Chak De India!

Above Phote: Front Page, Times of India, Sept. 25, 2007

So it’s been pretty darn fun to be in India during the World 20/20 Cricket World Cup. To top off the general excitement of watching cricket in a cricket-obsessed country, India faced Pakistan last night in the championship game – and it was as close as a match can get, ending in a win by India. Most people left work a good half hour early to make it home in time to plop themselves before their TVs and watch the showdown. Looking out the window from my apartment the streets of this hectic city were practically empty, but every few blocks you’d see a huddle of rickshaw drivers who parked their yellow and green vehicles -- giving up their evening’s income -- to watch the game on a tiny screen with terrible reception at a chai-stand with 20 other guys. My guess is that the chai-stand owner gave up his own income as well and dolled out free cups of warm chai to each of his guests. Even for someone like myself, who has just learned the rules over the past few weeks (thank you Brian), last night was full of tension and excitement. But Americans can relate, because everyone knows that you don’t necessarily have to be a Red Sox or Yankees fan yourself to enjoy turning on the tube when the two face off in baseball’s postseason action. The city where I reside, here in the state of Gujarat, had to take extra safety precautions for the game as this was the site of the 2002 Hindu-Muslim communal riots (India is home to the worlds largest Muslim population outside of Indonesia; Hindu fundamentalists -- and the key word of course is fundamentalists -- believe that with partition the Muslims in India should have been forced to move to Pakistan.. and that's a simplified version of the politics). A glimpse at this morning’s paper makes me think that no major violence broke out post match, and I'm sure it didn't hurt that two of India's strongest players last night - one of whom won "man of the match" - were a pair of Muslim brothers. Sports, afterall, do tend to unite more than divide a country and its people.

In other sporting news, I saw the Bollywood film “Chak De India” a couple nights ago on the big screen, and it may very well be my new favorite sport movie (okay okay at least it ties with Bend-it like Bekham and Pistol Pete). It’s a fictional tale about India’s national women’s field hockey team – and while it follows the team-sport movie formula to a T, it was still really amazing overall (it was better than Bend-it like Bekham in that the actresses were all really great athletes!)! The movie perfectly and humorously highlighted how diverse India is, as the team was made up of girls who had very little in common in terms of language, color, and culture, but they all called India their home and country. Admittedly there were no subtitles, but Bollywood throws in a sprinkle of the English language here and there, and on top of that many of the words in Hindi and Urdu come from Farsi (Bollywood movies use an amalgamation of Hindi and Urdu – which has come to be called Hindustani), so between English and Farsi I followed as much as I needed to enjoy the film. All in all it's been a fun few days of feeling India's national pride through sports!