A New Tradition:

Last year on the 2nd of April, my service group initiated (the first of its kind at OSC) an all staff cricket charity match which helped raise funds. All together we were able to collect about Rs.62,000, thanks to the many generous donations of  the OSC community, which got used to buy dry ration packs to the hospital that we gifted for Sinhala and Tamil New Year. Due to fact it was a huge success last year and the fact that we acquired two Australian cricket fanatic teachers as service superiors (Mr. Aaron Russo and Ms.Stella Damir) this year, we knew this was a tradition we wanted to continue and elevate to new heights. So little after the start of February 2023 planning was underway.

Preparation:

One of the hardest challenges this year was finding a good date to host the match. Last year we were able to time it right before Sinhala and Tamil New Year, but every week in April was blocked out by other school events or would conflict with our other projects like the food drive or making vesak lanterns for the kids, so alas we pushed it all the way to Saturday May 13th. Dangerously within the frame of the Southwestern monsoon, all we could do was pray for good weather. Last year the teams were limited to staff members only but this year we had enough student interest as well as after school cricket club that was willing to make up a third team. So we really had a nice dynamic, where we were able to represent more parts of our community.

Our advertising was pretty standard this year. Dimath and Avin made a wonderful pair of posters which we hung up around school. I coordinated sending out reminders via email and newsletter to spread the word. Finally to target market to primary school kids, during our lunches or homeroom periods Chirath, Avin and I went around to all classrooms spreading the message. As expected a lot of people couldn’t come because we had arranged it on a Saturday but donated instead to still sho support. With ticket sales well underway during the upcoming week, the only thing left to do was to pray to the sun gods for good weather.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

D-Day:

Luckily our prayers were heard, as it was just bright sunshine and clouds the morning of May 13. I arrived at school around 7:45 am to help out with setting up the food stalls as well as arranging any last minute ticket purchases. Slowly but surely, spectators and players started to trickle in by 8:30 am and so we commenced the games. During last year, I was unfortunately unable to help out on the day as it coincided with a Duke of Edinburgh training and therefore my main role was marketing. This year, while I did do predominantly most of the work involved in selling the tickets, I wanted to have a more active role on the day. Hence why I pushed myself to learn the rules of the match (something I ashamedly never learnt before) and with Dimaths ‘help was able to learn how to fill out a cricket score card! Throughout all three games, I was monitoring score, counting wickets, overs and totals runs.

Since this was a whole community event, we recognized that particularly with the service staff they would feel more comfortable with commentating being done in Sinhala. Therefore a big thanks is owned to Mr. Nimal who did a brilliant commentary in Sinhala for all three games. Otherwise thanks to Mr. Benson, Mr. Grandbois, Mr. Russo as well as Chirath who took turns commentating in english the three matches.

Overall there was some great gameplay out of the field. You could really see that all team was giving it their all and even if it was student against teacher there was no pulling back the metaphorical punches. It was a show of brilliant bowling, quick fielding, several caught outs, and plenty of sixers which called for quite a few replacements in the tennis ball used. And even though most the games ended in a close match, the overall winner had to go the Hawkin’s Hoikers.

Finally what’s a good cricket match without music and food to set the joyous mood? We had asked a DJ to come in and play papare music, an offshoot style of music reminiscent to baila songs that you can find being played at rugby and cricket matches around the island. We were also selling chickpea mix, king coconut, ice cream and bananas for a small price. We had chosen this particular range of food because the ice cream and coconut water proved to be the perfect refresher on such a hot day and we were able to package all of these with zero waste. The ice cream we served in cones, the chickpea wrapped in a kenda leaf fashioned into a bowl or cone. Even the king coconut we asked spectators and players to drink the Sri Lankan way with no straw, afterwards they could come back to have their coconut split in half and eat the coconut meat with a spoon made out of the husk of the shell.

Reflections:

Overall I enjoyed organizing such an event and I know many of the players enjoyed getting a chance to play some cricket, as unlike other sports, its not something we have a chance to practice or play regularly. Which is upon reflection and feedback from the student players, we are starting to have discussions on the feasibility of next year arranging a separate match where just students will get a chance to play against other student teams from schools like Elizabeth Moir, Colombo International School, etc. This would be a great way for our service to showcase your message to a wider audience as well as foster some more community spirit this time between international schools.