The Bugle - Look at this Massive Election! Bugle 4107

Episode Date: May 4, 2019

The world's biggest democracy goes to the polls, we dive deep in and get thoroughly lost. Also - Andy reviews Game of Thrones, and donkeys are sad Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dancelaguard fans, you will be thrilled to know a book is coming out if you fund it via Unbound. We are publishing the Dancelaguard Reader by Alice Fraser and Dancelaguard, a glorious insight into the world of Dancelaguard, self-published romance maven, and online bestseller. If you would like to find out how to support it, go to thebugelpodcast.com. If we get enough support, we will publish the book. That's a real thing that's going to happen. Thebugelpodcast.com to support the Danciler Guard Reader. A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A Audio newspaper for a visual world! Hello, buglers and welcome to issue 4107 of the bugle free independent funded by you, the listener, official podcast of none other than Poseidon, Ancient Greek God of the Sea. Good to have the old Trident wielder. On board should certainly until we have some very nice and calm sea crossings in future. I am Andy Zoltzeman, and joining me from Mumbai for this special Bugle Indian Elections special Bugle show,

it is Anu Vapal. Hello Andy, hello, very excited to be here this week because as you know, India is in the middle of a tiny thing of billion people are heading to the polls to elect a leader. Not a big thing, not affecting the country very much, but it's very exciting to be here to report from the ground by which I mean from my apartment. We will touch on this more in greater detail. Shortly we are recording on Wednesday this week for complicated logistical reasons. Well I'm going to Ireland to watch cricket but let's talk it up. Wednesday,

the 1st of May, to be precise, Mayday, no less, and one of every day is Mayday in Britain at the moment. But on this day in 1851, Queen Victoria, Alder Big Pants herself. Open the great exhibition at Crystal Palace, some hugely influential exhibits, including a precursor to the Fax machine. What a revolution in correspondence. I don't know who's the first person to a picture of their own backside from the Great Exhibition. History does not relate that. The world's first voting machine, the world's first pay toilets were used. People would pay a penny to use the toilets. Hence the term spend a penny originates from that, one of the great British youth, from Missums for a bodily function. Those using the toilets for a less liquidiness, a more conclusive exflegrution, were given a commemorative Sumerian gemstone known as a shite, hence the term take a shite.

A bit history-foy. It's been a long week, it's Wednesday, it's been a good short week. As always, some sections of the bugle going straight in the bin. Well, this week, a special Game of Thrones review section in the bin, one of the most eagerly awaited TV episodes of all time episode three of series eights of Game of Thrones, the hit TV series adapted from the Magic Land Fantasy novels entitled Death and Dinking. And well, I mean, it finally boiled down series 8 episode 3. So many questions are rising, finally boiled down to the climactic battle of Winterfell, although interestingly,

it's actually a bit like an English village, it's pronounced Whiffle. But was this episode, the most memorable piece of television since that episode of Sesame Street when a drunken big bird tried to make with a giant bottle of noldy mustard Or was it just a bit shit? I mean, I'll leave that for you to judge. A quick spoiler alert before we do our review. It's only pretend none of it happened. So the questions arising are, why are dead people so f***ing angry all the time? Could it be that burial and cremation? Neither of which is a particularly nice thing to do to someone objectively, really piss people off?

Also questions arising from the episode amongst the fans include, why didn't this that or the other happen? And with that I've made any more sense. Plot questions arising for fans include, well now that Strayhorn of Glauach has been trapped by the great wangling in an eternal state of gloss to your fridge, Could Vincent Hillair form an alliance with Hoggric Ram but Idris the Dragon Basel the Donkey Slayer and Brenda from accounts to destroy the deathly Pillock ferrets of Nethergrope or might a magic worm magically fix it all by shitting in a magic bucket or doing some karaoke. Could the returning pseudoking, glary on penis raker proved to be the real

Doug Mountjoy and will match Bishop return as Queen of the Undead. What has happened to the Sledgehammer of everlasting vengeance? It used to be so good. What's happening in the golf? Is that the time? Did I remember to put the bins out? And well a lot of fans were not happy with some of the battle tactics used in the battle. And I guess the question does arise.

