Prologue
As I make yet another attempt to revive my blog, I am clearly falling short of ideas, As I have given up on begging, borrowing & stealing thoughts, I am trying to get provoked (last time) and inspired (this time)
The title of my post could bring in way too many analogies starting from economy, governance, Military, fashion trends, movies, music, and how even a minuscule and unintentional American issue can create a furor in the rest of the world. But for once let me not pretend to be intelligent and purely stick to the literal title of the post.
AH...AH....ACHOOOO…..ACHOOOO (23…24…..as my younger brother gives me a stern look as he keeps track of the number of times I sneezed in the last hour or so rather the number of times he got disturbed from his serious semester exam preparation)
As I surf the Television, the news channels continued to flash “Breaking News”, which ironically and obviously is about the SWINE FLU that broke out in the US, 3 days ago, and since then has only been threatening to enter India (only thanks to the news channels), as they continue to wait desperately for the symptoms to be tested positive, so that they can go on and increase their TRPs, and later claim that they were “Subse Teez”
ACHOOOO…..ACHO (as I tried to hold my 2nd sneeze back only to avoid the unsympathetic looks from my family members)
Its been 3 long days since I tried to hide myself from the scorching sun and the horrendous heat, for reasons that have nothing to do with me getting a sun-burn or TANned (if at all there is a difference between those two), as I continue to sip the 5th glass of fresh lemonade + Aam Panna mocktail, which pretty much has been a lifesaver for me for 25 years, thanks to my aversion to yoghurt, buttermilk and all the byproducts of milk.
ACHOOOO (as I speak to my friend on the phone to discuss the weekend plans which later failed and if that was not enough the Deccan Chargers loss to Rajasthan Royals further ruining the already disastrous weekend)
I continued to surf the channels, completely ignoring my mom’s demanding looks to give up on the remote, meanwhile one of the news channels in a bid to become the number 1, almost confirmed the first “Positive” case of the Swine flu, as the others tried to demystify the dangerous disease; I decided not to leave it to them.
“Swine flu also known as pigfluenza or hog flu or pig flu”,
Couple more google results and I came across a news which was far more interesting than the actual disease itself, It is to believed that the Indian Health Ministry was facing a serious dilemma on what this outbreak would be called “Mexican Flu” or “Pig flu” ? I thanked god for leaving them only with 2 options.
If that was not enough, the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) & World Health Organization (for human health) are also battling it out to figure out if this “swine flu” is a threat to mankind or animal-kind. (Later they concluded it as cocktail disease, as I gave my mocktail a dubious look)
I couldn’t stop myself from appreciating the concern of the Health Ministry and the WHO; asking people (read pork lovers) to get rid of the misconception that they could be infected by consuming pork, which has already brought about the downfall of the sales (ultimately resulting in the downfall of the national GDP ? I seriously hope not)
Indeed the world sneezes when the Americans catch cold.
Meanwhile they finally decided to name it as the H1N1 (Influenza A virus subtype H1N1) I almost began to wonder if “H1” has to anything with “H1-B” as I try to rake in a new controversy but decided against it as i do not hold any stakes in any of the news channels.
ACHOOOO ACHOOOO (as I try to sneeze softly for the fear of being overheard (over-sneezed) by my neighbours who might panic and call up 108/102, and leave me to the aftermath of the Indian media who would prowl on a pray like me only for their TRPs
“aaap
If swine doesn’t get you, the Indian Media will……
ACHOOOO...........
"God Bless Me"
P.S. Clearly Inspired, Nothing Intended !!
Semi-Inspiration, Semi-Co-incidence, Semi-Fiction, Semi-Facts
9 comments:
With Media's usual overkill,they getting you for this is not an entirely unlikely scenario.
How are you feeling now by the way? The blogger community very much misses you.
The Health ministry clearly seems to be in doldrum because had they named it PIG flu...few in the ministry would certainly loose their jobs post election.;)
How dare they dis-respect the PIG......
You seems to be taking the news channel seriously...not their fault...These people must be brought to justice for screwing the masses with their content and so called analysis
Indeed.
Read the same thing in one of the Telugu blogs. (amerika ki jalubu chEstE ikkaDa tummutaaru) or something like this.
Anyhow We have to take these things seriously, particularly after knowing old-world in America almost died of chicket-pox!
http://anilroyal.wordpress.com/2009/05/03/%e0%b0%aa%e0%b0%82%e0%b0%a6%e0%b0%bf%e0%b0%b0%e0%b0%be%e0%b0%9c%e0%b0%ae%e0%b1%81-%e0%b0%b0%e0%b0%bf%e0%b0%9f%e0%b0%b0%e0%b1%8d%e0%b0%a8%e0%b1%8d%e0%b0%b8%e0%b1%8d/
Here is the link I am talking about.
Flu flu Flu.. Didn't have a chance to keep my ears void of this word.
Indiaaaa... woooo..! did not know it is having such momentum out there even if there would not be much to bother about than to just create a hype..
And Harsha thanks for keeping us well informed. I should say good effort.
Dude.. pls stay at home and stay away from us for few days :P .. the plan on the weekend wasnt canceled we were just avoiding you .. as we dont want to be called India's #2,3,4 ... :)
by the way ... sun stroke and pig flu have common symptoms ? :P how to identify ???????
...Go Green.. Go Veg .. Planet USA!
.U shud have given the NDTV an oppurtunity to do a " FIRST SWINE CASE FROM INDIA REPORTED" and later come back with the news " DOCTORS SAY ITS JUST COMMON COLD...NO SWINE CASES IN INDIA YET!".anyways.. lets see how many hits for U SWINE err..i meean the swine flu blog :P
And finally the actual pigs got the place on the frontpages of news paper :))
hey Nice post ### ...Media fever is dangerous than this swine flu.
"one of the symptoms of swine flu is, finding it difficult to breath"...when I read this , I thought that I have swine flu from childhood..I cud hardly ever do that while traveling by mumbai trains..:))
A typical flu season kill 37000 Americans every year...pigs never got offended though..
##ra nice to read ur blog..u really pick the perfect topic.. liked it.
hey nice post. thoroughly entertaining. but i always thought if america sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold. i liked it that u correlated h1 influenza with h1b visas!!! and yeah if flu doesn't kill u, media will! the U.S media is no better. All the news channels were obsessed with Obama until swine flu came along. Now im waiting for the next major news piece. Entertaining stuff Harsh! :-)
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