one more memoir

so before this tournament leaves your minds and this section of the forum fades away, here’s my recap of this 2008 tuc. sorry it’s rather long, but hopefully some of you will read it all the way through, i’ve had lots of time to draft it haha.

arrival in indonesia was smooth, but it was quite an experience driving through a flooded part of the road: we were in a bus and still the water almost reached the windows. but we made it, and that was the first, but definitely not the last time i heard the phrase ‘welcome to indonesia’ to refer to something unexpected, unusual, unfamiliar, or just generally strange. the tournament hotel, the sultan, was really big and pretty nice, fairly elaborate decor. the grounds of the hotel include something like 10 tennis courts, a pool, lots of restaurants, ‘gardens’ (in quotations because they smelled terrible because of a pond-like thing covered in moss), and other residences.. my roommate and i had fun exploring how far the grounds went, which at one point involved getting locked in a stairwell and accidentally setting off an alarm when we finally found the door that led back outside.

the welcome dinner was held at monas, a national monument, and was not as.. put together as expected. rudy mentioned some of this already. we were loaded onto buses and then waited for almost an hour while they cleared the road so the buses and the police escort could all go straight there without stopping. the entire main road was empty. it was weird. on arrival, we players looked for seats at round tables but found some of them already taken by officials, umpires, etc., so we instead took seats in the very back where there were just some chairs set up in rows. i remember seeing some of the malaysians, the thai team, even some of the indonesians (like nova, who was messing around with xie zhongbo) sitting back there as well. that left us really far away from where the speeches and things were happening, and there didn’t seem to be any order to what we were supposed to be doing. some waiters were taking trays to the round tables, but nothing was happening at the back, so rexy went to get a tray and came around with it, playing the part of a waiter, serving those of us who hadn’t been reached. the night kind of fell apart, with people going to get food whenever they felt like it, and leaving soon after. our team stuck around a little later than the others, and so we caught the most spectacular part of the evening. i’m not sure what the name of the presentation was, but it involved choreographed fountains and music and nationalistic images projected onto the water. it was really incredible, and it went on for almost 20 minutes.

team usa played on the first and the third day. our first match was on the first day at 8am against china, but i can’t exactly say what it was like since i didn’t play.. we played germany also that night. i played first singles against xu haiwen, which was another learning experience.. we had one day off before playing our playoff against hong kong. i played second singles. playing in istora was a lot of fun. it’s a lot smaller than i had imagined in my head. before getting there, i was picturing something like the nia (where the ae is held, it’s massive, you can’t hear anything and it felt like i was lost inside a big cave). but it’s pretty small, the courts are close together, and even though the ceiling is high, the lights are hung fairly low so it doesn’t feel like it’s that high. the main problem was the wind. our matches against germany and hong kong were on the court closest to the doorways where players entered (either to play or to watch). there were black curtains covering the doorways, but the wind was so bad that they were lifted up parallel to the floor. even lius pongoh (psbi official) was pantomiming how bad it was at breakfast one morning. adjusting to the wind meant changing footwork (ie. one step less when moving back when against the wind, and vice versa) and technique, so it was a pain, to say the least.

but not enough can be said about the indonesian crowd. they’re crazy. but in a good way, they rarely if ever went negative on their players (as some were afraid they might). we never played with the crowd cheering directly for us or against us, but our match with germany was played at the same time as indonesia vs. thailand (thomas cup), two courts away, so i was playing xu at the same time as sony vs. boonsak. the crowd was doing the “oooh.. yea! oooh.. yea!” for each of their shots, so it was weird to be playing my own game with such a different tempo in my ears. the crowd made playing so much better, the gym felt so alive.
during the later rounds, it got even crazier. walking to the gym, it would seem quiet, and then all of a sudden this roar would come from inside, and it gave me goosebumps to imagine what was happening in there to make that much noise. inside, everywhere you looked there was someone holding a sign, someone dancing, someone yelling, someone with a crazy hat, someone singing, people crowding the stairwells and entrances. the most electrifying times were those where everyone was in sync, there was a very impressive wave a few times, almost everyone got into it and it made it around the gym 3 or 4 times before dying out. but my personal favorite had to be the singing. cheering to me sounds like a lot of girls screaming, but these songs were lower and deeper and everyone was singing in time and in tune and it was thrilling. to put it lightly.

