Literary Expeditions: Knysna Soccer Tournament!

Hello Everyone!

I hope that everyone is doing well, I know that many people are on spring break or about to have a nice Easter break. As you are home with friends and family, take the time to really have genuine time with the people you love. Try to put away the iphones and smart phones (story to come later) and just sit and chat. Being away from home for so long has definitely reminded me to savor the moments that I have with the ones I love. Anyways, enough of my 23 year old wisdom. Time to update you on what has been going in Port Elizabeth.

About a month ago I started training with a local Football Club (soccer team). The club has four mens teams, a girls team, and a youth team. Back in the United States I was always more invested in my High School team and not my club team, so I had forgotten how structured a club can be. Initially I trained with the third division team, however was delighted to be asked to train with the first and second teams for the year. This past weekend our first team traveled 3 1/2 hours away to Knysna for a soccer tournament and I was even more delighted when I was invited to come along!

The 21st of March (last Thursday) was a public holiday, Human Rights Day. So, our team left early Thursday morning for the tournament. We arrived in the beach town of Knysna in the middle of the afternoon and lounged in our backpackers for a good portion of the day. It was really nice to relax and get to know my teammates who I only really knew on the soccer pitch. We played pool, traversed the town (very, very small), and watched a lot of cricket and rugby. Everyone is still trying to convince me that Rugby is much more exciting than American Football. Let's just say...keep trying. Although Rugby might have a faster pace and the tackles are pretty brutal, the passion is not the same (at least in my opinion, for all you South Africans reading this). When 62,000 people started bouncing up and down to enter sandman at a rugby game than maybe we can start talking.

Our game the first night was against Knysna Celtic a very talented team in the league above ours. Their team consisted of all South Africans who were small, quick, and tremendous on the ball. When they had possession on offense, they could knock the ball around all day. The game ended up a draw, with both goals coming in the first couple of minutes. The coach thought I would be an ideal fit for attacking midfield, and although it was a new position I had a lot of fun with it.

We were treated like kings after the game. One of our coaches has friends in Knysna, one in particular that owns an Italian restaurant. So, we showed up and were served round after round of delicious Italian cuisine. Pizza, mixed veggies, caprese, and some ice cream to finish it off.

On Friday we had a lot of the day to explore Knysna and the surrounding area. We ended up going to some beaches around 20 minutes away where huge mansions and castles had been built. However, at this time of the year there was no one on the beach, so we had it all to ourselves. So, we walked around for a bit, played a game of touch rugby, and jumped in the ocean. a couple of my teammates had never been swimming before, so it was lots of fun seeing them slowly tip-toe into the water and then dive in headfirst after they felt comfortable. All in all, a very relaxing day!

The other teams that we played in the tournament had a very similar style to the Knysna Celtics: small, fast, and excellent on the ball. Unfortunately, the timing of the rest of our games was a little off kilter. On Saturday we were originally supposed to play at 8pm. Then after our game on friday night we were told that we were going to play in the afternoon at 2. We woke up saturday morning to a lot of rain and received a call from the other team that the game was cancelled. So, we began to think of other plans for the day, only to receive another call saying the game was back on except it had been moved to 1pm. When it comes to timing in Africa your guess is as good as mine.

We ended up qualifying to play in the finals and played against the only team that had beat us in the tournament. We had some sweet revenge and ended up taking the tournament with a 4-0 victory! Here are a couple of pictures of the weekend: