The Idiot's Guide to Cricket

I am not bragging when I say that I know a lot. I do. I know a lot of things about a lot of things. I even know some pretty useless things - I used to collect useless elephant facts in my early twenties, for example. (Did you know that elephants are the only animals with knees and ankles that cannot jump? Or that they are the only animal you can teach to stand on its head?)

But one thing I do not know much about is sports. I suppose if you broke it out into all the different sports that I don't know much about, it would be a lot things that I do not know. Take hockey. Don't know much about it even though I once lived with three star players on an elite university hockey team. Or football. Don't know much about it, either, even though the same university was also known for its football program. In fact, in seven years in university there is just one non-graduation photo of me in the university yearbook, and wouldn't you know it, it is of me at the one football game I attended. On the two page spread, I am just about in the middle of the page. Everyone else in the stands are on their feet with their hands in the air, mouths open, as they cheer for...well, for something, but I have no idea what. And there is me, sitting there with a confused look on my face.

So it is not surprising that I know nothing about cricket either. In fact, the only cricket I had seen prior to this last week was the groups of men and boys that play in the sports fields that dot the country.

Steve does know a lot about cricket. Having spent time in India and Sri Lanka before, he has come to love the game. At Pizza Hut last week his eyes were glued to the television screen, as were everyone else's except mine. Yesterday he tried explaining the game to me as he watched the highlights reel of a big match from last weekend while we were eating at Burger King in Colombo, and while I sort of got it, it still really made no sense to me. Then again, I was distracted by the most awesome veggie burger I have ever had and was composing a "please extend your Asian veggie burger to North America" letter in my head to Burger King.

Cricket is a big deal in much of the world. It ranks number two only to football - soccer to North Americans. Yesterday when we were in Colombo we were slowed down getting to our destination due to a huge parade that stretched at least four or five city blocks. It was a precursor parade rally to a big cricket match that was happening between two high schools. There were numerous floats, countless instruments being played, music blaring from flatbeds, dancing, decorated cars, shouting, cheering, chanting, flag waving.... All for a high school cricket match. When Steve asked the tuktuk driver about it, he replied, "It's a very important game today for the school." With such fervour over a high school match, you can imagine how things get when the Cricket World Cup is on. In India alone, the big cricket match today between India and Sri Lanka was watched by 195 million people. India won, by the way, much to Sri Lanka's dismay.

Today, Steve, hoping to further enlighten my sports befuddled brain, found this piece which explains the game quite well, and could easily be dubbed "The Idiot's Guide to Cricket". Here is an except from the section on how the game is played:

• The pitcher (called a bowler) sends the ball bouncing off the ground, rather than directly through the air.
• When it gets to the batter (called a batsman), his primary goal is blocking it from hitting a set of three stumps stuck in the ground behind him, called a wicket. These stumps (roughly analogous to home plate) have a pair of small sticks (called bails) balancing on top of them, and if the ball knocks them off, the batter is out.
• Instead of four bases, cricket has just two wickets. The batsman's other goal is hitting the ball into the field, which allows him and the other batsman (there are two at any given time) to score runs by running back and forth between the wickets until the ball is returned.
• There's no foul territory: the batsman can hit the ball in any direction. If it goes past the boundary, he automatically gets four runs (if it bounced over) or six runs (if it flew over).
• There are no strikes, and the batsman doesn't have to run after hitting the ball. In the form of cricket played in the World Cup, each batsman gets one at-bat per game, but the at-bat can last a really really long time — it goes until he gets out, either by hitting a ball up into the air that gets caught, or getting caught running between the wickets, or by allowing the ball to hit the wicket behind him, or by blocking a ball with his body that the umpire thinks would have otherwise hit the wicket.
• Each team bats for one extended period of time (called an innings), then fields for the rest of the game, instead of switching back and forth like in baseball. A team's innings is finished when ten of its eleven batsmen are out, or when the other team has bowled a certain number of times (as measured in "overs," which are sets of six consecutive pitches).
• In the form of cricket played in the World Cup — called one-day cricket — each team can bowl 50 overs, and matches generally take about six hours.

Okay, that's pretty basic, right? But apparently this kind of cricket is played only to make the game more accessible. Real cricket is a grueling game called Test Cricket, which is designed to see which team has the most endurance and real skill, and can last up to five days!

Here is my favourite explanation of how the game works, from a sign on the wall at Lord's Restaurant....

  

That just about sums up the game, right?

2015 March 18: Whoa! That's Not the Sort of Thing You Want to Find in Your Bathroom!

Our home, like many Sri Lankan homes, has become the abode of many and assorted creatures. In a place where no house is completely sealed to the outside elements due to slatted window spaces for airflow and the need to air out houses daily in order to keep the insides from mildewing, it's just a fact of life.

