2012: End of the World

It’s the End of the World as we know it and we feel fine.

There’s no point making long term plans, because on December 21st 2012, the Long Count calendar used by the Mayan civilisation completes its thirteenth b’ak’tunb’ak’tu (or ‘cycle’ for the shamelessly ignorant) for the first time in a span of approximately 5,125 solar years.

Since the Maya are long gone and probably enjoying themselves in the great El Dorado in the sky, no one really knows the significance of this day. Which can only mean one thing:

IT’S THE END OF THE WORLD!

Conspiracy theorists are having a field day blogging from their mothers’ basements and people are minting money building bunkers for, and selling gas masks to, the gullible (read: lunatic) fringe. We expect mass panic, widespread power outages, a complete collapse of law and order and total governmental paralysis. In short, an average Pakistani Tuesday.

Of course, some wet blankets insist that the ending of a Mayan calendar only means the dawn of a new spiritual age, but we know that’s just a marketing ploy to sell Deepak Chopra’s new book. Unfortunately, even if the world does end, it won’t be in time to prevent the release of Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 2.

Of course, just because you know the world is going to end doesn’t mean that you know how it’s going to end. So we’re going to tell you:

Doomsday 101

1-The Great Galactic Alignment of 2012

One of the many apocalyptical theories is that the galaxy will realign and somehow create a combined gravitational effect between the Sun and the super massive black hole at the centre of our galaxy, thus wreaking havoc on Earth. Some doomsayers use the term ‘galactic alignment’ to describe a very different phenomenon, prophesying that mass extinctions are not a random event but recur every 26 million years with December 21, 2012 being the date for the next one.

2-Geomagnetic Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious Reversal

Often mistaken as a polar shift, this theory states that a massive solar flare would release energy equal to 100 billion (Yes, billion with a B) atomic bombs and trigger a geomagnetic reversal of the earth’s magnetic poles. North will become South, destroying Earth’s climate, flora and fauna and also effectively changing the title of the next instalment of Om Puri’s East is East series. On the plus side, the Houbara Bustard won’t be able to fly to Pakistan that year and will thus avoid getting shot.

3-Planet X marks the spot AKA Nibiru to you too

One of the most popular theories among doomsday proponents and near-complete idiots is the Planet X/Nibiru hypothesis. This is a planet, discovered apparently by the ancient Babylonians, that has an unpredictable orbit that makes it swing into Earth’s solar system every once in a while. Planet X-ers claim that Planet X/Nibiru will collide with or pass by Earth in 2012, causing...you guessed it...THE END OF THE WORLD!!!! The idea was first put forward in 1995 by Nancy Lieder, who described herself as a contactee with the ability to receive messages from extra-terrestrials from the Zeta Reticuli star system through an implant in her brain. Nancy, bless her heart, was apparently chosen to warn mankind that the object would sweep through the inner Solar System in May 2003 causing Earth to undergo a pole shift that would destroy most of humanity. Nothing happened. The (revised) date for this event is now...wait for it...2012!

4-Nostra-Yo Mama-damus

The great Nostradamus has spoken, the end of the world is nigh. Nostradamus writes in one of his quatrains, “In the sky will be seen a great fire dragging a trail of sparks.” Nostra-Fans say that this line clearly suggests the coming of a comet almost the size of Jupiter which will pass close to the earth causing the oceans to rise and the earth to shake. Better go buy an underground bunker since old man Nostradamus has never been wrong… at least in hindsight.

5-The Vogon Hyperspace Bypass

Although not commonly known, this theory is quite popular in the ET office. It is believed that come December 21st, the earth will be destroyed to make way for a hyperspace bypass for interstellar traffic. For more information, contact Arthur Dent. Don’t panic.

POLITICS

 Well, regardless of whether we all end up dying in one of several possible apocalyptic scenarios…a few high-profile world leaders may just have to carve tombstones for their political ambitions. That’s because it’s ELECTION YEAR, PEOPLE!!!!!

