It's Cricket My Dear Chap... please pass the gravy!

The Invitation read:

Dear IPL Visitor,
Welcome to India and Mumbai! Get ready for a fun IPL Final, because you're going to see some serious partying ``Bollywood Ishtyle'' -- people eating, drinking, singing, shouting, fighting, lathi charges, human sacrifice of an IPL Commissioner along with a handsome politician and his moll, fireworks and free-for-all groping on the field. And those are just our BCCI and Income Tax Officials.

But don't worry! You are perfectly safe. India has been hosting Major Spectacles along the lines of the fall of the Roman Empire for more years than I can remember, the Harshad Mehta Stock Market scam, the Satyam Computer Saga, the Bofors Gun running, the Mayavati Statue installations, the Bihar Fodder Scam, the Tehelka expose, the Raja 2G Spectrum Saga and so on….and in all that time no harm has ever come to a visitor who didn't do something stupid such as venture outside his bedroom. So have fun! Here are some tips to help you make the most of your visit:

GETTING AROUND
Mumbai has an extensive mass-transit system. Unfortunately, it doesn't go anywhere you need to go, and it sometimes has snakes on it. (I’m not kidding.)
Mumbai also has a modern taxi fleet, which consists of three modern taxis, but they're pretty busy. So your best bet is to rent a car. Keep in mind that Mumbai has the same traffic laws as the rest of the world; the difference is that nobody here obeys them. The main expressways are Eastern and Western Express Highways and the Sion Panvel Expressway; do not use these unless you are an experienced fighter pilot.

WHERE TO GO
The heart of the action during the IPL Final match is Nerul Navi Mumbai, which you should refer to as ``Dr.D.Y. Patel Stadium'', if you want to sound like you just got here from Jhumri Tilaiya. To get to Nerul , simply drive across the Vashi bridge, then turn around and drive back through Palm Beach Road, and try to find a quiet parking spot. Then you can walk back (not recommended) or attempt to hail one of the three taxis.

Mumbai is famous for its nightlife ``scene,'' featuring clubs where you can enjoy hideous bollywood music played at the volume of moon rockets back-firing while running up a bar tab the equivalent of two years' tuition to business school. Mumbai also boasts a vast array of obscure celebrities, so you just might spot a famous Director that you never heard of, or a Slumdog Extra, or even -- if you're lucky -- a Real Actor from Choti Bahu. Also you pretty much can't throw a rock over there without hitting a Thackerey.

And so on to ……

IPL WAS GREAT AND SO WAS THE GAME…
All in all I thought it was a terrific Cricket Tournament. The earlier match between the very same Chennai Super Kings and the Mumbai Indians, also witnessed the Maoists crashing through the east grandstands in Dantewada and take out the entire CRPF’s 62nd Battalion.

I'm kidding, of course. That was a P.Chidambaram "googly", similar to the Stock Exchange Fiddle in May 2006 when he was Finance Minister. In another “Sadim Touch” (the opposite of the Midas touch) this time as Home Minister he reduced to ashes (pun and irony intended) the fortunes of 76 families of the CRPF.

According to some he "commendably" offered to “resign” What? No jail time for someone responsible for homeland security and the massacre of 76 personnel?? Didn't he grandstand and say, “The buck stops here”, a la Harry Truman. But whereas Harry Truman alluded to ultimate responsibility; our politicians really opt out by resigning and "passing the buck" to some other poor sod to try to sort out the sorry mess... more like Pontuis Pilate or Nero the Roman Emperor who played the fiddle while Rome burnt.

But other than that, the 6th of April was a fantastic day at (you guessed it) the “Chidambaram Stadium” where Mr. P.C. was focused watching his peeps, the Chennai Super Kings defeat the Mumbai Indians, which at half-time nearly changed its name to ``Podu Podu Stadium'' and by the end of the game was going by ``Dhoni''. This brings us to……

the second and final match......

Sundays pregame scene outside the D.Y. stadium and betting stands was very festive; the moon was shining and the fans were happy (I am using ``happy'' in the sense of ``fairly stoned on moonshine already''). You could tell the Chennai Kings fans because every few feet they would shout "Askalakadi gumava Superkings na summava...." This is a system -- similar to the sonar system used by bats -- that enables Chennai cricket fans to identify each other by sound when they are “flying blind”or stoned.

RUMBA HAPPY SAAR
You could tell the Chennai Super Kings fans because a lot of them wore yellow lungis folded at "half-mast". The Mumbai Indians fans had their faces painted blue so they looked like characters from the movie Avatar who had been transported from the planet Pandora and developed a Vada Pau habit.

The Chennai Super Kings fans don't say "Balle Balle,'' but they do call themselves "Dravidians.'' There's a fascinating story behind this name, which is: Nobody knows. At least none of the Super Kings fans I surveyed did, although they hazarded various guesses, the most interesting of which was that a Dravidian is "a species of homo sapiens that eats Idli-Vada-Dosa'' This guess was hazarded by a man named Maha Lingam, who is the father of a Super Kings player, water boy Muthuram Lingam. Maha Lingam is Indian; I asked him if ``Lingam'' was a common name in India, and he said (I swear he said this): ``Yes Saar! There are many Lingams in India. The gestation period of a Lingam is only nine months.'' Maha Lingam seemed like a happy man, if you get my drift.

CELEB SPOTTING
There reportedly were many famous celebrities at the game, but the only one I encountered personally was the Harbhajan (Cop-a-Feel) Singh, with whom I conducted a “quickie” exclusive 11-second interview. He told me, exclusively, that he has, quote, "no idea'' what Lingam means, being a hands-on guy himself.

The opening show was spectacular. They wheeled out a really elaborate portable stage, then turned out the lights, so the stadium went dark. And then, in one of the evening's most dramatic moments, the spotlights came on to reveal, in the middle of a swirling cloud of smoke and laser lights…..
Rakhee Sawant’s Baby.
No, sorry, that was Shahid Kapoor; from a distance, he bears a certain resemblance especially when he broke into his version of the St. Vitus’ Dance. Although I thought Bipasha Basu shook her scrumptious booty way better than Shahid.

Then there was A.R.Rehman who is of course the celebrity composer for the legendary rock band called Belabour-it-to-Death-With–My-Oscar. He performed a medley of his greatest hits, which have been electrifying the world since they first came out during the Bombay Riots. The crowd went crazy, especially when Rehman, in the climactic finale of Vande Maataram, ejected his dentures all the way into the upper stands of the stadium.

ENCORE
Also there was a cricket game, which I thought was a clever, innovative and -- to be honest -- totally unexpected way to cap off the IPL season. So in conclusion, I think this was the best IPL ever, and I hope the UPA and the BCCI agree with me that they should definitely return the game to South Africa.

Speaking of returning: If you were at the game and seated in Box C Seat 24, be advised that Rehman would like his dentures back.