This has been a blog post that I have wanted to do and get off my chest since a very long time. If it wasn't for Rafael Nadal and Shikhar Dhawan this pastweek, I probably would have gone back to listening to some music. The timing feels good today. Especially when you've had a good week and there's nothing else LEFT to do. LEFT in this case, sure feels RIGHT.
What's the one thing common between Rafael Nadal, Shikhar Dhawan and Adit Ganguly? We're all lefties. Yeah we do things with the other hand. And we do it very well. With the hand, that's supposedly the one, from which majority of the world cleans their bum. Well there are those who use toilet paper and I got to admit, the jet spray is a fantastic invention. But let's just stick to the bucket and mug.
Like any individual who is now in his 20s, I was introduced to the pen and pencil way before the computer and a touch screen-mobile phone could enter my life. I chose a profession where I and my hand do the talking. And that's where the fascination began. You see, I didn't even have to write a single word down to capture the world's and your attention. Your eyes were already on me. For a man whose job is now to delight the world with his writing, the world was already delighted by not what he wrote, but by how he wrote.
via GIPHY
"Adit. You're a lefty?"
"Adit. Tu pen kaisa pakadta hai?" (Adit, how do you hold the pen?)
"Adit. You're a lefty? You must be so creative and funny!!!"
"Adit. Dusra haath aage kar. Prasad right hand se lete hai" (Cause habit)
via GIPHY
Yes. And that's been my story since I chose not to write with what's considered right (oh fuck. what a pun). And this is the story of all us people who are presumed to be "smart, creative and funny".
I don't know if it's a genes thing but neither my grandparents or my parents for that matter are lefties. Me and my lovely brother Mudit decided to be absolute rebels and be the black sheep of society. Mudit, like me, is a lefty as well. We both are artists, One a writer, other other an ace graphic designer. Mudit was an extremely artistic person as a kid, His paintings and designs are to be in awe of. I'm sure he's been at the receiving end of "You're a lefty?". But not once were we ever scolded or spanked with the ruler at home. Our parents were very chill.
But it was in school where things got a little weird. I always had to sit on the left side of the bench since sitting on the right hand side was obviously the dumb thing to do. There were times where me and the person who I shared the bench with decided to switch places, slam our hands against each other just to disturb the flow of the class. Cheap thrills before Sia got cool. But the school I went to was lovely. Not a single teacher ever told me to write with the other hand.
I didn't have great handwriting to begin with, but what made it worse that my grip made it impossible for anyone to have the slightest of peaks during exams. They would have failed regardless, I was only helping them by doing what's right (in this case writing with my left hand). As I got smarter and started giving BMM exams and those in Communications and Journalism, I realised that there is a good majority of the public that's cursing me for being a lefty.
The other area where this was brought up time and again was when I played cricket. I bat and bowl left-handed. Whenever there was someone new who came to play, I had heard the same three words like always.
"Tu lefty hai" (You're a lefty)
It got to a point where I didn't even know if there should be an exclamation mark or a question mark at the end of the quote. But it's nice to screw up the field settings just because you're different.
And this doubt of whether it should be an exclamation mark or a question mark by the person surprises and amazes me to this very day. I always faced a problem with scissors, I do with some even today. I hate writing in books that are spiral bound because it's a pain to write from the right hand side page. I look up the internet and there are places where I can buy stuff that are custom made for lefties.
via GIPHY
Shirts with buttons on the other side, scissors, notebooks, left handed chef set, gardening set, sewing set, knives cause it makes it a lot easier for me to kill you guys. And thank god for these inventions cause I could really do with scissors especially. People wanted us to continue doing how we did what we did best.
But these people are evil.
via GIPHY
In case you didn't know, these products made for us special people costs more than what does normally. Why? It's simple economics. We lefties are the ones facing the problems. I need this scissor more than the scissor needs me. That's why I will pay more.
And I as a lefty could never find that joy when I saw a lefty write or bat/bowl. You're never fascinated by what you have right? (no pun intended). Why do such questions always come from the people who are right-handed people?