If you've got a f***ing dragon, why not get your dragon to do a massive dump on your enemies when you're flying overhead. Surely that would do some damage. Dragon sheet is probably absolutely horrific. They have terrible meat-heavy diets. And if dinosaur crap is anything to go by, if you dropped it from 300 feet, it could take out a Sherman tank, naive. Also, with Jon Snow patently tiring in the heat of battle, should skip a Roman Dillingworth, a brought Derek Underwood on for a containing spell from the nursery end.

What's the whole thing more or less realistic than Brexit? And is it all an allegory for the dangers of professionalism in rugby, the EU's common fisheries policy or something else? We look at all that in the section in the bin. And the fantastic analysis, but I think what you've just done is you've written the prequel to Game of Thrones. Brenda from accounts will never form an alliance with those guys. That's not going to happen.

She is above all else practical. I'll be honest, that is the only episode of Ever Actually Watch Starts Finch. I don't know if that came across as my analysis of it. But the wife's quite into it. So I thought I'd see what it was all about, or not see what it was all about. And I think the thing is that those ravens, they are very high tech for the time, both wireless and 3D. So I'll assume they just, you know, you just know.

You've got it, you haven't as a message raven. You can't learn it. I mean, the shore allows for just, you know, you just know. You've got it, you haven't as a message, Raven. You can't learn it. I mean, the show allows for a lot of things, right? There are very few places the world and the, in 2019, we can see the words Night King without having erotic undertones. Ah!

I'll have to take your word for that, I don't know. Top story, one billion people are voting right now over the course of, well, five weeks or more so, almost six weeks in a 39-day election, Anuvab as our Indian democracy correspondent. Talk us through exactly what it is like to be in India at the time of this extraordinary democratic process. Well Andy, this is a fantastic time to be in India. I mean for one, look, the whole world is interested. The BBC have sent 10 different camera crews, the Americans have sent no one. I'll just be right here. And I really love the Election Commission of India

because of all the times in the year, you can get a billion people to vote. They choose the middle of me in the middle of one of the worst summers we're having. So you can blame the Election Commission for a lot of things, but not foresight and net logical expertise. They have those. Neil Times did a great rundown, Andy, of what's going on here.

A billion people are about to elect a government. Why do these elections matter? Well, they matter because two billion people the loose idea of a adult franchise is important. Of course the ruling party are going to win, but there is something in 700 million people coming out of the house and feeling like we did something. If mostly the doing of that means standing in a very hot summer day, in a line, and voting for a symbol of a shoe or a sunflower. We'll get into that and in a bit.

Who are running? There are thousands of political parties running, but like in Britain, you have two major political parties. You have the BJP, India's ruling party, who have been described as slightly right wing by other right wing parties. The rival party is the completely democratic, fair, non-nepetistic, Congress party, which was founded by the English actually. You're welcome.

Thank you. Thank you. To fight against other English people when you guys had some business here. But that is a very polite way for you guys. When you guys had some business here. When you guys had some business, when we didn't have to get together and have somebody at both the stuff, because you just had a guy in a week saying, this is how things are going to be right.

It's so much simpler. Easy, easy or any. Election commission would be happy. So the National Congress is currently the opposition party and completely fair democratic liberal party run by the great graphs of the founder of the party. So again, anyone who is eligible and has the ability to rise through the party can become its leader as long as you're the great grandson of the founder. That is true Liberty. I was fascinated by the number of political parties, such as or had been calculated to be 2,293 when registrations closed before the election. Now, there is such a thing as too much choice, isn't there?

