RANDOM Run-In!!

Population of Germany = 80 million
Population of Kodiak, Alaska = 10,000
Odds of running into someone from Kodiak in Germany = Slim to none

...But did I?  YES!!!!...

My roommate and I are walking up the most random little alleyway in Heidelberg after enjoying some delicious gelato when we hear some people walking along the main road talking in English.  My roommate turns to the closest of the group and asks "Are you from the States?"

"Yeah, we're from Alaska!"

"No way, what part? So is she!"  *proceeds to point to me*

"Eagle River." Says one lady, "And he's from Kodiak." *points to the guy in front of her*

Wait, whaaaatttt???? *noise of a car breaking*

After some discussion we came to the conclusion that we know similar people and they knew of me.  Is this world really THAT small?!  I'm still in shock.  I haven't run into a single person from the states before them and they were from MY hometown!  I think the one guy might have been Coast Guard though, so maybe not from my hometown persay, but they were flying thatta way the next morning.  Should of wrote my family a note and signed it!  That would of been hillllarious.

Aside from random run-ins...the Internet has been down in our apartment for the past few days and I thought I was going to go loco.  I usually head across the street and down a few blocks to the mall where there's a Starbucks with Internet, but guess what... they decided to do construction this week and now the Internet is out there too.  Man oh man.  First world problems?  But hey, we've got a nice little box now from our Coach and so I'm getting in some quality world wide web time before heading off to Sweden on Friday to see two of my good buddies, Hanna Johannson and Tamar Gruwell!

The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it.

I'll be honest with you, one of my favorite things in life is proving people wrong.  And let me tell you, there have been some doubters downing the hater-ade for our team this year.  Yes, we're a scrappy little crew who..until we hit the court..you wouldn't think had a shot at contending for something bigger.  But with so many things in life, you really can't judge a book by it's cover and you certainly can't allow aesthetics or any other type of flashy hype to be the sole reason for trusting that something or someone is "better".  

Let me get you up to speed on what's been going on over here:

• We had a funded dinner at the Time's Cafe, who is the sponsor who is conveniently on our hiney's as you can see in the picture below. 
• During this dinner, our President (on the right) gave a speech about how we weren't going to be as good this year since (the team) lost a considerable amount of talent from the past year and that we're going to lose some games but hey, we're still going to go out there and have fun.... Huh??? Not exactly what I was expecting the "boss" to say about his team.
• A few days later, the coach of USC-Heidelberg (the team we were set to play as our opening game) is quoted in the paper saying that we're not the team we were and it should be an easy 20 point win for them.

I'm way too competitive to stand around and hear all this nonsense, so by gameday on Saturday I was hyped and ready to prove people wrong about our team... I really didn't care too much about coming out in my first pro-game and doing well for me, even though in the back of my mind I knew that I needed to have a good performance (because I'm being paid to do so).  

Breaking down the game: 

• The first quarter we hit the court like we were shot out of a cannon: pushing the ball, working together as a unit, playing relentless and aggressive defense... this built us a 14 point lead.
• In the second quarter the other team decided okay these girls are for real we better step our defense, so they did and we committed a couple turnovers, started trying to go one on one a bit more, and let their defense rattle us offensively.  Our defense still held them to 15 points that quarter (they scored 14 in the first), but we went dry from the field for a bit and let them close in by 4 at the half.
• After a brief halftime break to get our heads straight, we came out in the 3rd going back to how we needed to play offensively and were earning each bucket.  We ended this quarter neck and neck... in fact they might of even been up a point or two.
• The fourth quarter is where the true test came.  Both teams were tired, the pace of the game was fast (how we wanted it) and the physicality is a lot different over here... needless to say I felt at times I was playing football not basketball and even got two hand shoved going up for a basket from a girl who looked like she ate babies and nails for breakfast (I still bounced up and gave her the stank eye though =p).  Anyway, the tougher team would prevail... and by controlling the boards and sticking to our guns and tough defense we grinded out the game and ended up with a 6 point victory!! 
• Moral of the story: keep your words sweet because you never know when you're going to have to eat them. 

This is a great start and I'm proud of my team.  However, we have a long road ahead!!  Stay tuned :]

The Big Practice Before the Big Game

Last night we had scrimmaged a team in our conference for a trial run to work out some kinks before our big game against USC-Hedielberg (a top team in our conference) on Saturday in their haus (house).  Our scrimmage (versus a team by the name of Leimen) was complete with two officials... who of course had to call me for that stupid open step travel and allow their huge post to practically fist fight me off the ball but call me for on the ball fouls when I grazed her with my fingernail.  Oh Euro Basketball, how will I ever adjust (answer = BEFORE SATURDAY!!).  

