Hannibal Lecter

We won our game in Santander last Saturday 67-43. It was a pretty close game up until the 4th quarter, and then we kind of took off. I was not able to play because of my knee. I had a doctor's appointment this past Tuesday and he said I could run on Wednesday(yesterday) for 20 minutes on the track, and if that didn't hurt 30 minutes on Thursday, and then try to practice on Friday. I don't think I have ever been happier to run in my life! My knee was a little sore, which is expected since I have literally done nothing for the past 11 days. It feels pretty good today. This whole injury thing is making me appreciate being healthy a lot more. Watching practices and games for the past couple weeks I have just been thinking, what I would give to be able to sprint or cut like that right now! Something new for me, but I suppose my patience is being tested in certain ways. The picture is from the game in Santander and the tall girl on the end with blond hair is my German teammate who cannot play right now either because the Spanish Federation has not approved her letter of clearance from the German team she played for last year.

This weekend we face Covipro San Isidro at home on Saturday. I do not think I will be able to play in this game either, and they are second place in our league right now(2-1) so it is kind of a big game! Hopefully I can play for a little bit, depending on my knee. It has been getting pretty cold here during the nights, but the days have been really sunny. I took my camera to class on Tuesday and this picture is of my campus where my class is. This part of campus is all the way across the city so I have to take a 15 minute bus ride to class each day. I could walk, but it would take about 25 minutes, and I haven't yet with my knee like this.

Speaking of it getting cold, I almost always like to wear flip flops when I am wearing athletic clothes. Being from Alaska, it has not been that cold here, so I have continued to wear my flip flops when I can. Here, they are called chanclas, and my team always makes fun of me for wearing them, and think I am crazy for wearing them when it is a little chilly out. I tried to explain how cold it gets in Alaska, and we did some calculations to calculate what 50 below translates to Celcius. They were pretty shocked, and then I uploaded this photo onto Facebook so they could see what I used to run in! This pictures is from my Senior year in high school I when my cross country running team was training for Nike Team Nationals in 20 below weather. The ice on my eye lashes and mouth is from my breathe freezing! I sure do look pretty happy! After seeing this picture, they all were like "Now we understand why you wear chanclas and why you eat ice cream when it is cold out!" They also started calling me Hannibal Lector.... As you can see there is some similarities in the picture. This past week I found a nice little bar to watch some of the soccer games in right around the corner from where I live. Turns out the owner has been to Alaska and loved it. He wears a pin on his shirt every day that is from a Native Village in Alaska. He whipped out his laptop and started showing me all the places he has been in Alaska. Small world!

100 Puntos

Well the last time I wrote on my blog was right before our game on Saturday. I warmed up with the team and my ankle felt good so my coach played me for the 2nd quarter, and then put me in at the beginning of the 4th quarter. We ended up winning the game 102-39! I have never scored 100 points in a game so I was excited about that. Here in Spain it is a tradition that the person who scores the 100th point has to bake a cake for the team. Yesterday at practice Patricia shared a tarta de queso(cheesecake) with us. It was our first home game, so I am sure we impressed a lot of people. A few of my girls that I coach came to the game so I got to talk with them a little after we got done playing. Unfourtunately, during the beginning 4th quarter I went up for a layup and made an awkward movement, tweaking my right knee. I was out for the rest of the game and I have not been able to practice since then. We had some team pictures earlier this week which you can see now.

We head to Santander for a game today which is about 3 and a half hours east of us, right on the northern coast. One of my teammates, Tina, is from Santander so a lot of her friends and family will be able to see us play. Unfortunately this will be the first game that I have missed in 5 years(since my Junior year in high school) due to an injury =(. I saw a doctor on Wednesday evening, and he said it definitely was not the ligament which is good news, but possibly the meniscus. I have another appointment on this coming Tuesday to see if the swelling has gone down.

On another note, I have started my Spanish class which I am enjoying. Almost everyone in my class is American on some sort of exchange program through their college, which I actually don't like because they all speak English! I have found, that the longer I am here, the worse my English gets! I guess that is a good thing, meaning my Spanish is getting better, but I still have a longggg way to go.

