Sharmistha Gooptu in Leeds
I was at the same place as yesterday — the utilitarian Cafe Lento — for my morning cappuccino. It was a cold morning and the little place was chock-a-bloc. An Indian family walked in. On not finding enough places inside, one of the younger women told the elderly gentleman in the group that she and the others would take the chairs outside and ‘he and Ma’ could sit at the small table next to me.
It sounded like Bangla, but not quite. The Behera family is originally from Odisha. Mr Biswanath Behera has a Kolkata connection, he said, after I introduced myself. He had been employed with the Metro Railway in Kolkata for 15 years, and had lived in the city. He is in the UK for the first time, coming into Leeds from Dublin, where he is visiting his daughter.
“My father is crazy about cricket,” she says. “It’s been his dream to watch a Test match here and that’s why we came here.” Her husband adds that in Dublin, where they live, a visit by an Indian side is always a major event. “We Indians play together sometimes, but the most excitement is when an Indian side is visiting Ireland, like when they came two years ago.”
Mr Biswanath Behera with his daughter. Image: Sharmistha Gooptu
The trip to Leeds has not been disappointing so far. “This summer, we were hoping to see Virat Kohli and what he brings with him to Test cricket. But now, we are hoping for the new team to take out the English in their home ground…and hopefully we will get to see some good action!” And they did of course, with hundreds from Rishabh Pant and KL Rahul.
For Indian fans here, cricket always comes along with the sense of home and feelings of assertion against their one-time colonisers. For Indian student Prajnadip, who is part of the hospitality team at Headingley, being here with a large number of others who are also working part-time in the stadium, is like being at Eden Gardens in Kolkata, his home city.
There is constant messaging on student WhatsApp groups for cheap tickets, and groups of friends patrolling near the team hotel, Queen’s, for a glimpse of the stars. “My flatmate and I saw Gautam Gambhir the day he was here, we saw him in the city centre. To see a legend like Sunil Gavaskar up close is like a dream. I posed with him for a picture,” says Prajnadip. With these students now working inside the stadium, their own circles are abuzz with the cricket news.
Through this Test series, Indians everywhere in this country will conglomerate and find unlikely co-incidences and shared histories. Who knew I would run into Mr Behera this morning? And that we would talk about Kolkata and the Metro Railway! Indeed, I might never have met him if not for the Test match.