to garner everyone's attention for all the wrong reasons. We do not know how many other cretins will join the foray and think their nonsensical self-centred ideas indeed need scrutiny! We should not be entertaining these nut cases. 

Engaging with these wackos would prove fatal, as influencer Esha found out the hard way.

The story of Arshad Nadeem and Neeraj Chopra comes to mind when discussing sportsmanship and how sports transcend borders. It is said that even though Nadeem popularised javelin in Pakistan after his 5th place in the Tokyo Olympics, funds were scarce for him. When his old javelin needed replacement, he tried to crowdsource it. Although rivals on the field (and through politics), Chopra thought it would be wise to retweet the word around and even send a copy to sponsors and the Government of Pakistan. So when Nadeem won the gold medal in the 2024 Paris Olympics and broke the 118-year-old Olympic record at 92.97m, both mothers sang praises of not their respective sons but both winners. The mothers are now trending as poster girls of sportsmanship and world peace!

Chopra(IND) and Nadeem(PAK)

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The Apollonian-Dionysian balance

Rush (2013)


Friederich Nietzsche identified enduring dichotomies within and amongst us that make our world tick. These two attitudes, both named after Greek Gods, have clashing features. Apollo, son of Zeus, stands for order, logic and reason while Dionysius, the God of Wine, represents chaos, madness and drunkenness. Nietzsche thinks we need both. It emerges from nature itself and can be applied in our day-to-day activities, from art, psychology, ethics to politics.

Apollonian way of doing things can be visualised how a scientist functions with his obsession with precision, discipline and punctuality. The Dionysian effect can be seen in music and art form, which may appear chaotic and not following the rules but nevertheless is music as it is, pleasant to the ears and emotive.

Nietzche saw the fusion of frenzied energy of the Dionysian to be applied constructively inside an Apollonian framework as ideal.

This biopic depiction of the professional rivalry between two F1 racing legends, Niki Lauda and James Hunt brings us to a time when F1 racing meant booze, girls and drug. Even though the movie depicts them as mortal enemies, in real life, they were close friends and had kept in touch for a long time.

James Hunt is the impulsive hard-drinking, the hard-partying late-night bad boy of F1. Lauda, on the other hand, is a fastidious, calculative and disciplined racer who prepares his every move meticulously and goes to bed early.

A memorable quote in the film goes like this. 'Drivers are revered not because of what they do, driving around in circles but because of their brush with death. The closer they are with death, the more people find them fascinating.' I suppose the same applies to other professions that deal with or hold people's life at the clutch of their hands. This would include people in the medical fraternity or in the mafia business.

This opposing features in the drivers form a compelling narrative for a cliffhanging adrenaline-fueled, rubber-burning suspense at the F1 track set in the early to mid-70s. The excellent direction by Ron Howard makes the experience more enjoyable.

Life would be boring if everyone conforms to a universal set of rules and practises fair play all the way. The Apollonian and Dionysian dichotomy remains a useful way to view art, psychology, society and every other aspect of life.

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Time tells a different story

Thrilla in Manila (2008, HBO documentary)

They say that nature is a violent creature. There is plenty of evidence that shows that the forces of Nature are both brutal and murderous. Its damage can be mammoth. It has no sympathy for the weak-hearted and even the righteous. It is a necessary evil that ensures only the best survives. Man can be equally inhumane. Over generations, the will to survive as a species has ensured that only the strongest survive. A reflection of our violent past is seen in the society sanctioned a display of legal murderous intent of boxing. Here two individual are put on display to knock each other blind as many around them prosper in more ways than one.

We grew up at a time when a live telecast of boxing could paralyse a nation. In the 70s when live broadcast was new, a boxing match held half a globe away was a national event, especially one involving the World Heavyweight Championship, specifically one involving Muhamad Ali. The greatest boxing fights of all time is the one involving the two greats of the ring, Muhamad Ali and Joe  Frazier. Their fights went beyond the ring. It started as a friendship when Ali refused to serve in the US Army in Vietnam for his religious belief. Frazier petitioned with the courts and President Nixon for Ali to be allowed to box when his licence was withdrawn for his refusal.

Suddenly, things changed when they were arranged to fight in a bout. Therein started the mortal animosity and the trilogy of Ali-Frazier classic fights.

After an eventful first fight and a not so eventful second fight, the two pugilists were drawn at one fight each; Frazier winning the first and losing meekly in the second. With such a curtain-raiser, the stage was laid for a final showdown.

The Philippines with its internal turmoil, a flamboyant dictator and communist uprising, Marcos decided to divert the attention of his subjects by upstaging an extravagant boxing match to showcase to the world of the greatness of this backwater country. 

