FIFA at the convo hall

About my experience watching a football match screened live in Convocation Hall, IIT Bombay

Half of my friends are going to fall off their chairs at the first sentence itself - considering the fact that I am as related to sports as Rakhi Sawant is to sandpaper manufacturers of the world.

So here I was with four friends, in the auditorium where the match was being screened. Pramod exclaimed, "Oh, bahut match baaki hai!" And I murmured in his ear, "What is the duration of a football match?"

Obviously unaware of the depths of my ignorance, he looked at me like I had asked him to give away his right eye (and his CSRE identity card.) and said, "90!"

We sat down to watch the match. The scoreboard said that the match was a BRA against a PRK. While I guessed 'BRA' would be Brazil, I heard Shobhit say, "Barcelona" when I thought that's what BRA was for. For 'PRK', I kept guessing. From the players, I could make out that they were East Asians - but there was no country that I knew that had those initials.

While my guessing game as to which match I was actually watching was on, someone hit a goal and Shobhit shouted. Totally unaware, I looked around like I had been slapped by an invisible ghost - finally I could see the goal again in slow motion. The coach's and the players' expressions in slow motion were so Shahrukh-Khan-like. I almost thought they were imitating hamare-apne-King-Khan. (Notice the inverse mapping?)

Later when I noticed that there were 'ohh moments' (Missed goals, etc. in the game where the audience goes 'ohh') in the game, I shouted 'ohh' at regular intervals - with no support from the audience. I chose to keep quiet after some time.

Finally, when the ninety minutes were over, another timer appeared on the screen. I so wanted to ask Pramod how long this timer goes for - but I was genuinely scared of being knocked down. Hence, I chose to remain quiet.

The match ended. The lights of the auditorium were turned on and we walked out of the auditorium.

I was proudly singing the Wavin' flag song. So what if I had not understood much/anything, I had watched a football match today!