Off-the-school

In those days, I was fully occupied with activities. I never remained idle. We have played cricket like anything on the street near my house, in nearby schools' grounds and also in paddy fields. We used to hit balls and when it goes on the terrace of some house we would climb on top of a house and walk the entire street on the terrace and get the ball. Those were really adventurous and I am very scared now on the very thought of such activities. We would play ice ball in the evenings when there are power cuts. There were very strange rules for the game and it will be so funny to explain them and I am skipping them. Video games were creating the trend. Mario is a game which I have played in all possible ways to reach the queens. Business was another time killing game.

Some events are still so crystal clear in my memories. I do not remember the age when I did this. My grandma alone was in the house. My friends were all quite elder to me. They had planned to go to a movie. Indian starring Kamalhassan was the one recently released. I too wanted to join them. My grandma would not allow nor give money if I had told I am going to a movie. So I said I am going to buy a team cricket bat and we all are sharing the money. It was not a lie. We bought a bat but for 35 rupees!! We went to the movie Indian and saw it seated in the first row. Then I told this after a long time to my dad. He did not tell anything. After all he would have got reminded of his childhood.

One day, when we were playing cricket during some vacation in the day time, I was keeping wickets. Then, there was an edge from the batsman and I took the catch but the batsman said it was not. The stump was the base of an electric post. When the batsman denied it, I threw the ball in anger and the streetlight was broken. It burst with a great sound and people came outside their houses. But we immediately vacated the streets. But everyone knew we were the culprits. We have broken several roofs, water pipes of houses, hurt so many people while playing cricket, spoilt milk cans etc. etc.. On that eventful day, one of my friends who used to come by cycle to play left his cycle near the playarea. Since I was responsible for this, I had to get the cycle. I did not know cycling then. I had to pull the cycle by hands and took it to the street corner and handed it over.

This is an accident I saw very close to my eyes. We were playing a tournament in a school ground. When our side was batting, we were sitting on the terrace of the principal room of the school. One of my friends, was standing on the wall of the terrace. There was a high voltage line passing on top of the building. He started swinging holding that and at some point, he held two wires together and he started screaming. Another friend of mine, was too smart enough and hit his hand with a rubber slipper. The boy fell down and we could see his bones in the forearm. His flesh had already melted. I took him to some doctor and after dressing up, I took him to his house and I got scoldings from his family. Poor people, how would they know what had happened. I saw him after a long time and we remembered everything.

I have played a lot and have gone missing from my house and have got a lot of scoldings from so many people. Everything just seem to be nothing other than memories now. I have enjoyed my life each and every moment, whether it was happy or sad, I have enjoyed. I was quite athletic and used to run considerably fast among my classmates. And I also used to play many more games like Shuttle Badminton, Volleyball, football and have won prizes. Even now I play some volleyball, cricket, football but the frequency has come down considerably. I will write more on things other than sports and games.