You haven’t heard hockey until you hear it in Punjabi

Yvonne Zacharias, Vancouver Sun

Published: Friday, November 14, 2008

Vah ji vah!

If you hear those words bellowed from the pressbox during the Canucks-Leafs hockey game Saturday night at GM Place, don’t be surprised. They mean “What a play!” Words any hockey fan can relate to.

What you will be hearing are the new sounds of an increasingly diverse Canada and of two Punjabi hockey commentators who will be calling the game from the broadcast booth for the first time. Toronto’s Parminder Singh and Calgary’s Harnarayan Singh will give a play-by-play description of the game to a community that loves hockey and wants to hear more of it in their own language.

“No one in the Punjabi community in Canada had ever expected or imagined this would happen,” said Harnarayan. “It’s great. Nothing says that Canada is a multi-cultural country more than this.”

Both Singhs strongly believe that listeners of the Punjabi version will get a much livelier rendition of the play on ice than comes from English broadcasters.

“We bring a lot more enthusiasm to the game,” said Parminder. “When you watch the game in Punjabi, whether you understand the language or not, you are just so drawn into it. It’s like a huge magnet.”

That’s because sports played in the Punjab, whether field hockey, cricket or a wrestling sport called kabaddi, ride on the shoulders of the commentators. So they have developed some colourful analogies that they can apply to hockey.

The broadcasting Singhs don’t think they will have any problem finding the words. The problem will be holding their passions in check for a game they love with the unbridled enthusiasm of school boys shooting pucks on a frozen prairie pond.

“Sometimes the excitement just takes us over,” said Parminder. “The little hockey fan in us comes right out.”

Both grew up playing road hockey rather than the on-ice version. Parminder said the equipment for the on-ice game was too expensive for his family.

Parminder, who grew up in Toronto, said his favourite player is former Leafs captain Mats Sundin, who is currently biding his time, waiting to sign on with a team.

“Unfortunately he left the Leafs and sold his house in Toronto.” And Parminder claims to be heartbroken. “If it’s okay with you, I wouldn’t like to talk about it now.”

The pair are known to the Punjabi community for providing play-by-play out of CBC headquarters from live feeds both from last year’s Stanley Cup final and from double-headers Saturday nights this season and say they have had nothing but positive feedback.

They sense they are stitching families together since more traditional moms, dads and grandparents can now sit and watch games on Saturday night with their ultra-Canadian kids. They also hope that more kids who are natives of India will be drawn to the sport, thanks to their Punjabi broadcasts. Not that there aren’t plenty already.

Ex-Canucks coach Marc Crawford told the pair he wasn’t surprised by the popularity of Punjabi broadcasts because he sees so many Indian kids playing hockey out here. (The Singhs are proud to point out that NHL player Manny Malhotra is half Punjabi.)