Cultural Encounters:
From the Sand to the Snow

July 18, 2006

Table Tennis Competition

This Saturday was the Iowa games held in Ames, and I signed up to play table tennis. I ended up going to Ames by myself because my sister and boyfriend had to work. This was this first time I drove forty miles alone and I am horrible with directions. It is so bad that I do not know if I am holding the map in the right position. Going to Ames was an adventure for me. I left at 8:30am to play at 12:00 pm because I knew I would get lost.

I printed out directions for both ways, and I was really surprised that I just had to stop 2 times to ask for more directions.

I came to a conclusion that I need Tom Tom. This is a device (GPS) that gives you voice direction turn by turn and if you turned on to the wrong street, it recalculates the directions. Nikolas said that “recalculating directions” is the only thing Tom Tom will say to me.

I ended up playing at 1:30pm and 2:00pm. There were 12 table tennis tables and more than 50 matches to be played. When I walked into the Gymnasium you could feel the human body heat from over 200 people. It was so hot that I was sweating without even playing. In the establishment where the matches were held did not have AC, but the restroom did. It felt good in there. I ended up taking a few trips to the restroom by the end of the day.

Finally it was my turn to play, and I played against a girl from China. This was the only match I lost in the category and I ended up with a silver medal. After this match I started to talk to this Chinese girl and I found out that her school in China offers table tennis classes and can be part of the curriculum activities in college. No wonder why the Asians are the best in Table Tennis!

I really enjoyed participating in the Iowa games especially because I did not come home empty handed and I will definitely participate in the winter Iowa games in Dubuque.

PS I should have worn my Brazilian shirt maybe I would have won the gold medal