Raise Your Hand

From Dec. 25-09
Dear Fellow Travelers,

Our building lost its Orbit satellite TV capability for a week. What was I to do? First I read Blue Horizons by Wilbur Smith, about the early settlers in South Africa. It was really good. There was no shortage of murder, war, carnage, rape, and personal vendettas that often ended with duels to the death. The bad guys were really bad and the good guys were really good…your two basic teams.

Then my friend Rick returned from the Dubai film festival where he interviewed with both a South African Indian guy—who wants to branch out from Bollywood—and a university that is building its film department and is considering Rick for a position. He worked ten years in Hollywood and knows stuff. There’s lot of new movie equipment/studios in Dubai…where they showed about 45 new films at this fest. Anyway, when Rick learned that I was boobtubeless he loaned me a bunch of episodes of a new series. It’s called “24,” which is sort of a strange name.

At first I thought it was just a random name but after I watched four episodes I figured it out. Pretty clever. What they’ve done is divide each episode up into 24-second segments. And each of these segments is like a miniature play, with a beginning, a middle, and a climax.

This is accomplished through the fact that during this time span exactly 24 words are spoken. So now you have 24 x 24 and come up with 576. I think you see where this is going. Multiply this number by itself and your 331,776 square root quotient forms the basis for the perfect algorhythm; and you already know that it is through the use of algorhythms that scout honeybees are able to communicate information to the other members of the hive. And without honeybees there can be no life as we know it on earth and therefore the battle against terrorists makes sense.

So then each of these 24-second pieces fit together to form the whole, which thus represents the unity of our lonely planet. And I like this particular unity, because it contains plenty of murder, war, violence, carnage and personal vendettas that often end in duels to the death; until now, however, there is a shortage of rape.
You should also know that this program comprises three teams. You have your really good guys; you have your really bad guys; and you have your really bad guys who work among your really good guys in order to thwart their brave and cunning efforts. It would be easy to illustrate this with a pie graph: first group=12%; second group=83%; third group=17%. Then the remaining 19% are just assorted characters called “extras.” I’ll let you know how it comes out. One thing I haven’t figured out yet. The Secretary of Defense is named Richard Heller. But I recognize him and know for a fact that his real name is The Fonz. So this has me temporarily puzzled, but I bet I work it out.
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The only good that came from my TV being down was that I didn’t have to watch the replay of our last game, which aired the day after. We lost another heart-breaker, 101-99. One tiny referee, who has a long vendetta of mutual hate with my club, was a big part of our undoing. We were awarded two technical fouls and a flagrant and the 8 or 9 points Ahli Club gained from those was easily the difference.

This little dude whistled a foul against Lamond to foul him out of the game with three minutes remaining and us up one. Ahli’s ex-NBA player was still in the game for them, but our guys managed to hang in until the last play, when we rebounded a missed free throw with 7.2 seconds remaining, down two. Our point guard came down for what I hoped would be a game-winning 3-pointer; he jumped in the air to shoot…and then decided to pass the ball into the corner, where it was batted around until final buzzer. I finally saw replay of the game and they play the fifth foul over and over—it clearly shows no foul.

Back with over 8 minutes remaining Lamond had very uncleverly picked up a flagrant foul by pushing a guy who taunted him after this guy was fouled. When he was pushed the Ahli player pulled a huge flop to the floor, seen by everybody, and that got an immediate whistle and Lamond his fourth foul. Very unacceptable. He had 34 points and 17 rebounds and it would have been nice to have him in the game at the end.

The top four teams are now tied at 7-2 after the first round. The second round starts Jan. 3 but until now we have basically had no practices. Lamond flew home after the game for 12 days, while most of our other players are caught up in the activities of a big Shia Ashoora commemeration that is now in progress and requires their attendance for much of about ten days.

This event marks the major split between Sunnis and Shias, which has to do with the rightful ascension to leadership following the death of Mohammed. His followers had a battle at the time and someone decided to kill a Shia baby as part of the bloody intrigue. This re-enactment is part of the frenetic events that take place nightly, mostly marked by plenty of self-flaggelation.

The other day Rick and I were on our way to lunch near a mall and he had me take a detour and go through an old Shia village not far away. The center of the village was draped in black banners, which isn’t actually as cheerful a sight as you may think. Rick had watched part of the goings-on there last year during this period and the highlight was when someone cut open a large baby doll which had been filled with blood which then gushed all over. This marked the event mentioned earlier. What fun! And followed by the equally comedic procession of marching, chanting, adherents who are beating themselves with chains. Everyone who wants to join in raise your hand!

Speaking of blood and guts, I can’t fail to mention that one of our technical fouls was against my excellent asst. coach, Ahmed. He had also had a technical in our narrow win over Manama. As usual, he can’t resist leaping to his feet and screaming, in order to be the center of attention. All the refs hate him and are looking to T him. Our little nemesis, Fadl, got him this time. Of course Ahmed has repeatedly been told by everyone to sit down and shut up. But he’s Ahmed.
So here’s what I’m thinking: how bout a duel to the death between Ahmed and Fadl the ref? Everyone in favor raise your hand. Look how high my hand is!

Merry Christmas. And don’t hold your breath until I say “Happy Holidays,” cuz I’ll never say that. I’m so politically incorrect. But at least I understand the nuances of tricky TV programs. And I’ll share them with you.

Coach G-Pea