Who is Big Bertha?

Tay Ping Hui! It’s Medi­a­corp! It’s Sin­ga­pore the mer­i­toc­racy! Not Medi­oc­rity! See lah! You go play golf with Tiger Woods then he become No. 2. How, like that? You suck! You are the regional hub for incom­pe­tence! It’s all your fault!

I am not a golf fanatic. And I think golf on telly ranks with bil­liards, For­mula One and darts as the most bor­ing things to watch on the planet.

For­mula One com­men­tary: And they’re off, and they’re going round, and round, and round, and round, and round, and round, and oh, pit stop.

My friends had thought I was a recent con­vert to golf until I responded excit­edly to news of ‘Vee­jay’ Singh being num­ber one by ask­ing, ‘you mean Utt is no longer at MTV?‘

But golf is a dif­fi­cult game. For me at least. I tried my hand (and arm and back and neck) at it last year, going to the range sev­eral times with bor­rowed clubs and hit­ting 300 balls at one go, before a con­cerned friend said I was crazy to hit 300 balls at one go. I had pre­vi­ously thought, hey how hard could it be? The damned ball isn’t mov­ing, it’s just sit­ting there wait­ing for me to hit it. What a stu­pidly sim­ple game. There’s no one throw­ing the ball at me, or hit­ting it back, or tak­ing a swing at me with a nine-iron, or worse, with his biggest Bertha. Where is the biffo? Where is the glad­i­a­to­r­ial con­test? Where is Happy Gilmore?

Actu­ally, I did try my hand at the game a while back. When I was ten I think. My dad took the fam­ily to the dri­ving range and let us loose with our full sized clubs. I remem­ber myself lying on the ground bleed­ing because I had stood behind my sis­ter while she took a back swing. I ate the seven iron, and it was very painful.

Last year I brought dan­ger to the dri­ving range again. When hit­ting my 249th ball (or so), the five-iron flew out of my hands, hit the ceil­ing, richo­cheted back to the floor, bounced to the front and landed on the drain cov­ers. The noise was tremen­dous, as was the ensu­ing silence from the rest of the golf-ball hit­ters at the range. The guy in the next lane was still in a crouch­ing posi­tion when I retrieved the club and apol­o­gized meekly to any­one who appeared to be star­ing in my direc­tion, and there were many.

I think I still like going to the dri­ving range. They haven’t banned me yet. And the dri­ving range I like going to is a pub­lic one, not one of the stuffy coun­try clubs where they force you to wear de rigeuer golf out­fits (col­lared shirts and proper shoes). You can go there in a sin­glet and no one bats an eye­lid until you let your club fly into the ceiling.

So, there is a pretty lit­tle place called Green Fair­ways. And to get there, you drive down that leafy avenue called Eng Neo Avenue (yes, I like green leafy avenues), head­ing north­ward till you reach a gate that has a sign that says Green Fair­ways golf dri­ving range or some­thing. As you drive down the wind­ing road, you’ll see some pretty green­ery. You will see a yel­low sign­board that warns you about ‘Dead Slow Horses Cross­ing’. Spooky, but not as incon­ve­nient as on Cluny Road, where there is a sign telling you about ‘Slow Chil­dren Play­ing’ out­side a kindergarten.

Any­way, once you’re past the dan­ger of the Dead Slow Horses and their horse­men, you’ll come to a carpark and you’ll see the dri­ving range. If you’re up for it, take out your clubs and find a lane, turn on the fan and go buy your bas­ket of balls. If not, there’s a cof­fee shop that sells decent kopi and nasi lemak.

It is quite a pretty place to be at, once you’ve paused for a breather at say, your 248th ball (because at your 249th, your grip might weaken and you might fling the club to the ceil­ing). There is also a proper 9-hole golf course adja­cent to the range, if you’re so inclined. But for mine, the water haz­ard in front of the tee off on the first is enough to dis­cour­age me and make me stick to the range. I just like hit­ting the damned balls that aren’t mov­ing, and I don’t really care where they go except if the lit­tle caged buggy comes by to pick up the balls. I like aim­ing for the mov­ing buggy. Now, that’s sport.

Fair­ways Drive (off Eng Neo Avenue)
Sin­ga­pore 289631
Tel: (65) 468 7233
Fax: (65) 468 7047
Course: 9 holes, 1887m, Par 32