Soccer in China

So we're leaving for Suzhou in just under 8 hours and I'm hardly packed, but of course I'm putting that off till the last minute..! It's our first week trip away from Nantong where we'll visit Suzhou, Wuzhen, Hangzhou, Xitang, and Shanghai. I'm pretty stoked for the 4-star hotels, sight seeing, and of course the SHOPPING

Anyways, I know I haven't mentioned much about what I do outside of class here on the weekdays, and really it isn't much besides hanging out with the other students I'm here on the trip with, our China buddies, and occasionally playing soccer, visiting North Street right outside campus, maybe going downtown for dinner/sight seeing, and of course spending time online and talking to friends and family with the most brilliant software program ever called Skype. Of course I have stories for just about all of these events but probably the best story that sums up just how most of this trip has gone happened Friday afternoon. A bunch of the WSU students were in charge of planning this big party/talent show sort of event and when Friday finally arrived lots of people were either practicing what they were doing for the show, or helping out in some way. So when someone announced that there was a soccer game at 3pm in class, no one really felt like playing because we all had stuff to do. Well, by the end of class our professor who's in charge of the whole program told us that the soccer game was mandatory for everyone to attend either to support or play because it was us against a group of Chinese students and that there would be a local news station there (notice this is EXACTLY what he said).

So shortly after 3pm I made it to the field, not dressed up to play because I had played two days before and then worked out just the day before so I was a little sore and needed a break.. But when we got to the normal fields, we found out that the game was actually on the huge stadium field. A little surprised, we head over there to find that we are actually playing the school's soccer team, there's a decent crowd there to watch, and the news station isn't local, it's for the entire freaking province! On top of that, we had just enough people willing to play and some of them were hurt but attempting to play anyways, so our chances weren't looking too good. As the game started up I really began wanting to play, but I was wearing jean capris and flip flops, and the dormitory was on the other side of campus so the walk alone would take up most of the game. So what did my professor do? He made one of the China students lend me their bike (which was the most rusted sad hunk of metal I had ever seen in my life with the weirdest seat that was so low I looked ridiculous) and told me to go change. After getting used to riding a bike for the first time in years and avoiding the pointing and laughing by all the Chinese students I passed (I'm still not sure if it was because my bike was so ridiculous or because I was so wobbly and unbalanced!) I finally made it back to the game in the only clean stuff I could find that was suitable to play soccer in. The only pair of tennis shoes I brought were these checkered slip-on Vans and I never intended to play soccer in them but none the less they would work. But as I tried to head out onto the field my professor stopped me and said "You can't play in those shoes, they aren't right! Here let’s trade shoes". Now my professor is a 5'7 small Chinese man that definitely had smaller feet than me but he refused to believe that and continued to take off his shoes. After getting over the slight awkwardness of the situation and him telling me that I indeed did have giant feet, I ran out on the field to play.

The game went well other then the fact that most of our team realized they were horribly out of shape and some even got a little banged up. I unintentionally tripped a guy so bad that my left shin bruised deeper then anything I've ever experienced before... and with my turf burn right above it from a previous game I played in I definitely looked like I had been beat up or something. All in all it was a fun 90 minute game (yea we also didn't know it was going to be THAT LONG) and we lost only 5 to 4.

Funtimes... gotta love being told something totally different than what actually ends up happening! But like my dad mentioned to me earlier today, that's just a typical guy for ya :) Haha- Anyways it is LATE here and now I have even less time till I need to be packed and leaving and I would like to get a few hours of sleep.. Night!