Three No Trumps

This is what you may bid when you are playing the card game of Bridge. I am into more mundane pursuits right now, like making Trump jokes. Because it's the done thing, and I may not get a chance to do them after November (the elections).

Trumpeting. Trump (without an elephant's trunk) talking about himself.

Ta ra rum pum pum.. reactions of people to Trump claiming to be the right man to lead a democracy of mostly sane citizens.

Trumped up charges- Founders of ISIS are Hillary and Obama.

Trump tax returns- Even Columbus would find it taxing to discover any money there!

Trump Debate- Everyone is an ***hole, but me.

Trump Home- A Wig-wam.

Donald's score - a Duck!

Contests for World Leaders

No prizes for guessing who's going to win the best Kurta contest. Let's look at some others.

Best hairstyle without a wig. The winner is Kim Il ..whatever. the North Korean guy.

Best one with a wig. Donald Trump.

The only one cuter than Shahid Kapoor and Hrithik Roshan combined. Justin Trudeau- Canada.

The only one with a heart- Dil-ma Rousseff, if she has not been impeached. Brazil.

Six packs. Putin.

Nitwits. Nawaz Sharif may have few competitors.

Shepherd of largest flock of sheep. The New Zealander.

The militantly named one- Bar(r)ack Obama.

The one with an endearing Hindi word in his name- Abe, Japan.

Obama Visits India, I Visit Timbuktu

Inspired by all the visits by Heads of State, and the Pope, I decided I would visit some place. It had to be unique, but known to people somehow. There were only two such places- Jhumritalaiya, made famous by all the farmaishes (song requests on radio) and Timbuktu. Given that the former was too 'middle class' and infra dig, I settled on Timbuktu.

I had to work hard at finding out how to actually get there, but once I did, I got a hero's welcome. I was told that I was the first visitor from this continent to actually go there. I felt like I had achieved something that even Obama hadn't. And at a fraction of the cost that it must be costing him. Also, saving myself from the traffic jams resulting from his visit.

I also found out how the place got its name- there was a buck-toothed guy called Tim, who everyone there made fun of, and his name over time stuck to the place itself. Tim-buck-too also, in a stroke of poetic justice, got to be spoken of derisively. Saving Jhumritalaiya the blushes.

Sorry, But You Look Great

In the good old days, complimenting a lady on her beauty was an art that was highly valued. Chivalry was also a high art form, with Sir Walter Raleigh being known (among other things) for spreading out his cape on the floor for a lady to walk on.

Opening doors and pulling chairs out for women to sit on were considered a done thing for a gentleman, and the ladies were grateful for it. But it looks as though times have changed.

An Obama finds himself in the soup for having complimented the good looks of an attorney general in a Western state of the US of A. And finally, out of a threat of censure or of being asked to demit office (not sure what demit means but anyway, sounds right here), has APOLOGISED to the said lady. Sorry I thought you were beautiful, or something like that. How un-cool is that?

On the same lines, can I call someone ugly without being apologetic about it? And without the lady being apoplectic about it? Something to think about, surely.

Yingluck Shinawatra and the Feel Good Factor

She must be one of the most good-looking Prime Ministers around. She shared the stage with Obama (on a visit to Thailand) and answered reporters' questions with aplomb in a press conference televised yesterday. I think she had a lot of sense too, in the way she answered them.

We are so used to getting advised by the West on what we should be doing. We need to kick this addiction, and start doing some thinking in this region ourselves. It might at least FEEL good.

That reminds me. I have classified a few things for their feel-good quotient or FGQ (Shinawatra's not in the list). Measured in time units- mins., hrs., etc.

Facial Cosmetics. FGQ- Until they run (down your face).

Shampoo. FGQ - 1 min.

Body Cream.  FGQ- 1 hour

New car. FGQ- 1 month

New child (your own)- 5 years or until they make unreasonable demands, whichever is earlier.

New child (others')- Until it pees on your shirt.