The weather here has been overcast and cloudy, with a few sunny days. I still have practice with my little kids on Monday's, Tuesday's, and Thursday's and I have been enjoying that for the most part. We should be starting up our games soon which will be once a week. I have a total of 12 girls right now, and they are all comfortable with each other now so sometimes they are out of control! Well I am off to have some lunch and get ready for this road trip, hopefully we will get our third win of the season!

1st Injury!

Unfortunately I had my first MINOR injury here in Spain. On Wednesday nights practice I went up for a lay up and came down on someone else's foot, rolling my left ankle. The next day I already had an appointment to go to the team physical therapist for a lower back massage, so she checked out my ankle as well. She gave me some ultrasound and gave me some excesises to do with my ankle. The coach would not let me practice on Thursday or Friday and we have our first home game here tonight. I am hoping that I will be allowed to play a little bit, it doesn't hurt to run or walk or anything. I have spent the last two days laying on my floor with my foot up on a chair, icing every hour! The swelling has gone down, but there is more bruising so it looks worse...It is frustrating for me because, at Merrimack, I was used to being looked at by an athletic trainer or doctor each day, and that medical professional making the decision on on how much activity I should do for that practice. Here, the coach just looks at my ankle before practice and says si or no! Pretty odd to me, but I have to deal with it. It could always be worse though, the coach could be telling me that I am fine and encouraging me to practice hard on a hurt ankle!

Octupus and a win!!

Well we won our first league game! The score was 48-37. Very low scoring! I guess last year they only scored 30 points in this gym, and it is very hard to win there. If you want to try to read about the game, in Spanish of course, there is a summary at this website, http://caubaloncesto.blogspot.com/ Throughout the year I believe that game summaries will be posted on this website, with links to the other teams pages as well.

Anyways, we had practice on Friday night, and afterwards we went out for a team dinner for some typical Asturian food(at around 1130pm). This included pulpo(octupus), mussels, and a famous dish with eggs, shrimp, and potatoes all mixed together. I had never tried octupus until Friday, and I was not a huge fan of it. Too chewy! I had never eaten mussels either, but I liked those more than the octupus. The dish with shrimp and eggs sounds pretty gross to me, but it actually tasted pretty good! You can see in the picture my whole team along with our coach and physical trainer. The yellow drink in all of our cups is also a typical Asturian drink which is a mix of sidra and sangria(white wine and fruit juices).

I thought it was odd that we didn't practice on the Saturday before our first game, but we didn't. We left that afternoon for Burgos, where we stayed in a hotel and played the next day at noon. On the drive there in the bus, we watched Finding Nemo in Spanish. We had a big debate about what the movie was called. I said it was called Finding Nemo(pronounced knee-mo), they were trying to convince me that it was just Nemo(pronounced nay-mo). The night before our game, Spain played the United States in the semifinals for the womens world basketball championships. It was fun to cheer against my whole team who were obviously going for Spain! The United States ended up winning by like twenty =)

Last week I also decided to stop into the local McDonalds for the first time! The place was packed!!!! It was more like a restaurant that a fast food place. You still went up to the counter to order, but then there were 3 floors of places to sit with booths, tables etc! McDonalds and Burger King are both extremely popular here in Oviedo. My team loves both places! The McDonalds is right near the Parque de San Fransisco, which is the largest park in Oviedo. This is a picture of the upper area of the park with the fountain and a bunch of benches.

I also came across this picture on one of my teammates pages that shows a better view of the Cathedral. During San Mateo I also got to see this band perform live, and it is one of my favorite songs here! If you paste the link in your browser it should open in youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdUzp8NY9Uc
This morning I had my exam to see where I would be placed for my Spanish class. I start classes tomorrow morning, one hour a day, four days a week. I am excited to start learning and practicing better grammar! Our next game is at home this weekend on Saturday evening, so I am excited for that!

U2 360 Tour Concert!

