A Long Jump Bet

This is an account of an incident which happened during the same time frame as The Incident of the Heckling Spectator

Once upon a time in the land of Mordor... actually, I mean Madangir, (not much difference for mere mortals who venture out in ignorance) was held a cricket tournament. Our team had flocked to see the match being played between UT1 and UT2 (UT = Unknown Team). There was this huge buildup to this match with expectant crowds and all, which lasted exactly 5 minutes into the second innings.

Chasing a huge total, the team batting second was expected to bat aggressively. Into the 5th over of the second innings, the excitement was killed when the opening batsman in an extreme show of aggression, took a big front foot stance and with bat and pad perfectly together, defended a luciously overpitched delivery which was begging to be eliminated.

The batsman did not move after having defended the ball. He waited about 10 seconds in his defensive stance to see if his footwork was exactly as he wanted and there was no gap between the bat and the pads, and to make sure that everyone had seen his stance and had time to admire it. The teammates clapped.

Obviously, the field is not where the action was. It lay in a drain that flowed alongside and outside the boundary which encircled the playing field. The boundary consisted of a concrete wall, about 2.5 feet high, and 2 feet wide on the top. There was also an iron railing on this concrete wall, which was present not to restrict the spectators from flocking into the field, but for them to have something to hold onto to prevent from falling into the drain which lay just 2 feet behind them and seemed to be very deep (this deduction is based on the fact that we coudnt see its bottom).

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I planned to have an ascii art of the drain here and later followed with another one below showing a graphic version of my mental picture... but it was difficult to format it currently. Will update soon.
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I was there with my local friends and gully cricketers, to enjoy delhi's mid noon summer sun in the month of may. We were all standing on the boundary wall, holding onto the iron railing and trying our very best to enjoy the match. Our position was very uncomfortable as one could not even clap when the batsman played a splendid cover drive directly onto his stumps.

The drain, just like every other drain was filled with filth which floated on the top and it seemed to form a solid enough platform to walk across, which was just what one of the kids watching the match tried to do. He was a nice kid, and didn't make too much noise when he flopped into the drain. But there was a hell of a noise after that "GET HIM". That was no one shouting to get the kid out, it was just a spectator egging the bowler on. The kid got out of his own account and ran home.

Poor kid, he was too small to jump across the drain. But we were big boys and could easily jump across, and after the match we all got down from our perches, jumped across the drain, and were crossing the main road to head back to our favorite hanging out place when one of my friends had this crazy idea.

His name was... Lets call him Som and the other guy as Paps. Som said to Paps "Oye Paps, Can u jump from our perching spot right across the drain?". Now, this was a mean task. I mean, the drain wasn't too wide, but from the top of the boundary wall, it did seem like the most probable place where you will end up if u try to jump across. Paps is of the kind who will risk anything if the task is challenging enough or the challenger is insulting enough.

"Paps, you got no balls. NO BALLS." teased Som. Instead of showing everyone his balls, Paps decided to show his mardaangi and took up the challenge. Paps went back to the boundary wall, climbed it very slowly. He seemed like a cat mentally preparing himself for a bath. For the uninitiated, Mardaangi = very physical method of proving your maleness while having highest probability of incurring maximum damage. He looked something like this, perched on the wall

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Another ascii art here
Art not to scale. The drain has been widened in this art with respect to the previous art according to the difficulty of the jump. If u feel that the jump is too easy, you are invited to increase the width of the drain. Simply add spaces between "Drain" and "Foot Path".
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After meditating a minute or two alongside the drain, as if he were worshipping the sun god on the banks of the holy river ganges, he decided to take the plunge... I mean the jump. With a mighty heave, Paps flew across the gap between the source and the destination, and he made it, only just, but he made it. He had successfully done the jump, but now lost his balance too (he had lost his mind when he decided to jump). His momentum carried him forward, over the footpath, and onto the road as he tried to regain his balance stumbling all the time. Atlast, he gave up his valiant effort and fell flat on his chest, sprawled right in the middle of the road. At that fateful moment a blue line was approaching at a leisurely pace of 60-70kmph.

We will break at this point for some definitions.
Blue line = Privately owned public transport buses in delhi whose drivers are famed to keep a brick on the accelerator, their feet on the steering wheel, their hands behind their heads, and a beedi in their mouth while they sit back and enjoy the breathtaking view of fleeing pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists, scooters, cows, dogs, cats, cars, etc. Everyone runs from a blue line.
Aaah, not exactly everyone. Blue line buses are a great attraction for college kids who get a free ride from the kind hearted driver and conductor uncles. These college kids also help these uncles in return. It has been observed that whenever these uncles or the buses they drive are in trouble, the college kids are always around. A friend in need is a friend indeed.
Also, blue line buses ply precariously balanced in the centre of the road leaving just not enough room on either side for anyone to overtake it.

Back to the great jump and the approaching blue line.

Paps was lying flat on his chest right in the middle of the road and watching as a blue line bus hurtled towards him. He was rather beginning to like the drain more and wished he was in it rather than on the road. The driver of the blue line must have been surprised to see that one of the pedestrians was fleeing towards the centre of the road and not away from it. Probably his eyes were playing tricks on him... and shook his head vigorously and rubbed his eyes to make Paps go away. When he looked again, Paps was still there, stubbornly lying in the centre of the road, and refusing to budge despite the drivers best efforts.

Not able to contain his surprise, the blue line driver braked and braked hard, stopping short of Paps's demise by about 5 feet. Driver and conductor uncle jumped out of the bus, concerned for the man lying in front of their bus. They picked up Paps gently by the scruff of the neck and thrashed him so hard that he nearly fell back into the drain.

"We were only trying to have fun" explained Som. "FUN??" exclaimed the driver uncle. "Could you only find my bus suitable enough for suicide?". "Fun my foot. You could have died and then those college kid friends of ours would have landed here and taken the bus away for their own fun, only that each of them will have a piece of the bus for their own".

The driver stopped thrashing but continued firing choicest abuses for some more time, his motto probably being "Since you didnt die, I will now kill you with my words. Bad move to dodge the bus buddy... this is now going to be slow and painful". But soon, he realized to his horror that he cant kill by words alone... infact, he was appalled by how less damage his words were doing to Paps, and how ineffective were they in killing him. "At the current rate" he might have thought, "I will take about 50 years to kill him". His vocabulary was clearly lacking.

Unhappy with the dying rate of Paps, he finally cooled down and left as Paps proclaimed himself winner over drains and blue line buses.

This incident happened in 1997, and the bet was a treat at the chinese hot shoppe. The treat is still due.