Golf. FGQ- 3 hours

Movie. FGQ- 3 hours, unless it's made by Ram Gopal Varma.

Favourite music. FGQ- Many hours

Cricket. FGQ = Playing time minus all the commentary and pre-game crap time.

Knowing Your Xis and Hus

It is getting exceedingly difficult to keep track of your Hus and Xis. I mean, it's one thing to know your Who's Who, but then, who is Xi?

World leaders, the least you can do is have easy names like Manmohan Singh, or Obama, or Karzai. It was even easier in the earlier, good old days, when we knew only three or four world leaders- Castro, easily identified by what he smoked- cigars, Bhutto, made easy to remember because of the resemblance of his name to the Indian name for corn - Bhutta, Bill, who was hard to forget because he was presented to you several times every month- for instance, when you ate out, and all the Russian leaders' names, because they were all same-looking and sounding, with a lot of consonants and no vowels worth the name in them. Only Polish names have more consonants.

Oh, yes, and Tito. What a simple name. Unfortunately, like the Yugo, a car from that country, he had to go, and then his country broke up into a few pieces-no one knows how many.

Obama, India, Fog and Storms

Quite a diverse set of topics to deal with. If Obama makes it to the White House again, he would be the longest Black president to live in the White House. How's that for a new take on the elections? I think he is a smart guy being ed astray by the 'establishment' which is into routine things like finding the next country to bomb and so on. No novelty, or out-of-the-box thinking.

India has elections going in the state of Himachal Pradesh, and I have no clue about the issues there. FDI in retail appeared shortly in TV debates, but disappeared just as quickly. Prices of apples, maybe?

Delhi had a few fogged-out days, which was the result of some unusual weather, and it was not a reflection of our fogged-out brains. The Chennai storm Nilam had something to do with it, plus other things.

Now, if only we had something more interesting on the anvil- actually, there is. The old classic Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro is re-releasing. Should do a world of good in a humourless world. Go see it at a theatre near you. I somehow don't feel enthused by the new Bond.

Obama and Osama

Spot the differences between Obama and Osama. I got six. How about you?

1. One is alive, the other is dead.

2. We all know where one of them was born. The other is still trying to prove it.

3. The number of wives they had.

4. One is hairy, the other turned out a Dirty Harry.

5. Pakistan knew what one of them was doing.

6. One believes in safe landings with Air Force One, while the other believes in crash landings on high buildings.

Gaga over Obama

If there's a lady gaga, can there be a Lord Gaga? My vote is for Obama, but the title is because the world goes gaga whenever he goes anywhere. No surprise then that India went gaga over the last three days.

Maybe we should invent a Gaga Index which measures the extent to which people go gaga; something like a Geiger Counter- maybe a Gaga Counter. When the heat and dust of the Obama visit have settled down, life may not have changed much. We still have a lot of work to do for our own sakes, and for India's. Nandan Nilekanis and Sunil Mittals and others will have to play a role, or their successors, maybe.

What we could learn from the U.S., is their willingness to acknowledge that they screwed up, whatever the nature or however big the scams they are in, and put in place quickly a machinery to change things. This James Bond-like propensity for action is something that we can certainly do with, even in good times. Inaction can be good for Public Sector banks, because it safeguards our money from going astray, but in most other things, action rather than discourses are required.

Obama vs. Hillary

It's not clear why, but the time for America to choose a different President from its traditional white male seems to have come. Going by Africa's track record, not many blacks have governed their countries well, but maybe Obama will set the record straight if he wins. Hillary has already been a senator and first lady, so it may be only a marginal stretch for her. Whether the average American stands to gain anything with any of them in power is hard to say, but they are both infinitely more interesting to listen to and watch than their Republican counterparts, as of now. I remember Gary Hart who probably would have swept to power but for a scandal during his campaign. Whatever happens, America will join the ranks of many 'backward' countries if they elect one of these two to the top job.