God bless America, my home sweet home

Well, it has already been too long again since the last time I wrote. Not a whole lot has changed, except that I get to come back to good ol' America tomorrow!! I will get to that a bit later. We had two games since the last post with one win and one loss. I guess handing out the fliers at the mall worked. We had the arena almost full for our game on the 11th. It was a good game and the other team played cheap, which kept the tension high. The guy I was guarding would flop if you touched him but would try to throw in a cheap elbow to the gut when the ref wasn't looking. I hate that. At least if you are going to play dirty don't cry to the refs when someone gets a little rough with you. That is one thing I dislike about the basketball over here - there are a lot of players that could win an Oscar for their acting skills. Oh well, we got the win and that's what counts.

Our game this past Saturday was not a good note to go out on. We lost in overtime to a team we should have beaten. We had plenty of chances and we just couldn't finish the deal. The team was from Bucharest, Romania's capital, so the trip was a long 12-hour train ride to the other side of the country. At least we were in a sleeping car so we could get a little shut-eye, even though I couldn't fit in the bed. Imagine that. We will just have to start strong when games start back up again on January 15th.

Tyronn and I are now the last ones to leave. Everyone else was like Houdini and vanished. The plans changed four times for when we were going to leave for the airport and how we were getting there in the first place for that matter. We started wondering if anyone here really cared how we were getting home. I'm not home yet, but at least there is a plan in place after the lack of organization over here. I guess just roll with the changes like R.E.O Speedwagon said. That's about it. I will blog again when I get back to Romania. I am on my computer all the time over here that I truthfully don't want to see one for a couple weeks :) Soon I will be with Andrea in Maine and I am really looking forward to that. I wish I could spend time with all of you.

I hope all is well with you. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!

God bless and take care,
Mike

Back to "O" town

First of all I would like to thank the co-author of this site, Joel, for the last post. It is very much appreciated my man. I will give you a little update on our past two games. We had a very long but successful road trip this past weekend. Although we played two teams that were towards the bottom of the standings, it was still good to keep the momentum going. Our first game wasn't much of a match the whole way. We broke into a quick 20-point lead in the first quarter. The first half of our second game was a different story, however. We were playing very poorly and found ourselves down by 13 at the break. It didn't help that they could have shot the ball blindfolded and they would have made it. I think some of the guys on their team had career highs. We quickly got back into it in the third quarter. We never broke into a huge lead, but I feel like we definitely took control of the game from that point. Then we looked forward to a long 12-hour bus ride back and we arrived at the hotel at 8am. It's almost a feeling of jet-lag when you spend all night on a bus. Everything is all good now though and we are ready for another win this Saturday at home. The whole team went to the mall tonight to hand our fliers to get more people at the game so hopefully it will work and we will have the arena roaring.

I hope this post finds you well. Take care and God bless

Celebration

Here is video from Mike's last game. It isn't the dunk he is referring in his last post, but is a nice dunk by one of his teammates. If you watch the video you can see Mike giving a perfectly executed chest bump after the play. I contacted the guy who posted this video to try and get video of Mike's dunk. I'll keep you posted.

On the road again...

I figured I would give you all a little update on our games. We won our last game by about 18 points I believe. They were a decent team, but it helped that we were firing on all cylinders. It was a good feeling to have us all playing well together. I should mention that I had a nice little dunk that I should tell you about. It was on a two-on-one fast break and the opponent's 7-footer came over to help from the weak side but was a little too late and I went up over him. Needless to say, I was pretty pumped after that and it was my first dunk on a 7-footer. Well, that's my glory moment for you :)

We have a long road trip this weekend with a game Saturday and Monday. Our first game is seven hours away and then it's another six hours or so to the next game. That will make a long 13 hours trip back home after the game Monday. At least we are getting too long road trips out of the way at the same time.

I hope all is well back in the states.

