{"id":3178,"date":"2006-03-20T16:56:45","date_gmt":"2006-03-20T21:56:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com?p=3178"},"modified":"2009-06-30T05:28:36","modified_gmt":"2009-06-30T10:28:36","slug":"desi_athletes_t","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/2006\/03\/20\/desi_athletes_t\/","title":{"rendered":"Desi athletes take the gold"},"content":{"rendered":"

Desi athletes have picked up a series of gold medals in the 2006 Commonwealth games in Melbourne. I know it’s not the Olympics, but the sight of a gold medal hanging around any brown neck is rare enough that it is worth remarking on. India is ranked third of all countries<\/a> (after Australia and the UK<\/strike> England), with 12 gold medals, while Pakistan and Sri Lanka each have one. [By comparison, Australia, the host, has 42 gold medals and the UK<\/strike> England has 18]<\/p>\n\n

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Invoking every Goddess before serving sure slowed things down<\/p><\/td><\/tr><\/table>These recent victories wont give brown people a reputation for being jocks though. At least five of India’s gold medals are from air rifle events. While I’m sure this requires skill, I can’t imagine that it takes either stamina or strength. The Indian women’s table tennis team also won a gold, but only with divine intervention:<\/p>\n\n

In table-tennis, India’s women’s team won a closely fought match against Canada, winning 3-2. “I prayed to the Goddesses to please give me strength to perform well for myself and India,” India’s Mouma Das is quoted as saying by AFP news agency. “I felt in my heart they heard” [Link<\/a>]<\/blockquote>\n\n

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p>This isn’t even badminton fer cryin’ out loud, let alone “real” tennis. How much pride am I supposed to take in the fact that it took all the Goddesses in the Hindu pantheon to win a table tennis competition without any Chinese athletes! And air rifle and table tennis account for at least half of the Indian gold medals.<\/p>\n\n

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p>The most macho gold medal was won by the Pakistanis who set a new Commonwealth record in weightlifting:<\/p>\n\n

Pakistan picked up its first gold medal of the Games with a win for Shuja-ud-din Malik in the men’s 85kg weightlifting event. Malik’s combined 343kg in the clean-and-jerk, including a new Commonwealth record of 193kg, placed him ahead of Cameroon’s Brice Batchaya. [Link<\/a>]<\/blockquote>\n\n

I’ve got my fingers crossed, hoping that desi athletes can redeem themselves by doing well in some more strenuous sport, like Netball<\/a> or Lawn Bowling<\/a>. During the last Commonwealth Games, the Indians won 30 gold medals<\/a>. Would it be too much to ask if half of India’s gold medals this time were in sports that desi mothers would disapprove of? <\/p>\n\n

UPDATE: Wgiia<\/a>, ms<\/a> and Soooraj<\/a> remind me that India’s first gold medal was earned by female weight lifter Kunjarani Devi<\/a> and that two of India’s 12 medals are in women’s weightlifting.<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Desi athletes have picked up a series of gold medals in the 2006 Commonwealth games in Melbourne. I know it’s not the Olympics, but the sight of a gold medal hanging around any brown neck is rare enough that it … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3178"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3178\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}