Mr. Everything Comes from India breaks down the origins of the Irish flag:
Dressing up in color and molesting people while tipsy:
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The official plant is a widely-available magical weed:
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More specifically, the Irish are like the Punjabis. One is a farming culture where people are warm, like to drink and like to fight. Its men are famed both for toughness and for being mama’s boys. The other sits around singing farmer songs in an unintelligible accent. It used to host a religion-based separatist movement and is now a magnet for outsourcing. I even know of several Irish-Punjabi marriages. No, nothing like each other at all 
Éireann go Brách, chak de phatte and belated happy Holi!
Update: Check out these Irish-Indian fusion tracks: ‘Punjab Paddy‘ by Gaelicstorm and Butterflies by conFusion (thanks, Saheli and niki).
Update 2: Post was accidentally deleted, taking the comments down with it. Mea culpa, sorry!
OMG…..manish, that was toooo funny! loved it. chuk de go bragh!
ps – gaelic storm rocks.
Excellent. So reminds me of that guy in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Mr Everything Comes From Greece!
Somebody has been hitting the green beer to hard.:-D
“Hey, today’s March 17th! Saint Patrick’s Day… Or what we colored folk refer to as “Hide our asses for the next 24 hours unless you want to get the shit kicked out of you day!”
chak de phate means pick up wood planks, which i guess are hard to pick up. its a statement that says, get up and do what you got to do
Not quite, sahej. Chak de phatte means throw the wooden planks. In rain-based irrigation farming, water runs from tubewells to the fields through channels. Wooden planks (phatte) are used to regulate the flow of water. “Chak de phatte” is therefore an exhortion to let the water loose i.e. throw caution to the wind, and let the enjoyment flow.
i’m sure you have a point based on your family and all that. but chak de phatte means, get your work done and don’t whine about it. tubewells and irrigation, sure, if thats what chak de phatte means to you and your family thats all good. but it means, you got work in front of you and you best start doing it
Excellent. So reminds me of that guy in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Mr Everything Comes From Greece!
omg yeah!
“Hey, today’s March 17th! Saint Patrick’s Day… Or what we colored folk refer to as “Hide our asses for the next 24 hours unless you want to get the shit kicked out of you day!”
hey, stick a shamrock in your GREEN dastar, and come celebrate with me!
wow…ok….i have heard sooo many tranlsations of what chuk de phatte ( and related spellings) mean, and non one can agree. one translation i’ve heard is ‘ it’s what you want, or do as you want’ or soemthing like that, and i forget what all else i’ve even told.
Darn (that the previous comment was deleted), I wrote up a great story about how a few weeks ago I made a BHANG TANDHII with my parents, got high with my Dad, flew a kite, listened to some music, did pooja, and went out to eat.
That being a totally serious and TRUE story as I have a medical cannabis prescription and live in California…
The recipe being about a .5 – 1 gram of high quality cannabis INDICA (not sativa), milk, cardamom, cinnamon, poppy seeds, lots of HONEY, almonds, and pistachios. You boil it all together, let it cool down – blend it with ice, serve it cold.
And that I have come to the conclusion that the roots of my Hindu faith are found in cannabis. That the plant was used to bring worshippers closer to God, and that it was administered in the temples via INCENSE. Also that the sexual imagery (voluptious women, phallic symbols, etc) in ancient Indian idols was meant to incite arousal – that feeling of sexual arousal combined with being high was considered being closer to God.
That was about it – oh yeah, and I reccomend all my Hindu/Muslim/Christian desi brothers and sisters to enjoy the gift of cannabis, vaporize it, or have a nice bhang drink and think of the Lord.
Om Namah Shivaya!
Just wanted to add to the above comment – seeing that its St Paddys Day and all…
Our nation America likes to think its peaceful, but we promote alcohol and guns as part of culture – two things that lead to premature death…
How can a society that allows GUNS to be sold and distributed so freely – an item used to kill people – so easy to get…and at the same time outlaw CANNABIS – a substance that helps one connect to the Divine, feel a sense of PEACE?
Where is the logic there?
chak de phate = do the needfull?
The literal meaning of chakk de phatte is lift/pick up (chakk de, in Hindi it would be ‘utthaa de’) the wood planks (phatte, no idea what that is in Hindi). The IMPLIED or symbolic meaning, I guess means different things to different people in different situations and circumstances. I think it’s just an expression of enthusiasm.
