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Article: How ping pong made the world a safer place
- Article from:
- The Scotsman
- Article date:
- September 4, 1999
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 1999 The Scotsman. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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THERE was a time, I think it was in 1972, when the world was saved
by ping pong. It was a strange time, characterised by the fact that
most of us expected to die within four minutes. There would be a
loud bell, the time would pass, and then it would be over, and that
would be a blessed relief.
That was a tense way to grow up, but we did not cope by spending
those four minutes in a frenzy of lovemaking, or looting, or score-
settling. We went about our business in a calm and tediously
Calvinist manner, our underlying dread only noticeable in the fact
that we chose to mock the cruel vicissitudes of reality by wearing
trousers of improbable broadness and shoes made of plastic which
curved our ...