Sunday, September 11, 2005

Only A Pakistani

So these days, while waiting for my work permit and all to come through, I am killing time in Windsor by hunting for apartments in TO, looking up cars and insurance rates, and playing cricket. I hadnt played cricket in almost 6 years when two weeks ago I took up a friends offer to join him for some cricket in the quad. Considering that frosh week was about to start, I went to the quad hoping to meet some hot new comers, but ended up getting totally involved in the game that I would play religiously as a child.
That led to me being a part of a team of friends participating in a cricket tournament today. The students association at the unviersity organized the tournament (in a soccer field, but still something is better than nothing) as a part of the Frosh Week. My friends put in a team and I played along. It was'nt much of thriller, since our team was way stronger than the others there, but it was still a good way to kill a lazy sunday afternoon. After the match ended there were five us, all Pakistanis, heading for our car, when we come across a huge tractor tire lying in the middle of our way. It was being used by the soccer team for some training exercise and they had not kept it back. For some reason, we all instinctively thought that we need to move the tire to the corner, so two of us put the tire up and started rolling it towards the corner of the field.
Our soccer field at the University rec center is made in an unusual way. Theres the parking area and then a grassy incline that plateaus into the soccer field itself. While we were rolling the tire to the corner, yours truly opined, wouldnt it be fun for someone to sit in the tire and roll down the incline. Everybody laughed, we made jokes, asked for volunteers and made fun of each other about rolling down in the incline in a bigg ass tractor tire.
Five minutes later, the tire was held upright by two of us, while a third person, Hasan, was taking position in the tire. We had two engineers among us, and they decided the best position for a person to sit and what would be the best position for the tire to begin its descent. Myself and one of the engineers were asked to play the role of a break at the end of the incline. Our job was to stop the tire from rolling into the parking lot. Two people took position at the "launch pad" and one person was all set to roll down the incline in a Good Year tractor tire.
The fun began when the tire started rolling down. We could clearly see Hasan with expressions of panic and curiosity as he held on to the tires inner wall. I was the first break, Salman was my back up. The tire was initially rolling very slowly, but gained momentum as it rolled further down the incline. I was all set to grab a hold of the rolling monstrosity when I realized that it could actually run me over. Behind me, I could hear Salman saying oh, its suddenly gotten a lot faster. I was feets away from the tire, when I decided to jump of to the side. Salman miscalculated the speed and by the time he moved away, the tire crashed into the side of his body bruising his shoulder. It fell off the path, onto the grass, and we could all hear Hasan laughing out loudly inside the tire.
Although the ride did not end as planned, yet it was still a great thrill. Everyone caught on and soon all five us were ready to roll down in the tire. We figured out a better braking mechanism and decided to use cricket bats in tandem, instead of bare hands. For the next 30 minutes, five Pakistani men, in their early and mid twenties were rolling down an inclince in a tractor tire.
What makes this even more funny is that there some caucasian, some indian, some sri lankan and bangladeshi people before us who had walked past the tire, but it took someone from Pakistan the brains to figure out that a tractor tire on an incline makes for a great time. Hence our unainomus conclusion was that no matter how good people from any other country are in any other field, no one can take the cake from Pakistanis when it comes to screwing around. :D

3 comments:

Maria I said...

*chuckles* You betcha! Screw it. Then fix it.

Yawerite said...

Absolutely true of Pakistanis when it comes to turning the mundane around. Your fun numa 'brain wave' and eventually hurting your friend reminded me of the push outside MCS building and me being down to earth (literally speaking) :D amidst your chuckles

qu3st said...

that was hilarious....i couldnt help laughin out loud and i mean laughin out loud...and the way u describe the scenario made me feel i was actually there....fantastic way of puttin it into word....fantastic....still laughin.