I even know of several Irish-Punjabi marriages.
Oh, man, no joke, I went to one last year, in Chicago. Both sides were trying to out-drink each other, there was an Irish-jig vs. bhangra dance-off (two very overweight, drunk uncles were the competitors)… The best part was when the [Irish] guy’s dad made some joke about how “us Gallaghers have been looking for lucky charms our whole life and it looks like my son finally found one” and none of the Punjabi side laughed. Very awkward, a pregnant pause where everyone wakes up from their happy dream-sequence thinking “Oh, Lord, these two families will never get along…” until the [Punjabi] girl’s father gets up and says, “You know, I never thought I’ll love the Irish because my whole life I’m drinking scotch… “
Anyhow, what’s the Punjabi equivalent to the blarney stone?
thanks amitabh! interesting, and i think you’re right. it seems to mean different things to different people, and is certainly an expression of entusiasm..
Anyhow, what’s the Punjabi equivalent to the blarney stone?
a cute sardar with plenty of fuzz and a dastar…dancing bhangra…..i’d rather kiss that anyday.
i’d hope an irish dad would be similiarly accepting of a desi son in law. we desis aren’t the only ones with burrs in their butt about that sort of thing
Hello campers. Quick stop-off for the Bong Breaker to say what ho. Very funny post Manish.
On the subject of St. Patrick’s Day, guess who I met on Friday?
No guess. Come on guess. Guess. Oh OK.
In a completely random twist of mutiny, I was stumbling down a San Francisco street in a suitably Guinnessed fashion, when I spotted none other than Vinod himself. Recognised by a fan. You’re a celeb (now).
Chak de phatte, napde gilli. What is this?
Chak De Phatte: Here’s the most interesting origin I found for the phrase. Apparently it’s a Khalsa war cry; the warriors, escaping after attacking the Mughals, would destroy the bridges behind them (Hence “Raise the planks” ), and also sometimes to prevent the enemy from escaping…. so it became a general expression of enthusiasm…..
My 3 year old daughter (who is half Irish / half Punjabi) has recently taken to both DJ Rekha AND Riverdance, doing her interpretation of Riverdance moves while dancing to the Basement Bhangra Anthem. I thought I’d be the first to figure out a way to mix the two musics, but it seems I’ve been beaten to the punch:
http://www.delhi2dublin.com/
Although, in reality, delhi2dublin doesn’t use enough bhangra!
Awww. I am Irish and Punjabi. My maiden name is Dullat, and my mother is a McKinley. It’s sweet to see there is someone else in the world out there…maybe I’m a less of a freak?…Obama makes all of us halfies ‘acceptable’ I must say…by the way, I’m now married to a Korean Russian Jew. What does that make our children,, ..the future right?
A seldom known fact : that the Indian flag colours were deliberately chosen by the Indian leaders to snub the British who were then fighting the Irish. The Free Irish colours and the Indian colours are the same because of that reason. The Free Irish flag which is the Irish National flag today was FIRST raised ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD (not even in Ireland..!!) by Irish soldiers IN INDIA, at Connaught. The British Army considered it to be a mutiny by those Irish soldiers and some were court-martialled and shot.
As an Irish man I’m really gratified by the comparison
but remember that the Irish are not a race, we’re a nation. Under our Constitution, (which shares the same Directive Principles as the Indian Constitution) we differentiate between nation and state so the Irish Nation can include not just the citizens of the island but also non-citizens like our diaspora their family, friends and descendants, In effect anybody can be Irish, we encourage it. We’ve even gone as far as to invent a day where people can try it out. So if you like it please feel free to consider yourself Irish on Patrick’s day or any other day. And if you feel the need to get a passport, buy Riverdance DVDs or even wear green body paint you’re of course welcome to it,
but none of that’s really necessary to being Irish. Any kind of vague wish or declaration will do it.
Don’t worry its not hard, drinking isn’t even mandatory….but well you know Better yet you can stop being Irish any time you like, too! I won’t lie we’ll be sad to see you go, but we do not pursue or penalise apostates.
There’s only one rule, added after some Catholics spent 25 years trying to kill Protestants while waving a flag symbolizing peace between Catholics and Protestants.
You can all be Irish or not, just please lads, don’t fight.
(turbanhead, if you are ever in Dublin Cork or Galway during Paddy’s day I will move heaven and Earth to buy you a pint of Guinness.)
The Irish flag stands for Nationalists and Unionists, not religion