After sinning, you need to atone. And if the sin happens to be gluttony, there are only two ways of atonement. Either you go on a crash diet. Or you start doing a hell of a lot more exercise to start burning all those extra calories you have consumed and which have gone straight to your waistline.

Of course, if you are a glutton, for punishment you could do both — that is, starve yourself while increasing your quantum of exercise as well. In my case, as I see no particular reason to punish myself twice over, I preferred to work out the excess calories through exercise alone. Cutting back on food did not appeal to me.

But first, the genesis of my problem. At the beginning of September this year, I weighed a reasonable 80kg — or 176lb — on a 5 ft 11-in frame. That’s not svelte but it was not obese either. Then, in quick succession, I celebrated my birthday, Durga Puja/ Navratri, the Bengali Lakshmi Puja followed by Diwali/ Kali Puja/ North Indian Lakshmi Puja and then rounded it off with Bhai Dooj or Bhai Phonta.

Each celebration meant a few sweet dishes, several extra helpings, and many, many mid-meal snacks. By October end, the scales read 86kg — 189.2lb. I had put on 6kg — 13.2lb — in a month and a half of festive feasting.

Let me explain how this whole weight thing works. The average man, woman or child requires a certain number of calories from food just to maintain his or her weight. Now how many calories you require to maintain, that is, neither gain nor lose any weight, depends on two factors.

First, it depends on your basal metabolic rate. The basal metabolic rate (BMR) is the energy — or calories — you expend for your body to function normally. That is, for such routine activities like your heart beat, your body temperature, and your respiration. This takes up a healthy chunk of the calories you consume. The rest is burnt up by activities or exercise.

While there are numerous complicated formulae to calculate your basic calorie requirements to maintain your weight, a rough guideline often works better. If you are basically a slothful character like me, you need to multiply your weight in lbs by 14 to get the calories you need to consume every day to maintain your weight. (In my case, therefore, at 176lb, I needed to consume roughly 2464 calories to maintain my weight). If you are somewhat more active, you need to multiply your weight in lbs by 17. And if you happen to be one of those hyperactive people forever jumping up and down, you need to multiply your weight by 20.

The sad truth is that you start piling on those additional pounds the moment you start consuming anything more than your maintenance food quota. Before you notice, you have consumed an extra samosa (about 300 cals) or two slices of that rich chocolate cake (600 calories), over and above your normal food. It takes roughly 3,500 extra calories to put on an extra pound. In my case, I had consumed over 45,500 extra calories over two months to put on 6 kilograms. In other words, I had seriously hogged at the dining table.

Now it is payback time. As the Yanks say, it was time to get off my butt and start moving — and start moving seriously. Not being a person who believes in tackling anything without thorough preparation, I decided to do some serious research. I wanted to see how to burn all those extra kilos in the most pleasurable and efficient fashion. The first result of this research was the realisation that there is no activity that is both pleasurable and efficient. (You may choose to disagree but these were my conclusions.)

The great things in life…

As I have just said, the really fun things in life don’t burn enough calories. Taking one of my favourite activities — sleeping. (Editor’s note: For the purpose of this article, sleeping is an activity). Now 30 minutes of blissful sleep only burns up a measly 38.6 calories. Simple arithmetic tells me that putting in an extra two hours to my daily eight hours of sleep is going to burn a mere 154.4 calories — not enough to make a dent on the 45,500 calories I need to get rid of.

Sitting in my favourite armchair and finishing my novel is not much better. Reading, while sitting comfortably, burns a mere 43 calories per half hour. Watching television consumes exactly the same amount. Of course, the worst discovery of my research was that even 30 minutes of vigorous sex would burn a mere 100 odd calories. (Thirty minutes of moderate sex would burn only 34 calories). Making your bed works somewhat better at burning calories — 86 calories per 30 minutes. The obvious problem is that it takes roughly three minutes to make my bed so I can’t see myself burning a lot of calories this way unless I develop obsessive compulsive disorder and start making my bed a hundred times daily.

The other fun activities…

Since staying at home wasn’t going to help in burning any significant calories, I thought I would research some of the more fun activities in life outside home. Unfortunately, here too, my research throws up the same sad conclusion: the fun activities do not burn significant calories.

Take golf, for example. You will agree that it is one of the more fun exercises. Well it turns out that golf is way down when it comes to any serious calorie burning. Half an hour of golf, using the cart, would burn only 150 calories. Even if I dumped the cart and lugged around the clubs myself, it would only burn a mere 185 calories per half hour of play.

Of course, golf is not the worst calorie burner. Bowling burns a mere 129 calories per half hour while billiards consumes some 100 calories in the same time. (Aside: No wonder the legendary pool player Minnesota Fats put on so much weight. He used to drink and play pool 18 hours a day).

The great disappointment though was table tennis or ping pong — an activity I always thought was fairly hectic. It turns out that I would burn only 172 calories if I played ping pong vigorously.

Water sports…

Though with winter setting in, burning calories through any form of water sports is purely of academic interest, I decided to check them out nonetheless. It turns out that water sports are pretty efficient as calorie burners. Thirty minutes of swimming would eat up anywhere from 300 to 450 calories, depending on the stroke and the intensity.

Snorkelling would consume 215 calories while scuba diving would happily burn 300 calories in 30 minutes. Water Polo: a healthy 430 calories per half hour. (Interesting tidbit: Beach Volleyball would consume 340 calories if I played it for 30 minutes. Watching those hot bodied women playing it though would only use up 43 calories.)

The big ticket burners…

The awful cliché reads: No Pain, No Gain. If you are ready to bear the pain, there are lots of activities that can effortlessly gobble up those calories that have been accumulated. At my weight level, a mere half an hour of serious martial arts training — judo, kick boxing, karate or Tae Kwon Do — would take care of 430 calories. Seriously pummelling a punching bag would burn 250 calories. Bicycling fast would burn 500 plus calories and squash, played with enough intensity, would do the same.

If you can’t find companions, you can take the solitary route. Depending on the speed with which I was running, I could burn anywhere between 380 and 550 calories. High impact aerobics could account for 300 calories per 30 minutes. And serious weight training with free weights could take care of 250 calories for half an hour of effort.

The big dilemma

Having done all this research, here’s my dilemma. What do I choose and how long will it take me to lose all that accumulated extra calories. If I choose one of the 300 calories per 30 minutes activities, I would still be burning only 600 calories per hour. It would then take me 75 hours to burn through those activities.

If I spend one hour every day, that means two and a half months. Far more doable are the activities that burn between 150 and 250 calories for half an hour of effort. But that also means that much more time to be spent before I get back to my 80kg. Choosing those moderate exercises would mean spending five months before I have shed this accumulated flab. Five months effort to burn up what I have put on in two months. Life is definitely not fair.

Counting calories

Find out what you could burn off in 30 minutes

380 to 550
calories: Running,depending on speed

500
calories: Squash, Bicycling fast

430
calories: Serious martial arts training (judo, kick boxing, karate or Tae Kwon Do), Water Polo

300 to 450
calories: Swimming depending on stroke

340
calories: Beach volleyball

300
calories: High impact aerobics, Scuba diving

250
calories: Training with free weights

172
calories: Ping pong

150
calories: Golf, using the cart

129
calories: Bowling

86
calories: Making your bed

38.6
calories: Sleep