THE WILD LIFE
Shuttlecocked Without Mercy:Badminton Punk

by TED KATAUSKAS
243-2122

Ah, spring. I open a window for the first time since October and consider the sounds of the urban outdoors. Starlings twittering in a bud-crusted cherry tree. Subwoofers thudding like distant artillery. The hollow bounce of a basketball. The shriek of the Dayglo Abortions.

The mohawks have emerged from their nest on Northeast 7th Avenue. Peculiar species, these badminton-playing punks, with their bristling plumage, their leather and stainless-steel-studded coats, their combat boots stomping the hell out of naked clay where there once was a lawn. One after the other, each player--diminutive racket in one hand, cylinder of Pabst in the other--takes an overhand swipe at a shuttlecock and bellows "Yeah!" A rubber-nosed plastic mesh funnel flutters over an insubstantial net, capricious as a leaf in the wind.

What the hell?

I walk around the corner, down a driveway past a van sprayed with graffiti (DESTROY...RIOT PUNX...I'VE BEEN SHUTTLECOCKED), and stand on their turf. What's left of it, anyway. The doubles match abruptly stops and a yellow-haired punk wearing fatigues tosses his racket to a beer-swilling bystander and introduces himself as Ricky. After I explain who I am and what I want, Ricky tells me that he bought the badminton set for a barbecue three years ago. The game quickly spread to other punk houses in the neighborhood, which now harbors four makeshift courts and an informal circuit.

Right now, a sizable subset of Portland's punk rock population is practicing for a summertime championship (played with a $30 shuttlecock, with real feathers) where each game costs two bucks and the winner stumbles home with a wad of cash. Picture it: Punks on the roof; punks in the trees;
a bi-hawked ref on a ladder at mid-court, enforcing the rules of international play with a broadsword. They call it "badkitten."

Broadsword aside, I wonder if the sport isn't a bit, um, wussy for this crew. Ricky allows that some shitheads laugh when he says he plays a lot of badminton, but they're always the ones who end up coveting $100 composite rackets. "This isn't most people's idea of the mighty outdoors, but it's one of my favorite things to do," he says. Next to swilling Pabst. "If I go to a bar, they better fuckin' have Pabst," he adds.

Beer break.

The doubles teams dive for a fragmented six pack, Ricky grabs his racket. As we volley the shuttlecock, I remember something I once read: "Punks only stay punks for a brief part of their lives before settling down to become pleasant lawn-mowing Christians." Of course, if the Riot Punx ever settle down, they won't have a lawn to mow. They'll already have stomped it to hell.