I have now speaking as a veteran of the British 2016 referendum, two choices was arguably too too many. So what, 2,293? That's got Charles De Gaulle, the French leader, the French leader said how can anyone govern a nation that has 246 different kinds of cheese? Well wake up and smell the paneer de goul try governing a nation that has 2,293 different political parties somewhere between 401,700 different languages and approximately four cheeses. Take your cheese and quit your whinzing. Andy, I think in a democracy, there's never too much choice. I know you guys have two parties, but where would India be if we did not have as we do the reasonably priced vegetable party? The clean thoughts party. That sounds pretty sinister. the clean thoughts party. That sounds pretty sinister.

And the common man party who symbol is the broom suggesting metaphorically we clean up the system. Well, I'm fascinated by the symbols that the political parties choose because there's still a huge amount of illiteracy in India. So the parties have to choose a symbol. Now Now I was reading that registered but unrecognized parties can't choose their own symbol, but have to choose from a list of 200 available free symbols. Coincidentally, free symbols is an election pledge by the Maharashtra Procution

Instruments for All Party. These symbols that are available include such potent democratic images as a helicopter, a kitchen sink, a sofa that I would vote for that. Abside me up. Compulsory, keeps in the afternoon for everyone. A javelin thrower, picking up on the proud Olympic history of Indian Javelin throws, a violin, a walking stick, a typewriter, toothpaste, a syringe, a pair of socks, a soap dish, a washing up rack, a pendulum. But that's just got nice, I suppose, shows the cyclical nature of life. Trauzers, ice cream, I mean that really is, we talk about bread and circuses, but when ice cream is your symbol, you are really laying your populist cards on the table. A 1920s gramophone, a frock, a domestic

power drill, a cauliflower, a bucket, but not a cricket bat, a cricket batsman, a set of cricket stumps. The 1980s Indian Cricket of Roger Binney scoring a single, that may not be one of the available options. And of course, a balloon. As a a voter and a hub. Yes. I mean, I would be confused by these 200 symbols, because obviously, I'd like to vote for binoculars, because I want my government to snoop on people from a distance. But I also like trousers. And I think people should wear trousers more often than not. But what is the point of wearing trousers if you don't have access to a helicopter or can't listen to contemporary vinyl recordings of Edith Piaff Or don't have a government committed to frogs for all or filling buckets with toothpaste whilst playing the violin and batting

It's so confusing democracy, so confusing And that is why I think we're doing it and the escalator would have intended it You know, we're giving you, you know, you're you can't read and write You walk into a polling booth, it's hot as hell. Would you rather have to go through your entire value system to figure out whose manifesto is better, or would you just press a button on a lovely looking ice cream? Well, now you put it in those terms. I can see a happier, more content democratic future emerging for the entire world.

Of course, I mean, the way that voting is carried out has led to certain difficulties because you're allowed your one vote, and then, so you have to press your button on the voting machine, And then you have some indelible ink put on your finger so that they know that you've already voted. But these machines, obviously, with so many different symbols on, can be quite confusing. And a man during this election, he accidentally voted for Modi's BJP. Yes. And then we're so racked by regrets because you wanted to vote for their, uh, their rivals.

That's, uh, having had the indelible link put on his finger, he took the logical option of cutting his finger off in a hope that he would then be able to vote votes again. Again, this is a great point. It's is a great point. And, and let's face it, we've all been there. We've all been there. You know, I wanted a cheeseburger, a self-service McDonald's, I pressed on a double cheeseburger. They wouldn't change my order. I cut off my finger. I was some Netflix

switched over to Amazon. There was a spoiler for a show my wife was watching cut off my finger. I just want to bring up one thing Andy. You may not be aware. I did do this. I went online speaking of symbols and pictures that represent political parties. Before the election, because I am that sort of person. I put in Andy's oldsman, Andy's oldsman political party and you can do it on the election commission

exercise to see what symbols I'd be allowed. And I was given Andy because when the middle of the election, so not very many objects available, I was given Andy and I don't know if these symbols would work when you launch yourself as a candidate. A stapler, a laundry bag and a boy link. That sounds like my perfect weekend in. Well, I'll be there. Yeah, that's all. I guess that encapsulates my political philosophy. I love to you know join bits of paper together It shows you know I'm collaborative. I can take bits of paper from from different sources Stape with them together and come up with a compromise when it comes to laundry bags I'm not afraid to attempt to clean up what what has in the past

