Do Go On - 479 - The Mystery of the Sri Lankan Handball Team

Episode Date: December 25, 2024

In 2004 the Sri Lankan handball team made headlines around the world, but it wasn't for their on field prowess, instead they were wrapped up in an international mystery!This is a comedy/history podcast, the report begins at approximately 03:58 (though as always, we go off on tangents throughout the report).For all our important links: https://linktr.ee/dogoonpod Check out our other podcasts:Book Cheat: https://play.acast.com/s/book-cheatPrime Mates: https://play.acast.com/s/prime-mates/Listen Now: https://play.acast.com/s/listen-now/Who Knew It with Matt Stewart: https://play.acast.com/s/who-knew-it-with-matt-stewart/Our awesome theme song by Evan Munro-Smith and logo by Peader ThomasDo Go On acknowledges the traditional owners of the land we record on, the Wurundjeri people, in the Kulin nation. We pay our respects to elders, past and present. Resources/Further Reading:https://www.abc.net.au/news/2004-09-17/sri-lankas-handball-team-vanishes/553214https://www.ranker.com/list/sri-lankan-handball-team-vanishing/tracey-grahamhttps://journalnews.com.ph/the-entire-sri-lankan-handball-team-vanished-in-germany-but-did-the-team-even-exist/#gsc.tab=0https://www.ndtv.com/offbeat/how-an-entire-23-member-sri-lankan-handball-team-vanished-without-a-trace-in-germany-6220499http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3658966.stmhttps://www.dw.com/en/sri-lankans-pull-off-disappearing-act-in-bavaria/a-1332926https://opus.lib.uts.edu.au/handle/10453/31714https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/sri-lanka-handball-teamhttps://m.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.230213797121857&type=3https://www.sundaytimes.lk/100404/Sports/spt10.htmlhttps://www.sundaytimes.lk/070325/TV/023tv.html Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serenjai Amarna, 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there.

Canada, we are visiting you in September this year. If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. Hello and welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Dev Warnocky and as always.

I'm here with Jess Perkins and Matt Stewart. Hello. Hello. So good to be, so good to be alive. What time of the year is it now? That time of year where I wish I was never born. And joining us this week, it's a very special guest. And hello to our old friend, Sarenge, I'mana.

Hello. Thanks for having me. My friend. Actually, Matt, to answer your actual question, it's Christmas Day. Is it Christmas Day? It's Christmas Day. You there, boy. This episode is coming out on Christmas Day, 20, 24, baby.

Merry Christmas, everyone. So there probably will be some people listening, and I hope you're having a beautiful time. I mean, people will listen on Christmas Day or other days. No, I think of the majority of people are probably listening afterwards. And I'm not saying you're sad if you're listening to it today. No, that's fine, that you just don't have any friends or family. I think it's actually really sick. I think it's nice.

I think that's the coolest thing I've heard. Maybe you've got a long drive. Yeah. To visit family and friends. Yeah, maybe you're heading to Saskatchewan. Yeah. Maybe you are heading to Saskatchewan, for example. Yeah, for example.

You might be coming from Quebec. Yep. And you might be heading over to Saskatchewan. Yeah, exactly. So you might even be playing us on half speed. That's right. To make sure you've got enough. Yeah.

And I say Merry Christmas to you. And I'd say bless you. Serene, thanks for spending your Christmas day with us. It's a pleasure to be in this car with you between Quebec and Saskatchewan. Yeah. Hey, pass the turkey. Do we have loose turkey? We got loose turkey.

Can you pass the bag of turkey? It's a plastic bag for. How else would you describe turkey? Isn't it all, is it not always loose? Yeah, but like in a car, it would be weird to put in a hand over an entire, either an entire bird or like like a leg or something. Also, it depends how you cook it sometimes. Well, I'm driving, so I need a leg. I know, I can't use an knife and fork right now.

What are you, sir, and you're imagining one of those Thanksgiving. You know, there's videos where people chuck them in oil and it causes a giant house fire that we're doing in the back of the car. I've got, I plugged in an air fry over the back. They're quite committed. You can take them anyway. It's a mini one.

So I'm just doing little tater tots for now. A bit by bit. Yeah. And Saran, I asked you to join us because you're about to do a big tour. Is that true? That's correct. Two cities so far. Whoa.

Holy shit. But more to come. Put back in a Saskatchew on. Yeah. Adelaide Fringe. I'll be there at the Rhino Room for the last week of the Adelaide Fringe. And then Melbourne Comedy Festival, the whole month. So exciting.

Huge. Huge. And you're at the town hall, which is like... It's basically the MCG of the comedy festival. It is. They reserve it for all the best acts. And then until those acts decide to go to independent venues. And then, you know, the little fella gets a look up.

That's right. I am doing Spleen this year. An independent venue. It's going to be great. But what, Dave and I are also going to be in Adelaide. Yeah, the Rhino room. We're all at the Rano room. Yeah, all the Rano. It's the best place.

Yeah. It's so fun. If you're at Adelaide Fringe, this is the only place you really need to go to. Yes. And if, yeah, some people who are listening to this will have come to our show earlier this year, man, dry, dry.

Yeah, and they would remember that I was, you know, quite entertaining. Yeah, that's right. And they should come in. And those ideas that we started there are now, they've blossomed into our shows. They've blossomed or they've been thrown in the bin. Yeah, a lot of it's in the bin, yeah.

If there's a bit you hated, don't worry, it probably won't make it. You'll have it for it. You actually made me hate it. Yeah, that's how this works. But that bit you liked, hey, I've dragged that out to 15, 20 minutes. Hey, yeah, yeah. Hey, can I explain how this show works?

I would love it if you did. So, one of the three of us, and sometimes a guest goes away. Research is a topic, usually suggested by one of our wonderful listeners. They bring it back to the group. They tell us all about it. And we always get on to the topic with a question. Matt, it is your turn. Have you got a question for us?

to get us on the topic. I do have a question. I also already told Surrend the topic. So this is just to Jess and Dave. Okay. The question is, which country officially changed its name from Ceylon in 1972? Do you know, Jess? I was answering a message. So, Dave, you go first.

Is it Sri Lanka? Yes, it is Sri Lanka. What would your guess have been having I heard of the question? Sri Lanka, I think so. Yeah, that would have been my guess. Well, yeah, you would have been correct. Oh. Uh, Sri Lanka, that's right. Uh, this topic, uh, is set in Sri Lanka.

Oh, wow. I thought, I was like, we're doing the whole history of Sri Lanka as a country. That's amazing. And I, um, and I invited, uh, Sera, uh, because he has met Sri Lankan cricketers, which I think is pretty, gives him a pretty good. Can we talking, uh, Kanga, Kanga Scarra. Kangascah, is that right? Ganga, Kanga, Kangaara.

What, how I was that goes on? No. Angaskara was close. I've met, whoever I met. Jai Wardner? I've met Arindra da Silva. Oh yeah.

Asankar guru singer. That's about it. That's pretty good. But that's pretty good. Oh, and also Rashan Mahanama. We're actually... They're all from the one team, the 96 World Cup. I mean, if you're going to pick a team.

So that's why I'm here. Rannatonga. Oh, yeah, Rannata. Haven't met him. Who's the captain of that team, was he? Chiminda Vars is my favorite. Oh, great. Great.

Great. It's an I call. The iconic team. Yeah. All these names, people are feeling the nostalgia on their Christmas afternoon. But yeah, we're not, we're talking about Shlankan sport, which is why I've got the great shankan sport expert, Sarangana, are in. But no, we're not talking about cricket.

We're talking about another sport, which I'll get into soon. But first, this topic was suggested by four different people. Morgan Clark from Texas, Shannon Godelli from Kitchener in Ontario, Canada, which I believe I have no idea. On the way to Saskatchewa. Also, Abyshech from Hyderabad in India. And Don's Ronald from Sydney. Don's is such a good first name.

It's so good. I don't know why I like it so much. Every time Don's Ronald comes up, I'm like, this is the best name I've ever heard in my life. Don's Ronald. Don on its own is a good name. Yeah. But this is, he's like pluralized. I know a baby named Don.

What? Really? Isn't that crazy? Yeah. I think he's coming up to one. And his name is Don. Is it just Don? Yes.

Not short food. Not short. I'm just Don. Baby shower. Asking for a favour. Don. Incredible. What's a surname?

No, you can't. I won't completely docks here. And address. Yeah. Doc's Don. All right. So this story, I'm taking it back actually to a German guy. As all great, Shlank and sporting stories begin.

This is 981. And the retired professional table. table tennis player, Ditmadoring, which is a pretty good name in itself. Oh, wow. Just graduated from university in his native Germany, and he was waiting to get a gig as a business lecturer, and in the meantime, he decided to head to Sri Lanka for a holiday. Andrew. I've made Andrew sound more complicated than it.

I think you've made it sound fancier, which all Andrews would appreciate. Andrew. Oh. Yeah, I like it. How does Andre Ryu come into this? That was closer to a famous Christmas performer. Of course. He probably has a fresh Christmas album out there.

A few people have got the Andre Ryu on at the moment, I'm sure. I'm fingers crossed that I'm going to go home and unwrap it from the stocking. The DVD. A fresh Rieu. Oh, I can't wait. Andrew. Andrew Fiozzi. Luckily, I'm only going to be quoting his surname from now on.

What was the easy one. Fiozzi. Andrew Fiorsey writing for Mel magazine, which is strange. It's like a man magazine. It's about man things. They write about sex and stuff like that. Oh, man things. Yeah.

That's what it says in its description. Was it just founded by a guy called Mel? I guess so. Mel's magazine. But this is the best English, at least, um, uh, rundown of this story that I could find. Other things quote this writing for Mel magazine. Oh, there have been times I've, the best resource I've had. This is recently.

I can't remember what report it was. but the best resource I had was an article from Playboy. So, you know, sometimes. Their articles are awesome. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah. If you skip through that filth, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck.

Ooh, story. And they're really well written. Yeah, really well written. Oh, crossword. Yeah, and it's possible that, you know, there's better sources out there, but because this story is German and Sri Lankan, maybe it's just not that many in English. Anyway, if you're writing for Mel Magazine writes,

when he arrived, this is we're talking about, Ditt Madoring. Who's a retired? Retired table tennis player. He's already lived such a life. Yeah, that's right. Incredible.

King of Pole. What age do you retire from table tennis? I feel like you can keep going. Yeah, yeah. That's true, yeah. For a long time. Hand eye coordination. Whoa.

Also brain tongue coordination is quite important. Oh, no. So I guess, whatever age mad is. Yeah, I retire this morning. Someone comes over and just grabs the bat out of your hand and says, it's over. That's enough.

That's enough. You pinged your last poem. Do you think at the end of your table tennis career, you're like, I can never look at another table again. Any table. Any service he's just like, oh yeah. Got a door, you got a gym, you got a table, you got it? Man, at this dining tale, a lot hit cross court.

Reading the grain of the time. Really interesting people. Oh, this table, I'd hit cross court. Okay. Sorry, Uncle Kevin, I'm just asking you to pass the piece. Doesn't this table to a Big Pong really feel like a Dave Waterkey sport? It does. I love, I actually love playing it.

Of course you do. Of course you do. And they're real athletes. Actually, retire in 25. Because it's so brutal. On all the joints. Several knee constructions later. I'm back.

I'm off. I'm off the court. I'm off the court for good. Okay. So anyway, back to Fiazza. When he arrived in Sri Lanka, his taxi driver asked if they could stop to pick up some clothes at his home. So it's just what you're your taxi driver. Sure.

