... ummmmmmm... because of the increasing number of diabolically-clever costumed super-villains using kites in the commission of their dastardly CRIMES, maybe...?
... or... I dunno... not, I guess. I dunno. :)
Posted on 02/06/2005 12:42:30 PM PST by KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle
THIRTEEN people have been killed and more than 500 injured during an annual kite-flying festival in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore.
Seven people with severe head injuries died in the city's General Hospital alone, and about 220 people were admitted with a variety of injuries including broken bones, hospital officials said.
The two-day festival of Basant, marking the start of spring, began with thousands of revellers perched on rooftops.
Two teenagers were killed when they fell from a roof, and two more were killed when a car hit them while they were trying to catch a stray kite, police said.
A man was killed by a stray bullet, while another was electrocuted when metal wire used to fly a kite became draped over live electric lines.
Officials said more than 300 injured people were taken to four other hospitals in different parts of the city.
Meanwhile, the festivities continued amid chants of "Bo Kata" (We have cut) as rival kites came down. Victory was celebrated with drumbeats, firecrackers and often firing in the air.
The celebrations also included concerts and dinner parties.
President Pervez Musharraf and his wife Sehba had visited Lahore for Basant, officials said. He watched from the roof of a historic building in the old part of the walled city.
Officials said more than 50,000 people from across the country had arrived in Lahore along with 10,000 other Pakistanis residing in the Middle East, Europe and the US to celebrate the occasion with friends or relatives.
Hundreds of shops and stalls across the city were selling kites, while many multinational companies distributed free kites carrying their insignia.
Police said more than 50 people had been detained for using metal kite strings or firing in the air.
City police chief Aftab Ahmad Cheema had warned before the festival that police would take "stern action" against both offences.
A refresher course in Ohm's Law.
Metal kite strings are outlawed because they could lead to electrocution, or because they're used to cut down other kites' strings?
OH! Kite fights!
We always raided the slot in my dad's medicine cabinet for razor blades to attach to ours.
It came to earth I know not where...
(in my best Curly accent)but it did come down and this I swear
somebody soiled their underwear.....nyuk nyuk nyuk.
FMCDH(BITS)
In their usual form, kite wars of the Indian sub-continent are great fun. Classically, you take stout string and coat it with glass shards which when rubbed against an opponents string cuts it.
The spectacle of tens of thousands of kites is great! Probably not such a good idea where there are power lines, though.
I can understand the falling from a roof, getting creamed by a car when you don't look where you're going, even getting electrocuted by a wire hitting the power lines - the people are stupid - but WTF: they SHOOT at the kites too?
"In Soviet Russia, kite kills you!"
< / yakov >
... ummmmmmm... because of the increasing number of diabolically-clever costumed super-villains using kites in the commission of their dastardly CRIMES, maybe...?
... or... I dunno... not, I guess. I dunno. :)
"In their usual form, kite wars of the Indian sub-continent are great fun. Classically, you take stout string and coat it with glass shards which when rubbed against an opponents string cuts it."
Have you read "The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini? What a little gem of a book! I loved it, and because I read it, I knew what the heck this article was about in the first place, and why people are so rabid for these kite fighting contests. ;)
No, but I've seen the festival in Khathmandu. My little brother was quite good. There was no electricity in that neighborhood, so wires were not a problem.
Oh, well...you win then, LOL! I'll just have to live other lives through books for now. ;)
Definitely "just damn" material...
Fell off the roof? No.
Dragged off is more like it.
My kite has an eight foot wingspan and two lines.
Each one is 100 pound test line.
When the wind gets going, it has picked me up off the ground, and drug me face down across the park.
I can cut perfect sqaures in the sky, or have it come straight down, turn 90degrees before hitting, and then zoom straight and level across the field, turn 90 and go straight backup. And you do not want to be in the way of these things.
Wrote almost same response. . .but left house without posting it. . .
The book IS a gem; Khaled is an incredible story-teller; and certainly can critiique pain and suffering; life's angst. . . in the most beautiful and simple language.. .
. . .we see Kite running as a national sport for these people.
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