How to make nothing from something
ACCORDING to the police, nine people have been arrested in Penampang, Sabah for running an illegal ring that took bets on the World Cup.
The cops seized almost RM100,000 in cash, betting slips and numerous SIM cards used to call football crazy punters.
In their defence, the nine pleaded that they had, at all material times, intended to donate their takings to the Hope Fund and they just knew that Lim the Elder would instinctively understand the inherent patriotism of said scheme and sympathise.
Just in case Lim the Younger, now Finance Minister, disagreed with the aged parent, the nine had Plan B up their legal sleeves. They claimed to have morality on their side: everyone knew that it was morally wrong to allow a sucker to keep his money.
Malaysian gamblers know that numerology is important to get winning numbers.
There is a little book for that too, and it lists numbers for every eventuality.
Say you were shaving and a cockroach suddenly jumped out at you, causing you to cut yourself in eight places.
That is a good sign as the number eight means “prosperity” and the smart gambler will then proceed to bet his savings on his car number even before attending to his bleeding face.
There have been other methods too which work just as well. Say you have to choose between France and Brazil. The shrewd gambler will pore over the form book and tot up the betting odds. Finally, the good, old fashioned eeny-meenie-miney-moe never fails. All sorts of gimmicks have been used to predict, and bet on, World Cup outcomes.
Perhaps the most successful was an unlikely octopus called Paul.
The crafty cephalopod predicted 10 games correctly and even nailed the final by cor- rectly picking Spain over the Netherlands in the 2010 World Cup. Unfortunately, it failed to predict its own demise a few months later at the hands of a crazed sushi chef bent on avenging Holland’s defeat.
His adopted country – Germany – grieved for the former psychic but could not give it a state funeral as it had been, well, consumed.
Instead, a wag suggested that Germany adopt a national theorem.
His suggestion: that 8 times 3.142 would forever be equal to octopi.
It was a terrible pun, and so bad that Oxford decreed that, in future, the plural for octopus would henceforth be octopuses which the Italians agreed were delicious when simmered gently with salt, pepper, garlic, onions and seasonal herbs in a red wine sauce.
Meanwhile, Russia has discovered their own prognosticator in the form of Achilles, a deaf cat that had correctly picked Russia’s 5-0 defeat of Saudi Arabia in the opening match of the World Cup.
Knowing the fate that had befallen the many-limbed Paul, Achilles sought to discourage his Russian handlers that he could divine the future.
He even pointed out that no psychic had ever won a lottery, an ironclad, irrefutable point of logic that should have floored anyone but humourless Russian handlers and rapacious Malaysian gamblers.
There was no point picking winners, thought Achilles gloomily, as he despondently picked Mexico to beat Germany and Argentina to be thrashed by Croatia.
As his success rate increased, his mortality rate decreased amid angry death threats, causing bodyguards to have to be hired to protect the fortune-telling feline.
It was a close thing because his enemies nearly succeeded in poisoning him recently but mighty Achilles foiled them by correctly predicting that his food was distinctly suspicious. You couldn’t really blame his handlers: how are you supposed to be able to tell when cat food has gone bad?