Sunday, November 02, 2003
It's been a couple of days and here's what I learned. First of all the guys I play basketball with are pretty darn good and they play euro ball, organized defense with good passing skills and movement without the ball. There are some distinct differences between the Finnish game and the American game, namely fouls. Everyone is so honest about who fouled who and there is never any arguement. Nor is there any tough guy act, by not calling fouls. These guys would all be killed in a street game if they called the silly fouls that they call, but since it's on everyone and there is no exception, it works.
Another interesting point of the game is the fact that these guys don't really speak English. Of course they can speak English, but they don't, except for on occassion, but certainly not when the game is going full speed. And since 5 on 5 requires a lot of communication to play effectively, I am not the most effective person on the court.
First of all I don't know when a foul has been called, because they say something in Finnish, which varies all the time and so I just keep on playing until I realize that I'm a fool and that they are all watching me. Second, I have no idea what the score is, even though I know the numbers pretty well. It takes me too long to figure out what the hell they just said that I wouldn't be able to concentrate on the game. So I just play, which in the grand scheme of things isn't that bad.
I've played with the guys twice since Thursday and I was hoping that I would improve after shaking the rust of a few years from my sneakers, but that was not the case. I stunk it up pretty bad, missing more wide open shots than I care to admit, plus my fair share of layups. But the good news is that I didn't have gas today. It may be because I ate smarter today before the game. I had Chinese beforehand on Thursday and that left me a with an unexpected obstacle, and a bit of a turbo boost at times that I was really wanting. And you can't blame gas can you? Today I had blisters on my feet but I toughed it out, I'm the only American and I guess you could say I did it for my country. Can't have these guys thinking that I'm just some pussy American. Hopefully soon I'll write about a good game of basketball, just like the good game of badmitton I had.
It took a couple of losses in a row before the old techniques started coming back and I won the last two sets we played. I think this will be a regular thing and hopefully I can join some sort of competitive league. Not that I'm so good, but playhing the same guy over and over and over again can become a chore and not fun.
Sorry for nothing but sports updates here, but I've been doing pretty much nothing but lately. And now that we have the internet I spent the weekend reading up on the Texas rout of Nebraska. I sure would like to have seen that, but I get a show where a random panel of four famous Finns watch music videos and then grade them. Fair trade off, no?
We're just about living in our house they way we would like. We're washing all the dishes, by hand (my kingdom for a dishwasher) and the laundry needs to dry either in the sauna or wherever the hell it fits, which isn't easy with a king sized duvat cover. But boy does that fabric softner smell good and loads better than the mothballs that it was packed in.
The weather has been ok. It's in the 40's and cloudy, which blows because when I heard about the solar bursts coming our way I thought for sure I would see some Northern lights, but NO we had clouds instead. Another fair trade off.
So that's that. I called the folks today and it was nice to hear their voices and the little guy's voice to. That Samuel, mmm. Too bad that the calls can't be longer. Soon enough though.
Lots of love everyone,
hb
Another interesting point of the game is the fact that these guys don't really speak English. Of course they can speak English, but they don't, except for on occassion, but certainly not when the game is going full speed. And since 5 on 5 requires a lot of communication to play effectively, I am not the most effective person on the court.
First of all I don't know when a foul has been called, because they say something in Finnish, which varies all the time and so I just keep on playing until I realize that I'm a fool and that they are all watching me. Second, I have no idea what the score is, even though I know the numbers pretty well. It takes me too long to figure out what the hell they just said that I wouldn't be able to concentrate on the game. So I just play, which in the grand scheme of things isn't that bad.
I've played with the guys twice since Thursday and I was hoping that I would improve after shaking the rust of a few years from my sneakers, but that was not the case. I stunk it up pretty bad, missing more wide open shots than I care to admit, plus my fair share of layups. But the good news is that I didn't have gas today. It may be because I ate smarter today before the game. I had Chinese beforehand on Thursday and that left me a with an unexpected obstacle, and a bit of a turbo boost at times that I was really wanting. And you can't blame gas can you? Today I had blisters on my feet but I toughed it out, I'm the only American and I guess you could say I did it for my country. Can't have these guys thinking that I'm just some pussy American. Hopefully soon I'll write about a good game of basketball, just like the good game of badmitton I had.
It took a couple of losses in a row before the old techniques started coming back and I won the last two sets we played. I think this will be a regular thing and hopefully I can join some sort of competitive league. Not that I'm so good, but playhing the same guy over and over and over again can become a chore and not fun.
Sorry for nothing but sports updates here, but I've been doing pretty much nothing but lately. And now that we have the internet I spent the weekend reading up on the Texas rout of Nebraska. I sure would like to have seen that, but I get a show where a random panel of four famous Finns watch music videos and then grade them. Fair trade off, no?
We're just about living in our house they way we would like. We're washing all the dishes, by hand (my kingdom for a dishwasher) and the laundry needs to dry either in the sauna or wherever the hell it fits, which isn't easy with a king sized duvat cover. But boy does that fabric softner smell good and loads better than the mothballs that it was packed in.
The weather has been ok. It's in the 40's and cloudy, which blows because when I heard about the solar bursts coming our way I thought for sure I would see some Northern lights, but NO we had clouds instead. Another fair trade off.
So that's that. I called the folks today and it was nice to hear their voices and the little guy's voice to. That Samuel, mmm. Too bad that the calls can't be longer. Soon enough though.
Lots of love everyone,
hb
// posted by Howard @ 11:15 PM 