Like, okay. Remember the time we got a taxi in Dublin, the guy took us to where his wife was born? Yeah. A full detour down the side street to be like, my wife was born in that tenement building. Okay. That was like, we just landed after 24 plus hours in the air. Yeah. Yeah.

And I'm thinking, are we on the clock here? Or is this a flat fee? We're on the clock. From the airport. So I enjoyed it. This doesn't surprise me too much. It's absurd. But this was Dublin.

Yeah. So that's like their big city, right? Yeah. You expect that might happen in like a quaint town in Ireland. Oh, yeah. Look at this lovely building. Yeah, sure. Yeah.

Man's gone out of his way, cross town to show us where his wife. Not even where he was born was his wife. It wasn't quite cross town, but it was definitely a detour. A detour. A detour side street that was a dead end. I remember we had to do like a full three-point turn at the end. It was like, oh, we didn't have to go past that building.

Maybe he was showing you how much of a miracle it was, she made it out. See that? This is a hard street to get out. Yeah. Most people get trapped down. She was born here because the ambulance couldn't get out. So, this is what Doring said. He was taking me for a 10-day round trip through the island.

So he said, okay, fine. If you need, you probably need some clothes. Fair enough, you take me on a long trip. The two men chatted. most of the way there to the house. And when they arrived, the driver invited Doring in for tea. Doring said, once inside, there are all these table tennis trophies in the house.

I asked him about them, and the driver told me they were his sisters. So Doring then asked if you could meet the sister. What's the challenger? For the trophy. I want that. I want that. Play for keeps. And there's a bit of a twist here.

What? The two fell in love and Doring ended up living in Sri Lanka from then on. He fell in love with his cab driver. His cab driver's sister. Imagine if that happened. Well, we're seeing where the mum was born. Oh yeah. I just come in for a little cupper and then one of us falls in love.

Or all of us. With his wife. Very awkward. Dave sees the table tennis. Oh my God. Your wife is really good at table tennis? I must meet this woman. Wow, that's so wild, though.

Yeah, because that obviously, going to get clothes has just changed his passenger driver. If his taxi driver was just semi-organising, he's not getting his 10-day job at the last second. Yeah, he knows. He's so lucky that he got in the cab and the driver was naked. I'm so sorry, I've made a mistake. I only live a few minutes away. I woke up, I was running late. I forgot to clear my teeth and I forgot to put on clothes.

I have put deodorant on that. Now the teeth, you know, forgive me. The clothes, I'm really sorry. That's a mistake. That is a big mistake. I thought it felt a bit breezy down there and also up here, everywhere. It's a windy day. As you would know.

You're on here as well. Because he just like all the cabbies are like old Aussie white guys. So this is in Doein's own words. He loved. Sri Lanka. So it's his first time visiting. He said, when I first touched down in Sri Lanka as a tourist, I instantly fell in love with the country. In the two weeks of my first visit, I experienced Sri Lanka as a kind of heaven. He loved it. He also said, since on all my foreign travels, I take my table tennis racket in my travelling bag,

I took the opportunity to play an open table tennis tournament in Colombo. As in like, he takes as carry on. Yeah, it's awesome. Just never know. Yeah, hey, there's any terrorists on this flight, don't worry, I'll beat him off. But then I'll use the table tennis. My life. You know that little change table in the toilet? He sees that. Some people see that as an awkward place to change a nappy.

Not him. Just a quick game. Marno Imano. Hey, if I win, you have to land the plane and give control back to the pilot. But if you win, you can take this plane wherever you like. Okay. And his sharks them as well. He loses the first bit on purpose.

Oh, double another. And by the way, I'm actually a right-hander. You have to give the plane back and pay the ransom money. Pay your own ransom. So he's in Colombo now playing table tennis. And I love it. It's the kind of thing that if there's a table tennis game, you don't have to bring your own bat.

If there's a table and a game going on, there's a bat. You tell that to like a tennis player. They're travelling with their rackets. Oh, you reckon there's like a... I think he's probably like strapped the handle the way he likes. And, you know, he's got a real feel for it, the weight. You know, yeah. Probably like a picture of Pikachu or something on it, you know.

Oh, lucky Pikachu, yeah. You know. Yeah. What year was this? 1989. Yeah, Pikachu. Yeah, Pikachu. Yeah, ahead of his time.

So he got really connected with the Sri Lankan table tennis community there, which is burgeoning. And then between 19802 and 89, he split his time between. his old and new homes. He was still traveling back to Germany, lecturing at a business college in Hilden, but was also just staying involved in the world of table tennis in Sri Lanka. Do his family know about the family in Sri Lanka as his secret second wife style stuff? Yeah, no, they know. Oh, you think he's just popping. Oh, I've got to get off on business again. For the six months of Sri Lanka. Why do you keep packing your table tennis bat? I always do. I thought,

You know that on any international thing. I've been on the record saying that. Look, there are terrorists to challenge on these flights. I might have to bat him off, so to speak. So to speak. He's just absolutely sweating. It's saying way too much. And then in 1989, he was offered the role of coaching the Sri Lankan national table tennis team.

That's awesome. And that's when he moved full time to his new home. Then the Shalankan team went straight to the world championships. year. And they were held in Germany, funnily enough. And they did really well. Although it's not that well documented. I couldn't find all the results of the table tennis world championships from 1989.

From 1989? Really? You'd think there'd be some website from the association of table tennis. All I could find was from the Round of 16, which it didn't seem like there were any shankan players in there. But they talk about it like it was a really successful tournament for them. one of the players, a guy called, do you know much about showing in table tennis?

I mean, it completely invalidates me being here, but no. Do you need to list names of cricketers I've met? I can do that. Do you feel like this was like a tokenistic kind of thing? A little bit, but I'll take it. I just, we were talking about our festival runs coming up last night.

I'm like, you should come on the show tomorrow. Yeah, it was very generous. It was quite a, you know, I would say. Yes, it's Christmas Day. I've got nothing to do. Yeah. Anyway. It's nice that you guys were chatting on Christmas Eve.

It's having a cute little catch-up. Yeah, we were visiting Santa at Maya together. Oh. We sat on an e-H. Wow. Tell them what you wanted. And then I want. Do I went to the Maya Santa.

I don't know if we have time for this. But I took my little nephews there. And it's all like, I don't know if you've been recently. but everything's very commercialised now. So they like, you line up for ages and they make you wait for photos so they can sell you the photos. And then because they're trying to cattle pull everyone through like so many people. That doesn't feel like the Christmas spirit. It doesn't at all.

It is weird for a big corporation like Maya to be quite corporate about it. Yeah, I was surprised. They're trying to make you consume, are they? They've got like 12 Santas there. And obviously they don't want the kids to see all of the same. Santa's. So the very last bit you go in, it's like a corridor with all these doors on either side. It feels like you're walking into a...

I've never seen one or been in one. That is heck. But I've seen them represented on film. But it feels like you're in a brothel. And then you go into... I was wondering what you were dancing. I thought you're going to say like a maze. I'm like, okay.

You go into the room, Santa's on a bed, you know? It's like very, yeah. Wow. That's a lot. That is, that is wild. Did we have time for them? I don't know if that was worth. Oh, I think we do.

I took my baby to the same one. Is this some R&A in the city? Yeah, yeah. And... Where the windows are. What are the windows this year? Steve Irwin? Steve Irwin themed.

Wow. Very un-Christmassy, I got to tell you. No, but I was into it. They put like Santa's hats on the crocs and stuff. It was bluey last year before. The very last window was sort of Christmasy. They brought it back. But the first one's like safaris and Aussie sort of stuff.

I think it's always like the gumnut babies and stuff. They always do. It's a non-Christmas thing just Christmified. a bit. How many Christmas things could you do? Yeah, that's right. That's, uh, red nose reindeer again. This time his name's John.

Hey, I was just say that we went in and, you know, down the corridor that I didn't even think reminded me of a brothel, but, um, I went, we saw Santa, but the noise bleeder so bad. You go in there and the stand is like, there's obviously a lot of Santa's helpers because Santa can't be everywhere. So you go in there and there's one of Santa's helpers and he's, ho, ho, ho, Merry Christmas for the noise bleeder so bad. You can just hear two minutes later. Ho, ho, ho!

In the room next door. Obviously. It's also, because it's just constructed like little... Yeah, just like plywood or something. Yeah. That's so funny. Yeah. And I guess as a baby, you're probably not having to worry about that too much.

But your young nephews are they going, what the fuck's that? No, like, I didn't bring cash. All right. So one of the players, not none of them made the round of 16, but there was one player, Lilath Priantha. He did so well.

He received a world rank. ranking position. Whoa. And according to the Sunday Times, he also captained the Shlankan team and was the toast of the country after winning more than 50% of his group matches, 13 out of 22. So they're like, this guy's dominating on the world stage. A lot of group matches and 22. Whoa.

And then back home, yeah, he was just the king over there. The Sunday Times rights after returning, he won a plethora of titles, including the YMCA open, the My Lady tournament, the mayor's country. Cup, the Colombo table tennis club tournament, the Sakura Open, and the Ashok Melvani tournament. Basically the Don Bradman, Don's Bradman of domestic shankan table tennis in the early 90s. He did the grand slam in one year. Yeah.

He just dominated. This is the best. So there's no, he's got no relevance to the story at all, but I just like him. Yeah. I don't want to talk about him. As he should. All right. So after the relative success of the world championships in Germany, the idea came about for a sporting exchange

program between Sri Lanka and Germany. Fusey suggests it was Doring's idea, but according to a social media post Doring made in 2013, it was actually the idea of politician the Honourable Festus Pereira. Festus? Such a good name. Especially today. Christmas Day. Oh, my God.

Festus. This is a Christmas episode. Happy Festus. Festus greedy. So Festus, according to Doring, contacted him to discuss fostering a closer relationship with the German sporting communities. And he proposed and founded then the Sri Lanka or Asia German sports exchange program. You really want that soft S with Festus, don't you? Because if it's a heart, it's more like Festus.

Oh, yeah, festers. It's like it's a condition or something. I want to heart S, but yeah, no, I see. I appreciate you explaining. Maybe take out the S at all. It's a fetus. Oh Or take

There's still an S Fetus Think about Think out the middle of That's what I was thinking I was like Fetus The N-S

Got it Anyway so This is where Take the first S Out of my name Still Jess Oh wow You got a backup S

That's crazy You got a surplus Yeah I got too many S's We got a Wren over here Oren Oren's good Oren

Oren All right Oren See you next time So anyway The Asian German sports exchange program I'm going to be calling it AgSep from now Thank you

Without an S Agep Is that one of yours? Yeah I think Well I don't know if it's an initialism Or the other one What's the other one Dave?

Accronym Accronym Let's go with AgSep Like it AgSep Yeah Sounds like an old Fairo

Yeah Yes Anyway Anyway the program AgSep program Was about bringing people from German and Sri Lanka together through sport. It's about building communities' relationships.

Yeah. And as Doring later said, when you put a German professor, he's talking about himself, with a doctorate against a Sri Lankan fisherman on a ping pong table, their professional background disappears. It's just about the sport. So I guess what he's saying is, you know, if I'm meeting a fisherman, I'm like, fishermen. I look down upon you.

I'm looking down. I'm a professor with the doctorate. Yeah. You're a yucky fisherman. You smell like fish. But put a bat in your head. I smell like books. Which you can all agree are very nice.

Which I've read. He probably hasn't. He probably can't. He probably can probably read a fish. I'm so judgmental. And see it like the first read? Just go, yeah, that's nice. Wait, hang on.

Yeah, that first read. I was like, okay. Like you could just say, regardless of your background of, you know, socioeconomic status. What language to speak? You put, you know, on the ping pong table, it doesn't matter. Just say that. Don't be like, me, great.

