Special request regarding Carom

Hi all, Well the wikipedia link explains all http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrom Now take u'r pick India, China, Yemen, Ethopia & North Africa. I used to be good at this game. Something in the family. Actually my Mamaji was a state champion & as folklores go, on his wedding night there was a friendly contest between my Mama & one of the greats in Carrom & Mama got the break. Till the 48 points, the guest didn't even get a chance to hold the striker. I do remember couple of games where these kind of things happened but far & few between. If u become addicted the striker becomes a part of u. You get sore thumbs like how fingers get while playing any musical instrument or typing. It takes more than couple of games to get settled with a board & sometimes the nail biting finish is like nail biting finish of a Cricket World Cup or Football World Cup. In fact I just remembered some beautiful memories from Bhagsu. There used to be a hotel about halfway from my place towards the Bhagsu temple on the left while going down or right while going up. This guy used to be open till very late night & serve coffee as well as sometimes food & we use to play carrom late at night. Sometimes there used to be these beautiful girls or women who had just come & didn't know where to stay & we used to pass the time. One of my best holidays in Bhagsu & Carrom

I am resurrecting this thread because I wanted to ask where in Europe one can buy a full-sized carrom board and the powder that goes with it. All that is on offer here is the small-sized one. That used to be the Kindergarten size.

a quick google search had

http://www.carromcentre.co.uk/

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&k...l_8fxbaioi55_b

http://www.upfrontcricketacademy.com...FQGY2AodEmf-ag

http://www.twenga.co.uk/dir-Toys-Gam...y,Carrom-Board

These are just the first 4 of 14,000 result that were returned and I think they all ship to Europe. Maybe Google or any other search engine in your home country will give you local shops.

I know it's not a personal recommendation but indivisuals but reading the reviews left on these sites give a kind of an indication as to if they are any good or not.

Hope that helps.

Thanks Beena450!

Boric powder- or talcum powder- is good.

What is a full-sized carom board? As far as I know the size is not standardized in India. South India seems to know of only the smaller (29" square?) boards (with circular pockets), whereas in West Bengal that is the kid's size. Teenagers and above play on much larger boards (I think 48" square) with pockets shaped like a quarter circle.

No problem Golghar, any excuse to google.

Captain, I was told or maybe read that talc is not so good for the board, can not remember the specific reason but I know that it degrades the colour to some effect. Maybe I should google

but I do know that nothing beats the proper powder, the discs just glide like water of off a baby's bottom. smoooooooth.

I play mine with talcum powder. It's not great maybe, but it does the job (in fact I picked it up in India -- the habit of using talcum powder, and the game. Well, have largely unlearnt how to play it, but, that's a different story. Lack of practice, is all.)

Regarding where to get a board in Europe, I suppose (specialized) sports and games/toys stores is where I'd look. They must be around. You might need to look for such in the main cosmopolitan cities, no doubt. (Stores importing oriental goods and the usual hippie trinkets and stuff might be another good bet. "Third world" support stores, maybe. Your Pakistani or similar grocery, who knows.) I guess "Europe" as such would be a little broad of a definition. In Amsterdam, I'd be surprised if with some searching you wouldn't find them. Berlin, maybe. London, probably (and possibly many more British centers). Zürich or so (Bern? Basel? I thought Golghar is in Switzerland), maybe? Etc.