Take care and God bless

Honorary turkey day

I will give you a brief update on our last game this past Wednesday. The outcome was not in our favor and we trailed for the whole game. The closest we came was within four points, but we couldn't close in on their lead any more than that. I shot the ball poorly, to put it bluntly. I had opportunities to lessen the opponent's lead while we were gaining momentum, but I couldn't close the deal. That's part of the game I guess, but it doesn't help with the frustration factor.

On a better note, we got to have a little Thanksgiving dinner. Tyronn's fiance was here visiting for two weeks and she cooked some authentic New Orleans food with gumbo and jambalaya . It was amazing to have a home-cooked meal. Then the team had a little surprise. Coach wanted us at the restaurant for a team meal later that day. We thought it was going to be the usual meat and potatoes meal, but we arrive to see a huge cooked turkey. They did it just for Thanksgiving and essentially for Tyronn and me. That was very thoughtful and I couldn't stop thanking them for that. My teammates were saying that Tyronn or I had to cut the turkey so I put my vote in for Tyronn because, to be honest, I never had the honor of cutting the turkey. My dad or mom had always done it. My plight for Tyronn to do the cutting did not last long because all of a sudden my teammates starting chanting my name for me to do the honors. Realizing I was outnumbered, I gave in. While I was cutting, the owner of the restaurant comes up to me and asks me if it's prepared well because he said, "We didn't know how to prepare it so we looked on the internet." I thought that was great. Needless to say, I have not eaten that good in a long, long time. Overall, it was a good Thanksgiving although nothing can replace the day spent with friends and family.

We play again tomorrow at home so hopefully we can get back on track.

Take care and God bless

Out of the smoke, back on the court

Well it's already been over a week since I wrote last and I have two games to catch you up on. Unfortunately, my ankle was swollen and not in the best shape after I played limited minutes in our game on Saturday the 13th. Therefore I didn't play in our game that following Wednesday. The team we played wasn't supposed to be very good so coach wanted me to sit and rest for our game against a strong opponent the next Saturday. It was a strange feeling because I can't remember the last time I missed a game (maybe high school). And to top it off I had to leave the game early for a doctor's appointment that could not be rescheduled. The game was taking longer than expected so to not make a scene and walk across the court during the game I didn't sit on the bench for the second half. I sat in the stands near the exit to be able to make a quick exit. Maybe because I had never experienced it before but watching my teammates from the audience was a weird experience. It took me out of the teammate role and more into the fan role. The guys rolled past the team by about 30 points so they handled business.

The doctor appointment was the same old hazy office visit. I don't really know if the treatment was helping that much since this ankle injury was taking much longer to recover than it should in my opinion. I missed about four days of practice and it was starting to get frustrating. After the first two days of quick recovery, my ankle seemed to hit a wall in the healing process. Some of my teammates were also starting to make jokes that I was faking so that didn't help the process either. So finally last Thursday I did some shooting and it seemed to feel strong. I came out on our road game last Saturday and I couldn't miss so I guess my ankle was feeling pretty good. I finished with 21 points although we lost the game. We were in the game up until the middle of the fourth quarter and we just let it slip away. It's frustrating because we mostly just beat ourselves.

It was my birthday this past Friday, but it wasn't anything too crazy with practice and a road trip. I received many birthday wishes though and I really appreciated that. I am blessed so many people thought of me. All of my teammates came up to me and did their birthday tradition, which consists of a hug and a kiss on both cheeks. To be honest, I was a little uncomfortable, but that's the way they do it.

We have another game this Wednesday at home against another team at the top of the league standings so it should be a good one.

I hope all is well with you and you are enjoying the winter weather of the Midwest. It was 60 here yesterday so I'm not looking forward to the cold weather that is expected to hit here soon.

Take care and God bless

Visiting the doc

We got the win last night. It was close throughout three quarters, but we pulled away in the fourth. I only played limited minutes because unfortunately I twisted my ankle in practice a couple days ago. I was heated about it, but I have been blessed with no injuries until this point and that's the way basketball goes sometimes. Coach said he only wanted to play me if he needed to so when we got into foul trouble at the beginning of the fourth I came in and did what I could. Although I wasn't 100% and the ankle was sore after the game, I still felt good about the minutes I contributed.