Yeah. Hib, stinky. I think... You have to be at least three and a half metres away from me at all times. And then I don't have to smell your fish. Yeah. I was like, I keep a table between me and this guy. I think because the first time I read it, I didn't connect that he was talking about himself,

German professional with a doctorate. It was very specific. Let's take two random professions. For example, an acclaimed professor. From Germany. From Germany. With a doctorate. We'll give him the initials D-D.

Yeah. And let's take another profession at random, disgusting fishermen. Yeah, you, the guy I'm talking to. What do you do? Stinky. Come on, mate. But the program was great success as Fiosi writes. Schenker, Shrankans played against Germans in hundreds of tournaments in a variety of sports.

Sometimes the German teams would come to Sri Lanka. Other times, the Shalankans would go to Germany. Thank you so much for explaining that. In Doring's words, in the wake of our massive sports exchange program, several high-ranking Sri Lankan dignitaries accepted invitations to Germany and visited together with me and respective German, their respective German counterparts. The energetic Sri Lankan ministers were able to foster closer relationships with provincial councils, German cities and German ministries, resulting in numerous visits of their German counterparts to Sri Lanka.

So, you know, it was sort of like, making connections politically in all sorts of ways. Yeah, perfect. Through sport. And yes, that brings us. That's a bit of background bringing us to this week's story. So in 2003, Doring took a call from a director in the Sri Lankan Sports Ministry about setting up a handball exhibition with the German national team.

And he was happy to line it up. He'd already done so many of these. There was nothing out of the ordinary. He sounds like a great idea. The exhibition match was organized. and it ended up being quite one-sided. Germany hooped Sri Lanka 36 to 2. I'm not surprising.

They're playing European handball. Yeah, and they're coached by a table tennis coach. It's like, I know how to hit a ball. You can probably throw a ball. Yeah, there was all balls. Now, they're Charlotte. He was head of the organisation, not the coach of the team. They got a handball coach in.

All right. But yeah, of course. You know, there's a flogging, but the program wasn't just about the sport. It's about building the relationships. And so a return series was organized in Germany for the following year. So Agzep organized the logistics, as I always did, setting the team up with visas, flights and accommodation before the two-week trip to Germany in September of 2004 for a 10-match tournament. Fusie writes, the team arrived in Witteslingen, a town in southern Germany the afternoon before the tournament was set to begin. This is, I think this is our old top flight sporting teams. do it. They'll fly in basically just before the match starts. Just land next to the court. Yeah, we don't want to have to pay for a combination. But they, and they didn't have a quiet one either. They arrived and, yeah, they met the mayor of the town. They took photos, had dinner with their German counterparts and they had a really nice time. Recalling the trip, one of the Schlenken players named Ruppers Singh recalled,

we went sightseeing, we sang and danced and had a great time. Fiorzi continues. On game day, the team tried its best to show what it improved since the exhibition game. But this time around, the Shlankans didn't score a single point. Chandara, another player, said, we got hammered again. But the Germans didn't laugh at us. So that's something. That is something. And the Germans, they're known for their laughing. Yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. You know, they're just, they're a very lighthearted people. You can stop them laughing, you know, that you've won their respect. That's right.

I mean, it is funny to say that, but who was the hottest crowd in our European tour? Probably Edinburgh. Pound for pound. Oh, you know, our Berlin show was incredible. How many of them were German? I think quite a lot of them there, actually. Can I ask, how bad were you at Handball that you got them to laugh? That's so impressive.

We actually, yeah, the only goal we school was Dave scoring an own goal. Yeah, I was like, I did it. And you're like, the wrong fucking enemy. Wrong way, mate. And the crowd absolutely pissed themselves Yeah And we said, okay But yeah

Rupa Singer said You know They weren't laughing So they compared it to the early beginnings of German handball in 1900 You remind us of us You know

Before cars were common Yeah And I don't know Before there were any other teams That could do this Yeah We were fishermen too Yeah

We played with a rock But no the Germans were really encouraging in that way, and they saw this tournament as a way of building relationships. Also building the sport. It's like, it's great to have more countries involved in the great sport of the European handbook. Doring didn't make the trip over, but was able to watch highlights of the match via the nightly news in Sri Lanka. So I was getting coverage back home.

That's cool. Yeah. Back to Fiorzi. At night, there was hardly any talk of sport. This is after the game. The Germans hosted the Shlankins for another dinner. It was just a party time. Sometimes you call him Fiorzi.

And sometimes you say Fusey, like his German Husey. Should I look in with? Fusy! Hey, Fusy, hey, no. Good on you, good on us. Hachtung Fuzi. I'll try and stick with one of those. Which should prefer Fusis.

Yeah, I definitely prefer Fusy. Andrew Fusy. So, yeah, they're partying. They're having dinner. They're dancing. They're singing. They're celebrating. Ruppa singer says,

We had a very great time in this place. So off the pitch, the tour is off to amazing start. But obviously, this story isn't just about some great tour where a team's not very good at a sport. Okay. Something's going to happen. Something is going to happen. I was thinking like, maybe he's just picked something, a nice story for Christmas.

Yeah. Hey, this guy's went over, had a good time. They went back. Good night. Shalank and handball went from strength to strength. No, the very very. next morning, the team had vanished. The entire team?

The entire team. The coaching staff. What? They'd vanished. Gone. Without a trace. What? Their clothes and everything were still in their rooms. They're just gone.

They're just gone. They're driving taxis there? They're like, oh. The clones are still in their rooms. Yeah, they've got to brush their teeth. They've got to put a clothes. You got to be my sister. How many people are missing?

Yeah, what is a Hamble team? That's like 23 plus. Oh. Yeah, I think it was, yeah, 23 plus coaching stuff. That's concerning. You guys are being very lighthearted about a bunch of missing people. Yeah, that's worrying. I have a feeling I, I, is this, it's like this is, we're talking about this is during civil war, right?

Yes. So that could be why. Oh, back in Sri Lanka, it's not. It is. That's right. It's a tumultuous time. It is a tumultuous time. It is a tumultuous time.

That's why I was being glipped because I. I think it's a happy story. Okay. I don't think that there's some... Well, the first thought the German organisers had were they probably went up, out for an early morning jog and a nearby forest and got lost. All 30 of them. Yeah. Yeah, even the admin staff.

Yeah. They've gotten up for the 5 a.m. jog. We train as a team. Yeah. The driver. Everyone. Yeah, bus driver. But no, they soon found out that wasn't the case.

Things took a different turn. And the world's news was captivated by the story. This is how Routers reported it in September of 2004. I can never say that one right. What is it? Reuters. Roiders. Rooters.

Fusy. Fusy writing for Routers. I'm, for one, I'm glad that the world news has picked this up, because that means Doring doesn't just have to wait for the Sri Lankan nightly news for its updates. The way he finds out about it is pretty funny. Okay. It's not that funny, but it's... I can't wait for it to be hilarious.

Start the campaign down. I think it's going to make Germans laugh. I'm going to laugh. So this is the Rooders report from that. Let's really laugh when Doring finds out. Let's really piss ourselves. It's not funny at all. I just think it's funny in the way that it's just like to pick it over to come from an official channel.

No, no, no, no, that's going to be really good. He's Routers. Schenker is trying to solve the mysterious disappearance of its national handball team. National handball team in inverted commerce. No. That's disrespectful That's rude While on tour in Germany

But it is no easy task As the country does not have such a team What? Okay There's no such team as the Sri Lankan handball team What have they just made it up to Get to Germany I'm just reading from Ruters guys

Okay There's no such thing I mean Ruters don't get these kind of things wrong That's so funny Acting German ambassador Sri Lanka Heidi Jung says the 23 strong team, in inverted commas, managed to fool the German embassy in Colombo into issuing visas for a month-long tour beginning on September the 8th. They presented documents and the documents looked all right.

So there were no reasons to say, we can't give you a visa, she said. That's amazing. The group vanished soon after arrival and German and Sri Lankan officials have been unable to trace them. They are legally allowed to stay until October the 7th. Sri Lankan Olympic Association President Hemisiri Fernando says the sport, popular in Europe, does not have a federation body in the country. We don't have a single club, he said. Shalankan Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sport says it is unclear about the group strategy,

whether it is political asylum or illegal immigration. So, yeah, pretty, pretty. That's, so, okay, I'm glad Saren said this is during a civil war time in Sri Lanka, And that's what you think. Because even without that piece of information, I'd still be like, what the fuck is happening? Yeah, yeah. But now I'm like, I love this, this rules.

And so are they the same people that Germany came over and played against? Yes. So they were just, they were... It's all part of the... Put what a team together are... Sort of a bit of a long con. People would never... Wow.

So they probably don't even know the rules. It's incredible. They scored two points against Germany. Yeah, that's the thing that blew my mind away. There's no chance we could get on a court against any European national team and even touched the ball. I'd never touch the ball. In the year 9 PE, we played handball and I was all right at it.

All right, you're our lead. That one time. Lead, I know the positions. I mean, David goalie, I guess, if there is one. We're allowed to touch the ball with their hands. We're like so confused. Whoa. That's so good.

Okay. So, yeah, are you wondering? Did you try and apply for like uni games? Of course. As a way to escape. High school. You in 12 classways, right? Yeah.

Let's go rogue at the Gold Coast. The only reason anyone ever plays handball is to get out of somewhere. Oh, we've looked it up. It's not even a real small. Yeah, yeah. The whole history. Handball's in quotation marks. Yeah, so Doring, was he in on it?

That's something you might be wondering. Yeah, I was thinking. Has he found out about it yet? Because Jess and I are really looking forward to that bit. Well, get ready for the next paragraph. Because he was as surprise as anyone. He did not know about it. This is a few.

How did he find out? Well, I'll let Fusey tell us. The following morning, a university student from Germany who was interning with AgSep walked in a Doring's office. His face was pale. He said, Mr. Doring, do you know what happened? This is Doring recalling it. I said, don't tell me that these people have gone. Somehow I could tell by his face that they had.

He's got to be in on it. A guy who has no idea what's happened. Yeah. Oh, don't tell me that it's completely disappeared every single one of them. Don't tell me they've left their clothes behind and they've left. I'm just coming in to ask if you wanted a coffee. That's weird. That is like, anything could have happened.

Yeah. One of the players had a heart attack or something. Yeah, yeah. Your preferred cafe downstairs is closed for cleaning today. So I have to get you a coffee from somewhere else. Don't tell me they've all escaped. But no, apparently, I mean, unless he is really good at this lie, he's maintained that. Wow.

I believe that he did not know. but it is a wild assumption to jump to. That's amazing. That was so funny. He's like, he runs this big Sri Lankan body that sent a like hundreds and hundreds of Sri Lankans to and from Germany. And he finds out that a team has disappeared because an intern comes in with a pale face. Oh, I know what's happened.

But is he, he's in Sri Lanka? He's in Sri Lanka. Yeah, he's at the AgSep office. So I guess, like, you have an idea of what's happening in the world. Yeah, maybe it's not completely far-fetched. But it is funny, that's the first thing you jump to. Oh, they've done a runner, haven't they? They've done a runner.

Have you heard the news? They won 30-0. No. Absolutely. Did they score again? You could have guessed anything. Yeah. So then he had the 33-mile drive from AgSep's headquarters in Maraweller to the German embassy

in Colombo, and he was on non-stop calls with TV stations around the world through that whole drive saying, I took an extra battery with me before the drive. I knew I was going to be on the phone a lot. Is this an era of car phones? No, probably a mobile phone with a battery. Yeah. It was early 90s, though. No, it was 2004.