been Dirty and in terms of boiled eggs That when that's the future of food. It's good for the environment, isn't it? Get on board. What you just described is better than the manifesto of both the main parties that I'm having. I don't know. So, well, just quickly on the indelible ink, it is actually interesting because the ink has been provided by the same company for 57 years and the Mysore Paints and Varnish Limited company. And it's a closely guarded secret, thought to involve some combination of Coca-Cola, the

source from Brighmax and the boiled down essence of cricket. And interestingly, when I get in dellable ink accidentally on my finger, I'm overwhelmed by a powerful subliminal sensation. I've just voted in Nagpur, so... Interesting. If you go to social media and India, don't know what's really going on. It's going to be very confusing because you'll see Indian person after Indian person holding up their forefinger and It looks like a bit of a bizarre gesture, but what they do is you go in there and they mark you in blue and Apparently the reason we do this the indelible in thing that there are slight incidents of fraudulence and

criminality in elections never heard of before It's a new phenomenon. And I faced this some years ago when I was in college, when I went to vote to a polling booth in Calcutta and found out that my vote had already been done by a widow in her 70s who happened to have the name Anufa Pal. But she also happened to be named the number of other things because back then when there was no system of marking the voter, the political party would just pay somebody to vote on your behalf. With,

to vote on your behalf. With, in hindsight, I think, seeing how democracy has turned out in my country, a far better option. Well, there was a report on writers of, well, incentivization for voters and the authorities had seized cash and goods worth hundreds of millions of dollars across India since the election was announced on the 10th of March, almost half a billion dollars worth of what we make called incentivatious materials. Include cash, alcohol, drugs and gold, the beg for, and to be honest, from a British perspective, if that bus of bullshit from the Brexit campaign had not promised to give £350 million a week to the NHS, but had promised to give to every voter a £20 note, a bottle of supermarket whiskey, a line of charlie and a commemorative miniature solid gold queen, if we leave the EU, then none of the current mess would have happened because we would have voted 97% to leave. And that's that, that is exactly why I think our democratic thinking is we're

ahead of the Western world. Because you know, I'm sure I'm sure Brexit would have turned out differently. If, if the Labour Party or whoever, showed up at your doorstep with the working microwave and said you could use the vote for us for this microwave, all you could vote for something stupid called values and belief systems. And values and belief systems cannot make you a nice chicken roast. I mean, are these not just merely the physical manifestations of the kind of policy bribe hybrids that are the staple of all elections. It's a much more honest way of doing it to actually physically give people things that you're promising to give them, rather than say, oh yeah, we'll

definitely do this and then not do it. I appreciate the honesty. Thank you Andy. You're honest of it. Exactly, they're doing it, they're doing it prior, you know, it's a prepaid system. As Indians, as Indians, we have seen through the 70s and 80s a lot of file intellectuals. We've seen, you know, criminal gangs going into polling booths and when it was paper elections capturing, you know, the box where the votes are in and running away. So to go from that India to a bribe India is actually an improvement. There's a significant less loss of life and you end up with an espresso machine and some Randy. So Narendra Modi, one, quite recently

convincingly in 2014, is he expected to win again and what exactly is he standing for? Great question Andy. The remainder of the Prime Minister has came in with a majority of in out of 529 in our parliament, promised his tagline in Hindi was Subgay Sard Subgavikas which translates to, we rise with everyone for everyone's economic benefit. It's played out really well because the 1% of India have become even wealthier and the poor stand no chance. So you know, like everywhere else in the world, you know, he did come in with that belief system. But even then, he's, you know, a number of Indian businesses have collapsed, there is a job crisis in India, but even then he remains

