we all (girls and guys)
met at the hamilton hotel at 0615 that saturday, which wasn't an easy time for anyone..surprisingly, people were talkative, and in good moods..(usually at that hour of the day no one wants to talk)..the bus ride was about 3.5 hours, including the requisite stop at a rest stop after 2 hours or so..as i've probably mentioned before, korean rest stops are NOTHING like rest stops in the rest of the world..this one had a rather large statue at one end, a memorial of some kind..i wanted potatoes, but ended up getting ice cream..go figure..
we arrived in gumi, and realized it wouldn't be all that easy to get to the pitch..we walked under a bridge, followed a path, then crossed a small river, climbed up the bank on the opposite side, and walked for another 200m or so..the pitch itself wasn't great at all..there were weeds everywhere..and, as we found out later, the boundaries weren't clearly marked, which was frustrating..it had been indicated to the girls that there would be another girls team there for us to play, but that wasn't the case at all...as usual, we had to play ourselves..the guys got started with their game, and we watched for a little while, until starting our own warmups..it wasn't made clear to the girls exactly when we would play, so several ladies asked several of the men, but they didn't have an answer for us..howeva, as soon as they were done with their game, they started yelling at us to get started..that was frustrating, since they had just told us they didn't know when we'd be playing..ugh..during our entire game the boys kept yelling to keep going, to stop wasting time, etc..since many of the girls are new, and don't really know what happens during a game, it's hard to keep play continuous..our ref wasn't moving quickly either, but he thought he was helping us..anywho, we finished, were practically run off the field, then we attempted to clean ourselves up without the help of a bathroom..after the second guys game was finished, they changed, and the whole group of people headed back to the bus (through the creek and everything)..
some of the girls had gone to find a sauna in order to take a shower before getting back on the bus, so they missed the first bus to leave..the buses then took us to gyeongsan, a bit over an hour away..there was a stop along the way at the smallest minimart ever, so people could grab food and beer and other assorted items..i think we cleaned out the place of beer and drinks in general, and sadly, there wasn't much food..everyone was counting on lunch food there, so it was definitely a disappointment..
we arrived in gyeongsan and made our way to the pitch..LOTS of foreigners..far more foreigners than koreans...nearly all the fans were on one side of the pitch, there were steps, but nothing great in terms of seating...surprising for a national level game...we squeezed ourselves into a space that really wasn't big enough for all of us...the game had already started, but oh well...some of the girls sat on the grass, not too far from the boundaries of the pitch..go figure, after not too long, they were told to move, though i'm not sure of the reason...at halftime we (the girls) walked across the pitch to the other side, and sat down in an area of completely empty steps...(big, concrete steps)...not surprisingly, we were asked to move after not too long..this time, we were annoyed..we were told that this was the official area of the KRU, or something like that..it would've been fine and dandy to tell us that at the beginning of the match, but it was the middle of the second half..who was going to move there that late and need all that space? i don't know who said it, but someone said that we were the official korean women's team, so we were allowed to stay..finally..
japan wiped the floor with korea during the game..it was totally expected, the only question was exactly how bad the final score would be..72-13 i think? the koreans looked very unfit, and their basic skills like passing were terrible..whereas japan was fit, and passed really well..some of the korean guys were huge, and sortof lumbered around, the japanese team was all fast..that being said, a significant portion of the japanese team isn't actually from japan..there were a lot of kiwis on the team..they get paid to go live in japan and play for the japanese national team for 2 or 3 years..i don't know how i feel about non locals playing for a national team, it seems to defeat the purpose of a national team???i took a cab with mary, janine and rochelle to the train station in daegu and we took the ktx (bullet train) back to seoul..i was signed up for a half marathon the next day, and the other three all had reasons to get back to seoul that night..the rest of the guys and girls got back on the bus and went back to gumi..there, they went out to a bar called waegook cook, and most of them got even drunker than they already were..there were some amusing stories the next day:)
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