Welcome to Badminton Becky!!

Hey there, welcome to my new blog! Maybe you came from my other blog, or maybe you are totally new. Let me ‘splain what this is.

Who is Becky?

That’s me. I’m an American girl who has been living in China since 2009, teaching English and traveling. I write about my life over at my other blog: Writer. Traveler. Tea Drinker. (Go check it out!) I currently live in Xiamen, China, which is on the south east coast of China. It’s on the ocean, and HOT and HUMID which I HATE, HATE, HATE!!! It especially sucks when I play badminton because I leak like an errant fire hydrant. But what can you do? We also have little pollution here, which is important to me. Though I would love to play in an air conditioned court I’m not sure they exist here.

What is badminton?

It’s a racket game where you hit a shuttlecock (also called a birdie) back and forth over a net. I hope you know that. But, if your American you might not know much more. While it’s just a backyard sport in my home nation, it is a much bigger sport in other countries. In fact, it is the second most popular sport to play in the world (after soccer). And it is a tough, tough game. It is the fastest racket sport in the world. The fastest badminton birdie was clocked at more than 200 mph, while the fastest tennis ball was clocked at a sluggish 150 mph. It’s a real, competitive sport dominated by Asian teams (China, Malaysia, and Indonesia are the biggies.)

Why Badminton Becky? 

Well, I kinda suck at badminton right now, but I’m working to change that. After all, I’m American! I never played badminton in gym class or watched it on TV. I didn’t even know the rules until 6-months ago when I started playing. But But I found an unexpected passion in the sport and I’m learning and absorbing and finding all things badminton very exciting. But not everyone does, I know.  I’ve been boring all my friends on Facebook and my other blog with constant badminton videos and blog posts. I know I’m annoying, but I can’t help it! Nothing in my life really makes sense to me unless I write about it. So I figured I needed a dedicated outlet for me to talk about this. And come on, is my name perfect for this kind of blog or what?! The url practically wrote itself.

If you are an experienced player, please try not to laugh too much at my clear lack of knowledge. I’m not even sure of the proper phraseology of moves or court positions. But it’s all part of the learning process, right? And I will reveal all embarrassing aspects of my journey towards competence.

I’ll even reveal some of the more embarrassing pictures of me. I sweat, A LOT, when I play sports, especially in tropical, humid Xiamen, and I do not look pretty in any way, shape or form when I play. So get used to the ugly people. There is lots of it coming.

Welcome to Badminton Becky! Please feel free to contact me about badminton stuff (or anything) at chinabecky(at)gmail(dot)com! And did I mention my other blog enough? Please check it out here!