NOTE: Sorry for the late posting, but we've been having some internet problems.
I guess I’m going for a bit of a sports theme this week. Not by intended purposes, but just what happens to be on my mind.
Over the holiday I participated in a basketball tournament. It was arranged by the school for students and teachers to give them some kind of entertainment while classes were out of session. The guy who lives across the hall from us is a pretty serious basketball player, and so he pulled together a team of the best foreign teachers (that would be us) and students he could find. I’m still getting used to the fact that everyone here assumes I must be a good basketball player because I’m an American. It’s a new feeling for me.
We easily won our first three games, usually with about a 20 point margin. The team we were supposed to play in the semifinals actually forfeited out of fear; apparently they had watched us play earlier in the day and decided it would be better just to not try at all.
The championship game was this evening, and it was much more exciting than I had anticipated. We were winning easily at halftime when our captain (a Chinese student) left an impromptu conference with the referees and said with a worried look on his face, “Play soft.” Confused as to what that phrase meant, I quickly understood the meaning once the second half began. To put it nicely, the referees gave the other team every opportunity to defeat us, but we pulled it out in the end to win.
The team was pretty excited after the game. It was a fun celebration. Hundreds of students turned out to watch the final, and they joyously joined in our victory whether they knew us or not. I haven’t been able to be a part of an organized team for a few years, and I learned a lot about these students and teachers just by playing with them. It was a great time and a great experience. Definitely one of the highlights of our time here. Below is a picture of everyone, post victory: 
So apparently Detroit has one heck of a baseball team now. Funny, that never seemed to happen when I was there. I wonder if that’s why I never really got into baseball as much as other sports. It can make it hard when the place where I lived the first half of my childhood has no team (Colorado), and the other place has the Tigers.
I think my deepest feeling of homesickness came as I watched the playoff games over Internet TV. It’s hard seeing your hometown enjoy such a great celebration when you can’t be a part of it. There are a lot of things that are wrong with Detroit, but that city definitely knows how to rally around a sports team. Some of my fondest memories of living there center on the Pistons and Red Wing championships. Watching them from the other side of the world makes the disconnection seem so much more real. I can just imagine the flags in car windows, the T-Shirt stands in front of gas stations, the constant news coverage, even the mustached Polish guys discussing the next game with their nasal accent. There’s just a certain relationship between a city and a team that’s special to Detroit. And I’m surprised how much I miss that. So if you get the chance to go to a game in the next few weeks, raise a cheer for me. |
Hey guys, congrats on the victory! Looks like you're having a blast. Hope that classes are going well. To be quite honest I wish you were teaching my english class this semester. It's just a little overboard with "themes" and touchy feely emotional observations in field research. You'd think we would be writting about some humanitarian crisis... my last project (which our group spent the last 6 weeks working on) was Starbucks. It's touching, I know, but please choke back the tears. But classes are ok as always. Mascot stuff is taking up a lot of my time but it's fun. I did an appearance on tuesday for a friend who's a 5th grade teacher at a local elementary and it was a blast. The kids are definitely the most fun part about it. We have Big Blue Madness tomorrow night (first official mens bb practice) and that is going to be a ton of fun.
In other big news I am now in a relationship with Britney Maddox, a junior here at UK and is a speach pathology major (smart!). her home town is Louisville. She is very pretty and very sweet. She goes to southland and csf (met her at csf at the beginning of the year) she has worked at an afterschool program at LCA so we have taken care of a lot of the same kids. She's a L ville fan if they are playing UK but still cheers for UK otherwise (doesn't make a lost of sense round these parts but im learning to deal with it). Given the fact that she's an L ville fan makes it even more funny when you consider that she's dating the UK mascot. She works at one the on campus starbucks here and is trying to convert me to coffee...not happening. We both love tea so it's a good compromise. She used to be a cheerleader...so yes I expect the jokes to start coming. Um what else, oh she likes to cook and she is making me dinner tonight before csf. I'm really excited. ANy way, that's what's new in my life and I'm pretty excited about it all. Hope you guys are doing well and i have really enjoyed looking at your blogs lately. Oh and csf just got a new imac desktop which has a camera so I may be able to set up skype and start chatting with you guys. If you could tell me where to go and how to set it up that would be fantastic. Thanks, I love you guys and I'll holla at you later.
Peace, scratch