- “Oi Kalu, ja net ta dhor baki der sathe!” (Kalu, go and hold the net with everyone else, go!)
- “Baban, ja doure club er bhetor theke bulb gulo niye aaye, aar haan, ekbar gune nish kota ache.” (Baban, run over and get the bulb’s from inside the club! Count them and bring it here!)
- “Rajat Da, baansh gulo pota holo? Net ta ebar lagate hobe je.” (Rajat Da, are you done putting up the bamboo poles, we have to put up the net now, no!)
- “Babu aar Polash, tora dekh Rajesh Da r electric er kaaj ta sesh holo ki na.” (Babu and Polash, go on and check if Rajesh Da is done with setting up the electric lines!)
This is our Soumya Da on the first Saturday of winter, hurling directions expertly that would put any Spielberg or Ray to shame. Soumya Da is our club’s one of the most distinguished members, and perhaps the most enthusiastic person when it comes to sports in our para (locality).
Soumya Da is an IT person by day and a sports enthusiast by night. Every day of every year, one can find him hanging around in the club either playing carrom or table tennis and having heated discussions about Messi vs Ronaldo, who is the better club in English football, why is Australia the better side in Test cricket, why are the Chinese so dominant in world badminton and table tennis circuit and what not.
I have heard from my Dadai that Soumya Da was an all-rounder as a child. During the evenings you would find him playing cricket, football, chasing kites, and the likes. But the one sport he shone the most was in Badminton. My brother says that he was so good, he almost looked invincible with the racquet in his hands and would give players twice his age a run for their money. He was destined to do something in this sport, and people, including himself, had hopes that one day he would represent India in the world stage. But as destiny would have it, he had to be called back from State Camp after his father’s untimely death. Having the responsibility of his mother and his younger brother on his shoulders Soumya Da was forced to change his priorities and eventually his career path.
This did not dampen a bit of Soumya Da’s love for the Sport. As winter came knocking at the door and people started bringing out the naphthalene scented sweaters, leps (quilts), kombols (blankets) and jackets out of the trunk, Soumya Da would open the club almirah to bring out the badminton net. To us, this meant that winter had arrived.
The Saturday following the ceremonious ‘Net Reveal’ is always the most hectic. We, the teenagers, and the elders of the para come together after lunch and start preparing for the next three months. It is a chaos of people running around with bamboo sticks, fixing light bulbs, making electric connections, checking in on the badminton net and drawing court lines on the field. Soumya Da coordinates everything. Sometimes remeasuring the length of the court, giving directions on where to place the light stands, counting the bulbs and finally helping us to fix the net on the erected bamboo poles. Completion of this task feels like an accomplishment in itself, but it also fills us with excitement about the nights to come.
The following nights are filled with rivalries, competitions, intense squabbles with generous doses of kacha khisti (an exaggerated Bengali phrase for slangs) and the most frequently heard phrases, “Dada, shuttle ta in chilo eta amar point howa uchit”, (Dada, my shuttle was in, please give the point!) “Na dekh shuttle ta court er baire pore ache eta amar point”. (Look, your shuttle has crossed the line, it’s my point!!)
Soumya Da returns from office an hour early to prep the field and commences the play. Everyone - from boys to girls, who have their annual exams coming up, to the elders, who used to be regular players but work and other responsibilities have restricted their time and energy, to our grandparents, in monkey caps- come out to play or simply be the loudest cheerleaders!
During the holiday season, our club organises a Badminton tournament where a lot of people from our and other neighbouring para’s participate. Here we see friends teaming up for doubles and becoming rivals for singles. I have always heard Soumya Da quote Kipling, “If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster / And treat those two impostors just the same;”, then quickly followed by his own words, “Winning and losing is a part of the game, if you lose, congratulate yourself for the fact that you participated, you put yourself out there, you tried.”
I think, perhaps, those words resonated with a lot of people, as participation is always high and so are the crowds. Rivals who stare with death in their eyes, come and hug each other after the match. Each point is celebrated with a roar and each miss with a whistle and a hoot. After each match, the winner is congratulated by everyone no matter which para they belonged to, and the loser is given a pat in the back with a “Bhalo khelecho” (Well played) or a “Nice try”.
