Being fat saved his life

Maybe don’t start the diet just yet

HAVE YOU FINISHED your dinner, sir? If so, do you mind if I lie down on your plate?

An Asian community has taken the adage about the poor benefiting from crumbs from the rich man’s table literally.

Leftovers from high-ranking Brahmin class dinners are wrapped in banana leaves and spread over the floor at a temple in Kukke, a town outside Bangalore in India.

Low-ranking people then roll over them to absorb blessings, I heard from V.S. Karnic, a correspondent for the Indo Asian News Service.

Cool. I wonder if this works anywhere? I mean, could I just go to the restaurant at the nearest golf club and roll around in the lunches of the tycoons?

I’d love to try, especially if they were eating them at the time.

Talking of food, I have finally found PROOF that being fat is good for your health—in fact, it can save your life.

Last week, heroic-but-heavy bus driver Omar Alegria Campos, 33, threw himself at a gunman in Santiago, Chile. The bad guy shot him, but Alegria’s pot belly caught the bullet, preventing any serious damage. In a report on the incident from the La Cuarta newspaper, sent in by reader Wendy Tong, doctors said a skinny person would have been killed instantly.

Next time anyone tells you you’re getting fat, just look deeply shocked and reply: “It’s my bullet-proof protective layer. You don’t have one?!”

**

NEED A cheap surgeon to remove a bullet or for any other purpose? Reader Graham Lovell saw a sign at Bolton General Hospital in the UK saying:

“Danger:  Guard dogs operate on this site.”

AMAZING what animals can do these days.

***
MOVIE PIRATES in Sweden have set up a religion of copying, a website reported last week.

The Missionary Church of Kopimism set up by Isak Gerson (below) is founded on the principle that there’s nothing wrong with stealing other people’s ideas.

“To everyone with an internet connection: keep copying!” Gerson told an interviewer from Torrent Freak website.

Hmm. That’s given me an idea. Here goes a revised news report.

A diarist named Mr Jam has set up a religion of copying. The brilliant new religion set up by me… etc, etc. Muah ha ha, give him a taste of his own medicine.

***

A CASTRATOR fish has been discovered in Papua New Guinea. The sharp-toothed Pacau fish sneaks up behind fishermen wading in rivers and – chomp!---takes a gruesome revenge on behalf of fishes everywhere.

The testicle-removing fish was shown last week on TV show River Monsters.

I hereby register a complaint against the Animal Planet channel for its GROSS IRRESPONSIBILITY in putting this dangerous information on television around the world where feminists may see it.

From now on I SHALL look extremely carefully before lowering myself into the bath.

I suggest all men with stormy relationship with women (Grandpa, are you listening?) do the same.

***

A MAN AGED 99 filed for divorce from his 96-year-old wife after he found letters revealing she had an affair 50 years ago, the ANSA news agency reported last week. I usually find the phrase “get over it” annoying, but in this case. . . .

***

MUCH IMPRESSED by the comments lately.

Last week I said that the gentleman who signs himself Fat Chinese Guy didn’t look fat on his blog.

He replied:

Dear Mr. Jam, With all due respect, are you accusing me of lying? If you are, thank you. You have just made my week. I must point out though that I have no intention of misleading anyone, just that I've been called fat in so many different languages, such as "gemuk" (college mates), "bulat" (client), "fei chai" (company tea lady), "fat man boobs" (my flesh & blood brother), that one can't help but believe it too.

***
Meanwhile, SEJ has gone over to Grandpa’s side and is learning to fly airplanes. I know Liftie must be devastated by the news.

JY: Welcome to gang, visit regularly.

Peter, Lynne, Liftie and others who commented on the snowy pics: yes, Japan is gorgeous. As for Liftie’s question about baptism in snow, it sounds like a brilliant idea – will definitely ask theologians to comment…

***

(Pic at top shows random fat guy; guard dog sign not original from named hospital; Isak Gerson shown in person; fish pic from Daily Telegraph, old folk pic shows models)

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Technorati Tags: Kukke,roll over,tycoons dinners,river monsters,Omar Alegria Campos,being fat is good for you,nury vittachi,Mr Jam

Comments

[Chamin]

Now I know why two third of the US population is obese. It is a natural way of protecting them from the guns all over the place! (long live Darwinism)

Hmmm, may be I can use idea to write a research paper with long, passive voice sentences :-p

[Ram]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Cc7jYVFLqc&feature=related

[grandpa]

WHOWWWWW

2012 is on a good start for me....

SEJ learning to fly, Grandma traveling with a pilot, WHOWWWW

LL
Can you tell me (in 100 words )why nobody wants to learn to drive elevator?
I can answer in 10000 words how to travel better in airplanes, in french English and soon , in Spanish

hehehe
It is in a book called :Papa , tell me:Air travel.
I wrote it with you in mind.

Uncle

You are being misled about the tycoon' crumbs;
Have you seen the quantity of food served in a plate of gourmet restaurant?
There is no such a thing as crumb, in those plates

[grandpa]

Sej
Welcome to the world.
After you start flying you will be wondering how so many people can miss this new life.
what plane are you flying
Did you solo yet?

