Our last full day on the island was a rather interesting one, as I'll try to illustrate below...
6:45--One of our players leaves for home, having had a grandparent pass away earlier in the week. Her travel debacle will be detailed in the next blog.
9:15--Supposed to leave for a practice at a different gym than the one we played our games at. However, we had 6 different players late for the taxi.
9:50--Arrive at the BCB Middle School on St. Thomas, where we were to practice from 10:00-noon. Walk into a rubber-floor 80-foot floor gym with 4 hoops and approximately 392 kids running around.
Luckily, the PE "teacher", Avery, ended up being one of the best people I met on the island. Avery says that the tournament director never called him to confirm the practice time. And, needless to say, the Island Times people failed to tell us that the gym would be the worst gym that we would ever walk into. However, Avery is gracious enough to clear the gym of most of the kids and let us practice, which, due to the poor floor, consisted essentially of running and more running.
The "best" kids were allowed to stay and watch us practice. It was a rather eye-opening talk with some of them afterward. The kids were absolutely mesmerized by pre-wrap. Many of them had never seen anyone get their ankle taped. The boys' favorite player on our team was our only left-handed player....apparently being left-handed is considered to be lucky in the Virgin Islands.
Our practice was cut short by roughly 45 minutes for a reason that every US team has to deal with--a steel-drum band began setting up for a school assembly.
12:15--Get back to resort to eat lunch, which was KFC. It was honestly one of the 2 best meals I ate all week long on the island. For some reason, the St Thomas KFC has french fries for a side item, and the gravy comes in styrofoam shot glasses.
1:50--Leave for a shopping excursion to St John, another one of the Virgin Islands. We had to take a ferry across the gulf to get to the island.
4:15--Leave island early. Very bored. St John was a very small, extremely expensive island.
5:00--Find out that some of the other kids not very bored, as five of them got temporarily lost in the woods of the National Park on the island en route to the beach.
7:00--Kristen and I had a nice, relaxing dinner in the upscale restaurant on the resort. This was the best meal I had all week.
8:45--For dessert, one of our players comes to our room complaining of foot pain. Turns out she stepped on what we believed was a sea urchin. She went directly to an Urgent Care facility when we got back from our trip from Hell the next day and found out that she had a rock and some glass in the cut.
Our head coach rooted around inside of her heel with various objects to try to get the rock out, including a nail file, a small metal implement designed to do Lord knows what, and a fingernail clipper.
We sent her away in tremendous pain after an hour of digging away inside her heel.
10:40--Ended the night by going to the pool and watching a lot of white people dance awkwardly.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Sawing a travel log
In reverse fashion, I'll attempt to somehow bring to life through the magic of words our trip we took to teh Virgin Islands with our team...specifically, we played two games on the island of St Thomas while staying in the Wyndham Resort and Spa on the island. I'm going to start with the last day because it seemed like it lasted about 3 days.
7:30--Awoke to head to the downtown shopping market.
8:00--Took the island "taxi", which is basically the Silver Lake sand dune open-air 15-passenger truck, to a shopping market. My personal highlight was haggling with the local merchants over pricing, including nearly getting a purse thrown at me. Didn't purchase anything, but enjoyed being asked roughly 3,000 times if I wanted my hair braided.
10:00--Returned to hotel room to finish packing for the trip, only to find one of our players still suffering from a heel injury after stepping on a sea urchin. I'm not making that sentence up.
11:00--Soaked in some last-minute rays at the pool.
11:12--Put my shirt back on, much to the relief of the people at the pool.
1:00--Left for the airport. This should have been a 20-minute drive.
1:15--Roughly 5 minutes away from the airport, saw a major accident on the only main road on the island from our hotel to the airport. At this point, we actually went back toward the hotel and began a circle tour of the island.
We had a great driver who knew we couldn't be late for our flight, so he began a drive that I can only describe as harrowing, treacherous, and panic-inducing. I was (un)lucky enough to sit in the front seat at a window. This means that I basically always had a body part hanging outside the vehicle as we took one hairpin turn after another while traversing some seriously steep hills.
2:18--Arrived in one piece at the airport to find our bags, which were taken by a separate van, laying on the curb awaiting our arrival, which was one of about four thousand issues we would have with the people responsible with running this tournament.
2:25--Began the incredibly ardous process of going through security for our flight, which was to leave the island at 3:50.
2:26--Found out that our flight was going to leave early (3:35). Began shoving toddlers in order to get further ahead in line.
3:20--After purchasing the single worst hot dog I have ever eaten in my life, was shouted down by a flight attendant who claimed that we needed to hurry up and get on the plane even though one of our players was still in TSA custody. Turns out that person was a 55-year old woman.
3:36--Got on plane to find out that we were leaving early because we had to fly to Puerto Rico. Was not told by ANYONE involved with United Airlines (Comic Book Guy voice--WORST AIRLINE EVER) that we were going to Puerto Rico.
3:55--Upon arrival in Puerto Rico, one of our players asked if Puerto Rico was a part of Mexico. Immediately consider a career change.
3:59--Ask a different player what they know about Puerto Rico. They think it's another part of the Virgin Islands.
4:01--Place a call to the education department at MSJ.
4:43--Leave PR for Dulles Intl Airport in DC.
8:05--Arrive ahead of schedule in DC to see that our flight to Indy is scheduled to leave on time at 9:45
8:20--Find out flight is delayed 35 minutes. The gate attendant, who didn't exactly use the English language as much as he abused it, stated, "The flight is delayed because fog is around the air at the Indy airport."
8:23--Eat as many Auntie Anne's pretzel bites as it takes to forget about it. Final total--34 bites, 4 packets of sweet mustard sauce.
9:58--Board plane. Our tickets won't scan. Gate attendant asks, "Where place did you go from with these tickets?"