The world continues to be fascinated by us. And there's no greater field where this is displayed than in the art of sport. Especially cricket. Besides playing the sport like any kid would, I did, thanks to my old man, spend a lot of my time watching the game as well. In the glorious 90s and 2000s where everyone found god in Sachin, I found mine in Brian Charles Lara.
via GIPHY
Before you guys can even begin to type "Sachin ko gaali diya". I'm a huge fan of both. This isn't a Sachin vs Lara debate in the first place. There was just magic when you saw Lara bat. Because in the world of right-handed people, here was someone different. I loved watching Ponting, Dravid,
Laxman, Sehwag bat. But my eyes always lit up when I saw a Jayasuriya, Hayden, Gilchrist, Ganguly, Sangakkara come to bat. And don't even get me started on Yuvraj Singh and the Prince of Kolkata. You guys remember Michael Beven? And what about Mr. Gayle-storm
via GIPHY
I don't know if the world perceived it the same way, did you? I'd love to know. Did they amaze you in a greater way as seeing someone write with their left hand? It's the same with bowling. Everyone hated facing Wasim Akram cause you never knew which way the ball would swing. It was just delightful to know that this wasn't a right-handed bowler doing all of this.
And if you just wanted to know the wrath of a left-hander, just ask Stuart Broad
And yes nothing gave me more joy than India winning the 2011 World Cup. The man of the series was a left-handed batsman (Yuvraj Singh), the joint-highest wicket taker was an Indian fast bowler (Zaheer Khan). And let's not forget, it was another left-handed batsman (Gautam Gambhir) who laid the platform for India by scoring 97 in that final at the Wankhede.
While growing up, you played Alan Border Cricket and Brian Lara Cricket on your PCs and PlayStations. Both were left-handed batsmen. So much win.
Moving on, the greatest footballer of this generation is left-footed, the legend he is compared to is also left-footed. Lionel Messi and Diego Maradona.
via GIPHY
The one's who have had the luck of watching these two play can surely consider themselves blessed. Both revered across nations to this very day. Both wizards of the dribble and capable of the near-impossible. Maradona's craze is such that he has a church devoted to him back home in Argentina.
via GIPHY
They do/ did things with a football that dazzles us to this very day. Watching players like Messi or Diego Maradona streak down the field with the ball at their feet avoiding droves of defenders, and springing free just in time to get a shot off to the far post, provokes similar feelings as watching an artist create a masterpiece.
Now we come to my most favourite left-handed sportsman, Rafael Nadal. I started watching tennis much later compared to cricket and football. The popular names at that time were Andre Agassi (8), Pete Sampras (14), Steffi Graf (22), Williams (Venus has 7, Serena 23) to begin with. Later on was I to look up the names of John McEnroe (7), Jimmy Connors (8), Martina Navratilova (18) and Rod Laver (11) (has an arena named after him) and be fascinated at how they dominated this wonderful sport. (Number of Grand Slam titles in brackets)
It was somewhere around 2006/2007 that the lines were drawn. You had to make a choice between two of the greatest tennis players of this generation. One was elegance at his very best. Poetry in motion. A delight for the purists. Probably the best tennis player to ever grace the game. Yes, I am not a Roger Federer fan but I know when to give credit when it's due. It's been an absolute delight to sit in front of the telly and watch him play. But there was someone against whom he kept coming up short. And that guy was a left-handed player. How could I not like what was happening. In fact, I loved what was happening. The more I watched this guy play, the more I knew - this guy wasn't Roger Federer.
via GIPHY
Rafael Nadal was born right-handed. He does everything, from signing autographs to playing golf to touching every part of his face before serving, with his right hand. But he plays tennis left-handed. And not even Nadal himself quite knows why. Playing left-handed has offered Nadal all sorts of advantages, most notably by allowing his stronger right hand to power up his double-handed backhand, which for some years has been one of the most feared shots in the game.
via GIPHY
The traditional advantage of the left-hander is the wide swinging serve from the left-hand side of the court, which is where most game points and break points and set points are played. Because of the ball’s natural spin, it tends to arc away from the right-hander’s backhand, usually the weaker side for most players.
Like the world around us where the proportion of lefties to righties is minimal, Rafael Nadal has been the flag bearer in the tennis world for left-handers. We needed a role model after all didn't we.
Now enough of sport. Time to get into another department that we all love, but at the same time see left-handed people face quite a lot of problems. If there's another thing besides sport that I absolutely love, it's MUSIC. And don't be surprised to know that there are instruments separately made for us 'special' people here as well.
And let's talk about the most mainstream instrument that is a hit amongst anyone wanting to learn. The guitar.
Left-handed guitarists are few and far between when compared to the many right handed guitar gods one can find on a general Google search for guitar players. There are many left handed persons who simply play the guitar right handed - the most famous example being Dire Straits frontman Mark Knopfler - besides him; guitar players like Duane Allman, Billy Corgan, Noel Gallagher and Paul Simon are also examples of left handed people who have chosen to play the guitar right handed.