I've had to visit the doctor a number of times to get treatment on my ankle and that has been a series of interesting experiences. The office is down this little alley and while approaching the door there is a pungent scent in the air. The whole office reeked of a hemp smoke shop. It was only a small, two room office, but the doors were always closed off to one of the rooms with the exception of the occasional entrance and exit of a nurse. I don't know what was going on in there, but your imagination is as good as mine. This doctor also does acupuncture so I got a couple needles in my ankle. I don't know if it really helped, but interesting nonetheless.

Well, that is all for now. We have another game Wednesday at home. Hopefully I will be in full swing.

Take care and God bless

Always full of surprises

We came up a little short the other night and lost my 4. We started the game slow, but we had a good second half run and made the game close at the end. There is one funny, unique story that I would like to share. During the second half of the game, one of the Americans on the other team was talking to me while we were lining up on the free throw line. He said, "Man, it's messed up. I was going to the bathroom during halftime and they locked me in the bathroom without knowing. I had to go through the window to get out." Locks over here are a little different than in the states. If you lock the door with a key on one end, it locks both sides so there really isn't any way of getting out. No one noticed he was gone until the 4th quarter. I had to kind of chuckle because that doesn't happen everyday. "How did no one notice that one of the two black guys on the team was missing," he said. That's crazy. I just thought I would share that with you. Our next game is home on Saturday so hopefully we can get back on track.

Take care and God bless

The long road trip was worth it

Our most recent game was this past Wednesday. It was another long road trip of about 10 hours, but we came out with the win by about 15 points. I shot the ball well and had a couple dunks and ended up with 31 points. It felt good to play well so hopefully I can keep that up. I have a feeling I won't get as many good looks at the hoop next time though :) It was funny because before the game Tyronn asked me if everything was okay saying that it looked like something was on my mind. I said I was fine and I really didn't have anything bothering me. He said, "I think your going to go for 30 tonight." I should have him say that every game I guess.

We had some interesting practices this past week. Our gym was being used for a handball tournament so we had to practice in a school gym a couple days. That was about the time it was starting to get cold over here too - poor timing to have practice in a gym that doesn't have the heat on. It was tough being focused when practicing in the morning in a gym that you can almost see your breath and with floors that don't have any traction. That's the way it goes sometimes I guess - definitely some interesting experiences over here, that's for sure.

Our next game is home this Monday. It's against a team that is on top of the standings in the league so it should be a good game. I hope all is well back in the states. I think about all of you often.

Take care and God bless

Well, let's get the next one

We didn't have a good outing for our first game since our sicknesses. It's tough to win a game when you score 45 points and have 25 turnovers - not pretty to say the least. We have an opportunity to get back in the swing with our game Wednesday. It's another long road trip - 10-12 hours by bus - so that should be a good time (sarcasm intended). Everything is all better with a win though. That's just the way it is I guess.
Our schedule has been changing frequently lately. There is a handball tournament in our gym so our game today had to be rescheduled. I just wanted to inform any of you who were wondering.
I'm feeling better - just trying to regain all the weight I lost. They have me taking all kinds of pills to get totally rid of the illness. I ask them what they all are and they give me vague descriptions, which makes me a little leery. I just have to trust I guess. I hope this post finds all of you doing well.

Take care and God bless

And the plague struck...

Well, we had our game canceled for today. Everyone started to get ill on Thursday and it has continued since. I don't know if it was something we ate or just a virus, but it is nasty. I am just starting to be able to eat again. I have been trying to get anything that will stay down - so far yogurt and bananas have treated me well. I just want to get better, but I have to remain patient I guess. Since we were getting dehydrated, the coach wanted us to go to the hospital to get an IV. That seemed to help our aching muscles, but didn't help with the stomach problem. I hope we are ready by the time Wednesday comes for our game. It will take some time to get our strength back to 100%, but I hope it goes well. That has been the news recently. Just wanted to inform all of you what was going on because we didn't have our game today. I pray that all of you are staying healthy over in the states.