Like football or cricket, badminton, for Bengalis is more than the game. This is a striking contrast to the famous classification of Bengalis being the laid-back kind of people who would prefer the domestic bliss of being under the warmth of a lep, sipping on nolen gur after a hefty dinner on a chilly winter night. It is like a bonfire where people come together to beat the chilling fangs of winter, share their stories after a tiring day of work or school and relax their minds and limbs by shooting the shuttle from one side of the net to another, desperately trying to keep the game of life buoyant. People do look forward to it. This activity of coming together and bonding over the love for a game and human interaction is what, I think, keeps us afloat in these trying times.
- “Baban, ja doure club er bhetor theke bulb gulo niye aaye, aar haan, ekbar gune nish kota ache.” (Baban, run over and get the bulb’s from inside the club! Count them and bring it here!)
- “Rajat Da, baansh gulo pota holo? Net ta ebar lagate hobe je.” (Rajat Da, are you done putting up the bamboo poles, we have to put up the net now, no!)
- “Babu aar Polash, tora dekh Rajesh Da r electric er kaaj ta sesh holo ki na.” (Babu and Polash, go on and check if Rajesh Da is done with setting up the electric lines!)
This is our Soumya Da on the first Saturday of winter, hurling directions expertly that would put any Spielberg or Ray to shame. Soumya Da is our club’s one of the most distinguished members, and perhaps the most enthusiastic person when it comes to sports in our para (locality).
Soumya Da is an IT person by day and a sports enthusiast by night. Every day of every year, one can find him hanging around in the club either playing carrom or table tennis and having heated discussions about Messi vs Ronaldo, who is the better club in English football, why is Australia the better side in Test cricket, why are the Chinese so dominant in world badminton and table tennis circuit and what not.
This did not dampen a bit of Soumya Da’s love for the Sport. As winter came knocking at the door and people started bringing out the naphthalene scented sweaters, leps (quilts), kombols (blankets) and jackets out of the trunk, Soumya Da would open the club almirah to bring out the badminton net. To us, this meant that winter had arrived.
The Saturday following the ceremonious ‘Net Reveal’ is always the most hectic. We, the teenagers, and the elders of the para come together after lunch and start preparing for the next three months. It is a chaos of people running around with bamboo sticks, fixing light bulbs, making electric connections, checking in on the badminton net and drawing court lines on the field. Soumya Da coordinates everything. Sometimes remeasuring the length of the court, giving directions on where to place the light stands, counting the bulbs and finally helping us to fix the net on the erected bamboo poles. Completion of this task feels like an accomplishment in itself, but it also fills us with excitement about the nights to come.
The following nights are filled with rivalries, competitions, intense squabbles with generous doses of kacha khisti (an exaggerated Bengali phrase for slangs) and the most frequently heard phrases, “Dada, shuttle ta in chilo eta amar point howa uchit”, (Dada, my shuttle was in, please give the point!) “Na dekh shuttle ta court er baire pore ache eta amar point”. (Look, your shuttle has crossed the line, it’s my point!!)
Soumya Da returns from office an hour early to prep the field and commences the play. Everyone - from boys to girls, who have their annual exams coming up, to the elders, who used to be regular players but work and other responsibilities have restricted their time and energy, to our grandparents, in monkey caps- come out to play or simply be the loudest cheerleaders!
During the holiday season, our club organises a Badminton tournament where a lot of people from our and other neighbouring para’s participate. Here we see friends teaming up for doubles and becoming rivals for singles. I have always heard Soumya Da quote Kipling, “If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster / And treat those two impostors just the same;”, then quickly followed by his own words, “Winning and losing is a part of the game, if you lose, congratulate yourself for the fact that you participated, you put yourself out there, you tried.”
I think, perhaps, those words resonated with a lot of people, as participation is always high and so are the crowds. Rivals who stare with death in their eyes, come and hug each other after the match. Each point is celebrated with a roar and each miss with a whistle and a hoot. After each match, the winner is congratulated by everyone no matter which para they belonged to, and the loser is given a pat in the back with a “Bhalo khelecho” (Well played) or a “Nice try”.
Like football or cricket, badminton, for Bengalis is more than the game. This is a striking contrast to the famous classification of Bengalis being the laid-back kind of people who would prefer the domestic bliss of being under the warmth of a lep, sipping on nolen gur after a hefty dinner on a chilly winter night. It is like a bonfire where people come together to beat the chilling fangs of winter, share their stories after a tiring day of work or school and relax their minds and limbs by shooting the shuttle from one side of the net to another, desperately trying to keep the game of life buoyant. People do look forward to it. This activity of coming together and bonding over the love for a game and human interaction is what, I think, keeps us afloat in these trying times.