A moving post from another forum...thought it'd be apt to post it here...almost in tears reading this!
Haven't gone through the posts in this thread, but just to let you guys know the first hand experience of the effect a Sachin innings can have.
I was at the Ganga Ram Hospital (in Delhi) pediatric ICU for the last 2-3 weeks due to a personal emergency. As you can imagine, near a hospital unit dealing with terminally sick kids, the scene on the floor was always somber with families praying for their kids to get healthier and there used to be the regular wailing from nervous families or from the families which bid good bye to young kids of the household who couldn't struggle against their acute illnesses anymore.
For those 75-80 minutes after SRT scored his 100 and then went onto unleash those gorgeous shots, the scene on that entire floor was completely different. There were smiles all around. I saw people who used to wail and cry all the time praying for their kids well being, jumping with joy and cheering for Sachin's 200, saw even some patients on wheel chairs being carried to their rooms stopping before a TV on the floor and applauding the knock. So much of positive energy all because of one humble human being wielding his bat and unleashing those sumptuous drives, cuts, pulls and delicate paddle sweeps.
And last but not the least, there was this young boy aged about 14, struggling with a multiple organ failure and on whom the doctors had given up all hopes of a recovery, he sat with me for 10-15 minutes during the last stages of that knock praying for the world record to be broken first and then for the 200, returned to his room with a huge smile despite all the pain and then 2 days later his struggle abruptly came to an end and he breathed his last. Trust me, I never saw him without a smile during his last 2 days.
Forget everything, if an innings can bring such joy and smile to someone in so much of pain, lets have more such gems, even if it's termed as useless by some people.
Thank you Sachin!