Intimidating Bunch // TSV Viernheim 2013-2014 Team

So overall conclusion about our scrimmage... wir gewonnen (veer geh-vone-en) aka, we won... and pretty handily at that.  We have gotten considerably better since our preseason tournament games, probably in part due to the addition of our main German point-guard who was on vacay for our tourney.  

Update on my German: I can read a few sentences in children's books now.  And by children's books I'm talking for 2 and 3 year olds ha!  But hey progress is progress. :) 

Some weird things I forgot to mention in my last blog about driving in Germany.  

1. The lights count down to when you can go (red, yellow, green) in addition to counting down for when you stop (green, yellow, red).  I like to think I'm in Mario Kart and it's counting me down to start, but when I try to red shell or banana peel a terrible German driver it doesn't work.  (If you've never played Mario Kart you have no idea what I'm talking about and if you have played you better be laughing!)
2. When you're driving along a road in town... it's super crowded and there's really only space for one car because there's cars also parked along the side of the road.  So instead of playing chicken, one car has to patiently pull over onto the curb and wait while the other car squeezes by.
3. Parking along the side of the road is actually parking up on an elevated sidewalk.  Our little beater doesn't have any power steering... so getting that hunk o' junk up onto the curb via parallel parking makes me break out in a sweat every time!
4. Yielding is crazy weird here.  So how do I explain this... okay... while driving straight through town I see a connecting road upcoming on my right.  It's my job to slow down, check to see if anyone is coming, and then go on ahead - even though I'm the one going straight!! So, God forbid, if someone is coming I better dang well yield and/or stop or expect to be T-boned. 

P.S. Comment if you like, they are appreciated! :)  And not just from my mom, love you though mama.  

German Rendition of Eat, Pray, Love: Coffee, Cake, & Cigarettes

It's now going on 21 days that I've been in Germany, so I'm basically an expert now (haha, not).  I've noticed so many different things about living here, neither good nor bad (well for the most part) and I figured I'd take some time to fill all of you in on the abnormalities of German life from life in the States.

Why don't we start with the cars.  Everyone drives a car or SUV, I haven't seen a single truck and for the most part the cars they do drive are tiny.  Smart cars are as common as BMW's, Audi's, and Volkswagen's, which are all more common than a Jeep Grand Cherokee or mini-van (to name some examples).  I guess this makes sense when you consider that Germany is the 4th leading automobile producer in the world, according to Wikipedia, and is home of Audi, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, and Volkswagen.
As you know, it's also home of the Auto-Bahn, which I really thought was just some random long stretch of road out in the middle of the country where people could drive really fast because no one else was around.  That is definitely not the case, stupid American!  It's comparable to the I-5 on the west coast and is the major highway throughout all of Germany.  According to word of mouth, about 30-40% of the Auto-Bahn has speed limits, while the rest is free game to go as fast as you'd like... but, most people keep it around 120km per hour (60-72mph).  Now if I drove a fancy car, like mannny people do here... I would LOVE the Auto-Bahn.  Unfortunately, life of a professional women's basketball player is really not so glamorous and here is our ride:

Nice I know.  No power steering and it doesn't have more than 4 gears.  P.S. the vast majority of cars here are manual.
Moving on... Why don't we talk about living. 

1. The doors never look like they're shut... Even though they are.
2. The washing machine is just chillin' in the kitchen like it belongs there (in every apartment I've been to so far). 
3. People are eco-terrorists.  There are bio, plastic, and paper bins in every apartment complex and everyone does the 3 R's (reduce, reuse, recycle!).
4. The plugs are alien and are only two pronged so I need specific adapters to plug my 'Murican stuff into.  (Thanks to my cousin Stefanie for covering me on that!)

Okay now how about out and about.

