Bashir, 60, was the focus of cameras during the World T20 in Bangladesh last year. He first started following his team during the 2007 World Cup.

Bashir has fast gone from being just another fan to the country’s constant face in the stands. Leaving for Australia, the US-based hotelier tells Nihal Koshie of a most unusual journey.

Whenever the Pakistan cricket team is playing around the world, the Bashir household in Chicago is edgy. The Patriarch, Mohammed Bashir, has suffered three heart attacks, the last one as recently as 2012. His wife Rafia, son and three daughters fear for the day the wildly oscillating fortunes of the national team takes a permanent toll on the heart of the 60-year-old.

What makes the family anxious this February is the journey Bashir is to set out on – another pilgrimage as a cricket fan. He will fly 15,000 kilometres from Chicago to Sydney and then to the various venues Pakistan is scheduled to play at during the World Cup in Australia and New Zealand beginning February 14.

The family doctor, for the umpteenth time, has advised his patient — increasingly one of the most recognisable faces at a cricket match — against travelling to watch Pakistan play because Bashir does not take lightly to defeat and allows emotions to get the better of him.

Though he is paying no heed to the doctor’s advice, Bashir is not taking any chances at the World Cup, knowing fully well that he may well be in for another rollercoaster. In his bag, which also contains the green kurta with the crescent-and-moon embossed on it, is a medicine box. The dosages of the different-coloured pills have been clearly marked day-wise.

“I take my medicines on time and have a prescription chart to follow. I am also a diabetic,” Bashir says. He also has been diagnosed with Obstructive Sleep Apnea – a disorder where the upper windpipe narrows causing him to stop breathing.

“I don’t know whether I will live to see another World Cup. I am flying to Sydney on February 4. Maybe I should have travelled to watch cricket when I was younger but then I had to work to make a living.”

This edition of the World Cup will be Bashir’s third since he turned into a travelling fan in 2007. He underwent a baptism by fire as he watched the upset of the tournament when Pakistan lost to Ireland at Sabina Park, Jamaica. “I was heartbroken when Pakistan lost that day. I cried a lot and could not believe that I had travelled all the way only to see Pakistan knocked out early. Pakistan have lost after that too while I have been at a stadium, but the day they were defeated by Ireland was by far the worst. I was lucky I didn’t suffer another heart attack at the stadium itself,” Bashir says.

Early days

The match at Sabina Park was his first international game as a spectator in over four decades. Back in the 1970s he watched a Bishen Singh Bedi-led India play Pakistan in his original home-town of Karachi.

But a personal cricketing setback and the compulsion to earn a living saw Bashir’s dreams of watching and playing the game go up in smoke. Bashir moved from Karachi to Saudi Arabia, where he worked as a supervisor in the transport department of the Riyadh airport.

“I was a budding wicketkeeper and used to open the innings for my club. I appeared for the selection trials for PIA, a first-class side. I was hoping to get picked as I would have had a job, which would also allow me to play cricket. But it wasn’t to be.”

Bashir has made a small fortune from his restaurant business. He runs the Ghareeb Nawaz, which has two branches in Chicago. The speciality at the restaurant is Hyderabadi biryani – chicken sells for $4 while mutton for $5.

“My family moved from Hyderabad in India to Karachi during partition. In 1979, I shifted to New York. I initially worked at a hotel in New York before starting my own restaurant. We started off by making Hyderabadi biryani because my wife hails from Hyderabad (now Telangana). In the early 1980s a plate of biryani would cost $12 in New York. My wife sold her first plate of biryani for $2. We began by serving value-for-money food. Thanks to God our restaurant business is now established, else I don’t think I would have been able to become a full-time fan of Pakistan cricket.”

Bashir has spent $7000 so far on flights and accommodation while he estimates he will need at least another $2500 for the duration of his stay. “Most of the money I have saved up on the sly. Bakhi main ne chori kiya. Biwi ko pata nahi,” the cricket tragic says jokingly.

While he is a Pakistan fan at heart, Bashir also plays the bhaichara card, which will be on show when he dons the kurta, which has the Pakistan green on one side and the Indian tri-colour on the other, for the game between the two arch-rivals at the Adelaide Oval on February 15. “My wife is from Hyderabad in India so I have also printed on the kurta the lines: ‘jis desh mein ganga behti hai us desh ki meri biwi hai’. It would be great if India and Pakistan meet in the final. I have received a lot of love from the people of India.”

Across the border

Apart from his wife’s roots, Bashir has a soft-corner for India because of two incidents. The first one occurred in Mohali ahead of the India versus Pakistan semifinal in 2011. “I didn’t have a ticket and held a poster which said, ‘Please I need one ticket for India-Pakistan match’. A kind fan gave me one.”

