Happy New Year

Happy New Year. Got a little bit of a late start yesterday. Wrote the blog, got dressed and read some papers on the internet. Tom and I were going to head out shopping with DT and Babacar (BB), but they were gone by the time we got rolling. Tom’s blog has been idle the last couple of days, his laptop ran out of power and his power cord is at the last hotel they stayed at on the road. He’s supposed to have it back today. So yesterday, he checked his e-mails on my laptop and it took close to an hour for him to get through to AOL, we tried several different browsers. When he finally got to his inbox, I almost fell over. I thought I got a lot of junk mail. On a big day I’ll get 25-30 messages with only five keepers. Tom had 418 messages. That’s not a typo, that’s four hundred eighteen new messages. Gives new meaning to ‘you got mail’.

When we finally got everything sorted out there was only an hour and a half til practice, so we hit the lunch buffet at this hotel. The clouds broke yesterday, it was sunny and clear in Changchun. This is the view out my room to the north. In the morning several kids were in the court yard building snowmen. The air is really dry here. My sinuses are starting to bark at me a little. They need a little Caribbean humidity. I told Tom if he takes another job coaching in China to sign up with a warm weather team.

The team bus rolled up at 3:45 for practice. The Chinese players stay in a separate dorm, while the foreign players stay at the hotel. The practice site is closer to the hotel than the arena. Only about five minutes away. But you’re not going to walk there without a full thermal outfit. Walking to and from the bus was enough.

The building they practice in is a state owned facility. It has big inspirational messages on the walls. I only got photos of two of the four messages before the battery ran out in my camera. (As a side note, it was the initial charge on a rechargeable battery that I was supposed to run all the way down. It’s demise was a fabulous testament to Murphy.) I had Pancake translate the messages for me. The first one said something to the effect that good players become great through intelligent play, the second message was a tribute to the Tigers finishing in the top three in the league a few years ago and how players should try to play up to that legacy.

The practice was interesting, very different. The first part was a lot of cardio. Lots of running, then a run through of the offensive sets, then shooting. The head coach, Coach Gao, never stopped practice to make adjustments. I thought some of the drills and offensive sets weren’t quite as crisp as maybe they should have been. But what did I know and he didn’t say anything. The players went to lift weights and then they gathered at the end of practice and Coach Gao critiqued practice. He mentioned the things I’d noticed and I couldn’t help but wonder why he didn’t stop and make corrections then. DT and BB said that’s just the way it is. And not just in Jilin. They talked to all the foreign players from the other teams and all the teams handle practice the same way. Interesting.

DT shot extra after the shooting drills and before heading downstairs to lift weights. I noticed before the game what a pure shot he has. Smooth, quick release, beautiful, precise consistent rotation on the ball. I was actually able to make myself useful standing under the hoop, catching his shots and passing them back out. The shot looks even better up close. Tom says DT’s shot reminds him of Dale Ellis when he was with the Sonics, can't argue with that.

After practice we headed back to the hotel to get ready to celebrate New Years at Shangri-La. Tom and I grabbed a cab and our cabbie from the day before was a good teacher. As we were climbing in Tom said Redbuds Hotel and the driver had a glazed, blank stare. As I piled in I said, “Szoo zjing kwahn” He smiled, nodded and repeated it back. Nailed it first time, boo yeah…. I’ll try to upload the original cabbie video again.

We met in the lobby at 8:15 and headed over to dinner, the five ex pats. Good food at the Shangri-La buffet again. Jenny, the wife of the chef, came by our table to say hi again. Tom is a people magnet. It was great getting to know DT, Rahrah, and BB.

After dinner we were planning on hitting the New Years party there, but the place was a little subdued. The players wanted to go to a pilgrim bar. No, wait, it was the Mayflower. I always get those two confused. :-) When they suggested that, Tom looked like they just asked him if he wanted a root-canal. Without novicaine. But, he came around and off we went.

We got there about 40 minutes before 2008 and the place was packed. Chinese, Russians, Brits, Germans, Arabs, Africans, and of course Americans. It wouldn’t surprise me if people from six of the seven continents were present in that bar. It was an amazing confluence of humanity. And everyone was there just to celebrate a new year. Common ground.

We brought in the new year in fits of laughter and it continued for a couple of hours. Coach Tom even wowwed them on the dance floor. Well actaully there really wasn't a per se dance floor, you just turned around and joined the pulsating crowd. It was memorable. At one point, this girl asked me to dance and I thought what the heck. Her name was pronounced Doe-tay. I just callled her Dottie and she was fine with that. As we were dancing, she asked how old I was. I asked how old she thought I was. She held up four fingers and said, 40. When I shook my head no, her eyes got wide and she held up three fingers. I laughed and held up five. Her eyes got bigger and she sounded amazed as she said, “Fifty?” Then she added, “You're ten years older than my dad.” Thanks for the dance…….

Jumped into a cab with DT and Rahrah, but it must have been the loud music and laughter that affected my pronounciation. I pretty sure it wasn't the Havana club cuban rum. The cabbie couldn’t understand the name of the hotel. Rahrah tried it and he didn’t get it then either. I tried once more and that look of enlightenment appeared. OK, to quote the Poet/Philosopher Meatloaf, 'two out of three ain’t bad'.

Finally crawled into bed about 2:45. The team has a film session New Years day at ten am. I think I might pass on that. But there is practice in the afternoon for a game Wednesday against Beijing. Thanks to DT and Rahrah for handling the photo duties.