Take care and God bless

I officially strongly dislike buses :)

We went into another overtime game this past weekend and ended with another win. We didn't play well at all collectively and had 25 turnovers. Fortunately the other team had 21. Yes, we played terrible, but when you win in overtime on the road despite playing poorly, it's a good thing in my opinion. Grinding out those games is important. I didn't play particularly well in the shooting department. I ended with 11 points I believe. There is always next game I guess.

Besides winning the game, the trip was anything but fun though. I simply cannot sleep on those buses. It's a charter bus and the seats recline slightly, but with the roads winding back and forth, it's tough to get some shut-eye. There is a mountain range in the middle of the country that we had to go through and the roads are anything but straight. The roads are a big difference between Romania and Austria. In Austria they had four-lane freeways with tunnels that went through the mountains, but in Romania the roads go between the mountains and there are only two-lane roads that go through all the towns. The distance of the trip wasn't even that far, but traveling slowly through every town on the way takes time. We got back at about 6 a.m. and I couldn't wait to sleep in a bed. It was crazy though because I talked to my teammates the next day and no one could fall asleep until about 7:30 that morning. All that traveling messes with your body for sure. I had the same problem, but it was great sleep once I finally fell asleep.

We play again this Saturday at home. We played this team in our league during the preseason and they beat us by about ten points I think. Nonetheless, it will be a good game.

Take care and God bless

On the road

It was a good win last night. I don't think many people expected us to win because everyone was overly excited when we won. The team was expected to win the championship this year I guess and they have a tradition of always being good with a high budget. It was good to see Tyronn back on the floor. He wasn't too happy with how he played, but I thought he played solid minutes for being out three weeks. Yes, it was a good win, but it doesn't mean anything if we lose on Saturday so we can't get complacent.

We are out on the road tomorrow for our away game on Saturday. I guess it will take about 10 hours by bus to get there :( We will leave in the morning and then stay overnight tomorrow night so we are hopefully rested for the game. That is one good thing about playing in a small country like Austria: short road trips. Oh well. I have a book and Andrea's iPod with some movies on it so I should be alright.

Just wanted to give everyone a heads-up to what's going on :)

Take care and God bless

If we play, we might as well win

This past week hasn't been too eventful - just practice mostly. I had spoken about our game that had been canceled this past Saturday and how it had been moved up to Wednesday of last week. I was going into it focused like any other game, but found out from one of my teammates during the second half that it was only a scrimmage and wasn't worth anything. That may sound foolish, but there were still refs, we still kept score, there were fans present. I just feel out of the loop with information sometimes, but that happened a lot last year as well. Go with the flow I guess. We actually do have a league game tomorrow though. Our coach is making it seem like it's the Super Bowl he is so worked up about it. It's a home game and they are picked to win the league or at least finish at the top. Nonetheless he has been talking about it constantly and how good of a team they are. That's refreshing to me actually. At least we are trying to win every game. That's about it for now. I hope everything is going well back in the states. Take care and God bless.

ESPN Article

The post Michael is referring to got deleted due to some technical difficulties. I'll paraphrase it again here. ESPN contacted Mike via Facebook (stellar reporting) and asked him about an incident involving Coach Bruce Pearl, who was coaching UW-Milwaukee at the time. Pearl is in hot water right now for a series of recruiting violations committed at UWM and Tennessee, where he is the current coach.

Here is the link to the article http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=5648545

Check out the article. It seems like such a random story and centers around a discrete event that occurred over six years ago. Mike did not comment, but that didn't stop this ambitious, Facebook-messaging reporter from running with it.

I made the point that, at the time Mike was being recruited, UW-Milwaukee had just made the NCAA tournament and cracked into the AP Top 25 basketball rankings. On paper, this organization was seen as a much more glamorous choice than their conference rival Green Bay. As we know Mike went to Green Bay and decided not to play for Bruce Pearl. I think Mike deserves our gratitude for choosing the less popular school and avoiding the shady coach.