We have had our share of winged creatures. Butterflies drift through. All sorts of flies - damsel flies, houseflies, gnats. Mosquitoes, the bane of mine and Elanor's existence. Despite mosquito coils, mosquito screens in the bedrooms, mosquito nets over the beds, Elanor and I still awake with mosquito bites every morning. Yesterday a tuktuk driver in Colombo saw Elanor's legs and told us about a product called soffel which is supposed to keep mosquitoes away. It is on our list of items to find today.

Beetles have also made their way through. Yesterday we had a scarab beetle trudging along the floor until Steve put it outside. Beetles are his thing, not mine. He loves beetles. That's why he and his best friend Sam have a collection of about 35 000 of them from all over the world. You can read about some of Sam's beetles adventures here.

Spiders are common as well. There is a species here that I am calling a ghost spider, for lack of a better name. So transparent you barely see them, with tiny bodies and long legs. Most of the time I only know they are there as I see them scurrying away from the morning's dust pile as I sweep the floor. We love watching the jumping spiders. Completely harmless - to us! - but they sure make quick work of other insects.

Geckos are also plentiful. Last night Elanor had the tiniest one I have seen yet crawling down her wall. While I was cooking supper another ran along the wall in front of me. Every night we fall asleep to the click click click sounds that they make. Surprisingly loud for such little creatures. We love them. Sri Lankans have a love-hate relationship with them. They love them because they eat all the bugs. They hate them because they can get into your food and they do poop on your walls.

Ants also come and go. We had harmless big black ants one day, but I just swept away their trail as they went out the door and they haven't been back. There are also tiny little red ants. They mostly leave us alone, unless we are in the shower. And they are surprisingly strong. Elanor and I watched a dozen of them carrying a bite of pancake that she had dropped, all twelve tiny ants moving in perfect unison to carry away their prize.

There is a palm squirrel that thinks he owns the place. We think he lives in the roof in the two feet of space between the red tile shingles on the outside and the wooden slats on the inside. The same palm squirrel that tried to move into the spare bedroom one day.

Our yard is slowly becoming populated as well. A koel spends part of every day in one of our trees now. I am not sure which wakes me in the morning - the koel calling or the local mosque! He also starts telling us about 4:30 every evening that the day is done.

Sometimes creatures show up in the bathrooms, Elanor's bathroom especially, since it is on the ground floor. Geckos are common, as are ants, mosquitoes, gnats, beetles, damsel flies, as she chooses to keep her bathroom light on so she "doesn't have to turn it off and on all the time" despite both Steve and I frequently telling her that she is attracting insects by doing so. Like many ten year olds, she knows best and her parents could not possibly know what they are talking about.

And so, a few nights ago, she took a shower, then came into her bedroom where I was sitting in the A/C and working, and said, "Uh, Mom? Something skinny and black just went under my shirt that's on the floor." Note: We have also been telling her that she shouldn't leave things on the floor.

I looked at her said, "I don't have anything to do with skinny black things in bathrooms. That's Dad's area! Go tell him!"

Steve went into her bathroom, and the next thing I hear is "Whoa! That's not the sort of thing you want to find in your bathroom!"

I don't know about you, but that's not the sort of thing I want to hear. Ever.

Apparently one of these things - or one very similar to it - crawled out of Elanor's drain, across her floor, and eventually into a crack in the wall.

Courtesy http://franmart.blogspot.com/2011/09/golden-moths-peas-and-other-delights.html

It was a centipede. A scolopendra, for those interested in knowing the scientific name. These (not so) lovely creatures can get up to 30 cm (1 ft) long in the tropics. The big ones can take out rats and bats, and their bites can be very painful, though not fatal.

That is not very comforting, though, when reading the experiences of Chulie de Silva on her blog. She writes: "The pain was sharp, excruciating, just below the elbow.  This must be the pain that precedes a heart attack  says my sleepy mind and  if so might as well die in the comfy bed – why get up?  Coming out of deep layers of slumber I wait for the heart attack that shows no sign of coming."

But don't kid yourself - they are found in smaller varieties all over the world. In Newfoundland we call them 'earwigs', and we were cautioned by adults to steer clear. With good cause - even the small ones can deliver a painful poisonous bite.

I never wanted to find these in my bathroom back home.

And I really don't want to find them in my bathroom here!

I get the heebie jeebies just thinking about it. As I said, Steve is the bug guy, not me!

Sixty-Four Degrees

To pick up where we left off last time....

We got our Suburban fixed (well, sort of - Dad reports today that it's not running again), got everything packed, and headed for St. John's for the night on Wednesday. The two little dogs knew something was up, as they both refused to leave my side during the trip. The snow started coming on as we finished up some last minute items. And the baleful look of my Shih-Poo as Mom and Dad pulled away from the hotel broke my heart. They drove our truck back to their place in a wintry blast all the way to Whitbourne, where it suddenly turned into a beautiful evening for a drive. Poor little Essie (my first dog, named Essex after my first new car, a Dodge SX) cried all Thursday because he missed his momma.