10:09--In what I can only describe as the single scariest moment of my life, the plane's power completely goes out as stewardess (excuse me, PERSON, begins safety talk). That's right---the plane's power completely went out. Person's response? "This happens all the time."
10:10--Try to figure out another profession which can re-name itself whenever it wants to. Cannot come up with one, but resolve to call garbagemen "individuals" from now on.
10:19--Find out that the smaller planes at Dulles work off of "secondary power" while boarding and if engines aren't fully fired before exiting the power grid, the plane fully blacks out.
10:20--Attempt to black myself out by hanging myself with my earphones.
10:32--Plane loses power twice more. Small angina attack suffered by multiple people on board.
10:47--Still awaiting takeoff, the pilot states that the onboard steering computer hasn't fully come back to "operational status"; thus, we are returning to the hangar.
10:59--Stumble back into the United terminal with a surly lot of travelers.
11:30--Re-assess meaning of life.
11:50--Reboard plane.
12:17--Pilot comes on and states "once we get up in the air, I will fly it like I stole it."
12:19--Absolutely no joke; someone asks the PERSON if the pilot has flown before.
2:20--Arrive in Indy and pick up luggage; get on charter bus with a driver who steadfastly refuses to A) drive without swerving for no reason, and B) will not drive faster than 66 MPH at any time.
4:45--Get to MSJ. Hold the shortest and quietest team meeting in program history.
5:35--Go to sleep.
7:30--Awoke to head to the downtown shopping market.
8:00--Took the island "taxi", which is basically the Silver Lake sand dune open-air 15-passenger truck, to a shopping market. My personal highlight was haggling with the local merchants over pricing, including nearly getting a purse thrown at me. Didn't purchase anything, but enjoyed being asked roughly 3,000 times if I wanted my hair braided.
10:00--Returned to hotel room to finish packing for the trip, only to find one of our players still suffering from a heel injury after stepping on a sea urchin. I'm not making that sentence up.
11:00--Soaked in some last-minute rays at the pool.
11:12--Put my shirt back on, much to the relief of the people at the pool.
1:00--Left for the airport. This should have been a 20-minute drive.
1:15--Roughly 5 minutes away from the airport, saw a major accident on the only main road on the island from our hotel to the airport. At this point, we actually went back toward the hotel and began a circle tour of the island.
We had a great driver who knew we couldn't be late for our flight, so he began a drive that I can only describe as harrowing, treacherous, and panic-inducing. I was (un)lucky enough to sit in the front seat at a window. This means that I basically always had a body part hanging outside the vehicle as we took one hairpin turn after another while traversing some seriously steep hills.
2:18--Arrived in one piece at the airport to find our bags, which were taken by a separate van, laying on the curb awaiting our arrival, which was one of about four thousand issues we would have with the people responsible with running this tournament.
2:25--Began the incredibly ardous process of going through security for our flight, which was to leave the island at 3:50.
2:26--Found out that our flight was going to leave early (3:35). Began shoving toddlers in order to get further ahead in line.
3:20--After purchasing the single worst hot dog I have ever eaten in my life, was shouted down by a flight attendant who claimed that we needed to hurry up and get on the plane even though one of our players was still in TSA custody. Turns out that person was a 55-year old woman.
3:36--Got on plane to find out that we were leaving early because we had to fly to Puerto Rico. Was not told by ANYONE involved with United Airlines (Comic Book Guy voice--WORST AIRLINE EVER) that we were going to Puerto Rico.
3:55--Upon arrival in Puerto Rico, one of our players asked if Puerto Rico was a part of Mexico. Immediately consider a career change.
3:59--Ask a different player what they know about Puerto Rico. They think it's another part of the Virgin Islands.
4:01--Place a call to the education department at MSJ.
4:43--Leave PR for Dulles Intl Airport in DC.
8:05--Arrive ahead of schedule in DC to see that our flight to Indy is scheduled to leave on time at 9:45
8:20--Find out flight is delayed 35 minutes. The gate attendant, who didn't exactly use the English language as much as he abused it, stated, "The flight is delayed because fog is around the air at the Indy airport."
8:23--Eat as many Auntie Anne's pretzel bites as it takes to forget about it. Final total--34 bites, 4 packets of sweet mustard sauce.
9:58--Board plane. Our tickets won't scan. Gate attendant asks, "Where place did you go from with these tickets?"
10:09--In what I can only describe as the single scariest moment of my life, the plane's power completely goes out as stewardess (excuse me, PERSON, begins safety talk). That's right---the plane's power completely went out. Person's response? "This happens all the time."
10:10--Try to figure out another profession which can re-name itself whenever it wants to. Cannot come up with one, but resolve to call garbagemen "individuals" from now on.
10:19--Find out that the smaller planes at Dulles work off of "secondary power" while boarding and if engines aren't fully fired before exiting the power grid, the plane fully blacks out.
10:20--Attempt to black myself out by hanging myself with my earphones.
10:32--Plane loses power twice more. Small angina attack suffered by multiple people on board.
10:47--Still awaiting takeoff, the pilot states that the onboard steering computer hasn't fully come back to "operational status"; thus, we are returning to the hangar.
10:59--Stumble back into the United terminal with a surly lot of travelers.
11:30--Re-assess meaning of life.
11:50--Reboard plane.
12:17--Pilot comes on and states "once we get up in the air, I will fly it like I stole it."
12:19--Absolutely no joke; someone asks the PERSON if the pilot has flown before.
2:20--Arrive in Indy and pick up luggage; get on charter bus with a driver who steadfastly refuses to A) drive without swerving for no reason, and B) will not drive faster than 66 MPH at any time.
4:45--Get to MSJ. Hold the shortest and quietest team meeting in program history.
5:35--Go to sleep.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
