Day 2: Bashing Bermuda

Yes, Casino Fever deserves a mention, though a written description cannot possibly do justice to the video. After all the excitement yesterday, we spent some time unwinding in the apartment before dinner. Some of us took a nap and the others watched Tempo, T&T's answer to MTV. The song that stuck in our minds? Casino Fever by Crazee. I imagine crazee refers to his manic smile. His similarity to a sadhu begins and ends with his looks; the lyrics of Casino Fever are anything but saintly. Liquor in the front, poker in the back. We all had a eureka moment when we saw him licking his lips and registered the double-entendre. Enough said.

Now to Monday and to our first live game in T&T. Bermuda fans, you ain't got nothin' on us. Check out our designer clothing (a Kuttan original creation), individually hand-painted (by Smi and Veena) and accessorized with a splash of colour that pulls everything together. The bandanas and warpaint really put us over the top. As THE fans, we have a rep to protect after all. The photo, by the way, was taken by our lovely landlady, Lystra. It's 8:00 am, ladies and gentlemen, and we are ready to roll!

We walk across the Savannah to the ground. The atmosphere is festive and lively. Seeing our smiles, the Trinis who check our tickets tell us they want to see us smiling just like dat when we come out.
There is just a smattering of people when we get to the stadium and it stays that way through the match. We are seated in the Dos Santos stand, right behind fielder OJ Pitcher. OJ turns out to be a good sport, smiling and giving us the thumbs-up when we sing "OJ, OJ, OJ, OJ." He also keeps us up-to-date on the score when the scoreboard fails. The people in our stand are a fun bunch of folks. Our favourites are the three Trinis who are there to have a good time. They periodically yell out rhetorical questions to anyone who cares to hear. Seeing the Indian batsmen smash the ball around: "Why you couldn't play like dis Saturday?". When the scoreboard fails: "What da score?"

But the story of the day really is about the batting. My favourite innings was Sachin's cameo in which he played audacious shots like the good old days. Final score? 413 for 5. We have just witnessed a world record and we're lovin' it.

We get our first taste of Trini food when we buy lunch from the concessions. We also run into some family members of the Bermuda players. The food is delicious, particularly the mango curry, and is liberally spiced with habaneros.

After lunch, the bowling is an anticlimax and India takes far too long to wrap up the tail. There are many empty seats and nobody cares that we walk around the stadium. We sit near a Bermuda fan making strident remarks for all to hear. She wants to know how may people we have to choose cricket players from and makes a point of comparing Bermuda's 56,000 population to our 1 billion. She also informs us that the Bermuda players all have day jobs outside cricket. Leverock, for example, is a police officer. She yells to the Indian players to stop begging for LBWs and to get honest wickets by getting the Bermudans bowled instead. I feel vindicated when Kumble's ball finds Tucker's stumps.

We're a little surprised to see that only the two captains and the man of the match show up for the awards ceremony. It is really too much to ask the players to show some team spirit (and acknowledge their fans)?

But all in all it's a fun day's outing to Queen's Park Oval. We take some pics in the fan zone before heading back and round off the day with our first taste of rum punch at Tamnak Thai.

And now for responses to some of your comments on yesterday's blog. Many of you wanted to know how we managed to get all the players to pose with us. People, you have it backwards. What you should have asked was: Weren't we tired of having all these players around everywhere we went? They couldn't seem to get enough of us, THE fans :). I, on the other hand, even forgot to mention the couple of Bangladeshi players we saw at the Hilton yesterday. You can imagine how bad it was if players were being reduced to mere afterthoughts.

Jokes (and delusions) apart, T&T is extremely relaxed and laid back. The Sri Lankans took full advantage of it. Smi pointed to a bunch of guys sauntering down Queen's Park East and joked that it must be the Sri Lankans, and sure enough, it really turned out to be them. The Indians, on the other hand, need to get out more. I mean that in every sense of the phrase.

• Who do we like?

• OJ, coz he's a good sport
  
• Leverock, coz he is to cricket what the bumblebee is to flying
  

• Not so much?

• Fans who heckle OJ
  
• Fans who heckle other fans
  

• New friends?
  

• OJ
• Two Bermuda fans in uniform (we are magnanimous in victory)
  

• Favourite activites of the day?
• Watching live cricket
• Bashing Bermuda!

See my updated photo album and come back for Day 3!