There comes a time in every man’s life when he must look in the mirror and take stock of himself. Then he must ask the question that has been burning inside all men since the beginning of time: Am I a Hindu fertility goddess?
According to a story written by Julie Moult, John Askill and Pamela Timms that appeared online April 3, 2007 on The Sun website, a man from Tooting, South West London (a real place, I promise) did just that.
Steve Cooper moved to India after some friends told him he looked just like the goddess Bahucharaji Mata, who was the patron of Indian eunuchs.
“I love being here,” Cooper told The Sun. “I don’t miss anything about Tooting.”
Insert your own fart joke here.
Whenever Cooper walks through the village in the northern state of Gujarat, the people flock to him and shout “Jay Bahuchar Ma”, which means, “The goddess is here.”
Cooper spends his days blessing pilgrims by placing his third finger on their forehead and muttering, “The goddess is here.” One pilgrim traveled for days to be blessed by Cooper. She said that “The goddess” had blessed her sister-in-law and “she got pregnant immediately.”
Sounds fishy to me. Maybe this guy is putting more than his third finger on these pilgrims, if you catch my meaning.
“I feel as if I have come home. When I first came to the temple, I sat down and smiled. Everything fell into place. After about 20 minutes everyone crowded around, and I naturally started blessing people,” Cooper said. “When I touch people I connect with them.”
But not everyone is convinced of Cooper’s divinity.
“He is a fake,” a eunuch called Sudha said. “I checked, and he still has a penis.”
So is that the official means of confirming that someone is a goddess? I wouldn’t take that job to save my life.
Temple priest: Hey, eunuch! We got another one claiming to be a goddess. I want you to check to see if he still has his “bodangle”.
Temple eunuch: Wait … what?
The story included a picture of the real goddess, and I must say that Cooper looks nothing like her. First of all, the real goddess is riding a rooster. Second, she has four arms. Cooper has the standard two arms, and he isn’t riding anything … which doesn’t explain how some of these women are getting pregnant immediately. But, hey, what do I know?
I also have the reputation of believing myself to be a supreme being because, to be honest, I have an ego the size of Joel Osteen’s bank account. But I don’t walk around blessing people, although I could.
My friends and I were bored last weekend, and we found a website that, once we filled out the necessary paperwork (basically, your name), made us Reverends in the Universal Life Church.
So if anyone wants to be married by an award winning humor columnist, shoot me an e-mail! I promise I’ll keep my third finger to myself.
thetruthandotherlies1@gmail.com