Now that Gen Bajwa is gone, and cakes have been cut, pictures shared and now that a new army chief has been sworn in — we are unclear about the sort of swearing involved — and now that Imran Khan no longer blames the US for his ouster — he’s still looking for a suitable country to blame instead — here’s a thought: maybe Pakistan, we can turn our attention to sports.

The England vs Pakistan Test match series is underway despite initial ludicrous calls for the first Test to be postponed because a number of English players caught a viral infection. How can anyone postpone a five-day event; a Test match goes on longer than our marriage ceremonies, probably requires more commitment too.

The English were so concerned at the prospect of illness, they even brought their own chef. If the idea was for one of their chefs to make that barely edible bacon, sausages and baked beans, which can only ironically be called breakfast, the combination would make any human being sick. Your people colonised an entire Subcontinent because your food is that bad.

What will they do next? Bring their own air purifiers? Maybe wear gas masks? Invade Poland on the way? Or will the next England tour of Pakistan take place in London and Manchester? The Cockney and Mancunian accents are much more hazardous to a human being’s health than a viral illness.

Now that the issue of the new army chief is settled, the cafe’s collective attention can turn to sports, without feeling guilty

Also, the FIFA World Cup has commenced in Qatar, on the back of deceit, oil money and slave labour. So, just like America then. In an interesting geopolitical intrigue, The Great Satan played the Islamic Dictators…Republic of Iran — our loving neighbours, who are currently tear-gassing and using water cannons on their own citizens, just like we do every other month.

Their authoritarian regime’s morality police murdered a woman in custody, sparking countrywide street protests. The Iranian players refused to sing the national anthem at the tournament in Qatar, until their families were given heart-warming death threats by the Iranian regime. After that, the players muttered some words as their national anthem rang out against The Great Satan, but still lost. The defeat was celebrated in the streets of Tehran because people didn’t want the regime to whitewash their crimes with football success.

A similar scenario unfolded in Brazil, where some of the prominent players expressed support for the autocrat Jair Bolsonaro before the impending elections, which didn’t go down well with the media or other players. What’s a military-backed autocracy between friends and colleagues, eh?

Belgium’s golden generation turned a hue which was more a knock-off bronze, when they went out in the group stages. They then started calling each other out for being too old and too slow to play at this level. They should really have seen our 2003 World Cup cricket side to compare notes.

South Korea beat Portugal to qualify for the round of 16. K-Pop fans rejoice, this is the first time three countries from the Asian federation have made it through the group stages, although North Korea claim it’s happened before in 2010. On their government radio broadcast they beat Portugal to qualify for the round of 16; on the rest of the world’s television channels Portugal won 7-0.

Japan also eliminated Germany, the country where most of the Japanese roster plays club football. In fact, it was so embarrassing that Lothar Matthäus, former German captain, pundit and sportswriter for Bild, had to spend 120 minutes watching Japan play Croatia in the knockout round. Just so his ticket wouldn’t go to waste.

Qatar meanwhile continues to deny that mass human rights violations took place, even after at least 6,500 labourers have died since Qatar won the bid to host the World Cup in 2010. No autopsies, no investigations; they mostly died from ‘unexplained heart failure’. Not a hint that maybe working in 50-degree temperatures for never-ending shifts and living in congested labour camps had anything to do with it.

The labourers still alive were given permission to enjoy the World Cup on the cheap, Qatar insisted. No, not in the stadium, that would be too humane. They were allowed to gather hundreds of miles away, at a screening in a small cricket stadium made especially for South Asian workers, just to make sure they never stepped into Doha itself.

Qatar also created controversy by banning the LGBTQ rainbow flags and armbands. The Qatari Emir said that people don’t respect our culture — that culture being of jailing human beings who are gay. They did later say gay people are most welcome to come and watch the matches, as long as they aren’t gay ‘here’. Because that’s how sexuality works. Also contrary to popular opinion, sexuality and sex aren’t the same thing.

Qatar banned alcohol too, though that was finally one thing in service to humanity. Otherwise, you’d have thousands of people poisoning themselves with the atrocity that is Budweiser.

The writer is a medical tourist who has almost died on three continents.

He tweets @haseebasif

Published in Dawn, EOS, December 11th, 2022