tremendously popular. So popular, in fact, that various news organizations are clamoring to get an interview with him. He very rarely gives interviews. He gave one to the big Bollywood star Akshay Kumar a week ago in which he decided not to talk about politics because he thought there's too much of that, but to talk to the Bollywood star about his love for mangoes. Well of course I could imagine absolutely critical part of any election. Exactly and how is a child? He's to climb up and have raw mangoes with no consideration for hygiene and he thought that this personal anecdote because he's quite secretive, single,

would make him, you know, likable to voters. He gave another interview in Varanasi, the Holy City of the Ganges, in a very fancy yacht in which he talked about how he's the son of the Ganges, that he's, you know, he sees the Ganges as the heartland of India, he's from there, it's almost like by defined calling, he should be brought back as the Prime Minister. It is of course an entirely different matter that he was born in Goodrat, hundreds of miles away from the Ganges.

But that's how he's positioned himself. And people are saying he's going to win. The rival Congress party has about 50 plus seats. And Rahul Gandhi, the son of the Gandhi dynasty, you know, he is a very likable fellow. He's a very likable fellow. He's a very likable fellow But he's likable in the way that you would like a golf partner or a tennis partner Somebody you play squash with

When you seem to talk about policies of how to address, you know, they use us for billion people He falls slightly short and by I mean by about 90 cents. Modi proudly announced during the campaign that India now has space weapons and can shoot down satellites much to the relief of the hundreds of millions of people in India living in abject poverty who worry about the simple day-to-day task of not having space weapons. And so there's a very proud moment for India now, has space weapons. The spokesperson for the Pakistan Foreign Ministry responded with these words, boasting of such capabilities is reminiscent of Don Quixote's tilting against windmills, which is a very welcome, if rare use of 17th century Spanish literature to

zing a political adversary. That's just great to hear, although if you do play Donald Trump's recent speech to the National Rifle Association in America backwards, it contains elongated passages lifted straight from El Pinto desu desondra by Pedro Calder Andela Barca. Thanks be to the internet. A further controversy for Modi came with the scheduled release of a film, a biopic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi entitled PM Narendra Modi imaginatively. There was due to be released on the day that voting started, was halted by the Indian electoral commission on the grounds that A, it could be seen as a political advertisement,

thus falling foul of campaign finance regulations and B, it's a f***ing feature film about a sitting Prime Minister. When do we get Theresa May, Dither of Destiny? Why do we not get David Cameron mission irresponsible? Why do we not got our biopics of our Prime Ministers? You know, all I've got to say here is, you know, again, you guys have a lot to catch up on. And it's fantastic to bring that up because this week we've got a Narendra Modi web series out in which he fights an alligator. There is a two page sequence in the comic book where he wrestles the alligator, doesn't kill it, saves it, brings it home,

only to be told by his mother to return it because you've separated the baby alligator from its mother his mother of course did not ask him what are you doing with a giant reptile now this got made into a web series called the rest of the Prime Minister and this is a sequence of the web series we've got the rest of the film We've got Narendra Modi, the film. We've got Narendra Modi in a TV show and Narendra Modi has popped up in a very successful Indian movie called Uri, which documents the surgical strike by the Indian Army when apparently we were attacked by terrorists from Pakistan, so they're going to Pakistan. So Narendra Modi has now featured in five different things. A web series, a comic book, a massive motion picture. Now till I see Boris Johnson in a Marvel franchise, Andy, I think there's a lot

of catching up to do. Apparently one third of all Indian members of Parliament have criminal cases pending. And a piece of research has found that a candidate with a clean record has only a 12% chance of winning their election seat, whereas a candidate with a criminal record has a 23% chance of, hey, when is this what voters want? Someone who's shown their prepare to do whatever it takes to get the job done, whether or not that is legal. Maybe that is that what we need in democracy. I think so, Andy. I think so. Because I think, I don't know how it is in the Western world, but we are trying to really narrow the divide between criminality and

