Tuscaloosa-Roll Tide!

This is the Part-II of a two-part story. It deals with everything connected with the University of Alabama.

Time to introduce you to some Tuscaloosa slang. In fact, just two phrases would do. Bama is Alabama for short and you will find this word used variously here. Right from the Bama Theatre, a hub of community events and cultural activity in Tuscaloosa, to Bama Belle, a pedal wheel cruiser on the Black Warrior River, you’ll find Bama everywhere.

The second phrase - Roll Tide - is a bit more complex. It originated as a clarion call for the Crimson Tide - University of Alabama’s Football Team. The crazed fans would urge their team to do better by screaming ‘Roll Tide’. Today, it could mean anything from hello to goodbye and all things in between. It is used as a phrase of hope, a grunt of disgust, a chuckle of ‘how-did-you manage-to-get-into-this-mess’, an acknowledgement of ‘seeyou-for-coffee-at-4’, and more. In fact, today it bonds not just the Tuscaloosa folks, but people across Alabama.

How did Roll Tide become all pervading?

Alabama’s Crimson Tide is one of the all-time ‘Top 5’ college football teams in the US. In fact, it has won 4 national titles in the last 10 years alone, including the 2017 title! For a town with a population of 100,000, such victories are a heady mix. Their weddings get planned around the football calendar - they want their friends around when an important match has to happen. Important social events avoid any clash of dates with a football match. In short, college football is as much a part of life for a Tuscaloosa family as breakfast. It is like cricket and Bollywood for India.

Little wonder the team’s call of inspiration is today a bond that unites the people of Tuscaloosa.

So why did I talk about ‘Roll Tide’?