Monday 30 May 2011

SURREAL SATURDAY: A Good reason to start blogging.

On Saturday 28 May 2011, I finally understood the meaning of the surreal. In the space of 90 odd minutes, I finally understood what it feels like to witness something out of this world, something one feels blessed to have beheld... and something you get the feeling you may never be given the opportunity to see again.

Make no mistake about it. I had flirted with this feeling severally, as a sports fan. Sometimes it manifested itself as a sense of deja vu: Premiership watchers this past season may have had this feeling during the FA Cup tie between Chelsea and Everton. Everton were awarded a freekick a couple of metres outside the box..and Baines stepped up... Anyone who had watched the Everton-Spurs fixture earlier in the season should have seen it coming.. top left hand corner. Cech, no chance, just like Gomes before him.( I must state categorically that the former seemed much nearer to it)

Sometimes, the feeling hits you, but for such a short time that you don't get the time to let it sink in, grab yourself your poison of choice, put your legs up and savour it. The day Usain Bolt broke both the Olympic and world 100 metre records in Beijing is a classic case. You saw it, you were blown away...for Christ's sake, the man did a king kong chest thump 10 metres from the line!!!! The only problem of course being, the moment lasted for all of 9.58 seconds, not enough for one to settle in their seat.

In contrast to the above scenarios, on Saturday 28 May 2011, the Champions league Final kicked off at 7.45 GMT. At about 7.55 GMT, I got the feeling in full. Poetry in motion. Xavi and Iniesta, playing like snake charmers, Messi running past United players like they were paraplegic. Even 'Mr. Shakira' looked like he could pick up the creative slack in Chelsea's midfield(am just saying). 'Shrek' tried to interupt the opera and failed as spectacularly as Benni McCarthy would in the IAAF Golden League. All you can do is ran out superlatives and say "surreal"