Turmoil at the Institute of Trickery and Thuggery

Ever been to Hotel de Same Place? If you find it hard to believe, here’s the address: No. 83 & 85, Malay Street, Colombo 2. The esoteric roadside eatery’s venturesome owner says that he so named the hotel fearing that patrons may deem otherwise.

“I wanted to assure my customers that my hotel will remain in the same place, laying out the same spread, with the same taste,” says the owner who wished to remain anonymous, but assured me that he has the same name from the same parents and remains married to the same woman. His refusal to divulge his own identity, though, made me sceptical about if he was, for a fact, the same man.

The hotel has been cited in a Cabinet paper presented by the Minister of Higher Education S.B. Dissanayake, to shut down public schools and universities. The paper predicates that academic and moralistic endowment is no longer a requisite to succeed in the island’s socioeconomic landscape.

A committee decreed to scout out the recent Z-score fiasco has concluded that qualified administrators lack the foresight and acumen imperative for solving mathematical equations demanding commonsense and practicality. A hand-picked team of politicos renowned for their dexterity in intricate commission and kick-back formulae have, according to the confidential report, cracked the problem but has been kept in the dark due the sensitive nature of the circumstances. Their plans of deceit and plunder are often fail-proof and ought to be channelled into every conceivable sphere of governance, the report recommends.

In today’s context, citizens just need to be street smart and armed with a bagful of tricks, the report suggests, while also pointing out an increasing number of unqualified personnel establishing successful practices as doctors, engineers and advisors. The Conspiracy Desk learns from its usually unreliable sources that schools will be replaced by institutes of trickery and thuggery. A spokesperson for the All-party Politicians and Contractors Association however said that the entire membership has voted unanimously to protest against such a move as it would result in a serious threat to their livelihoods. “There may be fewer opportunities if there were a surplus of unqualified individuals in our business,” he said.

The words of Roman philosopher Cicero sprang to mind as I lamented all my years of educating myself with skills and education;

“The poor: work and work,

The rich: exploit the poor,

The soldier: protects both,

The taxpayer: pays for all three,

The wanderer: rests for all four,

The drunk: drinks for all five,

The banker: robs all six,

The lawyer: misleads all seven,

The doctor: kills all eight,

The undertaker: buries all nine,

The Politician: lives happily on the account of all ten.”

I went over to the Royal Colombo Golf Club to wash down my depression. In the face of prying eagles and sudden death, here was a bunch of chivalrous men who have momentarily retired from the evil world out there; to chase after a small white ball.

I ordered a Death in The Afternoon! It arrived in a glass but I soon realised that all cocktails with fatalistic compellations are a prophetic warning of the big day, billed to hit town in exactly three months from today.

While I waited, I ordered another one and scanned the room to see a bunch of golfers discontent with the size of their balls watching on television another bunch of men in colourful raiment chasing after a bigger white ball.

I think I need another one!

(Dinesh Watawana is a former foreign correspondent and military analyst. He is a brand consultant and heads The 7th Frontier, an integrated communications agency which masterminded the globally-acclaimed eco tourism hotspot KumbukRiver. Email him at [email protected].)