My First Ultimate with DOD

first wrote this for http://www.indiaultimate.org/2012/05/my-first-ultimate-with-dod/

Hi,

I come from America, I have a proud “Made in USA” tag (one of the few things actually made in America), I am black in color (yeah color for me is color) and I was smuggled into India in December of 2011 by Adarsh, he said he brought me from amazon.com and the invoice said I was sold by Ultimate Disc Store, well thats all I know about my history (for more of my ancestral history click here), all I remember is he shoved me into a bag with a ball, the americans didn’t mind, but the bag was opened in Abu Dhabi where some zealous security guy looked me over as if I was a WMD (weapon of mass destruction, at least call me an UFO) and took away the ball ( he said it looked like a bomb, go figure!!!). I was in the dark until I got to this place called Bangalore and then this Adarsh guy locked me up in a closet for a long time with his other bats, racquets, balls and other sports stuff. I asked him why, why bring me all the way from USA and lock me up and he said “We dont get good quality frisbees in India so we have who ever goes to the US to get us some, and they are precious, so we save the new ones as Game Discs”.

One fine day, a Saturday, it was early morning, 6 am to be exact (who wakes up at this hour) I was taken out of the closet and taken to National College Ground, Basvangudi, I looked up horrified to see this bunch of people (they call themselves Disco-O-Dewanee, DOD, they played every tuesday, thursday and saturday, at the National College ground, Basvangudi, Bangalore and they are a crazy bunch of people.)  throwing many of my brethren around, they would throw them high in the air, over their head, from the left, from the right, backhand, hammer, scoober, flick, I almost swooned, but Adarsh was holding me tightly and I felt safe, he woudnt allow these barbarians abuse me, he handed me over to another guy and they marveled at my smooth shinning skin, my  figure, my contours, my color and they passed me around as a revered object, my precious, one of the guys threw me, I screamed and everybody shouted at him, I was supposed to be the Game Disc, I felt important and elated, finally I was out, I was respected and I was revered, I as going to be worshipped, things were looking up, alas literally!

They broke up into two teams, red and blue, the game started, one person picked me up and hurled me towards the other side, and for a second I lost my breath, and then everything was calm, I could feel the wind by my face, I could see the world move beneath me, I could see the first rays of sunlight as they skimmed the concrete of the metro tracks, I was spinning, cutting the air, creating eddys, oh Bernoulli! I was free! up up and away, to infinity and beyond, I was an UFO, and then, I crashed, I fell to the ground, I rolled, somebody shouted “stop the roll” and some girl kicked me. I was bruised, but nobody cared, they picked me up and flung me again, they started running around and passing me around, somebody dropped me and the other team took over, thus they went up and down the field until one team got to the end zone, and they they started all over again. pardon my french, but was this my raison d’etre?

Sometimes they played nice, short safe passes and sometimes they hucked me with reckless abandon, and the girls were no exception, they were as brutal as the guys, aren’t girls supposed to play soft. I was amazed at their effort, I would be sailing out of anybody’s reach, far far away and somebody would dive across and bang me to the ground, I would be falling to the ground, preparing myself for the inevitable and somebody would dive and catch me inches from the ground risking their fingers. For all the talk in the huddle about playing short and safe passes, at the slightest opening everybody just hucks, crazy people!! just because they can run, and boy can they run. I dont know if I am spinning or everybody else is spinning around me. I never now if it is some designed play or they are just running around without the least idea as to whats needs to happen. It was fun to see so many people so committed to a game and still have fun.

Then there were these other people in the ground, people standing, staring out into the horizon, or should I say playing cricket, this one time I smacked one of the cricketers bang right on his head and it was nice to see all the ultimate players berate that poor soul, as he committed the cardinal sin of coming in my way. There were these soccer players who would suddenly rush into the ultimate field, and more cricketers, runners, badminton players, basketball players, its amazing how many people fit into one field. There were these occasional fights with the other people using the field and usually the ultimate players came up on top. This one time I almost fell into a swimming pool, really, a swimming pool, beside an ultimate frisbee field, come on people! But this is India I was told, lots of people, and you the best you can with what you get. The ground is hard, with stones in between, the weather is hot, there are all sorts of people everywhere, but when the disc goes up there is only one thought on everyones mind, am I going to catch it or am I going to defend it, everything else just folds into the back of the mind. Thats Ultimate.

I think I am an ultimate frisbee now, scratched all over, rough around the edges but a smooth criminal. I love it when I am hucked into the end zone, I spin, I bounce of the air, I go short, I go long, sometimes I curve right, sometimes I dont, sometimes I am on my back, sometimes I am a blade. I play tricks on these players as well, I turn left for no reason, stop mid air, or turn right, with the slightest of breeze, thats enough to mess up these guys, or I find a pocket of air and drop just when they are about to catch me, I love the expressions on their faces, sometimes they cant believe that they made a throw and sometimes the agony of missing a throw/catch is heart rending and its always exhilarating to be plucked out of orbit for a score. I wish I had a camera attached to me, I could show you.

The game ended, finally some rest, everybody gathered around and had sugar cane juice, talked about how awesome I was and how perfect I was. I was to be preserved, I was returned to Adarsh for safe keeping until next saturday, I am after all the Game Disc. every disc dreams of being an UFO, I now feel every disc should dream of being an Ultimate Game Disc.