Sorry about needing to repost. Please remember to comment on the posts if you can. Feedback is greatly appreciated.

As Mom would say, "...remain flexible."

Once again, it has been too long since I last posted - no excuses. As Joel mentioned, I did promise him I would post more so I will try my best to do just that. I would first like to express my gratitude to my buddy, Joel, for writing the past post. He said it absolutely beautifully, and I could not have done a better job. I truly believe he could have a career in writing if he goes for it. With that said it was unfortunate that I was included in this whole fiasco with Bruce Pearl, but what's done is done. It was negative attention that I did not want, but I hope it dissolves quickly. I really appreciate Joel for writing that flattering post.

As far as basketball goes, we started our regular season with a win in double overtime last Saturday. We had chances to finish the game many times, but we always managed to let them slip back into it. Although I wasn't particularly happy with the way I ended the game, I did end up shooting the ball well with 25 points. We have another game tomorrow actually. It was supposed to be this Saturday, but the gym was being occupied by that city's expo with events for the public. That is one thing that is different about venues over here. Many different groups use the same gym, where it seemed like I could always get into our college gym if I wanted to shoot. Our assistant coach said he coached at a city in Romania where 11 different teams and groups used the same gym. He said the gym was being used continuously from 7 am to 10 pm. I always wondered why my coaches here kind of gave me a strange look when I asked whether there was a time the gym was open to get in extra shots. Our gym situation isn't quite that extreme, but it still is occupied all the time it seems. Needless to say, I believe sports programs in the states are pretty fortunate for the most part. On a side note, I also found out that you can watch play-by-play of our games at http://www.frbaschet.ro/
I haven't tried it, but just in case you wanted to give it a whirl.

There is a zoo here in Oradea that Tyronn and I had wanted to check out before it got too cold. We had a nice day several days ago so we decided to see what it was all about. It was only donations to get in so that was nice, but after we walked through the zoo and were on our way out we decided to donate more. They had quite a few animals, but we could tell they just didn't have the funds or resources to give the proper space and living conditions for the animals. That was a little disheartening but it was still a nice change of scenery, nonetheless.

Well, I missed the October birthday party for my family this past weekend. Since there are so many of us it seems like there is always a birthday going on :) I sure miss being able to be there for events. That is the price I pay for being on the other side of the world I guess, although I missed many events when I was at school in Green Bay as well - such is life I guess. There are many things that we cannot control in life, such as what's in the media. There are also downsides we need to deal with while chasing our dreams. In such events, Mom's quote comes to mind: "In this life we must remain flexible."

Take care and God bless.

A Little Slice of Home

Wow, it's already been 10 days since my last post and I apologize about that. If you think I lead some exciting life over here you are sadly mistaken because not much has changed since my last post. This past week we finally received our paychecks for last month so Tyronn and I had to celebrate and we went to KFC in the mall. It was an okay meal, but the fact that it was from an American restaurant made it so much more delicious. There is a movie theater there was well that plays American movies so we will have to check that out sometime. We should definitely appreciate the prices of some things in the states compared to here. KFC's prices are equivalent to what they would be in the U.S., but shoes at the Nike store in the mall, for instance, are ridiculously high. A pair of shoes that would be $90 in the states are about $200 here. Guys on the team love making jokes about how cheap everything is in America and how we waste gasoline because it is so much cheaper in the U.S. than it is in Europe. They may be right, but the jokes still get a little old. Everyone has his or her own opinion and that's the way it is I guess.

We had our first official game tonight. It's considered a Cup game just with teams in our league. We have another Cup game Sunday and then our regular season starts October 2. We didn't play very well tonight and took a mark in the "L' column. It hurt not having Tyronn on the floor. Unfortunately, he had to have microscopic surgery on his knee this past week. He had been fighting through pain for weeks and he nor the coaches thought it was a big deal. Tyronn said it was time to get an MRI and it revealed some damage to his meniscus. He has been staying positive, but it killed him to sit on the bench tonight and spectate. We need to get better at taking constructive criticism from each other and we are still giving up too many easy buckets. Thank goodness it's still early in the season.

