After a rather intense game, I was sitting on the sidelines watching my friend Rohit play: he hit a spectacular drop shot that brought a smile to my face. As I looked down (hand reaching up to sort my now rather longish hair), my smile froze on my face as I discovered that my shoes are smiling back at me.

They are a pair of Prince NFS Indoor squash shoes. I bought them at the EMS on Commonwealth Ave, a between BU and Super 88. It was just around 70 dollars (before tax) if I remember correctly. I was staying at ET for the summer while my siblings are in Taiwan, and S decided to take on squash playing in the off-season at the suggestion of Jarek. The shoes served me well as we semi-regularly played at Zesiger.

As the semestre starts, I found out, coincidentally, that two of my roommates, Aleks and Mihai, were also big fans of the sport. So I played with them here and there. As it turns out, squash shoes and badminton shoes are fairly similar in their support and protection, with the small difference that badminton shoes tend to be a bit lighter, so the pair also became my badminton shoes.

Well, the crack on the shoes were quite different from what I've seen before on other pairs of shoes (especially on running shoes). When my other shoes opened up, they tend to do so in front; on both feet, this pair of shoes cracked on the inside edge along the ball of my feet. And unlike running shoes where it tends to be a tear in the fabric, it seems that on this pair of shoes the outsole separated from the insole: I can't see my own foot through the crack, but I could see the rubbery material they put in the sole for support.

So the pair of shoes is pretty much done for. And I am out a pair of badminton shoes.

I was kind of worried what I should do about purchasing shoes: there aren't any racquet clubs around, nor are there any atheletic stores specializing in racquet sports in the immediate vicinity. I know that foot locker doesn't carry badminton/squash shoes (at least not the one on Nassau street). So of course, like any other Gen Yer would, I turned to the In-tar-web. (Just for reference sake: the closest specialty store that I know that definitely carries badminton equipment is a tennis/squash/badminton shop in lower Manhattan.)

I was worried about ordering from random places. Also, the majority of online stores specializing in racquet sports seems to be located in Europe (prices listed in Pounds or Euros notwithstanding, I don't think they do shipping across the Atlantic). And I was also looking for attractive prices (or, at the very least, I don't want to be over-charged).

So after mostly failure in locating online stores (I did find two), I suddenly had an inspiration. Fact: I bought my portable music player (a JetAudio iAudio M3) on Amazon. Fact: lost of badminton shoes seems to be on sale at eBay. So, I thought, perhaps there are some atheletic stores with no formal internet presence that, nevertheless, sells equipment online through "retail fronts" offered by Amazon and the like. So I searched. And was glad to find Asby Sports selling items on Amazon.

Now, some people might object to purchasing shoes online, seeing as to how one can't really try on the shoes and make sure it fits. Well, several of my friends have purchased general-purpose shoes online knowing only their size and the reports have been overwhelmingly positive. Furthermore, the shoes I was looking for, I had already tried them earlier this summer, when I played at the NJ Open. A vendor was there and he sold exclusively Yonex gear. That is where i got my ArmorTec 500 racquet (to replace the Kawasaki 8900F that I broke). I also tried one some shoes (that's how I came to the conclusion that badminton shoes are lighter).

I was really tempted by the Yonex SHB-99 limited edition: quite a few players wore it at NJ Open. But considering that it felt mostly the same on my foot when compared to the SHB-90 series, and that the 90 series is about 10 dollars cheaper, I went with the latter. (And, it turns out, not only was Asby selling the shoes cheaper compared to other places, its shipping rates is also lower [how I do not know].)

So, in the end, I would get a new pair of shoes in a few days.