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India's marathon boy, aged three

wdlove

wdlove

macrumors P6
Original poster
Oct 20, 2002
16,568
0
Very saddened that he lost his father. His mother sold him for $20, because you couldn't afford to care for him. A coach has taken him under his wing. He is on a better diet, Runs for several hours twice a day. I am concerned about that much activity for a three year old. Hope that he can have time to just be a three year old and play with those his age.



http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4241958.stm
 
What a wonderful opportunity for him though, to "break his chains" if you will... although I am concerned too, it sounds like he is being taken care of, and in such a positive way.
 
i bet the money this guy would recieve for getting this kid into the guiness book would be equivalent to several years of pay for him.

still think he is doing this for the benefit of the child? plenty of time to run all day, but zero education.
 
broken_keyboard said:
Dude, making a 3.5 year old run a marathon is child abuse.
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yep - getting up at 5 and running till noon? Sorry, that's not right. He should be doing some other things besides running all day - and the whole Guiness thing is ludicrous.

I'd be surprised if he ends up not being able to run at all when he's an adult - there is only so much wear and tear a body can take....

D
 
A very interesting case of the 'jogging slavery' phenomenon that has become so rampant in India and throughout southeast Asia, in which local athletics instructors or community figures will acquire a small child and force the child to perform amazing feats of physical ability for the public. Interesting, not because of the feats of this particular child, but because the new owner of the child acquired him from the dealer for apparently no price markup whatsoever.

"Mr Das, also the president of the residents' association of the run-down area where Budhia used to live, summoned the man who had bought Budhia and paid him his 800 rupees back."
 
BrianKonarsMac said:
i bet the money this guy would recieve for getting this kid into the guiness book would be equivalent to several years of pay for him.

still think he is doing this for the benefit of the child? plenty of time to run all day, but zero education.
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You think people get paid money for setting a record???
 
Hopefully the child will get an education also. A three year old in the Guinness Record book will certainly bring publicity and money. Just pray that the man will share it with the boy and see that he gets an education. Also medical checkups, to make sure that the running doesn't harm his developing body
 
broken_keyboard said:
Dude, making a 3.5 year old run a marathon is child abuse.
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In the US everything is some kind of abuse or problem with the law or something.

If the kid has a talent is ok, not everybody in the world think "money wise".

The man is concern about his education as well and everything seems fine.

I think is worst to spend the entire day (months) playing computer games or behind a computer, gaining weight, lacking of social relationships. For em that is a total waste of life.
 
Johnny Rico said:
A very interesting case of the 'jogging slavery' phenomenon that has become so rampant in India and throughout southeast Asia, in which local athletics instructors or community figures will acquire a small child and force the child to perform amazing feats of physical ability for the public. Interesting, not because of the feats of this particular child, but because the new owner of the child acquired him from the dealer for apparently no price markup whatsoever.
Click to expand...

Hmm. Still, without focusing on the negatives, if his mother was willing to sell him (regardless of dire financial situations), isn't he better off with someone who can provide for him? Hopefully when he grows up he will look back on his accomplishments and be empowered by his triumph over adversity.
 
dferrara said:
Hmm. Still, without focusing on the negatives, if his mother was willing to sell him (regardless of dire financial situations), isn't he better off with someone who can provide for him? Hopefully when he grows up he will look back on his accomplishments and be empowered by his triumph over adversity.
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And, whose word do we have about who did the buying and who did the selling. Convenient for the trainer that some unidentified other party did the initial buying and the boy therefore needed to be rescued.
 
first off, I doubt this is true.
A three ys old running for seven hours on ends? don't think so.
Let's assume they news are a 'bit' exaggerated and we have a 6 ys old forced to run for 3 hs stretches. Still child abuse to me
 
CanadaRAM said:
Well geeze, in Little League we limit 10 year old pitchers to 100 pitches a week and forbid throwing curves and sliders because of the damage it can do to undeveloped bones and tendons...
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and that pissed me off so much in Little League...


Thou now i can't play baseball anymore cause i have thrown out my arm 5+ times (outfield and pitching). And will have a shoulder problem for the rest of my life. But if i really really wanted to i could probably go back to baseball and probably pitch in the 80s if i decided to get in shape again.

And to think my coach yelled at me and sat me down for a week because he wanted me to go in to pitch for relief and i told him my arm was tired.....
 
There really isn't enough information in that brief article to determine whether this child is receiving adequate care or is being horribly mistreated and enslaved to make his guardian rich, but I would definitely suspect the latter. A "strict diet and exercise regiemen" for a 3 1/2 year old?? That's just not right.

I actually don't see how it's even possible for a toddler to be capable of that level of physical endurance... seems inevitable that he'll end up with severely stunted growth or some other defects from what he's doing. Think about those girls who begin training to be Olympic gymnasts at 7 or 8 years of age and basically end up skipping puberty altogether. Now we're talking about a 3-year-old! Kind of frightening to think about what this might do to him in the long run.... :(
 
That kid is going to have a heart attack at age 12. It's too active. HE is too active. He'll be messed up for life because of this man. I know he was poor to begin with, but I wonder if he'll go to school and (try to) make something of himself, or whether he'll just end up being a disfigured runner with a bad heart and knees?
 
This is just poor training, if this boy even did have potential he's far to young to train. Every good runner knows you get about 7 years out of your body for competitive use. This poor boy will be winding down as he comes of age.

But that aside, I don't agree with the child abuse posts, only because the boy sounds like he enjoys it, however it is still terrible parenting. Kids would love to drink pop and eat candy all day, should we let them? This man is exploiting this poor child.

Yuk :mad:
 
mymemory said:
In the US everything is some kind of abuse or problem with the law or something.

If the kid has a talent is ok, not everybody in the world think "money wise".

The man is concern about his education as well and everything seems fine.

I think is worst to spend the entire day (months) playing computer games or behind a computer, gaining weight, lacking of social relationships. For em that is a total waste of life.
Click to expand...

i dunno, sounds like exploitation to me.
 
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