There are things that fail even though the best of precautions are taken and all efforts are put to make it a success. Those things are victims of unforeseen circumstances. The Titanic is a perfect example for the above stated. No one would've thought that the gigantic boat that is predicted to survive the biggest of calamities would crumble to the force of frozen water on her maiden voyage! Sad!
But then there are other things that are doomed to fail by the very virtue of their very presence, how they came to being and then God's wrath. Commonwealth 2010 can go down in history books as a solid example to this. The disaster that began with delayed-cancelled-more delayed tenders, expenses of over 28000 crores, corruption charges on most people even remotely associated with the games has now taken shape of a broken city which is not likely to be built back again, only patched up and cheaply whitewashed where the the wounds are screaming the loudest. A trip to Connaught place is enough to depress a true-blue Delhiite like me. Rubble everywhere, Shivaji Stadium declared not to be ready by CW, traffic and parking woes- this just doesn't seem like the Delhi I knew. And the wonder of wonders is that I didn't see a single official/laborer working in the entire CP area!! I guess they've already made peace with the fact that nothing will be done so why not enjoy the status quo.
Last week, I participated in the Delhi Family Rally to kick-off the 30 day countdown to Commonwealth. I was less than impressed with the Commonwealth building where the design posters are already peeling off even before the start of the games. Shera, the mascot too appeared a tad too plain jane to me. A country that produced one of the most beautiful currency symbols could've definitely done a better job with the CWG mascot. The food was dripping with oil, the toilets barely clean and the security seemed hassled even with just over a 100 families participating. I'm hoping against hope that this isn't an indicator of what's to come.
Now comes the worst part, Murphy's Law in action. When the politicians were praying to God that nothing (other than the corruption charges already exposed) should cloud the games, God decided he had different plans. Enter the heaviest monsoons in decades, destroying every cheaply built road, choking the city in peak hours and pouring in the Yamuna making the flood danger loom large on the CWG. Not just that, the numerous mini water bodies created all over the city served as the perfect breeding ground for mosquitoes and viruses. Dengue, malaria and viral fever sent 11 of the 18 member cyclist team who came to Delhi to practice back to Patiala where they came from, unfit and unprepared! But wait, it doesn't stop there, members of the animal kingdom too wanted a piece of action. Monkeys have now started getting aggressive in East Delhi, close to the CW venue. They are entering people's homes, attacking and hurting people and killing a langoor that was brought to control them! It just keeps getting interesting.
By the looks of it, I think it'll make sense for someone to design a secure body suit/face mask for all the visiting athletes so they are protected from infections and monkey bites. We should also design a time travel machine so none of the athletes have to get stuck in traffic and they just vroom past the rest of us mortals. Oh and yes, we have to come up with high-tech pink sunglasses that just magically fix all the the broken building so no one sees a stripped down Delhi. Oh, and also stick a shock absorber in the athletes' spines so they don't feel the jerks of potholes on the roads. I mean how much more could it cost to design these gadgets, anyway! We are already the most expensive CWG in the history so it doesn't really matter, does it?
