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Out of Left Field |
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from Nepal |
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Would this young man from Nepal
be welcome at the U.S. Open today?
By STAN ISAACS
of TheColumnists.com
THE United States Tennis
Open, in progress this fortnight, is a big deal. Only the cream
of the world’s tennis players are invited. Everything about
it is pricey. Sandwiches cost as much as $11, sportswear and
rackets for sale challenge a credit card. Corporations pay up
to $110,000 to occupy one of the 90 luxury suites in the $254
million palace that is the Arthur Ashe Stadium.
One suiteholder, Steve Levkoff, the president of the Standard
Group, a manufacturer of printed boxes for cookies, toys and
cereals in nearby Jackson Heights, actually had his suite taken
away from him this year. It seems that last year the Levkoff
suite didn’t live up to the contract that requires each
suite to buy at least $24,000 worth of food from the in-house
caterer of eats at the U.S.T.A. National Tennis Center. That’s
the official reason--which is a giggle in its own right.
People who know better think Levkoff really got thrown out because
he had the gall to bring his own food into the establishment
On the final weekend last year he and his rebel gourmands brought
assorted delicatessen sandwiches into the sacred precincts.
It wasn’t always like this. I refer now to a piece I wrote
in 1960 when the U.S. championships were played on the lush green
acreage of the revered and leisurely tennis club in Forest Hills,
only a few miles from Flushing Meadows. The piece started out,
“Once upon a time…” and it went on from there.
There was this young man who came from the distant little land
of Nepal to the great United States to study international relations.
Before starting his graduate studies at Compton U. in California
the young man spent the summer in the fabled city of New York
studying in a United Nations internship program.
One day, while riding the wondrous subway, the young man saw
a poster announcing that the national tennis championship of
the U.S. would be held shortly at the famous West Side Tennis
Club. The young man, who had played some tennis off and on during
weekends in Nepal--where there were no more than three dozen
players--decided that he, too, would like to play in the tournament.
It was not that he was presumptuous or anything, because in the
only action resembling a tournament ever held in Nepal he had
been the best player.
The young man called the number of the U.S. Lawn Tennis Association
for an entry blank. He filled in all the particulars and, in
the space where it asked for his record, he noted that he would
be the first Nepalese tennis player to play, not only in the
U.S. championships, but in any tournament outside of Nepal.
Shortly afterward he told an American friend he had sent in the
entry blank . The friend laughed and laughed. “They’ll
never accept you,” he said. And they made a bet. If the
young man was accepted, his friend would buy him dinner. Or he
would buy the friend dinner.
Four days before the tournament started, he got word he had been
accepted. He rushed off to the tennis club to see what the other
players were like. After he ate the dinner, of course.
Imagine his dismay when he saw the acres and acres of tennis
players working out were better than he. Much better. Why, he
had never seen such magnificent players before. Now, some people
would think the young man would have become faint-hearted at
this point and dropped out of the tournament. Not him. By his
code of honor, it would been unsportsmanlike to drop out.
When the big first day of the tournament arrived and he took
the court against his opponent, a player from the great dominion
of Brooklyn, he was nervous. After all, he never had played on
a grass court before. And it was evident almost immediately that
his opponent was much better. The young man persisted, though.
He managed to win a few games. Afterward, his opponent told him,
“You will be better with more practice.”
Nobody exept a wandering reporter who stumbled upon the match
knew any of the young man’s story. When the young man politely
recited his story, the reporter--accustomed to whopping tales
from baseball players and other scalawags--at first thought his
leg was being pulled. But he studied the young man with the dark
complexion, noble aquilline nose, jet-black silken hair and deep,
serious brown eyes, and knew he was telling the truth.
“I think I would have done better if it had not been on
grass,” he said a number of times.
The reporter wondered why the young man was studying international
relations.
“Well, my uncle is the prime minister of Nepal,” he
said.
“The prime minister?!? The highest-official-in-the-land
prime minister?”
“Yes. His name is B.P. Koirala. There is a king, too.”
He said he had not put that piece of information on his entry
blank because, “I don’t see that it has anything to
do with my tennis.”
The young man’s name was Shail Kumar and on that Friday
afternoon in 1960 he lost to Don Rubell, 6-0, 6-2, 6-1.
It would not have surprised the reporter if the young man himself
became prime minister of Nepal one day. But so far it has not
happened.
© 2001 by Stan Isaacs. The Stan Isaacs caricature is ©
2001 by Jim Hummel. The other illustrations are from IMSI's Master/Clips
Collection, 1895 Francisco Blvd. East, San Rafael, CA, 94901-5506,
USA.
You
can comment on this column or contact Stan Isaacs with an email
to: talkback@thecolumnists.com
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