Cheese Rolling a Peculiar, if Entertaining, Pastime
Cheese rolling is an old traditional race that is held in many parts of the UK. Basically this peculiar-yet-interesting tradition has large circles of cheese being rolled from a hill, and people have to run after it in a race format to try and see who the first one is down the hill. That person wins the cheese. What is so strange about this tradition is that the only thing the winner gets is a slab of cheese. This is great for cheese lovers, but for the rest of us out there with not too much love of cheese, what is the incentive?
Recently an event was held where cheese aficionados and runners lined up to try to win that coveted hunk of cheese. “Runners and spectators met at Cooper's Hill near Brockworth in Gloucestershire to carry on the tradition which sees competitors chase a 7lb wheel of Double Gloucester down a 200-yard incline,” The official event that was to take place in the same area had been cancelled by the local council because of health and safety issues, but an unofficial event was scheduled in its place and was a roaring success.
Almost 200 people turned up to take part in the event and 10,000 people were on hand to watch. The amount of fun that people had taking part in the event was evident from the way they gushed about the experience, with one participant saying “I really enjoyed competing. For a contest that was supposed to be banned there certainly were a lot of people there,” If this person’s statement is any indication, then people had a great time.
Cheese rolling is a traditional pub game whose origins date back hundreds of years. Now with stringent health and safety laws in place, the slight bumps and bruises that people suffer when running down a hill after a block of cheese is deemed to be too much of a risk to their lives. It seems health and safety rules have gotten slightly ridiculous in the UK because people’s freedoms are being eroded. If someone wants to run down a hill and take part in a ludicrous traditional game, then why shouldn’t they be allowed to? Some say it is because if people get hospitalised, then the state has to care for them. But the people’s tax money pays for their own healthcare so it doesn’t really make sense.
If the event was organised, and the Cheese Rolling Association was involved, then it might make a difference, because then it might qualify as a proper sport. If people want to take part in cheese rolling and in the process risk falling over and injuring themselves, they should try and get cheese rolling officially recognised as a sport just like darts is. Surely darts, a game with little sharp metal pointed projectiles being thrown mostly by drunken people in a pub, is a more dangerous sport than sober people rolling down a hill. That very well could be the reason why darts can get away with being played in a pub because it is an officially recognised sport. Therefore, all the cheese rolling lovers need to do is get it registered as a sport and voila, all their troubles will disappear.
As the years have gone by and more pedantic health and safety laws come into place, more traditional games seem to be in danger of being banned altogether and lost to the folds of history. People will soon long for the days when anyone could roll down a hill in pursuit of a hunk of cheese, chuck metal rings at targets indoors, or play indoor skittles to their hearts’ content.
So what if a few people get hurt in the process; they still have a brilliant time just taking part in the game, and they feel what it was like to do something their ancestors did and relish in that memory.
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