There are several reasons for this disproportionate imbalance between right handed and left handed guitar players - Guitars have traditionally been made for the right hand side to be the strumming hand and the left hand to be the fretting hand and therefore, a left-handed guitar player is immediately handicapped by a lack of choice while selecting an instrument as left handed guitars aren’t nearly equal in number to the sheer amount of right handed guitars on earth.
via GIPHY
Another solution to this problem is to reverse the order of the strings and play a right handed guitar, - left handed but that wouldn’t be ideal. And then a typical issue that left-handers usually face is with guitar teachers who may also be right handed and therefore face trouble perceiving the guitar entirely differently. In order to avoid all of these issues, some people simply choose to play the guitar right handed even if they do routine chores like using their stronger left hand.
However, since this is meant to be an article about left handed guitar players, we are going to look at a few guitar players who haven’t allowed for the above limitations to cloud their vision and have gone on to become very successful indeed.
The first name that comes to mind when faced with the question of a left-handed guitar player undoubtedly is Jimi Hendrix who is widely considered to be one of the greatest and most innovative guitar players to have ever played the instrument.
Sir Paul McCartney is a name any music lover will recognise. McCartney in fact started playing the guitar right handed before deciding that he wasn’t making much progress with it at all. He then stumbled upon a picture of country musician Slim Whitman playing the guitar left handed and decided to reverse the strings and strum with his left hand instead of the right. The rest as they say is history, he went on to found The Beatles with John Lennon and gave the world a discography that would stand the test of time.
via GIPHY
Yes, we are the black sheep of society. We're cool with that. Some accept the fact that you don't (not supposed to) take prasad or eat with your left hand. To avoid creating a scene, most of us just extend our right hand. We do face problems while cutting anything using a scissor. Despite all of us dealing with this in our lives, there is always a sense of amusement amongst us when we present ourselves in front of you. The look of seeing this for the first time despite having seen it before is what shall always continue to amaze us left-handed people. I will still have that exclamation or question mark doubt till the day I die. Because we will continue to be "creative". There will be many of you who will love seeing what a left-handed person can do. Be it me, Rafael Nadal, Brian Lara, Lionel Messi. There have been many before, and there will be many after. The one thing that both left-handed and right-handed people both know is that the former will always be asked
You're a lefty!!! / You're a lefty?
What's the one thing common between Rafael Nadal, Shikhar Dhawan and Adit Ganguly? We're all lefties. Yeah we do things with the other hand. And we do it very well. With the hand, that's supposedly the one, from which majority of the world cleans their bum. Well there are those who use toilet paper and I got to admit, the jet spray is a fantastic invention. But let's just stick to the bucket and mug.
Like any individual who is now in his 20s, I was introduced to the pen and pencil way before the computer and a touch screen-mobile phone could enter my life. I chose a profession where I and my hand do the talking. And that's where the fascination began. You see, I didn't even have to write a single word down to capture the world's and your attention. Your eyes were already on me. For a man whose job is now to delight the world with his writing, the world was already delighted by not what he wrote, but by how he wrote.
via GIPHY
"Adit. You're a lefty?"
"Adit. Tu pen kaisa pakadta hai?" (Adit, how do you hold the pen?)
"Adit. You're a lefty? You must be so creative and funny!!!"
"Adit. Dusra haath aage kar. Prasad right hand se lete hai" (Cause habit)
via GIPHY
Yes. And that's been my story since I chose not to write with what's considered right (oh fuck. what a pun). And this is the story of all us people who are presumed to be "smart, creative and funny".
I don't know if it's a genes thing but neither my grandparents or my parents for that matter are lefties. Me and my lovely brother Mudit decided to be absolute rebels and be the black sheep of society. Mudit, like me, is a lefty as well. We both are artists, One a writer, other other an ace graphic designer. Mudit was an extremely artistic person as a kid, His paintings and designs are to be in awe of. I'm sure he's been at the receiving end of "You're a lefty?". But not once were we ever scolded or spanked with the ruler at home. Our parents were very chill.
But it was in school where things got a little weird. I always had to sit on the left side of the bench since sitting on the right hand side was obviously the dumb thing to do. There were times where me and the person who I shared the bench with decided to switch places, slam our hands against each other just to disturb the flow of the class. Cheap thrills before Sia got cool. But the school I went to was lovely. Not a single teacher ever told me to write with the other hand.
