I was considered very brave by kids my age, to be playing with the older kids who played with a hard cricket ball.
If I remember correctly, a cricket cork-ball aka "cock ki ball" cost Rs. 15 in the mid to late 70's.
Rs. 15 was a lot of money especially for a kid at the time. Everyone playing would pool in to buy one, but someone had to take it home after the match; everyone wanted to be that someone.
Then it would get old, and oval, and spongy ... in that order ... and then the stitches would start to come off, and that was a sad moment, but cricket went on, and we played with a ball which looked in-flight like a nucleus with its electrons coming in and out of existence in a probability cloud around it.
Specially proud would be the person who played the shot that finally split the ball into its parts , an uproar of laughter over the confused fielder who couldn't decide what to chase; the two leather halves or the cork core?
There would be a good laughter as everyone high-five'd and celebrated a good end of a good cricket ball but then there was a somber silence when someone pointed out that we needed a new cork-ball. A moment of silence, not in memory of the cricket ball but in realization of what it meant for us.
After the fateful shot, everyone would walk home silently but resolute, to ask for money from their mothers to contribute to a fresh pool of Rs 15 for a new ball... A shiny shiny new ball. Oh boy the way it felt in your hand.
Luckiest and proudest would be the fast bowler who got that first over with that shiny new ball as the opening batsman stared in horror at the incoming projectile that looked like a glowing red dwarf in the reflected sunlight.
/Slash
If I remember correctly, a cricket cork-ball aka "cock ki ball" cost Rs. 15 in the mid to late 70's.
Rs. 15 was a lot of money especially for a kid at the time. Everyone playing would pool in to buy one, but someone had to take it home after the match; everyone wanted to be that someone.
Then it would get old, and oval, and spongy ... in that order ... and then the stitches would start to come off, and that was a sad moment, but cricket went on, and we played with a ball which looked in-flight like a nucleus with its electrons coming in and out of existence in a probability cloud around it.
Specially proud would be the person who played the shot that finally split the ball into its parts , an uproar of laughter over the confused fielder who couldn't decide what to chase; the two leather halves or the cork core?
There would be a good laughter as everyone high-five'd and celebrated a good end of a good cricket ball but then there was a somber silence when someone pointed out that we needed a new cork-ball. A moment of silence, not in memory of the cricket ball but in realization of what it meant for us.
After the fateful shot, everyone would walk home silently but resolute, to ask for money from their mothers to contribute to a fresh pool of Rs 15 for a new ball... A shiny shiny new ball. Oh boy the way it felt in your hand.
Luckiest and proudest would be the fast bowler who got that first over with that shiny new ball as the opening batsman stared in horror at the incoming projectile that looked like a glowing red dwarf in the reflected sunlight.
/Slash
No comments:
Post a Comment