I was away in India when I read an online report that put a glint in my eyes, that Dubai Municipality was giving away gold if your kid lost weight.
Just to bring you up to speed about the Indian fascination with gold, my mother-in-law’s ears perked up, even though she was feeling down, when I read out the report aloud. “How much are they giving”? she asked, looking at my son, who was sprawling on the couch with his ears plugged with white-coloured earphones.
“Don’t even think about it, ma,” said my wife. “He’s so scrawny, he doesn’t eat properly and the doctor said he should take vitamin supplements,” she said, while the person being discussed was blissfully unaware we were talking about him.
The Municipality was obviously worried; already airlines are thinking of refurbishing their seats as fat passengers are spilling into the aisles, making it difficult for the flight attendant to manoeuvre the food trolley with the famous tasteless airline lunches.
An economics professor recommended that air tickets should cost according to a passenger’s weight. “Charging according to weight and space is a universally accepted principle, not only in transportation, but also in other services,” he said.
Soon after that Samoa Air become the first airline to charge extra for passengers who pack in the pounds.
Desperate to get everyone in Dubai into shape so that it would not put pressure on its various services, someone in the Municipality hit on the brilliant idea of offering gold for your pound of flesh, so to speak.
Children had to lose weight
If you registered as a family, the Municipality offered two grams of gold for every kilo lost. But the catch was that the children had to lose the weight for the family to win more gold.
The promise of gold brought thousands out into the open, and even though it was blazing hot and humid, people who would not venture out during the daytime, stood perspiring in long queues with their surly kids.
Unfortunately, that gold is not for my family as we are scrawny and it seems odd that we are living here in a country that is deemed as the fifth fattest nation in the world.
The other day I was thinking of buying a smart pair of khaki shorts I saw in the shop window, when my wife nixed the idea. I had imagined myself sauntering in the mall looking like a cool dude, and was even planning that the colour of my trainers would be blue, and a red baseball cap on my head, when all that was shot down.
“Your legs are spindly and your knees are knobbly. You will look ridiculous,” said my kind wife.
From that day I have been trying to put some muscle in my legs and have done squats and other exercises that put you in awkward postures. “Can’t you get up?” asked the gym trainer when he saw me stuck on my haunches, giving me a hand up.
A friend recommended that I drink protein shakes to build up muscle and the lady at the counter at the nutrition store brought down a humongous container of powdered stuff from the shelf, and carrying it home was embarrassing as I didn’t want people to think I was a greedy person.
The silly shake, instead of giving me brawny legs, gave me a paunch. When you are skinny, a paunch looks absurd. My wife bought me a tape measure to keep track of my waist and suggested that I buy a weighing machine that would tell my body fat measurements.
Then I read a saying by Buddha: “The mind is everything. What you think you become.”
I am thinking of a body shape like that of Aamir Khan’s. Let’s see when I can get into that shape.