With yet another snowstorm forecast for Thursday morning, we were relieved to see clear skies when we awoke at 5 am to go to the airport. As we walked into the lobby a scant thirty minutes later, the heavens opened and we were in whiteout conditions. By the time we got to the airport, just five minutes later, all incoming flights had been cancelled, and our flight was scheduled to be the last one to leave.

And leave we did! Although, admittedly, it was more than a little disconcerting to be in 70 km / hour winds, with snow whipping everywhere at -31 C, and snowplows clearing the runway in front of the plane as we took off!

With all of the opposition we had faced while getting ready for this adventure, it was no surprise to be given this one last kick as we left for warmer climes.

In the meantime, my husband (who claims to be an introvert and anti-social) happily spent an hour at the gate chatting with former Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Beaton Tulk about politics, books, the oil industry, finance, Kevin King's back country cabin, Mr. Tulk's 76 year old house that he and his wife bought and restored in Musgravetown, and my first-cousin-once-removed Eli who is a good friend of his and whom Steve spent a day this past summer helping to put up a fence around a cemetery where many of my ancestors are buried - part of yet another cemetery restoration project envisioned by my great-uncle Sim who is celebrating his 91st birthday today! Our many hours long stop-over in Newark also saw my husband happily chatting away with the guys at the pizza stand in the airport food court - in Spanish, Sinhala, and Tamil.

The flight from Newark to Mumbai was an uneventful but long fourteen hours. It was rather strange in some ways, because we left on Thursday, but were flying east, so we had an extremely short day and landed in Mumbai shortly before midnight on Friday. It did give one pause for thought as we flew over Afghanistan, grateful to be flying at over 30 000 feet. But the sunset high in the air over Pakistan was truly spectacular - there is no word to describe the colour of where the saffron and cobalt of a Middle Eastern sunset meet as the sun is just sinking below the horizon. And one doesn't often hear this about airline food...but it was incredible. Curried chickpea wraps for snacking, some sort of crunchy grain salad and cauliflower curry for supper, mini samosas with sweet chutney and curried sago for breakfast.

The airport in Mumbai was incredible - the terminal has been completely renovated and now doubles as one of the pre-eminent museums in India, with 3 kms of exhibits! And, unlike American, Canadian, and other Western airports, photography is encouraged. With ancient and modern arts and crafts, frescoes, and archeological displays, it is truly breathtaking.

While wandering around and exploring all there was to see, I happened to stroll down a side hall in search of 'the facilities'. As I passed by a huge open double-door leading to a florescent sterile tube shaped corridor that apparently runs around the entire outside perimeter of the shopping, duty-free, and display area, I caught a glimpse of a large man with Asian features being held and forcibly removed of his jacket and backpack by three security officers. Needless to say, I did not stick around to see how this ended.

A couple of hours later we were on the final leg of our journey - Mumbai to Colombo - where again, the airline food was delicious - a spiced pancake with a vegetable korma and fruit salad (the one thing I did not like was a piece of fruit found in the fruit salad which tasted the way I imagine socks that have been worn for far too long in old hiking boots would taste), and Moong Dal for snacking. (This treat reminded me of a student I once taught who was supposed to be autistic and had been placed in my hard-to-serve regional autistic program. While trying to find some way to reach him, I visited him and his family at their home, where I discovered that he was a very different person at home than at school. While he obviously did have some intellectual delay, he could communicate just fine with his family, showed all sorts of social skills that he did not display at school, and did not have many of the repetitive behaviours that were his hallmark while in the classroom. After speaking at length with his huge extended family, I determined that the boy could not speak or understand English, but spoke Urdu at a child's level, and that Dal was his favourite food. I started bringing Dal to school to share with him whenever he became agitated, and miraculously, many of his autistic behaviours disappeared, and he was later moved to a program that better fit his needs as an ESL learner with intellectual delay, rather than an autistic program.)

At 5 am we landed, and quickly made our way through customs and immigration, found our driver (named Walleterad), and marveled at the beauty of a Sri Lankan early morning in 33 degree weather.

Of course, there was a mix-up at the hotel where we were supposed to be staying (are you surprised? given the nature of our trip to this point, we certainly weren't!) and our reservation had been lost. The owner of the hotel was very apologetic, especially after he learned that I am Canadian. He lived in Calgary for several years and loves Canada, but it was too cold for him although his wife loves it! First they lived in England, but it was too expensive, then Arizona where he loved the weather but it was a terrible place to raise children, then on to Calgary which was great for his children and he even considered buying some farmland, before deciding to move back to Sri Lanka, "the most beautiful and best place in the world!"

Fortunately, however, his son and daughter-in-law or daughter and son-in-law (it was a little confusing to follow) own a hotel across the street from his establishment, and Steve quickly arranged for us to stay there.

And so, here we are - from a North Atlantic blizzard to Sri Lankan humidity. And only 64 degrees change in the temperature!