Okay. Do you want to apologize to me? They still had car phones in 2004? Yeah, I apologize. You are an absolute fucking turd. I thought this was more in 1994, and I was like, ooh la la la. I'm going to dunk your head in a toilet. It's the only way he learned.

Non-stop calls that. That is pretty funny. Yeah. BBC, Australia, even reporters from Saudi Arabia. This is still him quote, I've been quoted. All the news stations thought I was the mastermind, though. BBC. Australia.

Yeah. Okay. Australia is a news network. Saudi Arabia is another. Yeah. Yeah, BBC. Does he know BBC is not a country? I think he is.

He does. Oh my God. This guy's an idiot. Speaking of the BBC soon after, Doring said, we initially thought the team had got lost in the nearby woods while jogging. But he said a note had been found saying the 23 strong team had gone to France. We know they crossed Sydney and Italy, Mr. Doring said. They even left their dirty laundry, he added.

Oh, rude. The entire team of 23 men, including the coach and the manager, has taken off. He was really annoyed. And was that like a ruse to say, hey, we've gone to France, they'll look. Sort of I think it might have been Yeah Wow

I think that was a ruse But yeah They That's pretty funny Did they tell the French That the Sri Lankan croquet team or something Yeah They're all dressed in like whites

Yeah It's just a lie And a lie and a lie Is there a more ridiculous sport Than handball Well I think Surrenders thought of it The news

Was portrayed differently By different outlets Around the world And the one that Doring remembers the most is Fox News in America. Oh dear. As Fusey writes, you can probably imagine what angle they took. During says they played up the civil war happening in Sri Lanka between the Sinhalese and the Tamil Tigers,

a separatist group known for setting off car bombs in the 90s. But that was mainly in the northern part of the country, says Doring. Not to mention, he adds, there are only three Tamil players on the team. The rest were Sinalese and one was Muslim. Fusey continues. Nonetheless, the report suggested that a handball team full of Tamil terrorists had been smuggled into Germany. So, yeah, the Fox went with... Terrorists.

Terrorists. That's, yeah, I wouldn't have expected that from Fox News. Doring was like, why wasn't I on that plane? I could have handled them. I would have challenged one after another. It sounds like I would have won easily. Multiple media outlets also called the Schlanken Sports Ministry for their response. and according to a BBC report from 2004,

they responded by saying that the trip wasn't authorized, or in the words of a ministry spokesperson, handball is a sport very rarely played in Sri Lanka, and the formation of a national team is a mystery. So they're just like, I didn't even know they were. I didn't know. Doreng sort of says, that's not quite true. He said, a director of the sports ministry knew.

After all, he said that it was an official from the ministry who put Aghsep in touch with Athula Wijin Yaka, who became the Shlankan team's coach in the first place. Wijin Yaka also went missing. Are they Shlankan? They're Shlankan, yeah. And during reckons he was probably the master one. So I'm doing a bit of reading between the lines,

but maybe the ministry generally didn't know, but someone in there was sort of in on this whole. whole ruse. It's so amazing. Like, if it is someone's idea, then they just start asking. I guess they have to ask, they have to be pretty young, pretty fit people for it to work. You can't ask like your grandpa to be on the handball team. People would be suspicious, right? But you have to start, hey, I've got this idea. We can go to Germany. And then you've got to get at least 30 people in on it. Keep it the secret. Yes. And then possibly officials too. That's amazing. Yeah. And yeah, to pull it off wild. Um, and, and, and,

I think another reason was mainly young men is they were going to try and work to earn money to send back home as well. Gotcha. So anyway, let's go back a bit to 2002 to figure out how this all happened. I had car phones then. Can you excuse us for a second? Dave and I just have to go to the toilet. No, no, please. I'll be good.

A.J. I had the flushing sound effect. Oh. Dave sounded like he enjoyed it. Oh, don't do it again. Oh, stop. Oh, I hate this. So, yeah, 2002, the era of Carfans. Carfons are huge.

I'm there. This is a couple of years before the disappearance. And I quoted a couple of players earlier. And I was able to do that because they both spoke to Andrew Fusey, talking him through the whole thing. Wow. And like I said, this is probably the most detail. So they're not dead.

account I can find no they're not dead wow that's good because imagine if we're just like oh they've just they've done this to sneak away and it turns out they were all murdered oh they did get lost in a forest and they fell like in a hole yeah yeah and we're like oh yeah but they're all dead the germans take handball very seriously yeah you violate into the sactity of our great sport so um so one of the players i was talking about before uh roper singer um were received a phone call in two thousand and two. He was about 23 at the time. And this was a friend who wanted to talk about leaving Sri Lanka for Europe.

And this is how Ruppersinger related to Fiorzi. Of course, I wanted to go. He had relatives in Italy. He could finally go and join them. He's like, maybe I could even get a job spinning pizzas. But when he thought about leaving the island nation, he envisaged getting on a boat and sailing across the ocean inside an 8 by 20 foot metal box like a piece of cargo.

That's how my relative has got to Italy, he said. Not legally, but via boat and container lorry. Which sounds like an awful way to travel. Yeah. And quite unsafe as well. They talk about how others had tried that and not made it to the other side. They died on the way. But he was also like, I can't do that.

He's like, my parents would never let me anyway. I can't do it that way. and he was ready to rebuff by his friend's invitation. But of course, this plan didn't involve a dangerous sea voyage. It involved handballed. Okay, I'm listening.

I can imagine rapper singer's reply came. Chandana received a similar call. His came from his brother, who was already living in Italy. So, like, outside of the group, there are a lot of people who are sort of putting all the wheels in motion. And apparently in Italy,

there's quite a large Sri Lankan expat community. Fussey writes. There's a plan, his brother told him. It would cost four grand, but Chandana could pay back his brother when he got to Rome. He just needed to learn handball. That's $4,000 of handball lessons.

Chandana had never played handball before. He had never even held one. He did, however, play volleyball in high school. He never made it a first base, which is obviously a different sport as well. Do you think of make it out as a sport? Yeah, to me. Yeah.

That's how I score. Yeah, touchdown. So, yeah, he played volleyball in high school, and his team actually won the national title. So he was handy at sport, which is good for handball. You know, the ball's even smaller. It's even easier. Yeah, I can just grab it.

Yeah, we're going to keep tippity tapping at him. Yeah, he's just trying to. a dig and pike a handball. So he says it didn't take him too long to learn the basics. There's two 30 minute halves. A player can run three steps without dribbling the ball. And the goal was to score. There were other rules as well, but they're the only ones he could remember.

And that cost $4,000. No, the four, I don't think the four grand was to learn that that was to pay, I think everyone to get into the scheme had to pay a fee. A bit of a buy-in. Yeah, which I'm guessing was maybe paying off a few officials. or some of it. Right. You've got to get fake uniforms made.

Yeah. Yeah, that's true. Fuzi continues. The first part of the plan was simple. Play in the exhibition match being put on by the AgSep. For it, the Schlenken Sports Ministry hired a handball coach, like I talked about before, Widgen, Ayaka, who Doring thinks might have been the mastermind. And the team had the 23 Schlenken man, and then they'd go and play the national tournament in Germany,

play handball, and then promptly disappear. Pretty straightforward. Bada bing. Bada bong. Bada bong. Bada gone. So yeah, I think, like you said, scoring it all against the Germans.

Two. It was wild. They had learnt the game a couple of weeks earlier. What an indictment on the German team. Yeah. No offense to the goalie. Oh, you would remind us of the German team in the 1900. Yeah.

We were trained to us. skip of Munich. Yeah, so they had hardly learnt a game, and they also must have been, I mean, I would have been shitting myself at any moment someone would have figured out the scheme, and you're playing against some of the best in the world, wild, so yeah. In hindsight, Doring says there were probably a few little signs that should have or could have made him suspicious, for instance. They had a photo shoot early, one of the first times he met him, and they all wore

suits and ties. And he said, most athletes I've met throughout the years normally wear gym clothes. So maybe I could have caught it on there. They wear their uniform. Yeah. He's like, they all smell like books, which I was very surprised by it. Yeah, normally they stink. Yeah, so the new coach had a couple of weeks to get them prepared, according to a

few zy. Practices were held a few times a week. So maybe they had like five or six training sessions for it. So, you know, enough to figure out a game. handball. Yeah. Grab a ball, chuck a ball. I think I got it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Imagine the coach. Yeah, yeah, we got it. I play cricket at the moment and I hate training. Imagine like you, how committed do you think they are at this training session? It's like such a chore. Maybe it's not worth getting out of the country. Can't we just play a game?

Three times a week. Yeah, it's too much. I've trained a lot playing basketball as a teenager, but I didn't have anything else to do in my life. other than school, you know, so it was fine. Now, if I'm playing a sport and they're like, and there's training twice a week, I'm like, I'm not playing. Sorry. That's bullshit.

Don't have the time. Who's got the fucking time? That's crazy. So they learned the basics. None of them at all had any handball experience because the whole country didn't have any handball experience. But the whole key was to appear like they knew what they were doing. At least to stop the officials feeling suspicious.

Take it so you make it. They ended up scoring two points to 30. then they flew to Germany for the tournament and like I said they had a great time with the Germans. The Germans were great hosts which is a little bit heartbreaking and apparently Ruppers singer said that lady he was like

we were feeling pretty bad the night before as they've been the best hosts and we're like oh we're going to be ditching them tomorrow morning and you showed us such a good time we're going to move to your continent we love it. That's nice the ultimate compliment

after dinner the shranking team went back to their rooms packed up their clothes, obviously not their dirty laundry, and waited until just before dawn. At 5am, they finally slipped out of their hotel. All of us in groups of two and four walked outside in different directions, says Chandana. We didn't speak to others about where we were heading to. That way, just in case any of them got caught, they wouldn't have any information that might jeopardize one another. Clever.

Yeah, so they all just like, I think it feels like, was it the Great Escape or something was like that? They were just all one off in their different ways after they escaped. The only thing they had in common was that they wanted to escape. Right. So, yeah, they weren't travelling as a group. Yeah. So interesting.

It is interesting, but also it makes sense too, because I was picturing before, like, it would be pretty easy to spot a group of 30 Sri Lankans in the German countryside or something. Yeah, you'd be like, well, you don't see that every day. And they look like they kind of know handball a bit. Yeah. But yeah Even though they weren't travelling together Most of them were heading to Italy Because there was already like

Quite a community in Italy Which I didn't realise I didn't know that Because Melbourne's got quite a big Schlanken Ex-Pact community But no handball here No handball, that's right I mean we're in Eurovision

Maybe we should be in Euro handball Yeah We went there's a What was that restaurant I went to for good Tucker That Schenken restaurant Yeah it was called Apalis That's so good

Yeah There's a few shankan restaurants around Coburg now as well. Yeah, there are. And they're mostly ex-handball players. But they know how to cook. It's one thing people are players, no. It's how to cook.

Chandana said, we knew from our relatives and friends. Once we reached Italy, there was no way of sending us back. They just saw Italy as like a safe zone. Italian people are very friendly and they like us to work in their restaurants, Chandana said. So yeah, that's the story. They all basically just went to Italy and they all got in. And they were allowed to stay.

They're allowed to stay, yep. But maybe it's not all happy because, yeah, it seems like not all of them enjoyed the Italian way of life once they got there. As Fusey writes, within a decade, more than half of the 23 players would return home. Chandana said, I came back after just six months. Yeah, right. My child was sick. I felt home sick. I couldn't find a job, even though I was promised one.

I wrote a letter to Mr. Doring and asked for forgiveness. So he headed back home. Right. I mean, it's brewing. He's leaving his kids, his family behind. That would be so hard. With the intent of sending money back and supporting them, but still makes it all a lot more difficult. Did he pay his brother the 4,000?

