Pipe dreams: Bangladesh surfers chase waves at Asian Games

COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh: The headquarters of the Bangladesh Surf Girls and Boys Club is a weather-beaten white shack but, like the seemingly endless beach on which it sits, its members' ambitions stretch far.

For Mohammad Mannan, 25, and Fatima Akhter, 16, their thoughts are fixed on the upcoming surfing competition at the Asian Games, to be held in Japan from Sep 19 to Oct 4.

The surfers from Cox's Bazar - one of the world's longest beaches that stretches for 120km along the Bay of Bengal - are hoping to carve out a place for the sport in a country obsessed with cricket and football.

"The moment I step onto the board, I forget everything else," said Akhter, who has had to overcome intense stigma in the Muslim-majority nation to succeed as a teenage girl riding her board.

"When I successfully ride a wave, I feel happy and fulfilled," she said.

"The feeling is impossible to describe."

Mannan's journey to the Asian Games - where surfing makes its debut this year - began on the same shores, selling seashell jewellery to support his family. He began skateboarding as a boy, but then turned to the waves.

"Skateboarding was a much smaller sport than surfing," he said. "I was mesmerised by surfing, because it was connected to water."

His parents urged him to give up surfing and concentrate on his studies, convinced there was no future in the sport. Mannan refused.

"I believed surfing would eventually grow," he said. "Surfing isn't a lucrative sport in Bangladesh now, but nobody can say it never will be."

Mannan has competed internationally in India and the Maldives, but opportunities are scarce.

He studies the world's best from afar, watching YouTube videos of Hawaii-born two-time world champion John John Florence to refine his technique.

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