Here are some more links to the Romanian league that I thought you might like to check out (you most likely need to download Google Toolbar to translate the pages):
http://www.numaibaschet.ro/
http://www.frbaschet.ro/

Know that I am thinking about all of you often and I am blessed to have so much support from all of you. You give me a little slice of home that gives me some peace of mind and I greatly appreciate that.

Take care and God bless

Hungry in Hungary

So we had a tourney in Hungary this past weekend. We won two and lost one. It was a good tournament though and we are starting to click better on the court as a team. We played against two teams from Hungary and one from Serbia. We made a great comeback in the game we lost, but it wasn't quite enough. I never blame losses on the refs, but they definitely didn't help us in that game. We cut the lead down to 4 points in the third quarter, but that is the closest the officials let us get. Progressively, the calls started going in our opponents' favor and, since the team was from Hungary, it wasn't too surprising. I think the refs knew in their minds that they would have to officiate against these Hungarian teams in the regular season so they didn't want to start any sour feelings with the fans or coaches. They don't take that stuff lightly over here. That's the way it works though.

To be honest, I don't know what city we were in and I probably wouldn't be able to pronounce it anyway. Nonetheless, it was a nice, clean city. Everything seemed to be more up-to-date than in Oradea. The currency exchange got the best of me though. The Hungarian currency is worth more than in Romania so I didn't have much money the whole trip with me running short on funds. Fortunately, I was foreshadowing such an event so I brought some snacks along to hold me over for the most part. The portions in the team meals were large so that helped as well. So although I didn't go completely hungry during the trip, I thought it was a pretty catchy title for this post haha :)

I should also mention that we got to see the Vikings-Saints NFL game on TV while we were in Hungary. It was dubbed over in Hungarian, but it was still an NFL game, which made Tyronn and me feel more at home. Tyronn was especially excited because he is from New Orleans and got to see his hometown team play. We have another trip this weekend in Romania for a pair of games so I will keep you posted. Take care and God bless.

Scouring the Romanian Internet

I was finally able to stumble upon some Romanian sports articles discussing the games played so far. The websites are translated to English so these links may not work. The translations are pretty rough but can be accurate at times, especially listing Michael as playing the 'extreme'. I would consider him a forward but 'extreme' is also fitting. Being that Michael is busy and humble, I will try to relay any stories I find to the Schachscribers (a word I just made up to describe readers of this blog).

If you go to this link (click here) you should find the articles listed under BASKETBALL. One has a quote and the other has the picture below. Let me know in the comments if it doesn't work and I will try to fix it.
Is this a file photo or did you really wear a Green Bay jersey in your game?

Round 2 of tourneys

This past weekend we had three more games. We ended up 2-1 so overall it was good progress for us. Two of the teams were from our league so we will see them again in the regular season. The other team was from Hungary. None of the games were very close in score to make dramatic endings. The game we lost we didn't play solid defense and lost by about 12 points. We gave up too many easy points. That will come with still getting accustomed to playing together. There are still too many communication errors that we need to correct. The team from Hungary had three 7-footers so that was interesting guarding them. We had an advantage in speed so that helped us beat them although they clearly had the rebounding edge. I played fairly well throughout the games. I didn't shoot very well in one of the games, but the other two went well.

The team went out to experience Oradea's nightlife on Saturday night. It was a good time and beer is cheap so that's always a plus :) I came out of there with the constant thud of house music in my ears and smelling like a cigarette so that wasn't the most enjoyable, but a good time with the guys nonetheless. We have another tournament this weekend in Hungary so I will keep you posted on how that goes. I hope all is well back in the good ol' United States.

