My father always says the bamboo bends but does not break, but I see our basketball boys bending too much in the state camps—learning fancy dribbles from YouTube but forgetting how to set a simple pick like our elders taught us at the village court. Last week at Kohima market, I heard the federation talk about hiring some foreign coach, but I wonder if they will first fix the court at Indira Stadium where the net is torn like my old fishing net after a storm. The early king chili harvest teaches me one thing: you cannot skip the weeding just because the sun is hot, and we cannot skip building from our own ground just because a glossy brochure looks nice.

The way they keep changing the state camp selection rules every year, it reminds me of when the city grocer tried to tell us to pick king chilis early because the market wanted them green. We lost half the batch to rot before they even reached the truck. Maybe let the teams prove themselves in the court first, like we let the chili ripen on the vine—then we know which ones are worth selling.