Ball Boys at RCGC, India

[atanum]

Our club has something called ballboys, who pickup the balls from the range and the chipping area . Most of these kids are amazing golfers. They rarely get to play, don't have clubs and manage to hit a few balls on the range by borrowing clubs from members.

Here's the swing of a ballboy named Shanu. He earns 2$s a day as a ballboy , works for 10 hours a day and if he is lucky gets to hit a few balls in the range ...

[iacas]

Beachcomber... as my ten-year-old kid would say:

YOU JUST GOT SERVED.

WITH A SPOON.

AND A SIDE OF CARROTS.

Bwah ha ha ha ha.

(Nice swing, btw. Thanks for sharing atanum. Goes to show how important imagery and mimicry can be).

P.S. Sorry Beach, I figure you can chuckle at this, and take it as the teasing it's intended to be, given your role as "hardest working swing tinkerer" on the site.

[colin007]

Hmmmm....I'm feeling left out of the loop...nice swing though!

[iacas]

Atanum, if we were able to gather some clubs, could we ship them to you so that you could give them to some of these ball boys?

I'm thinking we can organize a drive, award a badge to "Ball Boy Project" participants, and make a thing out of this.

Paul Hobart, thanks for the idea. Let's run with it.

[nevets88]

And he's swinging in sandals, no spikes. Swing looks pret-ty darn good to me. You tell me he's a 5SK/centered axis swing student and I'd say, yep, sure looks like it. I've got some clubs to donate.

[Zeph]

I wonder how many times he's filmed his swing. :-D

[divot dave]

Originally Posted by iacas

Atanum, if we were able to gather some clubs, could we ship them to you so that you could give them to some of these ball boys?

I'm thinking we can organize a drive, award a badge to "Ball Boy Project" participants, and make a thing out of this.

Paul Hobart, thanks for the idea. Let's run with it.

sounds like a great idea

[Beachcomber]

Dude can swing!  Sign him up!!!

[atanum]

Originally Posted by iacas

Atanum, if we were able to gather some clubs, could we ship them to you so that you could give them to some of these ball boys?

I'm thinking we can organize a drive, award a badge to "Ball Boy Project" participants, and make a thing out of this.

Paul Hobart, thanks for the idea. Let's run with it.

Super idea.

Couple of things that needs to be worked out.

1. Shipping logistics - costs of shipping to India. We need to look at options for this. The US consulate here regularly transports stuff for itself from US to Calcutta. I will talk to them and see if they can help us in shipping it free as a part of "Project Ballboy". The other possibility is for our club to pick up the shipping charges.

2. Customs -  We should be able to get around any customs charges, if they are designated as donations from a US initiative for upliftment of game  in India etc. etc.

3. Management - If we give the clubs away to the ball-boys they might sell it for food :( This process needs to be managed and I think and RCGC could manage the process of storing, monitoring and managing the distribution. I will talk to them.