Trinity tennis player adjusting well to big changes

Just as she often has to do during a tennis match, Tsheden Tshokey has had to do a lot of adjusting in life.

And, much like her tennis game, she has been successful.

Tshokey came to Euless from her home country of Bhutan in the spring of 2014. Since then she became one of the top players on coach Chris Yenne’s Trinity Trojans tennis team, along with one of the top students at the school.

“She has done a great job of adjusting quickly to being in the United States,” he said. “She is a role model to all of the kids, especially those who feel like a fish out of water. They see her and think, ‘If this kid can come in from another country and do what she’s doing, I can do this or that.’ ”

Tshokey’s senior tennis season came to an end recently in the District 7-6A tournament. She and doubles partner Alan Lao finished third, narrowly missing out on playing in the postseason.

She will continue her career at Aquinas College in Grand Rapids, Mich., which she chose after receiving a couple of scholarship offers, Yenne said. She’s going to major in biology.

It was school that brought her to the United States as her mother came here to study English. It was quite the transition for Tshokey, coming from the country in south Asia at the eastern end of the Himalayas that borders China to the north and India to the south.

“If you want to do something here in American you can,” she said. “There were just a lot more opportunities here for us.”

That includes her favorite sport of tennis. She began playing soccer when she was young, as do many youths in that part of the world, but her father introduced to tennis when she was 13.

“Sports, in general, for girls is not popular there,” she said. “Basketball is the most accepted for girls, and I tried playing basketball, but I like tennis much better.”

Having been taught English in school in Bhutan, language offered no adjustment challenge. The weather, however, that was another matter.

“It’s really pleasant there pretty much all the time, but coming here was an adjustment in that way,” she said with a laugh. “And now I’m going up north where there will be another adjustment.”

Tshokey is also a member of the National Honor Society and loves art. She recently took second place in an art contest.

“She’s got one of the best attitudes of anybody I’ve ever worked with,” Yenne said. “She’s positive, competitive, bright, all the things that tell you she’s going to be successful in life.”

Tshokey hasn’t ruled out someday returning to Bhutan, but she said she plans to remain in the U.S. for at least a while after finishing college.

“I think I want to work here, for a least a few years,” she said. “I kind of like it here.”

This story was originally published April 18, 2016 at 12:39 PM with the headline "Trinity tennis player adjusting well to big changes."