To Shillong, with love!

Where the hills are green,
And the waters crystal clean;
Where the sun rises to the sparkling spring;
And humming bees weave a charming ring;
Where every second person I meet;
Calls me by my name to Greet;
To that vibrant March Spring, I belong!
To that heaven on earth they call Shillong!

At Slip stood our Wall!

Dear Rahul Sharad Dravid,
As you retire from the Gentleman’s Game, my guilt overrides me as I make these confessions.
1. I never enjoyed watching you bat. Like several other Indian fans, in most matches, I was awake and glued to the TV when the likes of Tendulkar and Sehwag were exhibiting their mastery, but timed my sleep hours for the time you came in to bat. You could never keep me awake with awe-inspiring lofts and pulls. But you let me sleep -- sleep with a reassured peace that you were around, standing as the Wall when our other heroes were falling by the bullet!
2. I never missed you when you weren’t around. Each time, a Rohit Sharma or a Virat Kohli came onto the scene and people got chatting about giving these new blokes a chance, I joined them in the clatter. When the question arose on who should make way for these young turks, I thought of you. You can’t hold me guilty for believing that I wouldn’t miss you. You never left the scene to make me miss your absence. To play some 93-odd test matches on a trot since debut, you hardly ever gave us a chance to see an Indian team without you.
3. You had no say in the team. I remember how they shuffled your batting order and gave you the gloves in the run up to the 2003 World Cup. You were never asked, it seems, but just told. Why for once did you not tell the powers-that-be that you are a test cricketer of repute, why didn’t you ever throw your weight around? May be, because when others were looking to preserve their careers by taking centrestage on Indian pitches and hiding backstage on foreign batting tracks, you chose to risk your lifeline. Each time they gambled with your career, you came out with a fortune.
4. I am one of those myopic Indian fans who held a grudge against you each time you dropped a catch, unmindful of the fact that no one in the history of the game has more catches to his credit than you. I have cursed you for dropping the few, have I thanked you yet for the hundreds you held?
5. I think of Lords and remember a certain Saurav Ganguly, I think of Taunton (1999 World Cup) and remember the same name; I flash my mind to the Eden Gardens (2001) and remember a Very Very Special player and when I probe deeper, I can only think of Tendulkar’s 186 against New Zealand in Hyderabad. Where were you when these feats were being achieved? History tells us, you were right there. You have always played the neglected hero, but history is kind enough to record your heroics. Years later, generations to come will remember you as the last puritan to have played the Game of Cricket.
6. You never believed that charity (of runs) begins at home. When your contemporaries were hogging the limelight on sterile Indian pitches by tonking 200s and 300s, you most often had little time, just about enough, to complete a century. But, when the same players went abroad, their appetite for runs dried. Their 200s and 300s ceased, but what remained constant was you, and your willow making the 22-yards your own. To have the highest batting average for the country in Test matches won overseas elevates you to greatness. At least now, let this nation of cricket fanatics take a bow!

You faced 31,258 balls, the highest in the game’s history, to amass some 13,000-odd runs, the second highest in the game’s history. May be it just never occurred to us that you were busy at work too, while your other colleagues’ natural brilliance stole the show.

As the press conference in the Chinnaswami Stadium drew to a close today, it perhaps brought a shocking closure for several cynical and thankless Indians. At 39, you have learnt to deal with fans like me; I am not sure whether, at 25, I have learnt to deal with the absence of a selfless man like you.
At No.3, you will forever be mera No.1 . Stride on Gentleman, you will be missed!

To the old woman I met this afternoon!

Dear Granny-like-stranger,
Nearly 11 hours after we met, I am thinking of you. The images flash by as I recall you stumbling with the beyond-capacity weights on your shoulders. From the time you asked me to help you board the bus, till the time you left, I was looking at you very intently.
Your hands had twirled itself into wrinkles, eyes sunken into an endless gorge and your bent posture made me fear the helplessness of old age I would encounter 50 years from now.
I think of the several spineless young men who were standing beside you. They offered no help despite being half your age and twice your strength. I think of you and wonder if you did not have a family, a son or daughter? No child worth his salt would let his mother shoulder such physical burden in the winter of her life. Were you an unfortunate exception?
A lady of your age had no business testing your endurance with such physical activity. You must’ve lived through several battles in your glittered life; your body must’ve taken several blows. But, why is your physical fight still on in the last lap of your life?
As I meander towards the end of this piece, I am faced with a plethora of mixed emotions. I wish I had spoken to you for a while longer, understood what brought you to this pass at the fag end of your life. Life isn’t cricket, is it? The last few overs here shouldn’t be ‘slog overs’ as in the game of bat and ball.
But, you seem to be playing the slog overs. And it’s a colossal shame for people of my age, if parents of your age have to bear the titanic burden on their shoulders and brave it out in the sun.
As you stepped onto the bus, I stood behind you fearing you may fall. When you turned around and thanked me with your gracious smile and blessed me with that benevolent look, you touched a cord somewhere.
When I saw you this afternoon, we were strangers. Now, the reflective story of neglect has turned you into a fable for me. Signing off with a hope that the bus dropped you ‘home’.