 The race for the White House

Apart from the end of the world as we know it, 2012 may also mark the end of Barack Obama’s tenure as President of the United States. Expectations were absurdly high in the autumn of 2008 when Obama promised “change we can believe in”, but it all went downhill after that, and the only change the American people can see is what’s left in their wallets after they were emptied by bailouts, job cuts and the recession.  What gives us solace here in Pakistan is that we’re not the only nation whose politicians rely on false promises to get elected and then sink their voters for the sake of petty political gain.

The 2012 battle for the White House is going to be fierce, what with a semi-failed president, a Sarah Palin knock off who, creepily enough, never blinks, and the guy who thinks Palestinians were invented by Walt Disney.

Let’s take a look at the contestants in the greatest reality show on Earth.

The Democratic Party

Barack Obama, incumbent President of the United States

Loves:

Change

Long walks on the White House promenade

Teleprompters

Abortion

Hates:

Change

Killing Osama Bin Laden too early

Smoking

Fox News

Challengers:

Republican Party

Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House

Loves:

Historical Fiction

Dinosaurs

Pope Benedict

Space

Child Labour

Hates:

Free Speech

Islamists

Atheism

The Judiciary

Pakistan

Michele Bachmann, US Representative from Minnesota

Loves:

Tea Parties

Serial killer John Wayne Gacy

Nuking Iran

Ludwig von Mises

Hates:

Human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine

Blinking

Evolution

Gays

Pakistan

Rick Perry, Governor of Texas

Loves:

The Bible

The Death Penalty

The Death Penalty for mentally retarded inmates

Guns

Hates:

Foreign Aid

Elitists

Homosexuality

Alcoholism

Pakistan

Independent

Roseanne Barr, actress and comedian

Loves:

Kabbalah

Macadamia nuts

Green Tea Party

Occupy Wall Street

Hates:

Wall Street Bankers

Movies

Men

Robert "Naked Cowboy" Burck, a street performer from New York

Loves:

Singing

Nakedness

His guitar

Westerns

Hates:

Trademark infringement

Dallas Cowboys

Naked Cowgirl

So that’s the line-up for US presidential candidates. On second thought, maybe Obama shouldn’t be too worried. And on the plus side, if any of those guys actually win, your 2012 end-of-the-world bunker will also work for when one of these nutjobs actually starts Armageddon.

 

 Mayhem in Mother Russia

March 2012 brings us Czar Vladimir ‘I know Judo’ Putin’s attempt at a third term as Russia’s President. However, it’s not all hunk-dory for the former KGB man, as Russians are already up in arms and out on the streets in protest against what they see as a rigged election. Huddling in a Kremlin bunker, Putin is said to be relying on Russia’s greatest military minds: General January and General February to decimate the protesters the same way they took out Napoleon and Hitler. Of course, the French and Germans didn’t have General Vodka on their side. The protesters do.

Au revoir to Monsieur Sarkozy?

Fed up with his too-fond-of-fromage countrymen, Former French president Charles de Gaulle once complained that is was impossible to govern a nation that has two hundred and forty-six different kinds of cheese. Well, it increasingly looks like the French are looking at Sarkozy with all the love a lactose intolerant person has for a particularly putrid slice of Limburger. So, the upcoming April elections may have us bid au revoir to the current French president. With his opinion polls ranking tanking, nothing he does seems to make any difference, from expelling gypsies to bombing Libya to trying to ban the sale of Sarkozy Voodoo dolls. Come May, he may find his only remaining job is as Carla Bruni’s boy-toy.

 Who’s afraid of the big bad brotherhood?