other random notes and happenings:

the us team had lunch one day with tony (gunawan), his wife eti, and baby leon. the baby was so cute!! still lots of baby fat, but eti corrected us and said, “no, that’s all muscle”. even on his cheeks haha. he was wearing his baby thingy with gunawan/usa/the yonex symbol on the back. very very cute. we also saw rusli, who used to coach at ocbc before moving back to indonesia a few years ago, i remember him from my earliest junior nationals, even if he was always coaching against me haha.

kartono (halim’s father-in-law, there are pictures of him and his wife in some other thread) and his wife were so good to us the whole trip, taking us out to eat at the popular sate khas, another night at a kwetiau (flat white noodle) place, and to kelapa gading for a day at a mall and then friendly matches and seafood dinner with the kelapa gading sport club. everyone was so nice to us, giving speeches about how it was an honor for them to have us play there. and when it was our turn to respond, our own vtec101 did the honors

i didn’t spot any celebs, largely because i didn’t know there were any there and don’t know any indonesian celebrities anyways (no picture with agnes monica! hrmph), but there were a few random player sightings.. flandy was around a lot, always having to call for someone to get him from the lobby since he didn’t have a room key to go up the elevator.. a few djarum players were around as well (rendra, rian, etc.). i talked to rexy one morning, and one of the photographers came over and asked him where ricky (his former doubles partner who was doing tv commentary during the week) was. he said he didn’t know, and the photographer said, “what?? he’s your partner, you’re supposed to know where he is!” to which rexy said, “no, he was my partner.. if now still my partner, than gay!” the photog didn’t know what to say about that haha.

impressions of jakarta: it’s weird how much difference there is between outside and inside.. taking everyone’s advice, we only ate at malls and big restaurants in attempts to avoid getting sick, didn’t walk outside much, and generally stayed in sheltered, mild, safe areas. there are a lot of malls here, and they’re all clean and air-conditioned and cool and white and colorful and sterile. but outside is hot and kind of dirty and brown and muggy and not sterile at all. so it was very weird to be inside and then go back to the outside.. a little shock each time as we adjusted to the heat and humidity again, etc. outside there are endless rows of food carts and tiny marts open to the street selling anything imaginable. there are so many people and so many things crammed into this city. the traffic lived up to it’s bad reputation. it was strange to me to see people crossing the road whenever they felt like it or to see people walking right up to cars stopped in traffic or at lights to sell something like drinks, cigarettes, or newspapers.. all in all, jakarta feels like a crowded, unpredictable city where everything blends together into some heady mix that you can either love or hate.

as for me, i’m still in indonesia, i’ll be here until july 1 training with the djarum club’s singles group. i stayed in jakarta for another week ish after the uber cup, staying with a friend and then in the hotel with my new and temporary teammates, and now i’m in bandung because the players had/have national ciruit (or should i say sirkuit nasional?) tournaments. i’ll go to kudus (where the djarum singles players are based) in a week ish. and then the real fun begins. i’m getting used to eating with my hands, getting used to being constantly a bit sticky, and trying not to get too used to the cool weather here in bandung, because supposedly kudus is much hotter, even hotter than jakarta.

last things: a huge huge thank you to rudy aka hau-ge aka.. well, everyone knows who he is now haha. rudy took care of me the first days before the rest of team usa arrived, helping me to practice at djarum, taking me to eat, and helping me with phone and sim card. and then when the rest of the team arrived he did his best to get us out and about, even taking us to eat seafood at lagunas one night. and just as big a thank you to krisna for everything, from the cool shirt to the reason i’m still in indonesia

it was fun to meet my fellow bcers, to finally put faces to the handles. we had lots of fun watching the matches from THE best seats possible and going out to eat, or simply finding some place in the sultan to relax and unwind and, of course, talk about the games! and about babysitting and matchmaking and the crowd and what the 2010 tuc might bring, especially with all the talk of it being held in malaysia.. i’m also glad the banner got some exposure, even if it wasn’t on tv the games at djarum were a lot of fun, it kind of completed the bc gathering, to actually play with everyone. i’m sure we’ll all meet again

as for these rumors that i was with bcers more than the team.. not at all in the early part of the week (tournament first!!), but guilty towards the end of the week as my team slowly disappeared for home or vacation.. what can i say.. it was fun

picture captions:
1. team usa with the various signs they used to lead the teams out.. look!! they're rackets!!
2. team usa! i forget whose idea that pose was, but it was a good one.
3. at the hall in kelapa gading. they gave us all those polos to play in and to keep.
4. no caption needed, right?
5. the obligatory official team photo. top row, L to R: coach halim, panita, may, eva, paul (aka vtec101), rena's dad. bottom row, L to R: rena, myself, vimla, joanne.

the end!! phew.. smashie signing off.