India, June 15 -- Manika Batra was four years old when she first played table tennis-there was no turning back after that. Her world quickly expanded from the by-lanes of Delhi, where she grew up, to travelling across cities in pursuit of her dream. "I was around 10 or 11 years old when I started travelling for tournaments. In my early days, this meant long overnight train journeys with my mom, who would carry the entire kitchen to feed me," Batra laughs, "I was just a kid with a racket and a big appetite." From homemade parathas and paneer rolls to poha, and sweet treats like pinni (a traditional North Indian sweet made with ghee, wheat flour, jaggery, and almonds)-her mum would pack it all. "You know what the best part was?" she tells m...