When we were in school, a lot of
lessons were learnt during the lunch break in the large playground of Don
Bosco. Fighting for honour was common, so was fighting with honour. You never
fought to break anyone’s bones but you fought to prove a point. Today after so
many years, what we fought on is lost in the shadows of memory, what remains
are the lessons learnt from them. We were an all-boys school so the lessons
seem from another day and age where chivalry, honour and loyalty were all that
mattered.
There was rarely a hit to face.
The marks were the most visible and definitely the ones which would get the
opponent at the receiving end into trouble when he goes back home. You also
never hit the groins. The pain is unbearable and everyone knew it. That’s the
first thing you learn when you play cricket and mistime a shot. The kick to the
shin was acceptable and I do not know why because now that I am saner I know
how scary that can be. But then now of us had the speed of the Premier League Players.
We desperately wanted to play rugby but given that no one knew the rules and
there was a lack of equipment, it never really took off. But what we managed
was the shoulder shove, a highly effective manoeuvre that can come to use in
both football and basketball. In the basketball games, it was brutal because of
the hard surface. In the football matches, it was terrifying as the green grass
left the signs for all (read moms) to see.
But the favourite by far was the
punch in the gut. Never utilized on the games field, it was reserved for the
one on ones that rarely happened, but if they did, they were always scheduled
after school hours. It was the equivalent of a duel with a loaded pistol. Both
shoot, but the one with the more accurate aim is bound to win. The punch in the
gut was just that. Everyone knew that the one who could connect first would be
the winner. It made one see the stars and the pain was only fractionally lower
than a kick in the groins. The one who threw the punch always won, at least
that bout. And then he helped the fallen man stand up on his feet. There was
honour.
But the man who had fallen also
learnt a mighty lesson. He learnt to take on whatever the world threw at him,
embrace the pain, maybe double over if required but then find his own feet and
get up. The punch in the gut made him stronger, over and over again till one
day his own punch would land exactly where it was meant to be.
And as long as he had learnt how
to pick himself up and become stronger, there was not a thing in this world that
could keep him down.