Yeah, no, his brother's still furious. Ruppers singer went back to Sri Lanka in 2008, so he lasted four years. So he enjoyed it quite a lot more and still has an Italian visa. and he can quote, go back to Italy any time I want. I was in Italy for four years working in a pizzeria as a pizza baker. It was a good income. I could support my family in Sri Lanka who were very poor.

I had a great time. But yeah, so he still gets back there and can get back there. So he got there, got the visa sorted out and everything. That's amazing. As for Doring, he originally wanted to bring every member of the team to court. He was furious. Yeah. Because he's like, I've set up,

And because his whole, that organization kind of fell apart because it was, no one trusted them. He's like, no, I swear these other people, they do play table tennis. Yeah, yeah. He said, they made me look like a fool. After the incident, the German embassy blacklisted AgSept from ever participating in sporting events in the country again. That is a shame. That's a bummer. No more teams got visas thereafter.

That's the sad side of the whole thing, he says. Fuzi continues. Over the years, though, because he really was quite annoyed with the whole. whole team. You can understand that. Totally. But over the years, he's developed a better sense of why the players did what they did. This wasn't a story of crime or smuggling or malicious intent. Each of the men on the team supported an average of five to ten family members back in Sri Lanka. He estimates. And he says that he has it on good authority that each of those players sent money back to their families every month. For them then, this is, this is Fusie, how he finishes

this great article. For them then, they were playing a much more important game, a game of survival. Good stuff. I thought I was going to say a game of life, but that's even better here. But imagine if you were a real handball fan. You read that. Come on, mate. Handball is life.

Yeah, come on. It's important. How do you? Disrespected our sport. That's the story. And yeah, like I said, there's not as much info as maybe I would have like to tell, would have loved to tell more individual stories of how they got through Italy and whatnot. Yeah, yeah.

It has been turned into a movie. This is from a Sunday Times article by Sissitha Fernando. Fernando, a very common surname in Sri Lanka. I already knew, but I've realised more so in the reading about it. She writes, or he writes, or they write, internationally acclaimed a full Monty fame director, Huberto Pasolinoi, is in town to cinematically capture the somewhat tragic yet hilarious true story of the Schlenken National Handball team,

which disappeared in Germany of 2004. According to the news reports, the then team in inverted commas had fooled the German embassy in Colombo to issue visas for a month long tour in Bavaria from September 8th, 2004. And the worst was most of them had never seen or played the game. So yeah, they got turned into a movie in 2008, which I think maybe one day we could watch it for the Dugan movie club. I think so.

I'd be up for that. Yeah, I'd be up for that. There's a photo with the cast and the reason, like I knew something was wrong straight away. They're not wearing suits and ties. It seems all they're wearing. Come on, mate. They look, they're great, jazz.

They look not too far different from the World Cup winning. Yeah, the one-day cricket team. Yeah. Yeah, they look like athletes there in their gym gear. Yeah, they're actors. Yeah. They're like, they have to, they probably. had to do a few weeks of detoning to be more accurate.

Anyway, that's the story of the disappearing schlaken handball team. I love it. What a story. Me either, but I'm also glad that they didn't end up in a hole. Yes. That's nice. That's a relief. Yeah, they all ended up in a pizzeria.

I find it a bit disparaging when they keep saying, team, fake team. Yeah. As soon as you put a group of people together, they can score two points against the German national handball team, you're a team. That's a team. That's a team. Also, it takes so much teamwork to coordinate. Yes.

That's the ultimate teamwork. Yeah. Let's take out those inverted comments. Let them organise the next handball world cup. They're incredible at organisation. We won't have team in inverted commas in the title of this episode. Absolutely not. No, no.

We respect them as a team. That's right. Yeah, I don't know what should I call it. Because I obviously deliberately left out the disappearing things. I do love ones like that when I'm like, where is this going? Yeah, it's always fun. So, yeah, I don't know what we should call it. Had you heard of that, sir, before saying?

I hadn't actually. Yeah, it'd obviously been suggested by a few people in America and elsewhere. But yeah, I don't recall it. But obviously it did make world news at the time. Because 2004 is also an Olympic year. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Was it Athens?

And they play European handball of these summer Olympics. Yeah. So like, was that would be, that feels like that would require like real good subterfuge. You would need like an Olympic committee like to back you and all that sort of stuff. Yeah, too much. This way was better. Yeah. I think cool runnings.

This is like cool runnings. If on the day of the thing, they're like, where do they go? John Candy and all of them have gone. Well, Matt, fantastic report. What a story. Hey, Merry Christmas. Hey, Merry Christmas. Hey, a little gift to you, Jess.

Turkey? Oh. Loose turkey? Yeah, all right. Now, back to drive in the car, okay? Done your report, you can concentrate. But before we say goodbye to Surin, we would remind people that you're going on your tour.

What's your show called? It's called There's a World Where My Head Ought Be. It's a very artistic title. Cool. I love it. And a funny show. And yeah, I'll be in Adelaide for French Festival in the final week. I should have double-checked the dates.

I think it's like the 18th to the 22nd. Brilliant. And then Melbourne Comedy Festival. Sorry, that's March. 18th to the 22nd of March. And then Melbourne Comedy Festival is the whole month, which is like the 27th of April, of March to the 20th of April. Brilliant. At Melbourne Town Hall.

Amazing. Check it out. Check out, Saran. One of the best. You got to get along. 18th to 22nd of March. So we don't overlap, unfortunately. I'm there 11th to the 15th of March.

I'm going to do who knew it if you get there a few days early. Oh, it's tempting. Beautiful city. It's always a good time. That time of year as well. When are you there, day? March from the fourth to the eighth. We're all like back to back

Back to back I'm doing my show with Sammy P Sammy Peterson We're doing our show together But also on the Wednesday March the 5th I'm doing a live book sheet I've been invited I can't believe this to be part of the Adelaide Riders

Festival For book cheats So good That makes no sense You're right You could be invited To the readers festival Sure

They said they wanted to find something That was accessible Oh yeah And they chose you Yeah they were like You know people don't even have to read And they can come along and enjoy something.

So yeah, check it out. Thanks so much. We'll be back for everyone's favorite section of show in the minute. But thanks so much to join us. Thanks for having me. Well, that brings us to everyone's favorite section of the show. And while we did sub out at one Seren,

we have subbed in one AJ. Hi, everyone. I'm so glad to be here for the best part of the show. Yeah. And AJ, please edit that bit out. We'll remove me from this entire section. I've been told by a few listeners that you don't always edit out things that I say

AJ please edit that out I was thinking about this yeah I reckon we need like a safe word I agree because there's AJ edit this out but that's like you saying that as part of the joke and then there's hey AJ my reputation is on the stake yes can you please I don't think I'm ever joking okay really okay AJ take him really literally now okay

and wait and see how short the fucking episodes are yeah yeah future episodes are going to have very little man. I think, look, I, yes, that would be my preference. But I, you know, I would say, yeah, I think you make a judgment call, leave it in if it's funny enough. But I, generally speaking, I would say edit it out if I say edited out. Do you know why people find you funny?

Is this information you want, Matt? No, I don't know. Yeah. It's kind of like finding out when you'll die or something. Yeah. Do you want to know as a comedian why people find you funny? I mean, I, yeah, I don't know. I think it would be different because I think I, you know.

I think a lot of it is the stuff you ask me to eat it out as part of your schick. Well, yeah. It's a bit of a character. I've been working on. I know. Do you want me to step out of the character for a while? Yeah. Okay, well, really nice to meet you.

My name is Gertie. I'm, yeah, this Matt's shirt character I've been working on for years and, you know, I've been living. I'm starting to wonder where it starts. Yeah. And where Gertie ends. It's terrifying to consider.

But, yeah, no, I think, yeah, I think this is, this feels really good. I don't know. Why am I still putting on the voice? This feels really good. It's me, Gertie. It feels good to me out. It's so fun.

And it's so wonderful to finally meet you, Gertie. So I'm going to make you a referral, AJ. How much of this do you want me to edit out? Maybe Gertie needs to come through when you legitimately want something edited out. That's how I'll know. That's the code word. It's Gertie. Gertie.

Uh, Gertie here, AJ. Please do me a favor. AJ, how do you handle it when maybe 20 minutes into an episode? Matt just says something like, plenty of stuff to be edited out there, A.J. it is I cannot describe in words how unhelpful it is to know by that point that you want me to edit something out 20 minutes ago. Yeah, what do I, how do I handle that better? So, I mean, you would message you at the time. You would write down a time code as it happened.

You're rolling your eyes and I get it. I know. I wouldn't do it either. I don't feel regret instantly. There's a, you know, a 20 minute delay sometimes. It would be so funny though to just look over it. man, he's just gone sign. He's got a little notebook.

It's right. It's pretty good for us, though, because if he says something tedious, we can just point at the notebook. Write that down. Write that down. Yeah. But that's the problem.

It ends up becoming a bit, and then it loses all its power. You'll start doing it. And I'm like, is that a real one? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's exactly it, Matt.

Saying Ed is it at AJ has become a bit. It can be printed on shirts. It can be printed on shirts. That's important. That's important for podcast merch. Is it? Yeah. All right, well, let's print out some shirts.

Sex Marta. A few people want some Sex Marta merch. Oh, get that going for sure. We're writing it. We're writing lyrics at the moment for the first Sex Marta song. Cool. What's the song called? Well, the working title is Pork and the Pope, but, or pork by the Pope, I forget.

Both are so good. It must be so hard to choose. Yeah, yeah. Maybe that's track one and track two. Yeah, that's confusing for the fans, but every. No, but it's like it's the same sort of story, but from different perspectives. Oh, it's actually a really powerful. A Rochaman situation.

That's brilliant. Yeah. Which I only got to explain to me very recently. And I haven't, but I'll nod at it anyway. Yeah. Yeah, Hiroshima. Did you say, Rushma? Yeah.

Yeah, it's like that. Hey, Jay, this is fully out of context for you, but here's a bit that I wanted to share from the episode. Yeah. Which is about, have you heard of the Shalankan handball team? No. So they... But I'm sure I will hear about... Yeah, you will hear about it.

Yeah, you will hear about it. Yeah, about that. For Christmas. Anyway, they... Just, I'm going to tell a slight extra bit of the story here. Cool. Because, so all you need to know is that a Shalankan handball team was formed, traveled, traveled over to Germany to play, and then they disappeared.

and what was found in their room was a note and dirty laundry. Somehow I forgot to mention the note before, but I've just found a copy of it. I'm going to try and read it. Oh, no, it turns out the whole reason they made a fake handball team just to get to Europe so they could. They explained that in that. An Argo situation almost then.

Another movie reference, such as how I see the world. The lens with which I see the world. it writes for everyone we want to say thank you you're very friendly we have decided to leave Germany and travel to France

we want to find it's a bit scrappily maintained I think it might have been a lefty I think there's a bit of a smudging happening we want to find a better future life

this is our own decision and we also will take full responsibility and risk for our decision you all were very friendly and nice to us okay so that too many times now so it's like i don't think they were friendly it's weird isn't it you're great you were great you were great you were great you were great please forgive us for our decision we don't have any other way right now we can't go back to shalanka so we will go now please don't worry about us We will be fine. We are living out of Germany. You have done a lot for us and thank you all again with love, signed manager and a signature.

So that's the note. Okay. And then there's in brackets to the bottom. We go with our manager. He came today this morning. Okay. He came. Just a little.

It's behind the curtain of his morning. Yep. what he got up to and now we're off. He said, well, just give us five minutes. That's our son of the day. Give us three minutes and I'll see you guys out in the court. Yep. By the time you've grabbed your staff, I'll be ready.