Let the games begin

We had our first preseason games (or "friendly" games as they call it over here) this past Friday and Saturday. We won our first game by one point. We were down by two points and one of my teammates hit a 3-pointer with two seconds left in the game. It was a great finish and a great start to the season. We played fairly well together as a team. We are still getting accustomed to playing with each other so the communication on the court isn't the greatest yet. I played well for my first outing and had about 15 points. Even though the ball was wet from all the sweat, I was fortunate to have my shots falling that game.
Saturday's game did not fair too well for us. We played sloppy and gave up too many turnovers and easy buckets. We lost by about 15-20 points - definitely aspects of the game we can improve on, but the season is very young. My shots weren't going in for me that game. Even though I had about 12 points, it took me too many attempts to get there. That's part of the game I guess. I will keep you updated on our future games. We play another tournament at home this weekend with games on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

"They talkin' about practice"

I figured I should actually talk about the basketball side of things over here since that is the reason I am in Romania. For the most part we have practice two times a day for about 2 hours each time. They have consisted of less long distance running than last year, but we still do a good amount of it. Several times we have taken a bus outside the city and ran in the woods for about 5 miles. We lift weights two times per week and we do a lot of agility/footwork drills so I think it's productive. We haven't actually played basketball as much as I would like, but I think we are going to do more of that next week because we have our first preseason game on Friday at home. I'm excited for games to start, and it will be a nice change of pace.

We have actually played soccer (their football) a couple times after we do agility workouts. It's kind of amusing to me. The guys on the team have somewhat assumed Americans aren't very good at soccer since they haven't had any good American soccer players on the team in recent years so they stuck Tyrone and me at goalee. That was fine for me because I got a good view at the action. And man, do they take it seriously. There is no such thing as a friendly game of soccer with these guys. They were yelling at each other over wrongs calls and trying to come up with strategies that I was afraid of giving up a goal and getting a beating after the game. Okay, it wasn't to that point, but I still didn't want to let them down. I did fine I guess so that's good.

Well, that is about all that is going on over here. My days aren't too eventful over here, but I will let you know if anything exciting occurs. I took some pictures so I will try and put them all up here. On second thought, I think I will just attach the link to the pictures on my facebook profile. http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2081088&id=184600800&saved#!/album.php?aid=2101207&id=184600800&fbid=573302471937&ref=mf Hopefully it works, and let me know if it doesn't. I hope all is well. Until next time...

Gotta Love It

Well, here it is, already almost a week since my last post. I am now in the hotel I will be staying at for the rest of the year--definitely an upgrade, besides the internet not working. I tried coming back to use the internet last Friday, but it wasn't working--just lovely. Tyrone and I got a cab to the hotel, tried connecting to the internet with no success, and got a cab back to the other hotel. It was a successful trip to say the least :) That's the way it goes sometimes. It is working now after cutting in and out yesterday. Hopefully, it works the rest of the year.

I should really talk about the other hotel we stayed at. I had some interesting food when I first came into Romania. Breakfast was a bowl of some porridge-like substance with sour cream on top. Many of you know that I'll eat just about anything, but this stuff was too much to handle. The coach asked me, "Mike, do you not like the food?" I thought to myself, "Yeah I don't like it, this stuff is bad!" But instead, I said that my stomach wasn't feeling too great, which was true as well. Then comes out a plate of two meats somewhat like summer sausage and bologna. Not bad if I had some crackers, but not for breakfast. The other days we had eggs for breakfast so that was good with me. For lunch one day we had meat kind of like hot dogs, but it was much softer. It tasted like it needed to be cooked more, but that is the way they eat it I guess. Other than those meals, the food has been better than in Austria. For lunch and dinner, soup is always served first with bread. You always get a salad as well, but it consists of mostly cole slaw, not lettuce. Then they serve the main meal: meat and potatoes. Lately we have had grilled chicken at this restaurant where we have our team meals. Dessert is always served too, which is a plus.