respectability. It's building bridges, making us a more unified world. Exactly. And our elections, education is inversely proportional to success. So if you note, some of our leading politicians have not studied the day since fourth grade and they've made excellent leaders. So I think we're making a case to the world of all the things that you think make a leader respectable, education, life experience. Are any of those necessary when you could be handed a gun or a smuggling ring at the age of five. So we are now approximately,

what a half way mark. We are basically the half way mark of the election process, that 39 day election process, but still shorter than the impending cricket world cup. It is going to take, I think a week longer, and then getting 900 million people to vote. Exactly. And, you know, we do it over six weeks. And to be fair to the election commission, it is quite a task getting 700 million people out of their house. If we did it in a single day, it would,

you know, be like a game of thrones episode where, where you know all the dead would be marching together Instead they do it in phases they do something their first They just finished Mumbai yesterday then they go further up North to the states of Rajasthan and then they do the big ones They do Delhi they do the Pradesh which has a size of Brazil in terms of number of voters Then they do Eastern India and basically they take all, everybody's votes and they just sit on it and they release the results all on one day, the 23rd of May.

So they start counting in the morning and by the end they have counted 700 million votes. Can I give you a stat on that? Yeah, go on, like we're saying. So if 700 million people turn up, Anavab, I think, was it you said there's 2,293 parties? Yes, there are. Yeah. Let's say every single one of those parties was evenly represented. That's 303,000 votes per party, which is more than the DUP, Britain's most important political party, got at the last election. So we're looking

at over 2000 DUPs in India. Well, glorious vision. Isn't it of a brighter future that is? Yeah, each with a photo of a boy leg. But it is the largest exercise of adult franchise in human history. I mean, I think when the Greeks wrote this down, they hadn't accounted for a line that extends from Mumbai to Puna just to get it to the polling booth. Yeah. I mean, I think you get a good turnout. It's around about 70% turnout, which is better than we get in Britain way better than America gets in its elections.

And the Greeks couldn't get it to work with 30,000 voters essentially, be ancient of the Indians. They just couldn't nail it. So to get anywhere near anything functioning, even if you do end up electing religious nationalists, which is I guess, you know, not ideal as someone who's not a fan of religious nationalism. It's to pray, like everything in India, it's not the chaos that is so striking, but the fact that it's not even more chaotic.

Exactly, exactly. How does it happen? You know, we wonder this every day. For example, of course, people go out to vote because you know, you're being bride to do it. A cow will compete you up. You get into a van that's provided by some political party. You go, sometimes you'll get a packet of biryani, sometimes you'd get alcohol, and it's the same way with election campaign speeches. The reason Prime Minister Modi has a hundred thousand people listening to rallies

in the middle of the summer heat in Uthar Pradesh is because everyone is getting a packet of biryani at the end of it. Even if you can't hear him after the first four rows, it doesn't matter, you're going home happy. And it's the same thing with voting, it's a day out, they pick you up, they give you stuff. Of course, what you'll do in that nice cloth booth, you know, and it's by and large, free and fair. So there is, then anyone, you know, there's, then anyone pointing a gun. What you'll do in that booth is, of course, your business.

So if they show you a nice photograph of an object or whatever and you get impressed, you press whatever, that's still free and fair. And that's shocking to us, you know, That's shocking that we can even get all these people into that little booth. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa And elsewhere in Asia, Japan has a new emperor, old emperor, Akihito has abdicated and his son Narahito, viewed as a modernizer, has taken over, has a more global outlook,

studied at Oxford University, did some post-grad study there. And of course, was the official mascot for the 1982 football world cup in Spain, a powerful gesture of internationalism that reverberates to this day. And he becomes the 126th member of the current Japanese imperial family to be emperor. That goes back to Emperor Jimu, who ironically lived

to the age of 126, according to both legend and Wikipedia. And he was in, I think about 600 BC, Jimu of course was the descendant of a Scottish man called James and the son goddess Amaterasu, which means that Nara Hito will share up to 37% of his mitochondrial DNA with the sun, meaning if he ever catches fire, he will burn at 5,700 degrees Celsius. He's the 127th member of that dynasty, that's an impressive longevity from the Imperial family. And only two to go now, until you can have a full seven round knockout to find your favourite Japanese Emperor of all time. And I for one cannot wait the Bidadzu versus Kamehama first round