I'll be done. I'll be done. Don't you worry about that. I am very efficient. And there is, there's actually, like there's quite a history. I didn't talk about this either, but, you know, this isn't unique. This happens a bit. And, you know, it's just a way that.

that people can legitimately travel maybe from a place that's in a bit of strife. Like they were fleeing a civil war, basically. But yeah, obviously not the ideal system. But they don't usually fake their way to it, do they? Often it's like you're at the Olympics. You are a high jumper. Yes. You are world class.

And then you seek asylum when you're there. But they created an entire fake team, which is amazing. Yeah, so good. And they scored two points against Germany. A real team. In their first ever match. It's been playing for, what, two weeks? I can't wait to listen to all of those.

And then you hearing the recap? Yeah, yeah. All right. So anyway, I thought I probably should read that out. So that brings us to everyone's favorite section of the show, actually. AJ, thanks so much for joining us for this. Oh, no problem. First up, we're going to give you some facts, quotes and questions.

Actually, AJ, I don't know if you know this, but this section actually has a jingle. You're kidding me. Fact quote or question. For all. all the listeners, it's amazing in real life. Thank you. Thank you. Hey, he always remembers the ding.

She always remembers this thing. So, what have we got? In this section of the show, if you're on our Patreon at patreon.com slash to go on pod, linked in the show notes. So you can sign up on a bunch of different levels. What are some of the things you can get involved in there, Dave? We are doing four bonus episodes per month. It's about 250 in the back catalogue also to unlock instantly.

We've got a new Dungeons and Dragons campaign coming out at the end of January. We do bonus reports. We do quizzes. We do updates on our tours, that kind of stuff. You also hear about the tools for anyone else. Get discounted tickets. Get to be in the Facebook group, which is a really lovely place to be. And you also vote for topics. So you get to, was this a voter for one? This was a voter for one by people on the Sydney Schoenberg level, which is also the level where you can give us a fact, quote, a question. So that, yeah, that is one of the, it's pretty much the highest level, I think. Yeah, so it's a top tier in that. means that there's less people at that level,

so your vote goes really far. Sometimes it is, we are literally refreshing the graph of the vote because there'll be three topics and they'll all be tied. In this case, that wasn't the case. Okay.

It's one in a landslide, about 60% of the vote in a three horse race. Wow. Yeah, but so, fact quota question section, I'm going to read out four here. You can give us a fact quote question,

whatever you want, progress suggestion, people do all sorts of things. Yeah. By the way, AJ, it's a Christmas day for people listening live if you want to say anything to them. Oh, well, Merry Christmas. Oh, my God, that's not a bad one. Well, that's really nice.

I made that up myself. I came up with that just now. That's actually really nice. That is really sweet. That actually means a lot. Oh, you're so welcome. So, yeah, people who give us facts, quotes and questions also get to give us, or give themselves a title. I want to read out four right now.

I'm reading them out for the first time. AJ, can you verify that? Confirm. Yes, I can see them in front of them for the first time. You can see them from 3Ks away, I think, with their font size. Yeah, by the way, I was just talking before we started recording. For all those who have ever wondered, the text size on the spreadsheet is huge. Size 14.

My God. Can you believe it? I can't. Can I show you what my report is what font size is? 18. But what do you zoom on? What's the zoom on, though? because that changes it too.

100%. Oh, only 100. Yeah, nice. Right, but you do have a very large laptop as well. You've got the biggest screen MacBook road. Yeah, yeah. And if you look at mine, which is just in front of us, it's so small that it inhibits my work quite originally.

It is, yeah, it is interesting here. Some, some things are made fun of, like your eyes not working as well, whereas other things aren't, and I won't mention them. But you both have a few. I've got everything working at 100%. At all times. I never make fun of your esophagus. You're trying to eat a steak, are you?

Good luck. Sorry, can we get this steak blended, please? Look how little he has to cut up his steak. Everyone, gather around. Look at this freak. Look. Yeah, teach you to make fun of my laptop. I've ruined it.

you. So the first one this week comes from Katie May Westgate, the first. I don't know if it's a typo. It's just there's a floating eye there afterwards. Wow, it's an honour. And Katie's got the title of Group Monster in brackets according to Matt. I don't remember saying that. Wow.

But I do mean it. And Katie has a gratitude. This is the first time I've had a gratitude? Yeah, I don't think we've had gratitude. That's nice. writing, I just want to say thank you to everyone I met in Clapham and Ballum after the live shows. Especially thank you to Dave from Suffolk. Oh.

How much time do you need to feel like there wasn't, I didn't leave a gap there. Yes, that's my name. Suffolk. She's made a mistake. She's made a mistake. I don't live in Suffolk. Yeah, yeah. I don't need to Suffolk.

Sorry, please continue. Especially want to thank Dave from Suffolk who looks. looked after me and helped me cope with my social anxieties. Everyone was so lovely and friendly, apart from Matt, who called me a monster and forgot where I was from, even though I told him the night before, and we had a conversation about the river Trent. Okay. Oh my God.

This is your best way. Yeah, this is the best way to let people know that they've hurt your feelings. That's gratitude to David from Suffolk. Yeah, Dave from Suffolk was really nice. Unlike Matt. Okay, so maybe Matt was lovely too. Okay. Yeah, here we go.

You didn't have to come and have a few drinks with us. So good on him for that. Hope you managed to get to the end of the third Kingsman film. We did not. And hopefully it won't be too long until you come back to the UK. Yes, I'm already messaging Giles occasionally going, man, what do you reckon? We organise another two?

What do you think? Really? I'm messaging Giles too and just say, where's my money? So, you know, it's interesting. Different dynamics. Pay up you dog He's done a runner Have you done a runner Josh?

Oh he's got to Germany to play handball He said he'll pay us once he's back from Germany Playing handball Thank you so much Katie May Westgate the first Okay Monster

I don't know I'm the context there I'm sure I was being very funny I think you're being very funny Very charming Yeah yeah It doesn't come off that way in text No because it's just tone

I think Katie probably wrote that In a really charming way Yeah Yeah Read it with a smile That's what I do to make myself feel better about frosty messages from people. Oh, that's nice.

Let me just read one of the, the, um, everyone was so lovely and friendly, apart from Matt, who called me a monster and forgot where I was from, even though I told him the night before and we had a conversation about the river Trent. No,

that's better. I think that worked. That is nice, sir. To me, that sounded like, that was, isn't it more brutal when they're trying to hide it?

It's, it's filled with love and, yeah, and adoration. think. Well, I want to say, thank you, Katie May, the monster Westgate. Next one comes from Murray Somerville, our very own... Just leave it. Pause for the edit there. Do you name it and take a note on this?

No, I will remember by the sound of Jess blowing in, as I think. No, I think that was so subtle. See, this is a perfect example of now this has made it into the episode. It was supposed to be subtle, but then I made eye contact an age. Jay that I was laughing while following my nose. It went for about eight minutes. I'm sorry. It was that or I was just going to sniff for the next 20 minutes.

The next one comes from Murray Somerville, who designed our poster design there, who knew it. Murray. Oh, wow. What do you call it? Logo? Thank you. Fantastic artist, Murray. So great.

Dave, did you know this? He flew down for our taping. No. No. Oh my God. No, Murray, we're so sorry. So sorry, Murray. The taping that got postponed.

There was also someone who came from Perth. Oh, really? I didn't know that. Both Murray and, I'm sorry, I'm forgetting your name just right now, get in contact. When we're, because I imagine it's hard for you to come over again. When we're next in Brisbane and Perth, we will give you free tickets to our shows. Yes, of course. To make up, we're so sorry about that.

So Matt and I were meant to do our taping at the start of December a couple weeks back. But the whole crew got COVID. There was no one left to film it. Yes. We have had to postpone it. Looks like we're going to go for Friday, January 17. Hopefully that's been announced properly by now. Yeah, great.

Yeah, the patrons will be the first to know. They would already know anyway. But, uh, yeah. Murray and our Perth friend should be the very first to know. Yeah, so sorry about that, everyone. Yeah. It was on the day to, on the morning, we woke up, be like, sorry, guys, we can't, we can't film it. I, oh, what you heard about it for me, I woke up to a bit of a chain of messages.

Yeah. And I'm like, oh, oh. Yeah. waking up with that that nervous excitement turning to that kind of yeah such a weird feeling whenever I've got something on the books until it happens I am riddled with anxiety about it getting cancelled I expect it yeah yeah often I'm I love a cancellation not in this case yeah that's it depends what it is I love a night off but you're like no we've been practicing and relearning our shows we're ready to go quite like to move on just get it done

yeah absolutely right before Christmas and yeah yeah another the month of trying to hold on to it. Yeah, trying to remember it all. I'm going to try and turn it into a silver lining. There's a few people who've said that they weren't able to make that date and they'll be able to make the next one hopefully. So maybe that's a silver lining. But yes, we apologize to anyone who was traveling for it.

Sorry. Including Murray. But yeah, there is a spot on Dave's floor for you, Murray. If you come back just to save on an acom. It's always always available for you, Murray. So Murray has given himself the title of Dufus. Okay. Hell yeah.

Been there, brother. And Murray's got a question writing, there's a house up on the road. I'll say that again. There's a house up the road. What was my... Goody says cut that out, AJ. So yeah, already, it's now content.

We've already done it. We have to leave that in there. It did not even remain useful for one episode. There's a house. up the road for me that makes my skin crawl every time I'm walking past it with my hounds. I love the, I've never heard anyone call their dog's hands. Take the hound out. That's sick.

Release the hoons. Their yard and now the footpath is a field of cobbler's pegs. Yes, cobbler's pegs, those tiny terrors of the plant world. I've never heard of cobbler's peck. I have to look them up too. I'm googling. One look at those spiky little seeds and my skin starts crawling. As if they're already sticking to me, as if they're already sticking to me in my greyhounds.

I'm going to look them up as well. Because I wonder if I, I just don't know the name for them. It's like a flower, like a couple of, it's called blackjack when I googled it. Ooh. Maybe it's the sparky part? They're quite pretty, the flowers. What is it the sparky bit that gets stuck on you? Yeah.

Yeah, I think so. Yeah, I wonder if they're just more of a Queenslander thing. Yeah. I don't, I feel like they're probably the ones that my, every time I go walking with a group of friends, we walk our dogs together. One of my friends is always like, look out for that one.

So maybe it's, maybe that's what she's talking about. She calls it devil weed, but, because it is a weed. Go to Wikipedia.org. Other names include hitchhikers, blackjack, beggar ticks,

farmers friends and Spanish needle. Cobbler's pegs, they're all good, but why use all these fantastic names on the same place? aren't spread them out. Yeah, agreed. There's a whole page dedicated to it on the Brisbane City Council website.

Okay. So they're obviously a big pest up there. Anyway, back to Murray's writing here. I can imagine the feel of them clinging to my socks and my legs and somehow getting into places they have no right to be. Just looking at cobbler's pegs gives me the major X. What's your version of cobbler's? pegs.

What really makes your skin crawl? I'd love to hear it. Mostly so I know I'm not overreacting to my botanical nemesis. That could be another name for one of our songs, Dave. Botanical nemesis. Yeah, I think it's a great song title for Sex Mater. Yeah, I didn't want to be in the band. That's perfect.

That's worked that really well. I mean, you definitely could be if you want to be. No, that's okay. You're just not a lyricist. I've never yet lyrics have never been my strong point me and David we had a chat trying to come up with

Nick Cave-ish lyrics a while ago so I've just sort of I've gone now we're gonna ban yeah now so what gives you the what makes your skin crawl I was gonna say this Mario answers his own question

yep yeah cobbler's peg absolutely um I've developed an aversion to nail files.