History has shown that such an event happens all the time to make people feel good about their country and forget the fact that they are being shortchanged.

Ali-Frazier's fight has always been sold by Ali as a fight between the whites and newly emerging Black Power Afro-American community of America. Ali with his affliction with the Nation of Islam and his newfound religion is the voice the blacks whilst Frazier, who was financed by mostly white bankers is a reflection of the old.

Ali as a build-up to the fights called Frazier with derogatory terms like ugly, gorilla and 'Uncle Tom'. 'Uncle Tom' refers to a subservient black slave of the slave trade era who would 'sell' his own race for the comfort of the white masters. Ali continued tormenting Frazier with his antics even at Frazier's training ground. The media had a field day covering all these thrashy news and the stage was slowly set for the showdown.

The contest's name is derived from the frequent rhyming boast made by Ali that the fight would be a 'killa and a thrilla and a chilla, when I get that gorilla in Manila'. A song about Ali even made it to charts.

Even Ali's philandering lifestyle came to fore to spice up the event. During a formal state function, Ali's African girlfriend Ms Porsche was introduced as his wife to President Marcos. Upon viewing this televised event in the US, Ali's real wife, Belinda, scurried to Ali's hotel to show her discontent to the glee of running cameras!

For Frazier's credit, he was a cool cat. Despite all the heckling and the intimidations, he never retaliated.

The fight proved to be a well-awaiting clash of two Titans. A 6'3" Ali and a 5'11" Frazier who just would not bow to each other and refuse to fall. Visibly exhausted fighters soldiered on past 12 rounds - Ali almost at the brink of collapse and Frazier blinded at both eyes. Frazier later confessed that he had actually been fighting with sight only from his right eye. A 1964 training accident blinded his left! Imagine a blind man punching aimlessly without surrender. Ali, at the 14th round, was begging for his trainer to 'cut his gloves' but he refused. Frazier, on the other hand, was still rearing to go with a puffed-up face. 

Unfortunately, the Filipino umpire, who himself was a fill-in umpire as the regular umpires were deemed too controversial for the fight, stopped the fight. Frazier's trainer threw in the towel. He had seen enough men die on the canvass. There would be another day, another fight. Unfortunately, they were not to be. The fight scarred both men and it did irreparable damage to their bodies and they were never the same again. The differences between the boxers were nerve resolved and Frazier took his grudges to the grave. Ali apologised to Frazier's family about his misconduct, quoting that it was all part of the marketing of their boxing duel. 

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The art and science of knowing of your limit!

When you reach a certain age, everybody around you who apparently shows concern on your well being will give you unsolicited advice asking you to slow down and take things easy, that now is the time to the fruit of your labour and the sweat of your hard work. They would often quote you instances and examples of apparently healthy individuals just dropping dead like flies after a seemingly trivial chore. The way they coax (or put you in a corner), they seem to be cocksure of their facts and pretty soon plant the recurrent seed of doubt, uncertainty and fear in your brain. Admittedly, no matter how much there is of better living condition in the afterlife, we rather grow old, sick, wasted, unwanted and shoved around than die no time sooner, preferably never!
You will slow down, fearing for the worst, the unknown enemy. You become sluggish, puffed up, unfit and fat, poorly coordinated and a ticking time bomb. When your pin is unhooked, you disappear, become another statistic and everyone will move on with life, looking out to dash the hope of another health conscious middle aged man.
Man would not have reached where he has reached now if he had stayed in his comfort zone, fearing the unknown. There would not  be any of our ancestors who would have walked out of the African continent to explore newer pastures, no tomatoes in Indian cooking as tomatoes are native of Mediterranean land, no spices in cooking (the European wanted to find alternate route to lay their hand on these black gold), no preserved foods until refrigeration came around, no pleasures of smoking as the the first puffer would have been petrified to inhale, no simple pleasures in life (scared of retribution in afterlife), no new World as we know it as Columbus would have been stiff dead to topple over at the edge, no Fauja Singh running till the age of 101, no Arnie and no Arnie for post of Governor of California if he were just contented with green card, no space exploration, above us only sky, do not incur the wrath of the unknown force...
True, everybody has their potential and threshold. No pain and no gain they say. You certainly do not want to push yourself to the limits and beyond and to realise too late for goodbyes. It is an art to know your limits. Use the sciences and the signs to reap the maximal benefit out of activities.
I remember hearing a story in my childhood. A sage meditated for months to get his wish granted. He did not want to drop dead but to be given ample warnings. The Gods agreed.
The sage lived close to a century and died in his sleep. In heaven, he questioned the Gods for not keeping to their words. The Gods, in reply, denoted that They kept their side of bargain! The greying, receding hairline, the kyphosis, the joint pains, the reduced effort tolerance, the failing eye-sight, the slow thinking processes and so on.... The sage, the wise one he had been, had failed to notice!