Apparently everyone except the Egyptians themselves. One of the biggest fears of Western governments and media is set to come true in 2012 as Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood put their President in place. Meanwhile the Brotherhood itself is bending over backwards to prove that they aren’t the political wing of al Qaeda and are in fact the only real political force in Egypt, and spin doctors in Washington DC are trying to figure out how to reconcile love for democracy with hate for Islamism. However, unless the MB decides to have a massive strip-off in Tahrir square while swilling beer and roasting pork chops, it’s unlikely that the US will be convinced.

Monarchy’s Energizer Bunny just keeps going...and going...and going

As Mel Brooks famously said in History of the World Part 1, “It’s good to be King.” Well, it’s even better to be the Queen of England.

While lesser mortals fret and fume about elections and opinion polls, you’re sitting pretty in a shocking pink outfit and living large on public expense and the returns from centuries of global plunder. And you’re pretty much immortal to boot. That’s right, 2012 marks the 60th year of Queen Elizabeth II as the reigning monarch of England…and the diamond jubilee celebration on 3 June 2012 promises to be quite a bash.

Ostentatious celebrations — a grand concert in London, a nation-wide bank holiday and a majestic maritime parade of a thousand boats and other events on River Thames— are only part of the celebrations. And they’re not just limited to the UK. Canada and Australia— which are still under British dominion— have also planned to construct expensive commemorative tokens for their monarch.

Raising an eyebrow already? Unfortunately you are part of only a tiny coterie of sceptics. While Britons are quick to assault policemen and protest in the freezing cold against rising unemployment and inflation, they are happy to squander their tax money on the royal family. After all, what more do financially troubled commoners want other than watching sumptuous revelries organised for their monarch? Who said religion was the only opiate of the masses?

Euron the wrong track

There’s a saying that you only go uphill once you’ve hit rock bottom, but the benchmark for rock bottom for the global financial crisis just keeps getting lower. In fact, the bottom seems to be made of quicksand rather than rock. According to reports, there is a looming threat of a new wave of recession in the developed world in 2012. An EU forecast has predicted that growth in the Eurozone in 2012 is expected to collapse to 0.5 per cent— a steep drop from a previous prediction of 1.8 per cent. Moody’s Analytics has lowered its outlook for growth in the US economy next year, raising the possibility of yet another recession to hit the global economy.

That’s not all: US General Martin ‘I don’t know who I’m bombing’ Dempsey is even warning of civic unrest in Europe if the crisis continues — which it will, in all likelihood, since putting political gain before national interest isn’t just a desi thing.

This means that we’ll probably see Occupy Athens along with Occupy Rome, Brussels and Madrid. The English will do the usual thing and raise the drawbridge and block off the chunnel so as to not be infected with the Euroflu. This will be great news for TV channels, armchair revolutionaries and manufacturers of tear gas and rubber bullets, but not so much fun for everyone else. Except for the ultra-right, who will place the blame on brown people and minarets; the Germans — who will launch into a rousing chorus of Deutschemark Uber Alles, and the Chinese — who may just decide that the Opium wars weren’t all that long ago after all and that it’s finally time for some payback, Sino-style.

So long and thanks for all the icebergs

Remember the Kyoto Protocol? No, it’s not the alternative title for the latest Mission Impossible instalment. It’s actually an agreement, preceded by long discussions and negotiations, that was signed in 1997 in Kyoto, Japan. 160 countries agreed on a legally binding protocol under which industrialised countries would reduce their collective emissions of greenhouse gases by 5.2%, thus saving the world from the spectre of global warming.

Did it work? Well, 2011 was one of the hottest years on record, so that would be a big ‘NO’. The main problem was that the country responsible for emitting 25% of global greenhouse gases, *cough* USA *cough*, refused to ratify the treaty. Self-righteous hypocrisy being a national trait, they wanted developing countries to reduce their emissions instead. It flew like the Dodo.

But since everyone loves a good foreign trip, seventeen nations will be meeting for the United Nations Climate Change Conference from November 28 to December 9 in South Africa to plan the successor of the protocol. We give it about as much chance of success as Prince Charles has of becoming King of England.