MS Dhoni too has a hand in Bashir taking a liking for the Indian team. Last year, when Bashir didn’t have a ticket for the World T20 final between India and Sri Lanka, Dhoni, recognised Bashir, who was watching a practice session from the stands, and ensured that the man from Chicago got a match pass.

“Of the two teams, I think India is stronger because they have so many talented youngsters. Maybe because there is no international cricket played in Pakistan the youth are not inspired to take up the sport.”

So what does he crave for more — Pakistan winning another World Cup or them resuming cricket at home? Bashir has a simple answer. “If in my lifetime, if Pakistan win the World Cup and I have the opportunity to watch Pakistan play at home, at the National Stadium in Karachi, I will die a happy man.”

Terrace talk

Across streets and mohallas, World Cup conversations are in full swing. Everyday we lend our ears to those passionate voices. Today’s topic is a sentimental one:

WIN IT FOR…

West Indies

… what once was

Aside from the fact that the BCCI’s accountant-administrators want them buried for their insolence after they stood Indians up post the Dharamsala ODI, the West Indians have dug themselves another ditch to fall into. Their cricket contracts situation is one right mess, and anything short of winning this World Cup would mean they will go down the mire. The West Indian cricketing unity itself is fraying at the edges after stalwarts Dwayne Bravo and Kieron Pollard were left out. Now no Sunil Narine either. But win the Cup, and all will be forgiven and forgotten.

Sri Lanka

… perfect send-offs

For sri lanka, finalists of the last two editions, this World Cup is almost all about the perfect goodbye for Dilshan, Mahela, Sanga and Malinga. Their cricket is riddled with corruption and facing debt, but the hard tryers on the field ought to be respected more. It’s a country in the middle of serious rebuilding after years of a civil war – better infra, faster highways that have quartered travel-time between Colombo and Galle. As World Cup champs, they might just get into a position to do what Arjuna Ranatunga & Co did for a fractured country — rekindle hope.

New Zealand

… martin crowe, M.B.E.

Crowe. 1992. World Cup semis. Resting himself from the fielding side, he’d watched NZ get beat. It’s what haunts him until now. The Kiwi great has had a cancer relapse and refused chemo. They ought to do it for their Crowe (in pic), the heroic leader of yore. As hosts, everyone’s favourite – and a great chance to stick one up to Australia. Tattoos’ve never looked so cool as when Brendon McCullum flexed while hitting the big ones. And NZ’s always everyone’s favourite in their dazzling blacks.

INDIA

… the sake of the cup

It’s bad enough that a billion people believe that Dhoni and Kohli (and every player that captains India in the future) is entitled to the World Cup. There’s a sneaking fear that should Indian not win the World Cup, the BCCI will scrap the event whimsically and declare the IPL the new World Cup. Also, how can “Achhe din” be complete without India also pocketing the Cricket World Cup.

South Africa

… a mourning nation

It was the dark cloud of death that hung over South African sport in 2014. Former world 800m champ Mbulaeni Mulaudzi died in a car accident in Mpumalanga, and two days later the national football captain Senzo Meyiwa (in pic) was shot dead by intruders visiting his girlfriend in Vosloorus. Separately, boxer Phindile Mwelase, who spent 10 days in a coma, died after being knocked out by Liz Butler in Pretoria. All this while their Paralympic hero Oscar Pistorius went through a very public downfall at his murdered girlfriend’s trial. The unifying presence of Nelson Mandela had fetched the Springboks the rugby World Cup 20 years ago. Madiba’s spirit could lead them on to the cricket one.

Australia

… hughesy

Phil Hughes. And then some more.

Playing at home, the Aussies would want to reclaim their erstwhile dominance – highlighted by their three consecutive Championship victories. As such, Michael Clarke, a class player, has little in terms of a legacy as captain in one-dayers, and would need this World Cup to establish one. The nation is coming out of a slew of scandals in doping in other sports. But the modern-day innovators with their fiery Big Bash could do with a formal tag of world champs.

England

… a new beginning

After a mudslinging summer, England need to know once and for all that they can win without KP. They invented all sorts of shorter versions, but the country needs to face the Frankensteins they’ve created, and learn to win one-dayers. Realise that there’s a whole world out there beyond Ashes. And realise that pretty boy Jimmy Anderson is in their midst.

Pakistan

… the entire country

Fear of touring Pakistan (and BCCI’s stance to not allow the cricketers to play in IPL) has snuffed the life out of this once-swaggering cricketing nation.Ravaged by terror and the Peshawar school shooting tragedy, a Pakistan win could be the most heart-warming story . It’ll be cricket’s loss if the sport’s Peter Pan, Shahid Afridi (in pic), who was actually a pre-teen in 1992, cannot grow old to tell his grandchildren how he once won the World Cup.

ENS