Yeah. The sound of other people doing it, the feeling of it, even looking at the nail, I go, oh, yeah, that's pretty recent. I've got a, I don't know if I've talked about this before. I got a weird-ish thing where,

you know, like the metal sticks that hang things on at supermarkets or shops, whatever, I feel like they're piercing through my eyes. Yeah, looking at them. You feel that? Yeah, because working in retail, you had to,

if they didn't have anything on them, you had to take them off or put something on them. Sorry, just in case people at home don't get it as well. I don't think I get. Like a hook, like for me,

it was clothing. So like the hooks that you're, the metal rods that clothes would, would hang on. Oh, there's really small ones for small items. Like chewing gum or anything. They sort of just come up out.

But you're worried about it. I'm not worried about it. I just feel the physical. Oh, you think about it. Yeah. I can, like I can feel it. So I can't even.

look at them. It doesn't always happen, but then sometimes it will and I can't. Especially if you get close to them. Yep. Wow. I agree with that. And in shops, I'm like, oh, you got to take that off or put something on it. Because that's a hazard.

Anyway. Yeah. Yeah, that is a bit gross. And that and all, any sort of bodily fluid talk while I'm trying to eat, I can't take it out of my head. Yeah, right. Which you two have both found out, um, I accidentally while doing it that I'm like, But, well, I'm not eating.

That bagel's done. We love to talk about piss. Yeah, he just gets too horny and has to put the foot down. Yeah, exactly. Especially when it's a bagel. Too horny. Yeah. That's pretty good.

AJ, just, anything coming to mind for you? I think all my answers to this are digital, which is why, which is because. fingers. I don't go out very often. At the moment, the thing that's pissed me off the most recently or made me like, inconsolably like angry is whenever like the IRD

contact me and I'm not just being like I don't like doing my taxes right it's like they'll be like the New Zealand ATO yes sorry yeah the New Zealand

inland revenue department so they'll so you do it you do it is there some sort of a wet revenue department as well I'm not sure

but I imagine so but it'll be like hey you've got a secure mail log in and you go to in and you click the link on the text and it doesn't take you anywhere. So you go to the website and there's no obvious way to go there.

And you ring them up and you don't even get through to an answer phone message. And it's just like what they're asking me is to give them $900 to $5,000 for something I don't understand why I'm paying. And they're making it so hard to do. To take your money. To take. Yeah. I will give you the money. Just why do you have to make me?

like debase myself to get to this point, you know? That's my answer. Yeah, no. I get you. Yeah. Who will they again? Inland revenue. Yeah, inland revenue department.

Oh, yeah. So the American one's like IRA, right? Yeah, yeah. So, yeah. So, yeah, so they're inland revenue as well. IRS. IRS. IRS, yes.

IRA is the Irish Republican. Yeah, that's actually. Very different. Yeah. Anything come to mind, Jess? No. being asked questions yeah being asked

questions so whenever there's a question on that kind of question what about what about feeling like and I mean I think everyone feels this a bit

but I reckon you like it you really feel empathy for like if we're doing it a merch thing after a show and the staff

you can start feeling that they want to be gone yeah yeah you like you've like I fully shut down. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

My brain shuts down. People are talking to me and I'm staring over their shoulder. Just like the staff look bad at me. Oh, because people are stacking up chairs or wiping down things and looking at you like, turning the house lights on. Yeah. Don't enjoy that. Don't enjoy it. Yeah, and that's such a funny because we're also like feeling for the people who've been lining up as well.

So you're like, screwing someone either way. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Thank you very much, Murray. I'll be up in Brisbane early in the new year so I'll keep my eyes peeled for these coblers

what are they cobbler's pegs? I guess cobblers they have these little nails don't they do like wedge things open or whatever is that the idea? Maybe. Thank you Mary. The next one comes from Patrick J.

Early saying, oh, it's a brag. That's a good sign. Hey, gang. Just a quick little brag about the last couple of months. I recently got engaged, actually, the day after meeting Matt and Dave at Who Knew at 100. Congratulations. What was the more exciting moment for a moment?

Yeah, a weekend. Yeah, because I'm pretty sure. Now, he was the big fellow, wasn't he from Ballarat? Oh, great. I think he even had a question on the 100th episode. So I think that probably tipped it over in favor of him. Do we inspire it, maybe? Yeah, yeah.

Or yeah, because he doesn't say, he didn't say if he did the, I imagine his partner proposed to him after seeing him involved in a live podcast. Oh, shit. Go on, man. It's very sexy. This guy is going to the stratosphere. Yeah. Lock it down.

I also recently started a new job and I am loving it. Oh. And one of my songs got put in a bunch of Spotify radio playlist and was heard by like 10,000 new listeners around the world, which is friggin mind-blowing for me. That's good feeling. Basically, everything's coming up, Milhouse. Nice. Thanks to you and the pod for soundtracking

what has been some of the best few months of my life. Oh, that's sick. I love to hear that. That's awesome. Patrick J. Early. So good. And I think Patrick, yeah, if you haven't, you've got to post that tune in the Facebook group.

Finally this week, Adam Tripskinsky. Adam Tripsinski. Something like. Sorry, Adam. And Adam's title is Mover Shaker and producer. Oh. And under fact quote or question,

break or suggestion or whatever like, he's written, stove. Okay. Correct. It would be so good if he's just asking us for stove recommendations. Doing a kitchen renner.

What do you reckon? Smeg? Yeah, smig was the only, all I could think of was smig. Meeley. Don't say, Meg. The Bosch door. Westinghouse.

Doesn't feel like, just this Bosch do her. Anyway, don't know. I'll never own a kitchen. Not that attitude. No way for me to know. You think I could own a kitchen, Dave, get your head out of your ass.

You make commercial level. Yeah. Everything would be too hot. Dad. I think that might play into this little bit. Because Adam writes, I've done it. I've finally done it. I've found a stove that heats up correctly for the Triptitch Club.

Not too hot. Not too hot. Not too. Let me just plug it in to make sure everything will work correctly for the wonderful memos. Oh, no. Oh, dear God. There's so much fire. It's spreading everywhere.

Get the soup. No one's been eating. Wow, that escalated quickly. Well, I think I might take a break from looking for new products for the club. It's for the best, I believe. Anyway, let's just all forget this has happened and move on with our lives. It's no one's fault. Really, okay?

Stop grilling me about it. I'm going to play some air hockey. I say hockey, I hope. Adam, thank you so much. Hey, appreciate the effort. Hard is in the right place. Absolutely right, yeah, yeah. Who's going to clean this up, though?

Really appreciate the gesture. Well, that's what, isn't that why you're here, right, Jay? Yeah, this one was afraid of. If you can't see, AJ's just putting in his gloves. And you can't see because we're not filming this bit. Thank you so much to Adam Patrick Murray and Katie. The next thing we like to do, and I will say the last thing we like to do, because there's no trip ditch club members this week.

week for the first time that I can remember in quite a while. Thank God. What the whole place is on fire. Yeah, it's actually a perfect time. To rebuild. For a fire. So I'm just being positive. We must.

So we've, yeah, Jess, you normally come up with a bit of a game based on the topic in hand and where we think about nine of our great patron supporters. And what sport they pretend to be good at. Great. Love it. And I really,

should we be putting AJ to work here? No. I'll just say yippee after everyone is done. And that'll be we move on to the next one. Whether they're good or not? Regardless. Okay. So no one will know if I hate it.

Yeah, yeah. Can you do, would I prefer it not to be empty and you say yippie if you like it or? No. Okay. If you don't. I am a Kiwi though, so they will all be yippies because I'm afraid of conflict. I've got some sports here in front of me. I'm ready to go.

It's a random sport generator. Well, maybe it's a mandate. Dave can read the names. We go toe to toe and you can do the sports. Is that what you think about it? I'm having to do that. And then I just here for the Yippees. Or the nups.

All the nups. In theory, yeah. So yeah, these people are on the shoutout level or above. I want to also say these are real sports. I've just, I've Googled obscure sports. Okay, great. Amazing. Because some of them will sound like I've just said two words together, but they are,

somebody has done this. Just saying. Somebody else has put those two words. Correct. before me. Yeah. All right. So first up, I'd love to thank from London in Woffed.

I think that's the WFT. I don't know what that is. Probably Woffington or something. Probably. Probably Woffington. Woffel, what a place. It's where the Waffle wasn't being said.

I did the same thing you did, but it really did. You made it sound really funny from London in in Great Britain. It's Sinan Kinch. Chess boxing. Ooh. Yeah. Yippee!

Chips boxing. Yeah. Picturing that there's boxing and then they've got to go do a move? Based on the picture, it's a hybrid sport that combines two traditional disciplines, chess and boxing. You're kidding. Two combatants play alternating rounds of blitz, chess and boxing until one wins by checkmate or knockout. That's amazing. I like that, but I do wish they found a way to do them at the same time.

Yeah. I did assume that maybe that was the case. They take your turns. Porn. Punch, punch, punch porn. That's my friday that. America's don't, remember we had it a while ago on a phrase in the bar episode? They don't think porn and porn sound the same.

Yeah. What comedy they're losing by being, like, fastidious about that. And I say America, there's lots of different accents in a lot. America. Probably accents that, like, actually say the letter R, so they'd say, like, porn. Porn, yeah, I think that's right. Porn. It's the same with, so that's different.

Yeah, no, of course, no, I'm not saying they're wrong. I'm not saying, you know, I was doing it for my own example, because I was like, in what universe do they not sound the same? And then I just had to do the working out. Yeah, we don't, we don't, we don't, nearly any words right. Yeah, yeah. Which is funny when we get called out on occasionally, and you're like, yeah, but this isn't, is this any different to all the other words we say?

Yeah. Well, they've got a bit of flack for saying, um, and we were saying it wrong, I guess, but, uh, two pack instead of two puck or something like that.

But that's just an accent thing. Yeah, I think I, I'm like, two pack, two pack. We say a bit wrong, but we sort of say every word.

Yeah. I get it with, with wrath, W-R-A-T-H. It's supposed to be like Roth. Oh. But for years I was saying wrath. Because I have a New Zealand exit.

Wrath, grass, bath. Yeah. And everyone's like, AJ, you freaking idiot. No one says it that way. No one says it. Yeah. So good at you.

No one says it. Sayes is what it should be as well. That sounds so funny. Yeah, yeah. People do say say says. Also, in a Kiwi accent, bear the drink, beer the animal and beer as a naked are like homophones. Yeah, yeah. I thought they were homophones the world over.

Naked and animal are homophones for us. Yeah, bear and bear, yep. But not beer. I'll drink a beer, look at a beer, and be beer. All at the same time. All the same time. That's just fun of that. It's actually my new survival strategy for if you encounter a beer.

I was trying to do that line. How are they got a word out? I was trying to get it before Dave. Dave 100% had it. And I was like, and you were stepped behind as well. Go on. We are tedious.

I can feel the wheels of my brain spinning. The one that the Kiwis get me with is how you say woman as for women. I think you say woman and women both as woman. So one woman, many woman. Yeah. Yeah. How do you say women? Woman.

Yeah, you say women then. Yeah. But I, there was a, I saw a Kiwi stand up. And how hot a woman day as well. That's why we're talking about. Anyway, what are we, one down? One down. I'd like to thank from Derby in the greatest of Britain's Maddie James.

Maddie James is one of the best at extreme ironing. Ooh, is that sort of downhill ironing? Is there a picture for this one? Yeah, but it looks like somebody's on a rock. Hang on. It's an extreme sport in which people take ironing boards to remote locations and items of clothing. Yippee. Maddie James, that's sick.

