To Be a Sport

Sport provides moments that unites individuals to shape up a collective memory. The champions like Messi, Sachin and LeBron get to do so at the world stage. However every individual has had one or the other instance in time where his/her sporting ability eclipsed all else in life.I had my sporting moment at the age of 13 in the colony playground. People back here at my Cooperative Housing Society (CHS) which is equidistant from Mulund, Vashi, Ghatkopar, and Bandra while simultaneously being located near an expressway and a municipal dumping ground (otherwise known as the middle of nowhere) define life in its most natural and essential parameters. Parameters such as:

Who has an affair with whom at which block?
Affair: Is an event which is said to have occurred when boy (eg. Rocky) confesses his louuww for girl (eg. Pinky) OR When Rocky asks Pinky for her homework notebook (whichever takes place in front of neighbourhood Aunty)

Who won the Chitrakatha Dance and Drama Competition (This isn’t about a petty rat race it is about the thespian waiting to be discovered in my child)?

These parameters and the resulting competition within them define the macrocosm that is Suburban India. This location is almost always identified by the logo on the gate stating “Prem Vilas CHS, NO salesman allowed, Beware of Dogs, No parking in front of this Gate, No parking for visitors.”

It was the summer of 2000. The human race was at the crossroads trying to analyse the devastation and destruction it had witnessed in the previous century and was looking towards a very futuristic Isaac Asimov like 3rd millennium. The Indian IT companies had successfully neutralized the Y2K bug. I was still coming to terms with writing the number 2000 in all my school books and for some odd reason English music went beyond Backstreet boys to include Eminem, Linkin Park and Creed (Clapton, Cranberries and Eagles took until 2006 to register). We were playing the biannual World colony championship series which featured just us two neighbouring colonies. Reputations were made and lost in this series. Only those who had

1. Talent
2. the guts to battle it out
3. ability to spin underarm
4. own a bat and those
5. who would field anywhere where they were told to could make it into the team.

Owing to my prodigious all round abilities and ability number 5, I was part of the team for the second time. This was a home series which meant we were the favourites as we knew the conditions. The colony ground was as imposing as the Centurion stadium in RSA. Just that a few things were missing and cricket was played with a rather different approach:

No runs on the offside beyond the ashoka tree as there was a “Khadi(creek).”
No runs on leg side since there were buildings, glass doors and one stiff uncle who lived there.

Which meant that only people with sheer Dravid like discipline, Kallis like technique and Pollard like strength could hit straight down the line and score. It was a tough pitch with 50 stones, 5 grass blades and a hard tennis ball for the batsman to face. After warming up for an underarm bowl for nearly 20 minutes I was called by the captain. This was the moment I was waiting for. I could picture it all in my head; First ball leg spin, clean bowled! Second ball off spin, caught and bowled! Third bowl flipper, bowled again! The colony goes wild they hail their new hero!

“Abbey you!Go field there on offside near ashoka tree!”
“But there are no runs there!”
“That is why, now go and stand there.”

So after a rather eventful 6 overs I memorised the opposition batting line up, their choice of words to abuse our team, begged the bowler to atleast toss me the ball 10 times and fielded approximately 0 the match was poised at an interesting stage.The opposition required 1 run of the last ball. The best batsman in the opposition stepped out to a flighted leg spinner. The ball drifted away and he missed the pitch of it. But he swung his bat anyway. The ball took the edge and flew to the offside. Imagine the new ultra, ultra slow motion camera. Now imagine the new adidas cricket advertisement. Now just remember to add yours truly as a chubby fielder and spanking new sport shoes instead of Adidas Dude. I took 4 steps towards it, but there was a puddle of mud nearby. In these moments you have to make a tough choice, Dirty clothes and Angry Mother or catching a hard Tennis ball. The ball was dying on me and the puddle was closer. I had to think fast, but fate planned it all for me. Although statistically impossible to achieve, I managed to trip on a stone (alright pebble the size of a grape), then I stumbled on to the puddle,missed the ball and caught it on the half volley. That was in a sentence the greatest almost catch ever! What a moment! The opposition was jubilant. The bowler was mortified and I heard a person use the word “F@#K you” for the first time. I leave you to figure out whom my team captain meant it for. I realised that my actions did indeed have some consequence on this world and the people in it.

And then on life was never the same. I took the enhanced confidence I got from that incident forward for the rest of my life. I just missed out on the best Junior college by 50 marks in SSC. Missed out the IIT’s by 100 marks and consequently finished off my engineering degree missing the 70% mark by a mere 1000 marks. My sporting prowess was also improving. I went on to become an accomplished goal keeper during football season (that would be the rains when you can’t play cricket). I earned the distinction of saving 20 goals on target in a single match. The opposition always claimed that I ignored the 30 goals that I let in, but that is the way statistics play. So encourage all little children to be the “Sport” to accomplish their dream. If not the next Sachin let them try and be winners in life!