Shopping, Santa, and a Scrotum

Jesustan is awash with rubbish this festive season.

A Hershey Kiss Singing Candy Dish or Talking Shrek Cookie Jar is $19.99; a Floor Standing Fogger, whatever it might be, is Great Value at $29.99; Nice n’Fluffy Fabric Conditioner is $ 1.99. Everything seems to cost something ninety-nine.

It’s a lot to pay for self-delusion. Back in Hindustan, that much money would fetch a decent amount of weed. Weed, unlike shopping, for the most part does what its meant to do. Neither Cialis nor sexy lingerie will save the failing and tedious marriages most of those who signed up for conjugal bliss are trapped in. The Floor Standing Fogger may indeed temporarily transport them from their living rooms to the middle of the North Atlantic, but the illusion will, sadly, be temporary.

But this year, it turns out, Santa has something on offer of real value. It was a considerable relief when my native guide, after long days of foraging, brought me a catalogue which offered a 6-inch by 7-inch bully bag made from a bull’s scrotum, very thoughtfully “coated and sealed with polyethylene”. Crafted by experts, the bag costs just $39 and, here is the biggest relief of all, 97 –yes, 97 – cents. For the same amount of money, you can buy a bull’s penis, either crafted into a walking stick or a golf club, which, the catalogue notes, is “guaranteed to improve your concentration”.

The natives are, I often think, inscrutable. Who on earth would walk through the greens twirling a bull’s penis? Even if some merriment might be had – the retired bureaucrat at the sixth hole might became hot, then sweaty and be finally overcome by a paralysing frenzy of lust – what would the caddies think? And what use could a bull’s scrotum, lined with polyethylene as it might be, possibly be, especially since the bull’s penis has long passed its effervescent stage?

As is true of most mysteries, there is an answer. Consider the enormous anxiety and psychological trauma inflicted by the search for mates in Jesustan. Now, imagine the savings in cash and intellectual energy if its population could dispense with the tedious mating rituals of dinner and conversation. Instead, men could just whip out their trusty bull-penis golf stick, thwack it hard on the table, and, once the object of their affection has finished pulling out the pinewood shards from his or her face, ask: “you likee this”? It would all be simple and elegant. There would be yes or no answers, not bullshit.

Of course, there is the risk that the shrapnel might cause irreparable damage – or that they might for some other reason have tired of the object of their affection. Fear not! Capitalism has the answer. All they would have to do is shove his or her head inside the polyurethane-lined bull scrotum, and leave him or her to gag to death while they walked away, casually twirling their bull penis walking stick (even if someone saw them doing the dirty, no one fucks with a man packing a bull’s killi).

Real Hindustani Men, I am sure, would understand me. Goras have yet to discover arranged marriages – and the fact that there is no un-mating method quicker than a nylon sari ($ 86.99) and a litre of kerosene (free from the friendly neighbourhood Desi petrol-pump wallah).