Thaindian News

A new riot control weapon is being launched this month. You zap the sonic cannon at a bad guy and he immediately needs to go to the toilet. It penetrates all known underwear brands.

I know it sounds like a joke, but I was sent enough information to decide that it really exists. Polish police have been trained to use the “involuntary urination” cannon to control football hooligans at the current Euro 2012 soccer games. This is how it is intended to work.

Hooligan: “Mwahaha. Let us overturn this police car!” ZAAAAAP! Cop: “Ha ha ha, now you have a damp patch on the front of your trousers!”
Hooligan: “Oh no, I must immediately cease this antisocial behaviour so I can return to my hotel room to change into fresh, dry, lavender-scented clothing.”
Whatever.
Anyway, it’s clear that this weapon was dreamed up by a deeply immature male, or to put it another way, a male.

I am so getting one of these for my birthday. Just think, any time you are at a speech or lecture or anything which gets boring, you just use your sonic gun to zap the speaker and suddenly it’s “I think I’ll finish there” and he shuffles off stage holding his briefcase in front of him.

How does the sonic gun work? Invisible beams cause “unusual and severe internal vibrations in the abdomen”, according to the internet.

Why am I reminded of the food at Taipei airport? Eating that causes unusual and severe internal vibrations in the abdomen.

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The Nobel Prize was last week slashed from $1.4 million to $1.1 million. I’m sorry, but that’s ridiculous. Who’s even going to get out of bed for that?

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Beijing’s Got Talent: Entrants, all bespectacled men aged 80 to 200, each have to silence an elderly dissident within a set time.

Myanmar’s Got Talent: Entrants, all military generals, have to lose elections and lock up the winners.

Moscow’s Got Talent: The only entrant allowed, Mr. Putin, has to find believable excuses to take his shirt off at international summits. “Goodness me, it’s hot in here.”

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Talking of people who like the spotlight, party girl Lindsay Lohan crashed a borrowed Porsche last week. What an idiot! No, not Lindsay, the person who loaned her the car.

Imagine the conversation: “Hi, I’m Lindsay Lohan, the famous substance-abusing movie star who has crashed numerous cars and my career. Can I borrow your Porsche?”

“Sure. What could possibly go wrong?”

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A court in China recently found a football manager guilty of operating an office which accepted large numbers of bribes. Clearly this man is well on the way to becoming a top government official.

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The US suddenly terminated funding for the Pakistani version of “Sesame Street”, a children’s TV show which teaches the alphabet, the press reported. I wonder which lines caused the problem? My guess: “Today’s show is brought to you by the latter A, which stands for America, also known as The Great Satan.”

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After a crime wave swept through their district, police launched a unique new crime-fighting method. They smashed a pumpkin on their doorstep. They believed that this action, accompanied by suitable chants, would call down the gods to their side. But officers at Gudiyattam police station in Vellore, India, were sneered at by journalists last week, who thought this showed “desperation”.

I see nothing wrong with what the police did, which is common throughout Asia. Even in ultra-hi-tech Hong Kong, you’ll find statues of Guan Yu in every police station. That arrangement ran into problems when robber gangs also adopted Guan Yu as their patron saint. The dispute has now been sorted. Temples issue police stations with right-handed Guan Yu statues which enhance law enforcement skills. Robbers are issued left-handed Guan Yu statues which aid criminality. (Asian gods are very flexible, not like Western ones.)

On a practical front, any religious ceremony that involves smashing pumpkins has definite visual appeal and should be encouraged. Even better, someone should organise a ceremony based around the Holy Dropping of a Watermelon Off a Building. That I’d sign up for.

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Talking of crime, I can’t help but feel a nagging admiration for the masked raider who robbed a shop in Britain recently while holding a mug of coffee. He marched into the Manchester store with the steaming drink in his right hand, terrorised the shopkeeper into filling a sack with goods, and then strolled off, still sipping. A cop at the scene described the man as “nonchalant”. Imagine how efficient this robber would be after his coffee.

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A top Asian economist proposed a “hotness” tax for men. Good-looking guys would be heavily taxed, while ugly ones would get deep tax reductions on a sliding scale of hideousness, said Takuro Morinaga of Tokyo. The result would be to make all men equally attractive, boosting the rate of marriages, births, economic activity, etc. The report was forwarded to me by reader, Chris Huber, who said: “I know some guys who would be totally exempted from paying any tax at all.” Thanks a lot, Chris. I thought you were my friend.

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A man tried to sell an aircraft engine for $2 million on eBay, but he failed to get a single bid, the British press reported recently. Why are British reporters surprised at this? Is this how aviation people normally make planes in that country? “Hey, I got a cheap fuselage off eBay, we can add some new routes for British Airways.”

(Nury Vittachi is a columnist who travels around Asia. Send ideas and comments via www.mrjam.org)