Huh!! I can’t believe that I am writing about Cricket. I never imagined I would talk about cricket one day. I used to love this game when I was very young. I used to watch it with my dad. Later for many reasons, I developed some disliking for this sport and stopped watching it. Since all my close friends and colleagues watch cricket, recent days I have been trying to catch up with them and hence I too started watching cricket. 

On September 24^th 2007, the day of Twenty20 World Cup finals, sharp at 5.00 PM, most of my colleagues left from work to catch up with the finals at 5.30 PM IST. We all were excited as India made it to finals and to add to our excitement was the fact that India was playing against Pakistan. This duo is always a favorite one here in India.  

As usual, I stayed late at work as I had some task to finish. Me and my other team members who were working in second shift, we had been trying to ring up our friends and get updates of the scores at least every 5 minutes. I would say I was almost watching the game virtually.  

I was getting really late and I had to leave from work. I was on the way back home when my cab driver stopped near a junction. It was the last over and we were eagerly following the game. We waited till we heard the commentator say out loud ‘India Wins……’.  I happily got out of the cab to catch an auto to reach home. To my surprise, most of the vehicles stopped moving, most of the people were out on the road, shouting and celebrating the victory. Few people even burst crackers. I should say it was a festive mood all around. 

When I got in to an auto, the auto driver gave me a big warm smile and said “Madamji, Patha hai?? India-ne match Jeet liya” (Do you know?? India won the match). I just smiled back at him and started my ride back home.  On the way, I saw a lot of young crowd, rushing to Café, buying crackers and so on. I felt as if the day started at 10.00 PM in the night. The whole crowd was happy and brisk. 

Wow, this one game brought so many Indians together.  Thank you, Team, for bringing the Cup back home . I learnt ‘ One Victory equals thousands of smiles ‘