On Sunday I was able to go to a U2 concert in San Sebastian. This was one of their last stops on their 360 tour. I didn't realize that U2 was from Ireland, and just how popular they were in Europe until I went to this concert! San Sebastian is a big city right on the border of Spain and France. The concert was held in the futbol stadium of Real Sociedad. Real Sociedad is in the highest league of futbol in Spain so they play against teams like Real Madrid, Barcelona etc. Their stadium, Anoeta,  holds about 32,000 people for a soccer game, and a lot more when there are people on where the field would be. As you can see in the picture there were a lot of people! U2 performed really well live! They sang, and spoke in English the whole concert. When they would talk in between songs there would be a translation on the huge screen above them.

The next day I took a bus back to Oviedo which was a pretty long ride, considering buses stop in many cities along the way. There were some pretty parts of the drive though, along the coast and through mountains as well. The picture on the left are of mountains that were closer to Oviedo. Upon returning to Oviedo, I had a good practice with my little girls. I had some new ones joing the team so I am up to 12 girls! There is one girl, Sara, who always gets her self all prepared to say "See you tomorrow" in English after practice. It is so cute!! Sometimes she will say "See you on Monday." I always ask her what she learned in English during school that day, but she rarely wants to tell me about it. My impression is that all my girls have to take an English class each day at their day school. I try to get them to practice with me, but they are stubborn!

I found a nice little bakery yesterday where you can get like five things for 2 Euros. The other day when some of my teammates went with me to sign up for my Spanish class, her car got towed! We were only parked for about 15 minutes. They have these little miniture tow trucks that just speed around and snatch cars, even from parallel parking spots! I don't understand how they could have even towed her car because she was in a tight spot!

Last night some of my team went to this Plaza where they had live music and a fiesta for these races. We missed the race, but there are these big set of stairs in the Plaza, and I guess people put on these huge clown-like shoes and have to sprint up the stairs and then back down. Sounds unsafe to me....I was trying to explain to my team that in general, it is not normal for people to drink on the streets in the U.S. They thought that was so weird, because every single night there are big fiestas on the streets, and everyone just buys alcohol, drinks on the street, leaves the trash there, and then make their way to the clubs and bars after. Once everyone goes into the bars, then the street cleaners come around, so by the time you come out, it looks like a brand new city! The picture above is in Plaza San Miguel with some of my teammates!

We have three more days of practices, and then we have our first League game right near Burgos, which is Southeast of us. Today is a nice sunny day, so I am going to go read in the park for a while!

4-0 Undefeated Preseason!

Yesterday was our fourth and last preseason game in Valladolid. Valladolid is about a 3 hour drive southeast of Oviedo. The map to the left gives you an idea where I am living. The drive to Valladolid was very pretty. For the first hour we drove through a lot of mountains, and the last couple hours the landscape resembeled that of Nebraska! Very flat, with a lot of farmland. The team we played last night beat my team last year in the League championship game by 3 points. Since they won the league last year, they moved up to a higher league, Feminia Liga 2. We ended up winning by 25 points, so I think that is a good indicator that we will pretty good this year! On Thursday we played a team in a lower league than us in Aviles which is 30 minutes north of Oviedo. We did not keep track of the score in this game, but if we did, we would have won by a lot. We will now start our league play (1st Division Nacional) on October 3rd. From here on out we will only play one game per week, on either Saturdays or Sundays. This will be different for me because for the last four years in college I am used to playing 2 or 3 games per week. Here in Spain there will be a lot more practices, and a longer season.

A few days ago I was able to see the a parade in the city for the Dia de Americano en Asturias. I am not quite sure what this day signified, but there were thousands of people along Uria. Uria is one of the famous roads in Oviedo known for shopping. It is a long stretch of straight road lined with clothing stores and cute boutiques that leads to the Train Station. The night before the city workers set up thousands and thousands of little wood chairs and set up a bleacher section as well as you can see in the picture.

Earlier this week I was able to sign up for my Spanish course. I will start on October 5th, having class a total of about four hours per week. This should help me improve my grammar a lot. I also was able to watch a soccer game right across from where I live. Our club, the Universidad de Oviedo has men's/women's basketball, men's soccer, and a track and field team. There could be more teams but if there is I don't know about them. Our men's soccer team lost on a penalty kick with 30 seconds left so that was disappointing! When I look out of my window I can see both the track and the soccer field across the road. This is a picture of the game I watched on a sunny day!