Enough about food. I have to talk about this elevator in the old hotel. This hotel must have withstood World War II bombings and looked like it. There were two elevators, one small and one bigger one. The bigger one was always operated by a worker who only seemed to work two hours a day so the majority of the time it was out of order. Therefore we had to use the bigger one. The sign said that it could hold four people, but we soon found out that was a lie. It's not very fun being cramped in a tiny elevator with three other big guys and getting stuck in the middle of the elevator shaft. Fortunately, we just kept pushing buttons to get to another floor and it started moving again. Great times, I tell ya. Next time we tried with only three guys and it was working fine until we got to the bottom and the elevator door wouldn't open all the way. No worries, we just had to pry it open with our arms. By this time I was about ready to make the trek to our 7th floor room, but we only put two guys in at a time and it worked like a gem. Those are just some of the surprises you get playing ball overseas. Gotta love it.

I will have to take some pictures now that I am settled in my new place. The city has everything you need: grocery stores, bank, a nice mall, McDonald's :), but it has tons of run-down buildings. The center of the city is fine, but other than that it's kind of sad to see.

Well, that is all for now. I hope you enjoyed.

The Arrival

First of all, I would like to give major credit to my man, Joel Webb, for starting this blog for me. It was a genius idea to say the least. I am in the hotel lobby writing a little blip before I have to get some rest for practice tomorrow morning. Hmmm....where to begin. Well, I can start with my first scare of the adventure: I should have missed my flight. I went by the itinerary I received from the team, which is a no-no I soon discovered. My flight for 12:30 pm was moved up to 10:45, but fortunately it was delayed until 11:50 so I had to rush to the gate. The angels were looking over me on that one, as my mom said.
Then, I was stuck in Budapest with no one to pick me up. I was waiting around for nearly 1 1/2 hours before someone came. I called Andrea just to let her know and get some reassurance and sure enough about two minutes later the guy arrives to bring me the three hour drive to Oradea, Romania. We are actually staying just outside the city for this week in an older hotel with no internet. Therefore, me and the other American, Tyrone, got a ride to the hotel we will be staying at for the rest of the year and are sitting in the lobby using the internet. I don't know if I will be able to come back before Saturday, but I will write again then.
When I arrived I ate at the hotel restaurant with the coach and conversed with him. He seems like a good guy so I am excited/curious to see how he will be this year. He wanted me to come to practice tonight, but just rest from the long trip and watch the guys workout. That was refreshing because I was running on little sleep to be very productive. We then ate as a team after practice and that brings me to now and writing this blog. I tried to fit in as much as I could before we have to leave and I apologize for the lack of grammar and flow (I know my sister, Sara, would not be very happy about that :) Well, take care and this is me signing off for Day 1.

Where is Oradea, Romania?

It's probably an understatement to say that my knowledge of eastern Europe is poor. I think a lot of people are with me on this one. That said, I will do my best to give a worthwhile geography lesson about where Michael will be playing next year.

The town of Oradea is located on the border with Hungary (just to the right of the Y in Hungary). It has a population of just over 200,000 people, which is comparable in size to Madison or twice as large as Green Bay.

Michael is playing for a team called CSM Oradea which plays in the 16-team Divizia A, the top-tier professional basketball league of Romania.


I haven't yet figured out how to translate the team website but did find some pictures of the Arena Antonio Alexe. I am assuming this is where Mike will be playing his home games. From the looks of it, it seems like an improvement over the high school gym our boy was playing at in Austria.

Anyways, this is as comprehensive as I would like to get with this post. Michael will be able to tell us much more when he gets over there. The goal of this blog is to act as a place where Michael can write of his experiences. We will be allowed to add comments to any post, which I encourage.

I plan on keeping up with the team and posting any game information, pictures, or videos I can find throughout the season. Primarily though, I will be handing over the reigns to Michael. He will be posting updates of his antics on and off the court. Again, our comments are very important to the success of this blog. Sending our love and support will make the distance apart seem much less detached. Spread the word everyone.

Welcome

Welcome to the blog. This site will be used as a forum for friends and family to keep tabs on Mike as he takes his talents to Romania for 2010-2011 basketball season.