Superbowl

Superbowl is undoubtedly THE single biggest sporting event in the US. The attention it gets, in terms of TV commercials and other publicity is just amazing. Stores even put out special sales on TVs just for this single event! It is expected that somewhere to the tune of 130 million people will watch this year's game between the Arizona Cardinals and Pittsburgh Steelers! Moreover, they're expecting that around 90 million will take a bathroom break during the half-time! That's more than half of Pakistan's entire population, or the entire population of Mumbai! Can you imagine an entire city going to the toilet AT THE SAME TIME? It'll be just like that!

More fun facts include an estimate of chips being consumed on that day (20,000 tons), guacamole (8 million pounds). Tickets which initially cost a whopping $500-$1000 have been known to change hands days before the game for as much as $2000-$4000. Ridiculous if you ask me! And they say Football (Soccer) has become commercialized! And may I remind you that we are in a recession? The number of private jets flying in to watch the Superbowl is down as a result. Ha!

For first-time viewers, American football seems to be the most hideous game on earth quite frankly, a rip-ff of Rugby (that's what I thought when I first saw it). But as it turns out, the game is quite complicated with a plethora of rules newbies like me have a hard time fathoming at first. You have to grow up watching it to develop the kind of appreciation for it like we have for cricket back in desi-land. And boy do they love their football or what! If I cited trucks as the object of their obsession in my listing of weird american facts, football most definitely trumps that.

I still prefer the real football (or Soccer as they call it here), that's still a million times better than this IMO. Still, that doesn't mean I won't be watching Superbowl this year. My only issue with them is that they call the winners `World Champions`. Oh come on, this isn't WWE for crying out loud!