Cricket Unites the Nation #ACCT20 #Nepal

Can a game or a sport bring people together? Unite them as one? Making them forget their demography in their country, their caste, their community, their religion and of course their gender. If that happens can we call that a phenomena. Especially for a country like ours, Nepal, which is torn apart with all these factors.  We witnessed this phenomena, if I can call that a phenomena, in the modest yet beautiful cricket ground at the Tribhuwan University here in Nepal.

Nepal was gearing to fight against the most talked about nation around the world media; Afghanistan. Stadium was packed beyond its capacity just like our micro buses during peak hours in the city. People, mostly students found places in top of the tress, roof of the nearby building and where ever a human eye could find an space inside the stadium people occupied it. The metal sheet that was erected around the compound as a fence was kicked down by the crowd to make space for them to sit on top of the compound. Crowd would erupt, jumping and dancing, in excitement whenever a boundary was scored or a six was smashed resulting in heavy dust flying yet none bothered to cover up their face to avoid it. Everyone enjoyed cherishing the moment. It did not matter to them who was the reason behind this excitement, was it Khadaka, Malla, Bhattarai, Shrestha, or Airee. It did not matter. One can hear the chant "Nepal Nepal Nepal" being repeated with sore throat. There were little kids with facial painting and adults with their body painted, depicting their love for their country.

When match moved away from our grip, there was disappointment in everybody's face. Few walked out even before the match concluded showing no faith. But most of them stayed back despite the fact that our country was going down.They stayed back to support their country, who had put on a fight. They did not let the country down by walking away when it was required the most. Our players needed our support now more than ever. When we can do this for a game of cricket played by our country. I believe we can do this for our country, as a nation when it is going down. Only if we would have compassion for our country and for our fellow country men.

Text by Balakrishna Paudel (More photos here: http://on.fb.me/16pQPt2 )