1. Everyone in passing looks PISSED.  But really, once you get to know people here they are actually quite nice.
2. When entering a public common area like a doctor's office or gym locker room where people are kind of just waiting, it is polite to say "Hallo" and "Tschuss" when you leave (hello and goodbye)... yes, even if you don't know them or have never seen them in your entire life.  Now people probably think I'M the mean one for never doing that!
3. Smoke, smoke and more smoke.  There are cigarette vending machines everywhere.  On top of that, restaurant's set out ash trays for people to come have a cup of coffee and piece of cake while lightin' up a cig.  Doing all three of those are very common here in the afternoon especially... and NO, it is not rude to smoke in a crowd of people, haven't they heard of second hand smoke?! Ain't nobody got time for that!
4. When the little kids go to school they hold hands, it is ADORABLE.  They also have these old-school lookin' bpacks that have a hard exterior.  It's almost like they're packing around a mailbox on their backs.
5. If you're walking on the wrong side of the colored pavement, you might just get run over by a biker.  The bricks on sidewalks and in parking lots are either classic grey or a red to differentiate from the walking/biking path and different parking spots, respectively.  
6. Construction... can be on castles, but they also do a lot of work on the old school churches, the old timey buildings, and cobblestone roads.  That's gotta be spendy.
7. Lastly, and most importantly, beer is cheaper than water.

That's all I can think of/have discovered for now.  Stay tuned for more.  And if you're wondering how I fit into that car, please reference the following picture:

Cake & Basketball... Okay, I Guess I Can Get Used to This

Today the younger women's team for our club hosted a 6 hour long tournament that included the men's team and our team.  (Side note: TSV Viernheim basketball has a men and womens team and also a younger womens team and they're working on building the youth program as well).  To keep us fueled and ready to rumble we ate cake between games.  I packed a sandwich not knowing what food was going to be there besides cake (ended up being nothing), and one girl came up to me and asked "You're eating a sandwich when there's CAKE?!" Daaaaang sorry, just trying to get some greens and protein into my life.  I do have to say though, kuchen [koo-ken] (cake) here is deeeelicious.  Their cakes aren't like American cakes at all, there's no frostings and a lot of time there's fruit in the cake.  Also, if you want to make chocolate chip cookies here you can forget about it... they don't have chocolate chips!  But don't worry they have every other chocolate and candy humanly possible.

Oh, and let me just tell you about the water real quick.  The first tournament I played here they brought a case of water, and I made the mistake of just popping one open like I would normally do and started chugging.  Well, little did I know they like to drink sparkling/gassed water here instead of "still" water.  My first reaction = "YUCK!" ... 2-3 sips later... "yuuuummm..." Apparently there's an American every year who gets converted by the gassed up water.. I guess it's my turn this year.

Time to go roll into the bathroom (I ate a lot of cake) and shower away the 6 hours of nasty, awesome sweatiness.  Hasta la vista.. oh wait that's Spanish.. Tschuss! (Bye)

Sitting Here Half in Nice Clothes, Half in Sweats Wondering if I Got Stood Up

"Doh!"

So I'm sitting here very presentable from the waist up at 6:30am Thursday morning in Germany, wondering why on earth I haven't gotten a call on Skype to present my internship... Suddenly, I realize that I'm 10 hours AHEAD and that it's only Wednesday night in Alaska and presentations are Thursday night.  NICE Alysa, reaaaal nice going.  Where's Jordan Martin when I need her? She wouldn't have let me make this el stupido mistake!


I think this means it's time to go for an early morning run and get the GIANT cup of coffee I drank at 5:30am out of my system.  Hopefully I don't get caught in a torrential downpour because it tends to do that here and the clouds look ominous.  In fact, last night during practice there were purple flashes in the sky from lightening and rain pounding on the roof so hard that I could barely hear my coach talking.  Not like that was a big deal since 80% of the time he is talking in German.

But hey, German word of the day since it's so fun to say = Flügel (floo-gull)
It means guard.. so when I hear that I know I'm going to play at the 3 position, yay!  Fun times.  But really, I do like playing the guard :)

Okay good morning, time to go run off my foolishness... good night America!

Dennis Rodman: The Basketball Diplomat. You've Got to be Kidding Me.

I know North Korea already has a bad rep, and let's look at it this way, what exactly does it say about the country when we add that Dennis Rodman - who was one heck of a basketball player, but probably got dropped on his head one too many times when he was little - is "friends for life" with their current leader.

I don't think a guy who can barely pronounce the English language (check out the video below) should be paling around with a man who just fired down his ex-lover with a gun squad.  But hey, you also can't blame him for trying to keep the peace, however unconventional he is as a person or his methods are.

