Bend It Like P

Ram Avatar was our new sports instructor. At first, we were relieved that we had been relieved from our previous sports instructor, Rathi. This new instructor, in the first games period of the year, came to our class and started lecturing us on football, it’s rules, strategies etc. We, students already tired from 5 hours of classes in the day were itching to go out and play. This was probably the only games period in our whole lives that we ever hated. So, Mr. Avatar’s ratings took a deep plunge in his first week itself.

For a few weeks, he spared us his gyan and let us play. Then suddenly one week, he announced that he would test us in the sport of our choice. Having already experienced his ways of spreading gyan, we were very apprehensive of the form the test could take. But it turned out he had better sense than we expected.

He took us out of the class and queued us on the road ( it is more of a small lane, with the school building and our mess on either side of it ). He placed three balls, a basketball, a volleyball, and a football infront of us. He asked each one of us in turn to choose one of them and demonstrate some skills of that sport.

I was 3rd in the line. When my turn came, my decision was very easy. I had chosen the football, for a few very well thought out reasons. Firstly, the first two hadn’t chosen the football. Secondly, and more importantly, both volleyball and baskeball, the sports not the balls themselves, were alien to me. Finally and most importantly, because of the topography around. As I have mentioned already, it is a small lane, on the one side there was the school building, on the other trees and our mess building. So, one would have expected any sane person A not ask a person B to demonstrate his skills in kicking or shooting a football in such a place, for the kicked or the shot football might crash into one of the numerous windows around.

So, that was my choice, an intelligent choice, a choice that would force the instructor to ask me to choose one of the other two, which as I have mentioned were alien to me and so could not be tested upon, and which would allow me to get away from the test without being tested.

But obviously, I hadn’t taken into consideration the already mentioned ways of spreading gyan of our instructor. This additional piece of information breaks down the whole analysis that has been presented above. This is because (the careful reader would have already observed it) the whole analysis depends on person A being sane. So, my instructor being person A in this model, the whole thing breaks down.

So, I was asked by Mr. Avatar, contrary to the AB theory’s predictions, to shoot the ball. I was disappointed that such a complete theory could not stand for more than a few seconds. Well, I had to shoot. I didn’t know where to shoot it at.

Often while learning something, we are told to free our minds, meaning, not to be nervous and to let our instincts rule us, which quite often has remarkable results. So, that is what I did. I freed my mind. I let my instincts rule me. And I kicked the football. And I must say the results, both short term and long term, were truly remarkable.

First I’ll mention the short term effects. I had never and will probably never be able to bend it like that. I am sure even the over hyped up Beckham could never bend it so much. The ball after leaving my right foot, took a trajectory as shown in the figure below and hit Mr. Avatar staright in his face. The immediate reactions of all the people around, are too tough to be reproduced here. The arrow in the figure, indicates Mr. Avatar.

Now for the long term effects. My father was asked to visit Mr. Avatar to hear about a child who had gone astray in his life. But that was not an imporatant consequence. The most important consequence was that Mr. Avatar had since then stopped with his experimentation in coaching. This incident had taught me something that I couldn’t learn for more than 3 years in school, despite the best efforts of my teachers. ‘A stitch in time saves nine’. Never let things go out of control.

Travails Of A Young Sportsman

I am starting a new category today, which goes by the same name as that of this post. The posts in this category will be based on my experiences at school ( roughly between 6th and 12th standard ( for all those morons who try to ape the U.S in every small thing, 6th and 12th grade)), generally related with sports or games, or on those experiences that caused some trouble.

Since FIFA worldcup is in progress, I'll start with football. To be more precise with an incident in my 8th std., which, had Gurinder Chadha been a witness to, would have led her, GC , to name her movie as 'Bend It Like (Well, You Know Who)', instead of that good sounding, but not so appropriate 'Bend It Like Beckham'.

PS: This doesn't mean it is an end to CSC. Crow Shit Chronicles will be back soon.

PPS: I have got this bad cold tonight. So, the first post will have to wait a little longer.