Fun and Games

Okay, so what if the global economy is nose-diving and the weather is going crazy and we’re all doomed to destruction by December anyway? At least we have the Olympics to look forward to.

2012 is the year of the Olympics. The Summer Olympic Games are scheduled to take place in London in July and the 2012 Summer Paralympic Games in August. With the added threat of terrorism, security arrangements reportedly cost £250,000 per day and the Ministry of Defence is planning to deploy surface-to-air missiles to counter any threat from the skies. In other news, the London 2012 Organising Committee has stated that Sikh athletes and spectators will be allowed to wear the Kirpan (ceremonial dagger) in all London Olympic venues. It has also been reported that American Republicans will also be allowed to carry their own religious token, the rifle.

Protesters of the Occupy London movement can look forward to one advantage of demonstrating in 2012: clean air and greener surroundings. For the Summer Olympics and Paralympics Games, the organisers will be undertaking an ambitious environmental plan focusing on reducing low-carbon emissions and waste, increasing biodiversity and promoting environmental awareness. They aim to restore rivers, create wetlands and effective drainage and even plan to create a “green corridor” from Lea Valley to River Thames. Now if they could only hold the Olympics every month in every city in the world, we just might save the global economy and the globe itself.

Meanwhile, in the Land of the Pure

2012 will be quite a year for us in Pakistan as well, what with mudslinging and intrigue touching new heights in the run-up to the general elections. Many political ablution aids (read:lotas) will change loyalties. Others will opt for the PTI laundry services (‘get clean in 24 hours or get your vote-bank back’) and some familiar faces may just try and stage comebacks. Here’s what’s on the cards for Pakistan in the coming year:

Guess who’s back?

Former President Pervez Musharraf has announced that he will definitely return to Pakistan by January to start campaigning for the 2013 elections. When asked for a comment, he allegedly said “Paka promise.” Mass preparations are underway to receive the former President at the airport, with lawyers, court bailiffs and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court rumoured to be in the welcoming committee. Atiqa Odho and all five members of the APML are also making counter-preparations to foil any plots to arrest/deport or otherwise manhandle their fearless leader.

The Poor Man’s Elections

The upper house of Pakistan’s Parliament, the Senate, will complete its term in 2012. New senators will be elected in March by an electoral college comprising of members of the national and provincial assemblies. Luckily, fake degrees are fine as far as this college is concerned.

We expect a lot of last-minute attacks of conscience and resignations from Senators who belatedly realise that they can no longer be a part of a corrupt system and quit the senate just a few days before their term is due to expire.

Insiders have also revealed that — in keeping with hidden clauses in the Charter of Democracy — instead of the usual balloting, Senators will instead be elected on the basis of their performance in a grand game of Ludo. Demands by the PTI for a Facebook-based Farmville showdown instead have been rejected.

As far as the ‘real’ elections are concerned, the election commission plans to finalise computerised electoral rolls by April 2012. In response to this earth-shaking development that will usher in a new era of electoral transparency, political parties are busy setting up hacker wings and the Agencies are trying to re-engineer the Stuxnet virus, which is being renamed the ‘farishta’ virus.

Perpetually Powerless Pakistan

Will our country continue to be the Land of Blackouts in 2012? While it seems like we’re doomed to perpetually put up with electricity shortages, there might just be an energy-saver bulb at the end of the tunnel of darkness. In a bid to solve the power crisis, 18 companies have been given licenses to generate power through alternative energy and are expected to start producing 1,440 megawatts (MW) of electricity in 2012.

Wind energy is going to be a big part of this. Norwegian company NBT has expressed interest in establishing a 500-megawatt wind power project in Pakistan, by investing about $1 billion in alternative energy. Not to be left behind, Pakistan’s proactive electronic media also plans to install wind turbines in their studios to try and capitalise on all the hot air that is generated by talk shows. The surplus energy will be sold back to the national grid and, according to experts, Mehr Bokhari may well be the single largest Independent Power Producer by the end of the year.