a tussle that could be an absolute cracker. The actual Japanese abdication ceremony involves the existing emperor to go into a room and speak to his mystical ancestors. Do you have any rituals of this kind before the spot cast or in life Well, I speak to all my spiritual ancestors all the time on an almost daily basis. My general pre-bugal ritual, obviously I spend half an hour benching 380 odd these days. I do a triathlon in honor of Chris, but a mental triathlon where I just imagine myself swimming cycling and then running. And then I read transcripts of every single previous

bugle episode out loud. That's not how I see it. Right. I, Anavab, how I tend to see it is this kind of sound, a company with the occasional f***ing written this bit yet, followed by the occasional period of silence interspersed with a random comment like honky-tonk, but honky-tonk. Those are messages that I'm getting from my spiritual ancestors, Chris. It's a light of communication. Exactly. And, Andy, Chris, you forgot.

After doing all of that, Andy, it's time to run in the Indian elections with the symbol of a laundry basket. And I'm busy. I'm busy, Chris. Yeah. In other Britain news, some very important scientific researchers come out this week from the University of Portmouth who have found that donkeys do not like British weather. Donkeys don't like our weather, they prefer to huddle indoors and that it's a really hot bright sunny day. Horses, happy outside and pretty much any weather conditions, but donkeys, very

fussing, well done to the University of Portland for stepping up to this crucial scientific plate and cutting up our non-nums into easily-tuable chunks. This is the kind of science I can get behind. The reason apparently is that donkeys originate from Africa, so they don't like our chilly British weather. I for one I'm relieved, Anivab, that this is why they are h like our chili, British weather. I've won them relieved, Anivab, that this is why they are huddling indoors, because I'd always assumed that they were plotting our downfall,

but of interspecies resentment after a millennia of exploitation of the donkeys. The donk, of course, a crucial part of British heritage and culture, not only because it carried Alfred and Beatrice Roberts to the birthing suite in Grantham where their daughter Margaret Fatcher was born. Sorry, I must stop borrowing Jacob Rees Mugg's Bible. But also because the donkey ride is a fundamental part of British entertainment, as British kids for centuries millennia even have been taken to the beach,

put on a donkey and walked at incredibly slow speed up and down a beach and it is truly amazing what the human mind was capable of finding fun before the advent of television and the games console sitting on a slow moving animal walking up and down a cloudy beach. And the two things one still relevant that's how I go to Starbucks every day. relevant, that's how I go to Starbucks every day. Still works in some countries. Second, how did these experts do the studies with the donkeys? Did they take them to the theatre in the rain? Did they take work on sunny days? Like, what was the basis of the study? Well, I mean, it's a thing with science, I mean, it's not really our business to pry into how they do it. We must

just marvel at the very important influential results. And now we understand Donkeys better. Also, I mean, it does suggest that we could deploy them to nursing homes because they like huddling together inside to entertain our increasingly aging population. Scientists have made other, very important discoveries recently, including that a stopped clock is right either one or two times a day, depending on whether the clock owner is awake or asleep at night. Clocks cannot be right if no one is looking at them. Similarly, if a tree falls in a forest, a known as there to hear it, scientists have found

that it does actually make a noise. And that noise is, wee, I'm falling. This is the most exciting thing that's ever happened in my or bore real life. I feel free, ow, ow, my branch is ow. I think I've done one of my branches. Ah, tree down, medic. Can the rest of you fuckers quit standing around

and fucking do something? Yes, smug bastards. Further scientific research has found that the Enophilies Mosquito is 1.28% less likely to spread malaria if it is forced to listen to the classic funk hits of sly and the family stone. If courgettes taste more like chocolate, more children would eat it. That's another crucial scientific discovery made at Harvard University. And this final one also came from the University of Portsmouth's influential pointless animal research department. Whilst a live eagle is much better at flying than a live

badger, a dead eagle has only a 0.34% advantage at flying versus a dead badger. And then only if you splice its corpse out onto a special frame so it's wing stretch out. So thank you, science. And well, that concludes this week's Bugal Anivab. Thanks very much for shedding some light on the wonders of the Indian electoral process, truly baffling and fascinating as so many things in India. It's my pleasure Andy and I'll keep track of how many boards you're getting.