I had heard from many people that when I came here I would either start to smoke cigarettes or drink coffee! Well, I have started to drink coffee. Unfortunately, most of my team smokes cigarettes, although a few are trying to quit as of recently. It is legal to smoke in all restaurants and bars, so after going out, my clothes always smell like smoke which I really dislike! There are even designating smoking areas inside the airport terminals. The coffee here is really good and I usually have a cup in morning. It is normal here for the whole team, coach included, to go out for a drink after practice. We do that pretty often at two little cafeterias/bars right down the street. A famous local drink here is Calimocho, which is red wine and coke mixed together. They serve it in huge cups and then everyone shares it. In the picture you can see a big glass of this in the center of the table. This is most of my team after practice at Heiman, a little bar right down the road.

Week 3 -- Time is flying!!

Hola from Oviedo!

I figured I would start up a blog here for the people who are interested in my life over here. Now that I am getting settled in I will have more time to update this with pictures, etc. Today marks my third full week here in Oviedo! Everyone has been very welcoming including the team and coaches. My team consists of 10 women from Spain, 1 from Germany, and me, the only American! The women range from age 21-34. I am the youngest and only one that is 21. Only one of the women from Spain speaks English, and then the woman from Germany speaks pretty good English as well. My head coach speaks no English.

The first week of practices were pretty interesting. They were, and have been completely in Spanish. I had practice directly off the plane, and I had no idea what he was saying. I just sort of followed the lead. By now, I understand most everything that is being said during practice. Speaking the language is a little harder, but I have been practicing with my teammates and others that I meet. We have had two preseason games, at a tournament in Getxo, about 3 hours east of Oviedo. We won both of our games and the tournament as you can see in the picture. We play this coming Saturday in Valladolid, about 3 hours south of Oviedo. Our league play starts on October 3rd.


As far as the city goes, Oviedo is beautiful! On my days off I have had a chance to go to Gijon, which is a city right on the water about 20 minutes away. I do love the beach! To the right is a picture of the beach at Gijon during high tide. Each and every single night the streets are hosed down by big power washers, and trash is taken out each day as well. This is the cleanist city I have ever been in, and is the capital of the providence Asturias. Oviedo is a pretty big city with a population of about 225,000, but small enough that I am within walking distance of everything. I live directly next to the gym which is nice, and across the road from a track and soccer or should I say fútbol field. I am a 3 minute walk from my teammates apartments, and about a 10 minute walk from the center of the city. I am about 20 minutes away from the other side of the city with the train and bus station.


On that side of town I am also coaching a little girls basketball team. There are 10 girls ranging from ages 9-11 years old. Again, all of them speak Spanish! The first day of practice my teammate came with me to help me, but since then I have been coaching them on my own, 3 days a week. I tell them, you teach me Spanish, and I will teach you basketball! The first day of practice  I had to meet with all of the parents and introduce myself, and we have coaches meetings every once in a while. It has been interesting with the language barrier, but I am getting the hang of it! There are about 20 different teams with boys and girls ranging from 8-18 all under Oviedo Club Baloncesto. Under this club there is a Men´s team, Feve Oviedo, which is in the Silver league(3rd) of Spain. I had a chance to meet the three American´s on that team who are all very nice as well. 

For preseason we have had double sessions a few times a week, but now we are just having practice and conditioning during one time slot in the evening. They sure do know how to have fun here! The culture is a little different in that the big meal of the day is eaten at 3:00 in the afternoon and all of the shops close down from 2-5ish. Dinner is eaten around 10:00 at night. As far as the nightlife goes, people begin their evenings around 11 o´clock in the evening and many people stay out until 7 o´lock in the morning! I was lucky to be here for San Mateo which is a big fiesta for the city of Oviedo. It is a 11 day period with lots of vendors on the streets and concerts each night in the center of the city right next the big Cathedral. In the picture to the left you can see the Cathedral in the background and the plaza filled with people!

Again my team is very welcoming, and we all do a lot together! I believe I will be taking a Spanish course at the University which should start in early October. So far I have really enjoyed it here, and I assume it will only get better, especially once the games start up! For now, I am off to a quick siesta(nap) and then practice!