Rumour has it that a similar system is being planned for parliament but, when asked for comment, Federal Water and Power Minister Syed Naveed Qamar exclaimed “Earth, fire, wind, water, heart — by your powers combined, I am Captain Planet,” and then exited the press conference with a whooshing sound.

Limping in the wrong direction

Of course, at least we can draw some comfort from the fact that the United Nations isn’t located in Europe, because otherwise our representative may not have been able to get to the UN in the first place.

That’s because European countries are seriously considering placing travel restrictions on Pakistani citizens. That’s not all, and in other bad news the World Bank has threatened to convert one of its grants to us into a loan next year.

The reason? No, it’s not because of our refusal to assist the US in eliminating the Haqqani network. Neither is it because of a grand Zionist conspiracy to keep us away from the Swiss Alps and Louvre Museum. It’s because of one disease, confined to the annals of history in the developed world, that Pakistan has failed to eliminate: polio.  In 2011, there were 148 cases of polio in Pakistan, exceeding last year’s figure of 144. The devastating floods and militancy in the country’s northern areas have aggravated the fight against the polio virus, forcing the international community to press for punitive measures against Pakistan if we fail to eradicate polio next year. The Punjab health ministry also floated a proposal to shoot all horses, until they were reminded that it’s not Polo that needs to be eliminated. At that point the minister reportedly flew into a rage, saying that the ‘hole waali goli’ was his  favourite and that he would fight to the death to defend it.

Stainless Steel Kashkol

There’s more innovation on the debt front as well. Instead of trying to break the begging bowl, we’re lobbying for a bigger bowl. The country’s debt was recorded at Rs 10.890 trillion by August 2011 from Rs 5.799 trillion by March 2008, showing a net increase of Rs 5.091 trillion or 87.79 percent since the current government took power.

All good things must come to an end however, and on February 24, 2012, our country is due to repay $1.4 billion to the IMF. There are reports that the country’s senior leaders are asking US officials to use their “influence” in the IMF to sanction a second bailout — the first one in 2008 was worth $11.3 billion. The talks have however deadlocked on the inability to reach a consensus on the deaths-to-debt ratio with the Unites States.

So long, and thanks for all the tikkas

On the other hand, even if we can’t eliminate polio, militancy or debt, we’re certainly poised to bid farewell to our Afghan brothers. The government has chalked out a new strategy for the repatriation of millions of Afghan refugees and set the year 2012 as the deadline for their departure from Pakistan. After mass panic among the gastronomically inclined, Pakistani authorities issued a statement assuring the public that supplies of Afghani tikkas will not be jeopardised.

Resume-building, Pakistani style

United Nations Security Council, here we come! On January 1, 2012, Pakistan will proudly commence its temporary membership of the institution dominated by the largest arms exporting states with nuclear capabilities, ironically tasked with ensuring international security. As such, it doesn’t seem too far-fetched that a state with little or no internal security will take a seat on the UNSC. If we go by Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar’s words, our country looks forward to the “maintenance of international peace and security” as part of the Security Council. But our  attachment with the Security Council will probably yield nothing more than an increase in debates on the Arab-Israeli conflict (complete with vetoed resolutions), occasional hue and cry (also quickly vetoed) on the Kashmir issue and special security details for Ms Khar’s handbags. At least it’ll look good on the national resume. And the Birkins will be safe.

 It’s just not cricket

Finally, the coming year also marks the Pakistani cricket team’s first tour of India since the 2008 Mumbai attacks. It is rumoured that the Pakistani team will have new bottle-proof uniforms and will undergo extensive showboating and wicket celebration training. Luckily, the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 will take place in Sri Lanka, and since that’s about the last country in the world in which Pakistanis aren’t strip-searched on arrival, abnormal security may not be required.

Published in The Express Tribune, Sunday Magazine, January 1^st, 2012.