As for coaching the North Korean basketball team for the 2016 Olympics... do what you want man, America will still probably not break a sweat when we roll over them (no offense, but we have Coach K and Lebron, enough said).

Here's the link if you want to take a look, but I'd save that 4 minutes or so of your life for something better:

http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/09/09/dennis-rodman-will-train-north-koreas-olympic-basketball-team/

"How do you measure in cups? They're all different sizes!"

This weekend my roommate and I traveled up to Frankfurt by train and bus (would of been a 45 minute drive but our little hunk o' junk is at the doctor's getting fixed up... my other roommate ran it into a pole... long story!).  Enjoy the pictures!

Check out this food joint, I can only imagine what the kitchen looks like.

First metro experience... Thankfully my teammate was taking us around because I was more confused than Sarah Palin on foreign policy.

The little food joints they have here are small and cozy.  Here we ate Moroccan food... amazing!  The wrap is vegan wrap something that resembles a crepe moreso than a tortilla with hummus and veggies on the inside.  Oh and of course a bowl of spicy lentil soup, yaaaam.

City Hall.

The center square of the city, City Hall is behind me, the Rhine river to the right, and modern sky scrapers to the left.

Are you getting tired of these old school buildings yet?  Because I'm not!

One of about 5 huge churches in Frankfurt from across the Rhine river.

The Rhine river

 Frankfurt skyline.

Rooftop bar where I tried "apfelweine" aka Apple Wine for the first time.  Add a little sprite and it's pretty much amazing!  (Similar to an apple cider only less sweet)

Keepin' it real with the American statue.

German banks know how to touch the sky.

Not entirely sure what this is, any German readers want to comment?!

One big Euro symbol with one big European bank in the background.

The contrast of old and new.

Kickin' it at a little hole in the wall cafe.. doesn't look like it but we were sitting inside.  

Moroccan yesterday... Lebanese today!  Gyro meet with rice and salad plus a tasty spicy sauce, hummus, and some type of garlic sauce.  

Castle show in Heidelberg... fireworks over the bridge to compliment the bright red castle.  

V for Weinheim (V-een-hyme)

It has been a beautiful week here in Germany with temperatures still up in the 70's.  Can't say I can complain about that.  Since we practice when I would normally be puttin' on my PJ's (8:30pm) in the U.S. (okay, okay not that early), we have the entire day open with nothing to do.  For those of you who know me pretty well, that's going to drive me nuts!!

So mostly to fill the time I've been exploring with my roommates.  Today we took the train to Weinheim, which no does not have a W sound but a V sound (all W's are V's here).  Since a picture says a thousand words, I'll let them do the talking!

P.S. dad I walked past a Victrionox shop and thought of you!

Gelllaaaatttoooo... Yummy, yummy, yummy.  These little shops are everywhere and it seems like every other person is eating gelato in a tall waffle cone.

The perfect shot: Hard to tell in a photo, but peeking out of the bushes/trees in the background are the ruins of a castle.  You can see the tower on the left and the main part of it on the right. 

The medieval home.  This type of architecture is very common here, just like back in the day!  I'm sure it's very expensive for maintenance on these homes.  No sign of Princess Feona yet..or Shrek.

Check out this neighborhood!! This was going down just one of many side streets.  On the left we have an old synagog turned homes.  Could you imagine living here?!

Water running right next to the homes!

My bro will appreciate this because he's renovating his own home right now, but check out the woodwork on this "garage".  Not to mention the bricks plastered together with something in between mud and cement.  Sheesh.

A watch tower that would be sitting on one of four corners of the city (with walls running between back in the day).  Notice if you will the little box on the top left... that's the bathroom!! Wouldn't want to be standing below that.

Chicken on steroids.  Only a tad cooler than a blue heron. 

Not a bad place to live!  Mom don't even think about it.

Watchtower, castle, fountain, and two bball players!

One of the main buildings in town.

Heading into the town church... wouldn't wanted to have been the guy in charge of bulletin boards back then.  But seriously, this message is older than America.

Inside the church.

Standing in the center, looking towards the alter.  Check out the gold writing that goes all the way around the arch... Wish I knew what it said.

Looking from the center to the sides.

Largest organ I've ever seen, it must sound amazing.

WWI memorial.

The names of the fallen.

The gym the team works out at, aka "Globo-gym".  I'm not a huge fan of it... just give me one weight and an empty space and I'm good to go... Who just kicks it and watches TV in the middle of a workout anyway?!