Although badminton was very much a European game in the very early years, it was only in the 1930s that Asians started to play the game seriously. It was in the 1930s that badminton became very popular in Penang. Players from Penang then started to play in competitions in Medan, Indonesia, and Malaysia which included Singapore. Even upto the 1960s the top badminton players in Malaysia came mostly from Penang. From Medan, the game spread to other parts of Indonesia. From Indonesia some promising Indonesian players of Chinese descent, "the Thing", etc. fled to China in the mid 1950s. These "Indonesian" runaways of course became the pioneers of Chinese badminton. You can find more interesting material at www.coombs.anu.edu.au/SpecialProj./ASAA/biennial-conference/2004/Brown-C-ASAA2004.pdf
