Most of us have seen that hilarious video of the paragliding guy on social media --- the one who just wanted to get back down on earth. The guy is cursing everyone including himself and appears to be in real pain as he begs and even tries to pay extra just so that he can land back down. Meanwhile, the paragliding instructor is berating, scolding and doing some of his own swearing. This has caught the fancy of lakhs of Indians if not more.
The video covers the six odd minutes from takeoff to landing with lots of angst in-between. I am not a brave thrill-seeker by any stretch of the imagination so I sympathise with that poor misguided soul who decided to go paragliding and appeared to regret it almost immediately.
Now while I sympathise with the poor guy, I also find the whole thing laugh-out-loud funny… as do many, many other Indians, clearly.
The poor guy clearly didn’t know what he was letting himself in for.
Rather like some new jobs, the paragliding experience was fine to begin with. However, regret and disillusionment follow swiftly.
…Figuratively, and literally according to this commentator. One can quickly start to regret it.
The man’s repeated entreaties “Land karade” are quite heartfelt. This resonated with many who are scared of flying or who have some unusual experience for the first time.
The man has his eyes closed for much of the time. When they are open all he can see is fog (kohra hi kohra, he says). This is a bit like when a Google search returns too many Quora results, according to this commentator.
The paragliding guy calls himself plenty of impolite names… people were reminded of other such instances of people calling themselves names.
Some commentators felt that paragliding is similar to the Indian economy which, experts now seem to agree, is in freefall.
The paragliding guy is now the metaphor for any bad decision we make. And live to regret.
The guy regrets his decision to paraglide to such an extent that he feels he should be beaten and punished.
A big thank you to whoever did this remix. I fell out of my chair watching this. Again.
Vipin Sahu wanted to hide the ignominy of this video but his brother put on YouTube and the rest is history. In this video, he speaks of his wild ride, his attempt to bribe the instructor and the liberal use of swearwords, which is unusual for him (he says). He also speaks about receiving a message from a woman who patched up a quarrel with her husband because of the hilarious paragliding video. Laughter, is in fact the best medicine, it would seem.
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