His Airness, Michael Jordan

In the multi-cultural, multi-lingual, multi-national beehive in which I reside in Washington DC, a city of half a million ephemeral people, ...

In the multi-cultural, multi-lingual, multi-national beehive in which I reside in Washington DC, a city of half a million ephemeral people, it’s always party time.Come weekends and my apartment building turns into a den of roistering bohemians. No occasion is too fleeting or too frivolous to imbibe, and indeed it is something of a miracle that I have managed to hang on to my job, not to speak of my wits, amid all the carousing.

The partying is particularly raucous on big sporting days. The match between Evander Holyfield and Mike Tyson last year occasioned such furious tohu-bohu that cops and fire tenders had to be summoned to douse the ardour of faithfuls. Although given to only modest drinking, I relish the carnival atmosphere that my co-habitants of Boston House, compounded of at least two dozen nationalities, can bring to such special occasions. Boisterous Boston House, they call it in our upscale neighbourhood. It was therefore with some regret that the Sunday before last I turned down the invitationfrom the usual gang of merrymakers to foregather at Apartment 504, where a revelry was in the offing to celebrate what was possibly Michael Jordan’s last basketball game. Jordan’s team, the Chicago Bulls, were leading the best-of-seven NBA finals against the Utah Jazz by 3-2 and this was the sixth game. A Bulls win would give them the title. It could also signal finis to the career of His Airness, to my mind the greatest athlete and the noblest sporting figure of my lifetime.

I’d be damned if I was going to spend such a divine evening with a bunch of yahoos, my dearest friends and neighbours though they are. So at game time, doors locked and telephone off the hook, a rare Glenfiddich at my elbow and an even rarer Montecristo in hand, I was ensconced in my favourite couch for what I considered to be a sporting Gotterdamerung — a Twilight of the Gods. A nuclear conflagration in South Asia would not have bestirred me.

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So much has been written about Michael Jordan that it’s hard to say anything new. Allsuperlatives have been used, re-used and exhausted. Suffice it to say that if the Gods wanted to make a sporting icon, they would have chosen MJ. In fact, I’m certain they did have a hand in making MJ.

I had watched the fifth Bulls-Jazz game at the home of my friend Chris Sandrolini, the India Desk officer in the State Department and a Chicagoan to boot. Although the game was being played in Chicago and Jordan was expected to kick Jazz butt and lift his sixth NBA title in front of his home fans, it did not turn out to be the script. Led by a powerful performance by the genial Karl Malone, Jazz shocked the Bulls in their home ring to pull back to 2-3. Jordan looked a shade slow and uncertain. Was this the anti-climactic end to a famous career?

"No way," Chris said quietly, as his hometown crowd peeled away disappointed. "He’s just heightening the drama." In his voice was the calm assurance of a Chicagoan who had seen and grown up with the Bulls’ winning ways.

That Jordan did conjure a win was not asurprise, nor how he did it. With less than 20 seconds for the final whistle and Jazz leading 86-85 in front of 23,000 howling fans, Jordan stole the ball from Malone. He flashed across the court into the Jazz circle. With six seconds to go, he darted and feinted to give his defender the slip and rose in the air to shoot. Time itself stood still. The ball swished into the basket while Jordan stood with his hand still aloft. For one last, indelible moment, it was signature Jordan.

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I swear the warm, fuzzy feeling that swept over me had nothing to do with the Glenfiddich. And I still did not want to discuss the game with the yahoos.

I went up to my roofdeck, lit the Montecristo and looked around for the brightest star.

Canada, UK and Australia formally recognise a Palestinian state

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The UK, Canada, and Australia have recognized Palestine as a state, going against the US and Israel's opposition. British PM Starmer aims to revive peace without Hamas and hostage release. Canada and Australia also recognize Palestine, condemning terrorism. Over 145 UN members recognize Palestine, with France likely to join soon.

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