Bangladesh - a great experience

[5 April 2009]

Ioana Laura Alecsiu played three ITF Juniors events in Bangladesh this year, obtaining good results in the singles draw and especially in the doubles draw, memories that will survive over the years as a proof that a Romanian player managed to succeed in sport far away from home. Has Ioana something to share? Check out in the next lines:

"It has been the second time in three years when I visited Bangladesh. And as every tennis player, my purpose of visit was not actually tourism but three ITF tournaments.

Comparing the tournaments these years with the one's two years ago, I felt them tougher, as probably more players took the cheap life from Bangladesh into consideration. There were 24 players from the Chinese Taipei (including boys and girls) out of the 96 participating, who are good doubles players and if you play against one of their team, you have the feeling of playing a mini Davis Cup match, as the whole team is encouraging its fellow... and that is not exactly the best atmosphere to concentrate. This is probably one of the reasons why I chose to play doubles in the third tournament with Yung Hsin Chen from Taipei...

Three tournaments and all three were played on different hard surfaces. The first courts seemed to be as the Greenset, maybe a little bit quicker. The second tournament in Rajshahi was played on a very slipper and very quick surface that looked like the Romanian indoor surface from schools. The third tournament had a flexible carpet or paint (we could not figure it out what it was), which was very ‘friendly' for the players' feet. Taking these changes into consideration, players had to get used very fast with the new court conditions but also weather change. The first week was the most difficult one for Europeans, as we all played indoors all winter and we had to get used with breathing different, as playing outdoors. The second tournament was in the north of Bangladesh that means that we were closer to the Himalaya Mountains so it was colder in the mornings and evenings there. The third week was the worse taking into consideration the noise and air pollution. The tournament took place in the center of Dhakka, a city that literally never sleeps. Traffic in Dhakka is a special domain. Horns are the main ingredient in driving a car in Dhakka, so you may try to imagine the atmosphere of the city center there. This factor combined with continuous traffic jams created a sticky air, which was not the proper one for playing tennis.

Life in Bangladesh ... it is difficult to describe properly. Maybe every Romanian citizen should be sent there for one week, so that they will love their home country. Although Bangladesh is a poor country with low standards of living, people there try to make you feel good in order to come back again. The meals there were not very various so we had to eat constantly the traditional, local dish: chicken & rice. Asian food is one of my favorite dishes, but not having the choice of food, was not exactly what we wished there.

I really encourage everyone to go to Bangladesh and experience something new, they will surely never forget..."

Few more impressions wrote from Bangladesh can be read in the Blog Section of this site or after a click here.

A photo album from Bangladesh is posted in the Multimedia Section of this site or by clicking here.

In the Multimedia section here are uploaded few movies from Banglades.

Alongside Ioana another Olimpia Tenis Player Vlad Batachia experienced the tennis culture in Bangladesh, so a second article is already published only on our website in the Blogs section ( avalaible only in romanian language for the moment ).

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