19 August 2008

A new dream!

There's something that irks me, something that i never understand. Why the hell are pakistanis behind everyone else in every sport? I mean these days its olympic mania, and it feels so good just to see so many people triumph. But look at our own athletes, they've been a disgrace. All them have been invited on wildcards, and are seriously lucky people, but they just consider attending the olympics as their victory, while its so not true.
I always thought maybe these extraordinary sportsmen have been playing their respective sports since they were born or something but i was wrong. I read the story of a woman today who has won medals in 2 different sports!
Britain's Rebecca Romero had won a silver medal in rowing in Athens 2004. She later had to leave the sport due to a back injury, and just 2 years back, she took up the sport of track cycling. And just imagine, she's won gold in track cycling! This story certainly got me thinking that the real reason for our failures probably is our lack of determination and perseverance and practice and desire and hunger for success. We aim for mediocre and settle for poor. Very few in our history have been able to dream high, for dreaming high has been the first step to achieving high.
Right now so many random thoughts are circulating in my mind. Accompanying them are adrenaline pumping images of Michael Phelps' 8 Gold medals and a combo of his 8 victory stand pictures, Usain Bolt's 9.69s for a 100m which won him the gold and which made him the fastest man ever and that chinese woman weight lifter who continued lifting even after winning, just to bring her country's name in the record books. From as far as we are, they look superhuman, all these people. But they're not, they certainly dreamt high and pursued their dreams. Even most of the people who didn't come first second or third atleast competed their hearts out. And by this i dont mean only on the day of the competition, but constant practice and hardwork showed in their eyes. Its a pity every such thing including pride was missing from our sportsmen, even our hockey team. And i'm not taking any bullshit that we're not capable of competing with them, oh well thats our own fault. We're so tainted with complacency in every field that its disgusting. I seriously feel disgusted looking at small, poverty stricken, troubled nations like ethiopia, zimbabwe, jamaica winning medals and we just wanna freakin compete! What a joke, what a prank to play on your national pride. What's more, our shooter, Siddique Umer finished an honourable 49th, out of...49 shooters!!! Well i must say it takes something to come last so cleanly.
I seriously dislike USA for all its materialistic society and all the havoc they've played with the world. But there's one thing that they've taught the modern world, that is dreaming high and following your dream. I dont know where they learnt that from because there was a time that muslims had this quality too but in the past 200 years, the americans have shown the world what the lost art of following your dream was about. The world is fast catching up (except us obviously). Even india is trying. But they call the USA the land of dreams, and thats right. Infact, someone once said, the United States of America is not a country, its an idea. I'm not pro america or anything, infact i'm the stark opposite, but i've learnt to accept the qualities of the enemy.
Maybe all that i wrote was just a prelude to what i wanted to write now. 2 days back i decided something, maybe it will sound a extremely impossible but right now i think it is possible. Its very much possible. All my closest friends laughed it off but i cant blame them. Its the so called age of practicality when i dont believe in such a monster. Anything can happen, Frank Ribery became a part of the french national team just about an year into football, Lance Armstrong fought cancer to topple records, then why cant we do it? Why cant i do it?
2 days ago i decided i wanna go under ten seconds for the 100m sprint inshaAllah. I've been competing with people but never in serious competitions. The reason maybe was my complacency and procrastination. Everytime i used to think i would do it next year. I think MashaALLAH, i'm pretty good at it. But under ten is something world class sprinters dream of! So thats hard. And then its gonna be London 2012 inshaAllah. My heart is holding back its laughter but it too is affected by the society. I'm gonna dream and i'm gonna go inshaAllah no matter how impossible it sounds. It just takes hardwork and prayers and determination, starting from today.

Maybe, people, my closest friends, my family members might say i'm being to naive. Maybe they'll say i'm aiming for the stars, which are out of our reach. But i think they're wrong. Nothing's out of reach. Man's reach exceeds his grasp! And even if i fail, i'll be able to atleast tell myself, i dreamt and i had the courage to follow my dream! I will inshaAllah!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

woaw, now thats a long post
and Usain Bolt! kamal!!, the fastest man! i was reading about him only a few days back
about our sportsmen/women going in Olympics and still not making the most of it..ahem..got nothing much to say..hum cricket theek say nai kheltay :p
AND now about your dream :D
best of luck

m.h.a said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
m.h.a said...

Ha ha.abi to my friends are laughing at me and they call me "mr. Under 10"...lol, come to think of it, i like being called that hehe...and yeah i'm not too big a fan of cricket anymore...sigh...i dunno why, maybe i'm really disappointed..

Anonymous said...

u knew wht the reason we havent done well in olympics is tht we dont invest money at grassroots level ..i mean cmon how many footie training centers do we have in this country...at cricket we suck .we dont produvce good tennis players look at india sania mirza, mahesh bhupati and who is the other chap ....if we go out and develop sports trust me the youth in this country would be better off ...wht we lack is motivation look at players like gerrard , maldini or take spain for an example i mean casillas and his team changed their tag of underacheivers to being eurpean champion ...take gerrard istanbul 05 , westham 06 and numerous times he wins game for liverpool ...maldini as much as i hate the italian the sight of him and european cup made me cry but u cant take away all tht glory , the serie A titles the european medal ..n wht do we have as captain , shoaib malik who is such a timid guy..... muhammed asif an embarrasment to the sport n akhtar is no different his constant love of starring as a gangster in movie.. look at oscar prtorius ( the south african ignore ma spelling) the guy is an athlete runs on a pair of artificial limbs his urge to win and success does it for him ....the olympic medalists mihcael phelp ,, usain bolt ,, tht british woman who u talked abt have been training for 4 yrs for this event and it paid off nn wht abt us ..guess we will see muhammed asif failin another drug test shoaib akhtar meetin with mahesh bhatt ... lol ...but u need the ppl governing this to step up .... osrry for ma rant gues i went a bit off track...bt sorry

m.h.a said...

nah u r very right asif and shoiab should stay away from cricket and eery other sport and even pakistan.. man they r not sportsmen, ajeeb charsi log hain jootay marne chahyen inko...and as far as shoaib malik is concerned...just lmao...look at out captain, and in contrast look at wat imran khan was...there's none like him today yaar.anyways, more than money we all need hardwork, because we've excellent cricket facilities but look at the standard...therefore, whats lacking is also the desire for success and motivation....