Rahman Hekmat was an infant when his parents moved to New Zealand from Afghanistan in search of a better life. Raised by cricket and Bollywood enthusiasts, Rahman, the eldest of three siblings, developed a love for cricket, though he finds Hindi cinema challenging.
“My dad really loves Bollywood movies. When he would put up some movie, I would try and jump in and see If I can catch it. If I didn’t get the story, I really got very bored, so he would try to explain it to me. I struggle to understand Hindi. I always tell him to put the caption on, but he says the sense gets lost in the translation,” Rahman tells media from Dobsonville in South Africa.
“Recently, my parents went on to watch Shah Rukh Khan starrer Dunki. My father loved the movie, and he explained it to me over the phone for two hours. He is a fan of the actor and was trying to explain everything about him and his work. I try my bit to learn,” he laughs.
“I started as a pace bowler. One day my dad and I were playing, and I started bowling a few leggies. My dad thought I had a natural action and was quite similar to Shane Warne. He spoke to my coach, not a personal coach, he was just a player’s dad, who used to help out all the kids. The day after, we went for training, and then my coach also saw something in my bowling and said it is something we can work on. From there onwards, it was all leg-spin,” he shares.
“My idols are Shane Warne and Rashid Khan. Warne is the greatest of all time. Rashid Khan is an Afghani and got a quick leg break and wrong’un. The thing is I also love to bowl quite a few googlies like Rashid,” he says.