And now that you've registered me as a political candidate, I will commit to crime spree that evidently that will make me far more likely to win. Thank you for listening once again. Bugles, a gig to alert you to, I'm doing a solo show at London's Underbelly, as part of the annual residency on the South Bank. That is on the 18th of May. So do please come along to that. And we will play you out now with some lies

about our subscribers, our voluntary subscribers. If you do want to join them on the voluntary subscription scheme and donate whatever you can and or wish to, it's a regular or one-off donation. Do go to the bugle website, thebuglepodcast.com and click the donate button. And if you choose one of our, so we say, premium packages, you can earn yourself a lie about you to be told on this show, Chris. Orchestra, please. old, on this show, Chris, orchestra please. A Matt Porter sleeps with a full set of chess pieces under his pillow and a chessboard, as he reckons that if the grim reaper ever comes for him at night, he can distract him with

a game of chess and a chat about what they've each done with their respective lives and careers. An anonymous donor, initials MR, owns a collection of porcelain pelicans because he likes to own figurines whose subject matter is an anagram or part anagram of the material they are made from. He also has 24 plastic cats, 12 granite tigers, 2 rats made of quartz, and a statue of the aforementioned Narendra Modi made of red diamonds. Richard Van der Haak is five-time Northern Hemisphere bird of prey impersonation champion. You should hear his buzzard.

It is truly uncanny. Francis Ham is surprisingly kosher, inferior at least. Francis also wants guests correctly in 231 consecutive coin tosses before realizing that the coin had only one side. Another anonymous donor, initials CW, can cook a potato just by looking at it in an encouraging way. This makes the molecules in the potato jiggle about excitedly mimicking the physics of heat. Laura van der Veden thinks that the invention of sliced bread should

become the default year zero for all international calendars, time to ditch the at best hopeful guesswork of Bible-based chronology claims Laura. Anonymous donor, initials K.N. thinks all public spaces should have free trampolines for people to use. She has calculated that the economic benefits of this scheme in terms of public wellbeing and happiness could exceed $300 trillion a month. Matthias Eddra invented the kitchen spatula by crossbreeding a tarantula with a spaceman. Thomas Taylor sometimes deliberately leaves an upturned ice-cream cone on the ground in the woods to provide an impromptu cathedral for any Christian insects who happen to be passing by.

David Manual can tell what species insects are by the noise they make when they have squished against his car window whilst he's driving. And Rod Begby could never enjoy the children's fairy story Hansel and Gretel for two reasons. One because it is truly, deeply harrowing on many, many levels, and two because it always nagged away amount, obviously evil which could get planning permission to build a housemate of gingerbread and confectionery, given that frankly the first half decent share of rain is going to leave it as a big sticky mess. Daniel Hawke's worth reckons tennis players should have to use a racket in each hand and shout, ìI-Aî whenever they serve.. And Max Ashford has calculated that, in fact, fewer than 0.2% of roads

actually lead to Rome these days, down from a peak of 3.4% in the 4th century AD. David Wright wonders why golfers don't carry their own bags, and thinks they said a very bad example by not taking responsibility for their own kit, moreover by selfishly never letting their caddies have a go at hitting the ball even though they walk around with them for the whole f***ing day. And a correspondent who called himself Sylvia Burlaskoni has never done anything wrong in his life if anything his only crime was to have too much love. Thank you for your generous contributions to keeping the Bugle free and independent. To join them or take any form of voluntary subscription, go to the Buglepodcast.com and

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