Go on you, man. It doesn't have a middle initial, but I reckon it's X for extreme. For sure. Agreed. The coolest leader. Our mate Elon Musk certainly thinks so. Yeah, yeah. He's such a, he's like the richest man of the world.

I'm changing its name to. Yeah. It's so funny. I know that this is old news now, but every time I think about it, it does make me laugh. It feels like a child. Well, because Elon Musk's whole thing is that he's what people thought was cool about 15 years ago, right? Like he stopped there and went, this will be cool forever. Right.

And so everything he does is like 4chan humor, right? Yeah, yeah. Which I think thinking X is a cool enough letter to replace the word Twitter with is a perfect example of that. Yeah, well, I mean, its brand recognition wasn't too good Twitter. No, exactly. Whereas a single letter will get you better SEO for sure. 100%. I wish he just picked another letter

like k.com or something. Just kate. Kay it. Oh, yeah, that is better. The ketamine community wouldn't like that. I'm in a k-hole. Although,

X is also probably several code words for drugs, right? That's true. Anyway, I know a lot of our 50% of our listeners love the work of Elon. And he's personally

my favorite Elon. Top five Elon's for me. Yeah, look, I wouldn't say favorite. He is in the top five. Um, next up I'd love to thank from Slacks Creek in Queensland. That sounds fun. Cool name. I'm picturing just a river of pants.

I reckon you'd get a horror movie called Slacks Creek. Yeah. Oh, you know. That's a cool. That's a cool title. Oh, no. The Slacks Creek killers back. What, no, if you say it like that.

Oh, no. Take my trousers. Go on, take him. But he, yeah, he's, he comes. He kills it. And he kills you while he's Winnie the pooing it. Yeah. And then he take it.

He wears your car is he wears your pants away. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Some people will wear your skin. He wears your pants. Yeah, he's like Buffalo Bell, buffered pants. It puts the fabric softener off your pants.

From Slacks Creek. I'd love to thank you, Matt McGuigan. Wow, that is a good name. Have a guy on saying. Matt McGuigan from Slacks Creek. How good is that? The main character of the Slacks Creek movie.

And people would go, Matt McGuigan is such a ridiculous made-up name. And as is the sport of underwater hockey. Wow. Dangerous stuff Could you do it in the creek The titular creek? Imagine doing it like under

Like you could have two games going on at once Ice like underwater Yes under the ice And then you have the ice and play on top of the ice I definitely would rather be And then real hockey on grass above that Yeah Oh my God

That's a sandwich The real hockey I'm winking at our American and Canadian listeners The real hockey Does that get a YIP? Oh sorry Yippee Thank you Oh he's lost

Yeah he's lost it That's okay. I think we're ringing between the lines. That was a nup. I would like to thank from a location that is unknown to us. We can only assume they're deep within the fortress of the malls. Thank you to Kit, Popper squat, Ryan. The parents were having a bit of fun there.

That's at the hospital, weren't they? On your kit. Kit is one of the best at shin kicking. That's a recognized sport. Yep. Shin kick. Oh, not the shin. Jesus.

Yep. Yippee. Yippee. I've got to give it a yippee. Do you think so... Oh, I've got a really good run out of names. What's happened there, Kit Ryan's in the hospital. How has that become the middle name?

Pop-a-Squot, do you reckon? Probably the mother's maiden name. Yeah, or they named him how he was conceived. Pop-on-a-squat. Next up from Florence in M.A., probably Massachusetts. It's maybe in the United States. It's R. Sullivan. R. Sullivan.

Bogs snorkeling. Oh, hell yeah. Yep, e. I'd go bog snorkeling. Yeah. But we're, but yeah. Depends on the bog. Yeah.

Is bog not universally shit? No. No. It's like a swamp. Yeah. Which is pretty close to. So great. Like, you're not going to see anything.

It's so pointless. I love it. Yeah. It's good stuff. Apparently there's been suggested a few times of topic. Oh my God. That's cool. Yeah.

Apparently they turn up a bit. Did I? So R. Sullivan from Florence, bog snorkeling. Yep. Or bogling, as they call it. Bogling. Bogling is way better. Boggling I meant to.

Not to be confused with boggle, the word game. Also recognises a sport probably. Yeah. Boggling. Oh. That's tricky. Yeah. Yeah.

You can't see the letters to begin with. Did they get a yippie? I did. Yeah, that got an early yipee. A pre-y epi. Very happy with that, yeah. I would like to the letters. think now from a location that is also unknown to a steep within the Fortress of the Moles,

we can only assume Nader Tart. Nader Tart. Nader Tart. And when you're living deep underground in the fortress of the malls, one of the most popular sports is toe wrestling. I'd have an advantage there. It's a long toad man. Oh, wow.

You are one of the best in the biz. But as a strong toad man, I think I can take you on. Yeah, we just have to interlock our toes. I've got long, weak toes. Oh, my God. the next person is from any of you speak Swedish they're from

100% probably looks like Umayah in Sweden Oh okay It's Joel Nordlander Joel Nordlander Joel Nordlander obviously in Sweden They're really big into belly flopping

Oh I'm good at that Yeah And as they say in Sweden Yippee but it's spelled with a J Yeah pronounce names dot com Umel Oh, mao.

Yeah, pretty, not bad. Nice. Yeah, back slapping. That was when other kids do big bombs and stuff. Mm-hmm. I could never make a big splash. So I'd just do the feats of self-harm. Yeah, I'd get a niche going.

Yeah, so really red in my back, back-whackers belly flops. Yeah. Yeah. You're like, huh? Do you think I'm cool now? I'd just like, crap, you get a great sound. Yeah. Just really flatten out, a smack.

Oh. This is, this makes sense for someone who would then later get into comedy as a career. Yeah. I think that like I will jump off a cliff into water for attention. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally. Yeah. Oh, ruined my night for your interest.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Did that get a yippee? I did, I think. What is that the Swedish one? Yeah. Oh yeah. Yepy and a Swedish accent. Yes.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Umair in Sweden. That's out of French. Bring things back to Australia from Inaloo in Western Australia. Oh, that's where bog's bull. Thank you to

Amy Lindsay Amy Lindsay from Inaloo Amy Lindsay One of the best At unicycle hockey Oh Yep

E not for me though I'd fall off Unicycle Yeah Actually for me That's real hockey for me All the other Right

Right right That's Uniside Yeah That's You can't you You can't you They've got

Twirling moustaches Oh yeah Yeah Did you say that was that a joke that you'd walk past a unicycler in Fitzroy? Yeah, no, it was by the mighty Yara. Oh, you had actually. I walked past, so on my first day in Melbourne, I was exploring, and in order to get to, like, a food court area,

I walked along, like, the, I don't know, the footpath next to the river, and on my way past two separate, I think they were sword swallowers or fire, both were on unicycles, and both were like, doing the same like, hey everybody, like, same, you know, you know the personality of Baskers? English. No, they're Ozzy. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think I've seen them in Christchurch, actually, so I think they come over for the Basker's best. Wow. Yeah, well, yeah. One of our great exports. Buskers. And it's funny, I don't mean, there is a stereotype that Melbourne is like,

like nonsense whimsical and, which obviously, it's not a city of five million people. There's all sorts of different shit, but. Whimsy is bound to bubble to the surface. It is funny that I never see unicyclers. It was so funny, you saw him so quickly in Melbourne. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Jess is a unicycler, of course.

Of course. I don't count her when I say, don't see unicyclers. Yeah. Finally, from St. Lucia in Queensland and Australia, I love to thank Kirsten Woodward. And Kirsten, actually one of the best at my favourite sport, wife carrying. Yippee.

Yeah. But Dave does a bit of that, you know, conversation-wise. What are you saying, though? I'm saying Ella, honestly, a bit dull on the old child. I'll answer her. I'll take this one. She's fine, thank you. What do you mean by that?

I'm like, it made sense of my head, but yeah, no, not really. And you know, as well, in wife carrying, all the wives rolling their eyes as the asking it to carry. Yeah, yeah. Because behind every great wife carrier. Yep. Yep. It's literally the wife.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Going, come on. This is pathetic. He thinks he's so cool. Yeah, all right. Oh, said I'd do his little hobby. Dave didn't even understand what I was talking about there at all because Ella is such a great conversation list.

Ella's way more interesting than Dave. Yeah. Oh, that's for sure. Yeah. Oh, my God. Ella is carrying, Dave. She's a husband carrier. I love being carried.

Conversation was. All I've been carried. physically as well. Makes me feel safe. Scoop me up. Yeah. Like a cat. Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. Oh, my God. But not like my dog. Who just does this? Pull me now. Put me down. Pull me down. She's pushing her face back into her head, if that makes sense.

Yeah, he's a French bulldog. So, yes. She did an impeccable French bulldog impression for us. Yeah, a picture of French bulldog. Visual only. Not looking uncomfortable. Thank you so much to Kirsten. Amy, Jol, Nader, R. Kit, Matt, Maddie.

And Simon. And that, because we don't have any Trip Ditch Club this week. It was just for some reason three years ago, everyone who signed up, if anyone, has not made it. Right. They didn't have the guts. Cowards. No one signed up on Christmas Day three years ago.

How strange. That would be why. Well, if no one's going to get me a present that I want, I'll get it for myself. So yeah, that brings us to the end of the episode. Before we go, AJ, where can people find you? Oh my goodness. People can find me on line. My usual moniker at the moment is AJ and HD.

You can find me on Instagram and X and I technically on Blue Sky. Are you a remuner on X? Yeah, I am. Still X-ing? Yeah, I shouldn't though. I should get off it. No, I think I just, last time to have been on there that was sort of nothing going on. And let me tell you, the right-wing leaning humour of 2007 has come back full,

these days. Oh, great. I feel like I'm on, like, Reddit when I was in high school. It's like a time machine. Yeah, it's a little bit nostalgic if it wasn't so upsetting. What's, like, what's one of the classic cliche joke? Like, you'll just see, like, a viral video and it's like a woman being filmed and she's

angry. And the, the text would be like, check out this bitch, you know. That's pretty funny. Exactly. It's that kind of humor. That's a real thinker. Yeah. It's stuff like that

We're back on We're back on that That bullshit This is this is Elon Musk's X Well we find the thing that Matt finds The funniest in the world You gotta get back on there, You'd love it

No I didn't realize When I was on there The timidist of the pod is needed On X right now, dude That sounds really funny I have a podcast called Cole Popscher as well It's a Pinker Yes

We've all been on it You've all been on. Fantastic time. Talk about movies. Yep. The only podcast in the world to ever do that. Yeah. So good that you've finally broken through.

Broken that taboo. Yeah. Absolutely. Just anything we need to tell people before we go? Just that we love them. They can suggest the topic. There is a link in our show notes. It's also on our website, which is do go on pod.com where you can find information about live shows.

Dave's got his calendar open. Is there something you wanted to plug day? This is the last episode of the year, everyone. Oh, yeah. But fear not, because we will be back on January 1st. Next year. Oh my God. We never take a week off.

What a great present for Christmas, AJ here, unwrapped. He's not wearing any pants, is what I mean? That's in the English or Australian sense. But yeah, I can't wait to see you next year. See next year. I think, and we said at the end of 2019, I think we can say it again here, next year is going to be one of the great years. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It has to be. It has to be. I believe it. Yeah, everything's going to get better. Yeah. It's looking good. Good. The forecast is bright.

It's really nice. Sunshine, blue skies as far as I can see. Well, thank you so much for joining us, AJ. All good. Thank you for having me. And until next year, we'll say thank you so much for listening and goodbye. Bye. Don't forget to sign up to our tour mailing list so we know where in the world you are and we can come and tell you when we're coming there.

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