I didn't have great handwriting to begin with, but what made it worse that my grip made it impossible for anyone to have the slightest of peaks during exams. They would have failed regardless, I was only helping them by doing what's right (in this case writing with my left hand). As I got smarter and started giving BMM exams and those in Communications and Journalism, I realised that there is a good majority of the public that's cursing me for being a lefty.
The other area where this was brought up time and again was when I played cricket. I bat and bowl left-handed. Whenever there was someone new who came to play, I had heard the same three words like always.
"Tu lefty hai" (You're a lefty)
It got to a point where I didn't even know if there should be an exclamation mark or a question mark at the end of the quote. But it's nice to screw up the field settings just because you're different.
And this doubt of whether it should be an exclamation mark or a question mark by the person surprises and amazes me to this very day. I always faced a problem with scissors, I do with some even today. I hate writing in books that are spiral bound because it's a pain to write from the right hand side page. I look up the internet and there are places where I can buy stuff that are custom made for lefties.
via GIPHY
Shirts with buttons on the other side, scissors, notebooks, left handed chef set, gardening set, sewing set, knives cause it makes it a lot easier for me to kill you guys. And thank god for these inventions cause I could really do with scissors especially. People wanted us to continue doing how we did what we did best.
But these people are evil.
via GIPHY
In case you didn't know, these products made for us special people costs more than what does normally. Why? It's simple economics. We lefties are the ones facing the problems. I need this scissor more than the scissor needs me. That's why I will pay more.
And I as a lefty could never find that joy when I saw a lefty write or bat/bowl. You're never fascinated by what you have right? (no pun intended). Why do such questions always come from the people who are right-handed people?
The world continues to be fascinated by us. And there's no greater field where this is displayed than in the art of sport. Especially cricket. Besides playing the sport like any kid would, I did, thanks to my old man, spend a lot of my time watching the game as well. In the glorious 90s and 2000s where everyone found god in Sachin, I found mine in Brian Charles Lara.
Before you guys can even begin to type "Sachin ko gaali diya". I'm a huge fan of both. This isn't a Sachin vs Lara debate in the first place. There was just magic when you saw Lara bat. Because in the world of right-handed people, here was someone different. I loved watching Ponting, Dravid,
Laxman, Sehwag bat. But my eyes always lit up when I saw a Jayasuriya, Hayden, Gilchrist, Ganguly, Sangakkara come to bat. And don't even get me started on Yuvraj Singh and the Prince of Kolkata. You guys remember Michael Beven? And what about Mr. Gayle-storm
via GIPHY
I don't know if the world perceived it the same way, did you? I'd love to know. Did they amaze you in a greater way as seeing someone write with their left hand? It's the same with bowling. Everyone hated facing Wasim Akram cause you never knew which way the ball would swing. It was just delightful to know that this wasn't a right-handed bowler doing all of this.
And if you just wanted to know the wrath of a left-hander, just ask Stuart Broad
And yes nothing gave me more joy than India winning the 2011 World Cup. The man of the series was a left-handed batsman (Yuvraj Singh), the joint-highest wicket taker was an Indian fast bowler (Zaheer Khan). And let's not forget, it was another left-handed batsman (Gautam Gambhir) who laid the platform for India by scoring 97 in that final at the Wankhede.
While growing up, you played Alan Border Cricket and Brian Lara Cricket on your PCs and PlayStations. Both were left-handed batsmen. So much win.
Moving on, the greatest footballer of this generation is left-footed, the legend he is compared to is also left-footed. Lionel Messi and Diego Maradona.
via GIPHY
The one's who have had the luck of watching these two play can surely consider themselves blessed. Both revered across nations to this very day. Both wizards of the dribble and capable of the near-impossible. Maradona's craze is such that he has a church devoted to him back home in Argentina.
via GIPHY
They do/ did things with a football that dazzles us to this very day. Watching players like Messi or Diego Maradona streak down the field with the ball at their feet avoiding droves of defenders, and springing free just in time to get a shot off to the far post, provokes similar feelings as watching an artist create a masterpiece.