[grandpa]

talking about guns
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXSSrBBZV_8

[Stephen Durie]

Hee hee.. When I was stabbed under the left armpit by a skinny and hungry illegal immigrant in the hills of Tai Wai a few years ago the knife point penetrated a couple of inches into my left side.

However i was saved by being a bit overweight (among other things). If I had been thin it would probably have penetrated my chest cavity and deflated my lungs preventing me from defending myself and fleeing from my attacker. (He subsequently tried to cut my throat at which point I realised I had to escape or my time was up).

It's probable that if the knife had deflated my chest he would have succeeded.

One of the guys at church was a science teacher and used it as an illustration of the evolutionary? benefits of being a bit overweight (eg when injured or in time of famine etc). ....

When they got me into ER the first thing the thoracic surgeon did was to forcefully shove a wooden spatula up into the wound as far as he could to ensure it had not penetrated the chest cavity. It hurt like the worst pain I've ever experienced as he kept telling me how lucky I was...

I later went through what I now see as a few years of post traumatic stress but it was undiagnosed and I guess no one understood.

Now I have a degree of heart failure and every time I see my cardiologist he charges like a wounded bull and berates me for not losing weight.Ha ha ha.. Life is so ironic!

[Fat Chinese Man]

Mr. Durie,

I bet you are one of those who doesn't let life's irony get you down.

Not many people I know would start with, "hee hee, when I was stabbed..." and end with "I have a degree of heart failure, ha ha ha...". Respect, sir, respect.

[Nury]

Stephen, you are an amazing guy.

Reading your story about the time you were stabbed reminded me of the other time you hit the headlines -- as the rapping minister. Remember this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxXedd_C2u0

I imagine you must have a very understanding bishop over there to allow such fun activities at church...

[sej]

Grandpa,

I've only just started... that was my first lesson. Flying Solo I think is still a ways away yet... it's going to take me a while because it's so expensive - that's the one downside to flying - the money, or lack of it.

But, this is something I should have started *years* ago!

I flew a Citabria. Amazing little plane. You can throw it around and it just soaks it up. The instructor was amazing too. He'd just flick it into these 60 degree banks, and he would just seem to do it automatically. In the back seat, I'm pretty sure he didn't have his own instruments, so it would have been all by feel and experience.

But I loved it, and will be continuing on.

[peter wei]

Congratulations, Alegria! Wish other obese persons would be as lucky as you are!

Me, thin as Ghandi or SRR, do appreciate the obesity problem and the convenience caused to themselves and others. So don't accuse me of discrimination if I suggest that a person twice the size of an average one should be charged double for occupying two seats in public conveyances!

[peter wei]

Sorry, should be "inconvenience"

[Lift Lurker]

Sorry Liftie, but flying a plane can in no way compare to pressing a few buttons in a lift.

This is not auspicious start to my year.

But sej is least of my problem.

My young boy is learning to ride his bicycle (2 wheels, 13 years old). I hold him and run behind him while he ride.

When he successfully balance, he squealed the most horrible words in English: "I'm flying! I'm flying!"

As a tough love parent, I have to teach him how real world works: if you fly, you crash.
So I let go my hand and he learn the lesson.

---

I check some friends about snow baptism. They do not think TS's idea of throwing snowball is acceptable because to them baptism means immersion. So we need snow and shovels.

(But what if you only have ice?...ice cubes, crushed ice? ice blocks? Theology is really difficult. No wonder Dawkins settle on science)

[sej]

Although I can't think I've actually heard of it, there are enough instances of something similar, to make me think baptism with snow actually does happen.

I recall stories my father used to tell me about baptisms in the Ukraine... During winter, baptisms were routinely carried out in the ice cold river. By "ice cold", I mean, the river is covered in ice, and they've cut a hole in it.

Interestingly, between the birth and the child's baptism, an axe would be placed under the crib to protect the child from evil.

[rafanjr]

don't worry liftie, if i finished learning how to ride a bike myself, i would go on learning the intricacies of lift"ing"

[grandpa]

LL
If it can be of comfort, no aircraft would fly without Lift...

[Stephen Durie]

Dear Lift Lurker,
My old boss the then Vicar of St Andrews - aka the very Rev John Aldis (a wonderful Godly man and mentor I hasten to add) used to baptise people by wiping a clammy hand on their forehead. He was trained by John Stott (I kid you not). I allowed that it wasnt baptism - but what do I know as I come from downunder and obviously beig theologically lacking. So if one can be baptised by wiping a clammy hand on your forehead, I think a snowball should do the trick rather well! On a related subject my old friend Denis Carnahan is Father to an 11 yr old boy. He commented on FB "what does one wear at a dinner with 11 year old boys?" Answer: "A glass of water" ha ha ha..!

[Nury]

Wow, Liftie, you got a note of approval from a genuine church minister. I suggest you go and start the Church of Snow Baptisms immediately.

There's a church in Hong Kong which is on the 76th floor -- a glass pyramid on top of a skyscraper.

You need to take three lifts to get to it. I think it would be perfect for your needs.

[Mahjuja]

I wish I had gone with my father when he went. I might have had some tranquil memories to reflect on.