Unsung workers

Those who write about other people to the newspapers generally select doctors (benevolent), lawyers, writers, poets, film makers, engineers, etc. Sometimes it would be about foreign personalities or films.

For my piece I thought of writing about very little-known persons who have to work in the sun and rain to do their job properly and most of the time without any supervision. These are the groundboys who attend to the maintenance of the playgrounds. In the good old days in fact, they used to do everything connected to the sports activities of the school or club where they were employed. And they attended to these activities without anybody supervising. Almost all of them looked after the playing fields and the various sports gear of the college or club as if they were their own.

I will start with the ground boy at my alma mater, Kingswood College, Kandy. He was Viyay and he was the brother-in-law of the college watcher, Hendrick, who was married to Viyay’s sister. Vijay would have been employed because of this relationship as Hendrick was a very honest and diligent worker who looked after the school single -handedly during school vacations as well as after school till the following morning.

Vijay took over the job of ground boy and gradually did almost everything in respect of the playground as well as the sports equipment. The cricket pitch was a matting wicket. The matting had to be taken from the pavilion by wheelbarrow and laid on the pitch and nailed on the sides. The transporting of the matting up and down was done most of the time with the help of the boys who were sportsmen. The versatility of the person was seen when he single- handedly marked the ground for hockey matches, then football and also the lanes for the races at the sports meet. In addition to all this he used to season the cricket bats applying linseed oil and then hitting a cricket ball hung in a sock from the roof. He also used to bind the bats when they gave way in certain places. Vijay used to accompany the teams for matches with the sports gear in a bag. All this and he used to mow the grass in the two pitches at college.

I am not aware of the ground boys of other schools in Kandy at that time except the famous Marthelis of Asgiriya grounds of Trinity College. He had to be in charge of the maintenance of the turf wicket. Just like Vijay, Marthelis too used to attend to all work pertaining to the Asgiriya grounds.

The universities too had ground boys to look after the playgrounds. I remember Peradeniya had Samarakoon who handled the cricket pitch of the circular cricket ground. This had a turf wicket, which however had to be abandoned and a matting had to be laid when matches were played.

The University of Colombo too had three ground boys, with the tall Piyasena, who came from Veyangoda in overall charge of the playground. The short Piyasena who came from Kirulapona assisted him. They too had to get the grounds ready for cricket, football, hockey and athletics. The ground boy in charge of the tennis courts was an expert. By 9.00 am he used to finish mending the tennis courts. When he resigned Jinadasa took over the job and he too did a very good job. The other ground boy who came from Piliyandala did a good job with the cricket pitch. He also mended the damaged matting.

All clubs in Colombo had ground boys. I remember only one of them, that is Deen of the Bloomfield Club. I came to know him as a result of my association with the University of Colombo. When the building for the Faculty of Arts was to be constructed, I went around to inspect the land that would be required for the purpose. I found a wattle and daub shed within the area. When I inquired from the who was occupying the shed, he told me that he was Deen, the ground boy of Bloomfield Club. They had the audacity to construct this contraption on the other side of the road in someone else’s property! I told Deen that the following day a bulldozer is scheduled to come to demolish the shed and asked him to take his belongings and leave. The President of the club at that time, Mr. Shelley Wickremasinghe came and met me and stated that the club had no funds to construct a shed and for the university to do so using old, discarded material. This was done and Deen shifted. I know Deen used to do a very good job of maintaining the Bloomfield playground.

All the other clubs too had ground boys who were devoted to the club and looked after the playgrounds well. As the clubs played many games the ground boys had to be fully conversant with what had to be done.

I also must mention about the ground boy at St. Peter’s College. He comes early in the morning and works in the blazing sun with only a hat to protect himself. He mows the grass on two pitches which adjoin each other, one for cricket and the for Rugger. He does the cricket pitch too which is a turf wicket, watering it and covering it in the evening. I see all that he does from the balcony. It is very rare that you get workers like this nowadays.

When Don Bradman’s team stopped in Colombo on their way to England in 1948, they were surprised to see two women attending to marking the pitch for the match. At that time, it was only in Sri Lanka that there were women attending to playgrounds.

HM NISSANKA WARAKAULLE