UPPER DARBY — Farhan Chowdhury won’t be alone when he steps on the mat for the District 1 Class 3A Section South wrestling tournament at Interboro Friday.
His older sister, Mahrin, will be there with him, in his heart, as she has been since she died on Nov. 6, 2019 from injuries suffered in an automobile accident.
“She’s my motivation at this point,” the junior 106-pounder said before a practice Thursday afternoon. “That’s the only thing in my head. It’s my sister that made me push through everything and has gotten me to the point I’m at now.”
Farhan was in the car that day. For legal reasons, Chowdhury could not go into details of the accident, which occurred on the 5900 block of Chestnut Street in Philadelphia on Nov. 5, according to several television reports.
Upper Darby wrestler Farhan Chowdhury with his coach Bob Martin. (Pete Bannan/MediaNews Group)
Marhin, 19, a student at Drexel majoring in mechanical engineering, was at the wheel and on her way back to school when the accident occurred around 11 a.m.
“It was our day off,” Chowdhury said. “We went to go get breakfast. I called her ‘D,’ and I said, ‘D, I want to drive us to breakfast,’ because I had just gotten my license. My mom went to work because it was an in-service day. We went out and enjoyed breakfast and came home.
“I wanted to take the car out and work on it because I have a hobby of working on cars and I wanted to work on that car style wise so I went with her (to Drexel) so I could take the car home. On the way there, that’s when the situation happened.”
An 18-year-old driving a Toyota Scion east on Chestnut swerved into the left lane and struck the BMW SUV Farhan and his sister were in, according to published reports. The BMW wound up wedged underneath an idle school bus.
Farhan walked away with “a few scratches.” His sister was pinned in the vehicle and had to be extracted by firefighters. She passed away the next day.
“I felt so much regret over something I had no control over,” Farhan said. “If I could have taken some of the pain then she wouldn’t be in so much pain. If I got injured, too, she might not have gotten injured as much and we both could have gotten through it, too. Then you start to think that there was nothing you could have done than be there for her at the end and that’s exactly what I did for her.”
Wrestling preseason was set to start a few weeks after the accident, but it was the last thing on Chowdhury’s mind. He was so distraught that he thought about giving up the sport completely until he had a talk with Upper Darby coach Bob Martin.
“I just asked him, ‘What would your sister want you to do,’” Martin said.
It took time, but Chowdhury decided that the best way to honor his sister was to be the best student, athlete and young man he could be.
“She wouldn’t want me to stop succeeding, and that’s become my motivation,” Chowdhury said. “I need to finish everything that she couldn’t.”
It hasn’t been easy. There are moments when the events of that day pop into his head. But with the support of his family, and the counselors at Upper Darby, Chowdhury has been able to manage his grief and push through.
“Obviously, I’m torn apart from what happened, but I can’t stop living,” Chowdhury said. “My determination was that the things she couldn’t do, I’m going to do for her. It’s a team effort, for me and her. I have a younger brother as well. He’s only six right now. I want to be there for him, so I can’t fall apart now.”
Wrestling has been therapeutic, too.
“It’s a good way to let out pent-up aggression,” he said.
It took a while for Chowdhury to get back into wrestling shape. He ballooned to 122 pounds and had to work hard to get to 106, where he was a regional qualifier last year as a sophomore. He didn’t reach 106 until the final dual meet of the season against Ridley on Feb. 5.
Chowdhury was seeded seventh at 106 for the Central League championships and worked his way to the final, where he lost to Ridley’s Rocco Hartfuss by fall. Chowdhury is 10-9 and seeded 10th in the District 1 Class 3A Section South tournament, so he has a lot of work to do if he wants to get back to regionals, where he reached the second round of consolations before bowing out last year. The top four in each section make regionals.
His goal is to get to the PIAA tournament at the Giant Center in Hershey, but not for himself.
“Any win is for her,” Chowdhury said. “Any loss is for her. I wrestle her. I get through anything because of her now.”
• • •
NOTES >> The top four wrestlers in each section advance to the PIAA Class 3A Southeast Regional next week at Souderton. All the Delco schools are in the South and West sections. Academy Park, Haverford, Interboro, Marple Newtown, Penn Wood, Radnor, Ridley, Springfield, Strath Haven and Upper Darby are in the South along with Cheltenham, Harriton, Lower Merion, Plymouth Whitemarsh, Upper Dublin and Wissahickon. Chichester, Garnet Valley, Penncrest and Sun Valley are in the West section at Oxford along with Avon Grove, Coatesville, Downingtown East and West, Kennett, Oxford, Unionville and West Chester East, Henderson and Rustin … Sun Valley’s Hunter Catka and Strath Haven’s Chase Barlow are the only returning champions from Delco. Catka (31-0) won the 220-pound title in the West section last year and is the No. 1 seed at 285. Barlow (23-4) captured the 126-pound South title last year and is seeded No. 1 at 132.