Now we come to my most favourite left-handed sportsman, Rafael Nadal. I started watching tennis much later compared to cricket and football. The popular names at that time were Andre Agassi (8), Pete Sampras (14), Steffi Graf (22), Williams (Venus has 7, Serena 23) to begin with. Later on was I to look up the names of John McEnroe (7), Jimmy Connors (8), Martina Navratilova (18) and Rod Laver (11) (has an arena named after him) and be fascinated at how they dominated this wonderful sport. (Number of Grand Slam titles in brackets)
It was somewhere around 2006/2007 that the lines were drawn. You had to make a choice between two of the greatest tennis players of this generation. One was elegance at his very best. Poetry in motion. A delight for the purists. Probably the best tennis player to ever grace the game. Yes, I am not a Roger Federer fan but I know when to give credit when it's due. It's been an absolute delight to sit in front of the telly and watch him play. But there was someone against whom he kept coming up short. And that guy was a left-handed player. How could I not like what was happening. In fact, I loved what was happening. The more I watched this guy play, the more I knew - this guy wasn't Roger Federer.
via GIPHY
Rafael Nadal was born right-handed. He does everything, from signing autographs to playing golf to touching every part of his face before serving, with his right hand. But he plays tennis left-handed. And not even Nadal himself quite knows why. Playing left-handed has offered Nadal all sorts of advantages, most notably by allowing his stronger right hand to power up his double-handed backhand, which for some years has been one of the most feared shots in the game.
via GIPHY
The traditional advantage of the left-hander is the wide swinging serve from the left-hand side of the court, which is where most game points and break points and set points are played. Because of the ball’s natural spin, it tends to arc away from the right-hander’s backhand, usually the weaker side for most players.
Like the world around us where the proportion of lefties to righties is minimal, Rafael Nadal has been the flag bearer in the tennis world for left-handers. We needed a role model after all didn't we.
Now enough of sport. Time to get into another department that we all love, but at the same time see left-handed people face quite a lot of problems. If there's another thing besides sport that I absolutely love, it's MUSIC. And don't be surprised to know that there are instruments separately made for us 'special' people here as well.
And let's talk about the most mainstream instrument that is a hit amongst anyone wanting to learn. The guitar.
Left-handed guitarists are few and far between when compared to the many right handed guitar gods one can find on a general Google search for guitar players. There are many left handed persons who simply play the guitar right handed - the most famous example being Dire Straits frontman Mark Knopfler - besides him; guitar players like Duane Allman, Billy Corgan, Noel Gallagher and Paul Simon are also examples of left handed people who have chosen to play the guitar right handed.
There are several reasons for this disproportionate imbalance between right handed and left handed guitar players - Guitars have traditionally been made for the right hand side to be the strumming hand and the left hand to be the fretting hand and therefore, a left-handed guitar player is immediately handicapped by a lack of choice while selecting an instrument as left handed guitars aren’t nearly equal in number to the sheer amount of right handed guitars on earth.
via GIPHY
Another solution to this problem is to reverse the order of the strings and play a right handed guitar, - left handed but that wouldn’t be ideal. And then a typical issue that left-handers usually face is with guitar teachers who may also be right handed and therefore face trouble perceiving the guitar entirely differently. In order to avoid all of these issues, some people simply choose to play the guitar right handed even if they do routine chores like using their stronger left hand.
However, since this is meant to be an article about left handed guitar players, we are going to look at a few guitar players who haven’t allowed for the above limitations to cloud their vision and have gone on to become very successful indeed.
The first name that comes to mind when faced with the question of a left-handed guitar player undoubtedly is Jimi Hendrix who is widely considered to be one of the greatest and most innovative guitar players to have ever played the instrument.
Sir Paul McCartney is a name any music lover will recognise. McCartney in fact started playing the guitar right handed before deciding that he wasn’t making much progress with it at all. He then stumbled upon a picture of country musician Slim Whitman playing the guitar left handed and decided to reverse the strings and strum with his left hand instead of the right. The rest as they say is history, he went on to found The Beatles with John Lennon and gave the world a discography that would stand the test of time.
via GIPHY
Yes, we are the black sheep of society. We're cool with that. Some accept the fact that you don't (not supposed to) take prasad or eat with your left hand. To avoid creating a scene, most of us just extend our right hand. We do face problems while cutting anything using a scissor. Despite all of us dealing with this in our lives, there is always a sense of amusement amongst us when we present ourselves in front of you. The look of seeing this for the first time despite having seen it before is what shall always continue to amaze us left-handed people. I will still have that exclamation or question mark doubt till the day I die. Because we will continue to be "creative". There will be many of you who will love seeing what a left-handed person can do. Be it me, Rafael Nadal, Brian Lara, Lionel Messi. There have been many before, and there will be many after. The one thing that both left-handed and right-handed people both know is that the former will always be asked
You're a lefty!!! / You're a lefty?
via GIPHY
