Junior Circuits Abroad for Indian Kids...

[prasen9]

Or people trying to differentiate how we transliterate the A and the AA, etc., i.e., the long and the short vowels in Indian languages, and then getting the spelling wrong becuase they did not think about it. Or they think it is cute. Etc. Whatever. On with it. Anyway, we are getting more and more people in the world everyday and so may not be a bad idea to create new names or differentiate the names by creative spelling.

[sameerph]

13 year old Vihaan Reddy who won an unprecedented 4 back to back J30 titles in India in March is finally playing another ITF tournament series after 8 months. He is playing in couple of J60's in China in last 2 weeks as part of Asian under 16 development team. In a sense that is great news because being part of Asian team means at least as of now he keeping his India credentials.

In the first week, Vihaan lost in second round against a Chinese players. This week he is doing better and has reached the SF winning all his 4 matches in straight sets.

[jayakris]

Prasen, it seems Vihaan is playing in Chiinaa.

[sameerph]

Vihaan makes it to the final of J60 in China with a 63 61 against the 8th seeded Chinese, will meet another Chinese boy seeded 10th in the final.

[Dinesh]

Aditya Govila and Krisha Mahendran are in the main draw of the J500 Plantation Orange Bowl tournament. Adi qualified to the main draw winning 3 matches, whilst Krisha was one of the last direct acceptances. Rohan Belday lost in the first round of Q. All 3 of them are playing in the main draw doubles, as well.

[sameerph]

Vihaan makes it to the final of J60 in China with a 63 61 against the 8th seeded Chinese, will meet another Chinese boy seeded 10th in the final.

Vihaan lost in the final against the Chinese 16 26 in the final. Nonetheless very good run by 13 year old to the final.

[jayakris]

Aditya Govila and Krisha Mahendran are in the main draw of the J500 Plantation Orange Bowl tournament. Adi qualified to the main draw winning 3 matches, whilst Krisha was one of the last direct acceptances. Rohan Belday lost in the first round of Q. All 3 of them are playing in the main draw doubles, as well.

#157 Krisha beat Olivia Center (USA,120) 62 26 63 in the R1 yesterday, but now runs into the 2nd seed Kaitlin Quevedo (USA,7) who will be tough to get past. Aditya Govila (IND,154) plays the R1 today (Tuesday) against Daniil Sarksian (RUS,56).

[prasen9]

Prasen, it seems Vihaan is playing in Chiinaa.

Yeees!!!

More seriously, I am okay with transliterating the two a's in Indian languages to a and aa, although another alternative would be to use nothing for the short a and aa for the long a. In this case, to the best of my knowledge, there is no word called Vihn. But, vihan means morning. To the extent I know. If someone else knows more on this word or any close to it, please comment. However, if we start putting a single "a" for the short-a in Indian languages, then we need to use two a's for the long-a.

In fact, people abroad would perhaps prounounce my name more accurately if I spelled it Prsenjit. Or at least my name written in Hindi. The Americans pronounce the short a. In Bangla, of course, we make an "o" of the short "a" and thus it is Proshenjit. The "s" is another matter for another day.

[sameerph]

Aditya Govila and Krish Tyagi are playing qualifying in J300 in Tralalgon in Australia which is a warmup tournament for Australian open.

Both of them qualified thru to main draw. Kriish Tyagi beat 64th ranked second seeded Swede in second qualifying round.

Today, in first round of main draw, Kriish lost in 3 sets against 8th ranked Japanese Sakamoto but Aditya Govila created excellent upset against Viktor Frydrych (GBR,28) 61 64. He will play 29th russian in second round.

[jayakris]

Excellent work from Adi Go. I get the sense that Aditya will break out this year.

[sameerph]

Adi Go lost 76(4) 67(2) 06 against 29th ranked Russian. Still he looks to be progressing well.

Both Adigo and Kriish Tyagi have made the cut for qualifying entry list for Australian open. Rethin is 3 out from qualies draw but he is also in the entry list of J200 in Kolkata. So, not sure if Rethin is going there. Among girls, Maaya is 3 out from qualifying draw and has pulled out from Kolkata J200, so she seems to be going to Australia.

[jayakris]

The India #1 in girls (technically, at least; though I am not sure if she considers herself Indian), Krisha Mahendran from USA, won the J100 in San Jose, Costa Rica, yesterday. Ranked #128, Krisha was the third seed, and she beat a #145 ranked 5th seed from Canada (Naomi Xu) in the final, 63 76(5). Krisha is 17 years old and is in her final year of junior eligibility. She will move up to a career of around #110 now. I still expect her to join one of the universities in the US for college tennis.

More noteworthy was a 16 year old Indian-American winning the boys' title at that San Jose J100. Ronit Karki won the title, beating the top seed in a comeback 3-setters after dropping the first set and saving match points in the second set. Ronit seems to be really talented, and has now won 4 of the last 5 events he has played - J60s in Dominican Republic and Atlanta (USA), and now back-to-back J100 San Jose J100 titles. He is 23-1 in his last 24 matches, which is impressive. Ranked below 300 just 2 weeks ago, and basically the last entry in the two J100 draws, he will now move up to around #145.

[Atithee]

The India #1 in girls (technically, at least; though I am not sure if she considers herself Indian), Krisha Mahendran from USA, won the J100 in San Jose, Costa Rica, yesterday.

Uh oh! Jay said “girls” in his post.

[prasen9]

Krisha is 16 and is not playing in a tournament whose title is for junior women's. In so much, even if the tournament is for junior women, and a 16 year old girl plays in it, her being called a girl is fine. But, not all the players in general because the 21 year old woman is not a girl. I am also glad Jay did not use the term girls for females and man for males in the same sentence. I don't think he ever will. Girl is not a banned word. Showing mysogyny by using it for women while calling men men is what is objectionable.

Also context matters. I know Rohit and other cricketers regularly call themselves as boys. In context, that is fine. But, if say, they visit a restaurant in South Africa. A black waiter, 30, comes up. If Rohit addresses the waiter by saying, "Boy, get me a glass of water", there is ample scope for objection given the history of the use and abuse of that word by the colonialists.

[jayakris]

The India #1 in girls (technically, at least; though I am not sure if she considers herself Indian), Krisha Mahendran from USA, won the J100 in San Jose, Costa Rica, yesterday.

Uh oh! Jay said “girls” in his post.

I do use "girls" for anybody under 18.... Same as "boys". But I do not use it for adults. I had written about it before. I might use "ataboy" for a young adult male, but would not use "atagirl" for an adult female. I might have used "You go girl" in Sania's times, years ago. But times have changed. I don't think I have used "girl" for any pro level female for many years; at least 10 years.

There is nothing wrong in using "girl" for an u18 female. Heck, ITF rankings and tournaments use the words boys and girls!

(And, like Prasen said, I would not use even the word "boy" to refer to a young male in any context where African or African Americans may be included)