The Markets:
Market #1: The fish market.
A few days ago before our game Saturday we visited the fish market on the Atlantic Coast. The coast is lined endlessly with colorful wooden boats full of fish. The fish are carried either by donkey cart or by people with baskets on their heads to a pavilion where they are dumped on a table, their heads are cut off, and they are for sale by the pound. So, basically it’s very much like your local supermarket. And it smells fantasticJ Very cool cultural experience though.
Market #2: Shopping and such
Today we went to a huge open market with endless amounts of fabric and tailors to make whatever outfits you want out of the fabric you just bought. There were tons of shoes, sunglasses, and all kinds of things to buy always haggling over price first. Some people our hosts are friends with came along to help us bargain. Also there were lots of meats for sale and vegetables. It was very busy and crowded and again smelled fantastic. It was another wonderful unforgettable cultural experience for which I think we are all very grateful.
Clinics:
Monday morning we ran a small clinic for teenagers. It went very well I think but working through interpreters made things a little slow. We will be better at that the next time. But even though it was slow the kids seemed to enjoy it and were very open to learning what we have to teach. We tried to just be very upbeat and leave them motivated to be hard workers and good teammates.
Later in the evening we ran a coaches clinic… well primarily the leaders ran a coaches clinic. They taught about everything from practice drills to preventing injuries. The coaches here were so receptive and really have a lot of respect for our group. They are soaking up every word and it seems we will be able to have a great impact on them in this week of clinics.
Celebrities:
Our games have been covered in the newspaper and on television so the US Embassy now has invited us over to meet with the ambassador. Um… yeah that’s pretty cool. We are hoping it works out. So, our hosts are meeting a lot of new people and so are we. Life is pretty good and our work is slow but productive.