The Flying Sikh

Bhaag Milkha Bhaag ( भाग मिल्खा भाग, Hindi, Run Milkha Run; 2013)

What better way to stimulate nationalistic spirit than via sports? And the silver screen forms the platform to disseminate this message further. After watching this movie I came to realize that this towering Singh is indeed had an illustrious life, on and off the track. Perhaps also with a little push with the magic of Bollywood!

Hailing from the Pakistan part of Punjab, young Milkha Singh was witness to brutal killing of his parents and Sikhs during the Partition. Almost plunging into a life of pilfering and dacoit, he swayed to side of righteousness by promise of love by a young lass. 

In order of getting his life in life in order, he enrolls into the Indian Army. The lad who has been running all his life, first from the mob during Partition and then in his clandestine activities soon started running again. Only this time it was on the tract. 

The movie managed to impress upon its viewers the essence of the transformation and determination of a wayward boy to a national hero of sorts. His representation in the Olympics is spiced up with the usual masala to excite the story. It was entertaining, though.

The actor (R) and the real McCoy

In real life, in fact, his life was such. In the 1960 Rome Olympics, even when Milkha was fourth in the 400m race, he broke the then held world record (contested)!

His final race in Pakistan saw him beat his old time rival and the impressed Pakistani President christened him 'Flying Sikh' for his speed.

My son and I were keenly watching for boo-boos just for the heck of it as it was a sort of a period movie. Many of the scenes were nicely tugged into old footage to made it look authentic. One glaring mistake was supposed to have taken place in the vicinity of Melbourne stadium after his loss in the qualification races. He is walking in anger along the terrace of the stadium. We were laughing our hearts out when the flags of Malaysia (14-striped and 14-pointed star) and Singapore displayed majestically in this 1956 scene! Otherwise, it was a good film worthy of the time spent.

Joke of the day: Girl says, "So, you are relaxing?". Milkha says, "No, I am Milkha Singh!"

The name game

It is interesting to note that certain people are born to this world with a particular task to perform equipped with an aptly given name. This, I discovered during the time around the passing of one of Malaysia's badminton legends, Punch Gunalan. Punch is of course a nickname given to him by ardent fans after seeing his style of play and his killer badminton punches! Interesting his real given name is Gunalan s/o Panchacharan. (Panch!).
Then there is the manager of one of BPL's premier team, Arsenal. Guess what, his name happens to be Arsene Wenger. And the English footballer with the name Alan Ball! Bon Voyage Punch! Hope not to see you so soon.....

Punch Gunalan 1944-2012

All shook up!

There is a reason why traditionally games started and ended with a handshake between two 'warring' factions who are out for each other's jugular during the games but will be having drinks again afterwards. This is known gentlemanly conduct. What happens on the pitch is left on the pitch!
Times changed. People came out of conquest of war mode and natives gained independence. Man's unquenchable inner desire to kill and dominate is steered towards games which promise equal footing of action and gore. Suddenly, games especially football (soccer) became too big for its own good.
Along came creatures likes publicity and public relations managers who promise the sky and the moon to take the game to dizzying heights who scaled out of thin air. And 'poof' came the vultures in the form telecommunications whiz to bring the players to everybody's living room. And the hyenas of briefcase lawyers who were anything but brief in their circumlocutory lecture about ensuring justice and fair play to players, clubs, everything and everyone involved in this entity, which had started as a pastime for the rich and famous, who had the luxury to flaunt the affluence to the scavengers who were out looking for crumbs in the royal courtyard!
Any news is good news for the development of the game. So when a racial outburst occurred during a multi-million bookie deciding match of the two most famous football teams of the world, it got people interested. With the average modern man's attention span on the decline, misadventures like this was played again and again to arouse interest in the game going on and on.
When a veteran suggested that they should just kiss and make up (not really, end it with a hand shake), his idea was shot down with the fastest ammunition. The powers that be decided that sports must be a beacon of hope to eradicate the fire of racism at its flint. The perpetrator was punished and when he returned to play the same opponent, he was expected to be dandy with him obliging with a handshake.
Now, for all the publicity yearning game had hoped for, the issue remains unsettled and people are still talking about it. Good for the game, any news is good news!!!