March Madness

One of the oddest things I've had to do while in Switzerland is explain March Madness. Not even the Canadians really understood the pain I felt for my bracket when Dayton beat Ohio State. And during my flooball tournament, I had nobody to celebrate Harvard's win with. Which leads me to my next topic of conversation...

Yes, I played in the floorball tournament. I was supposed to meet my team outside the gym at 6pm, but after a late bus, making me miss my second bus up to the university, I arrived more like 6:10ish. Which wasn't really a problem. The problem was the fact that I did not know how to play floorball. My friend David, the one who coerced me into playing in the tournament in the first place, explained the rules to me via Facebook messages about 90 minutes before our first game. At least everyone on the team knew that I did not have any experience with the game so we could all set our expectations at my abilities to about zero.

We first had to play the three other teams in our pool. I guess you could say the tournament was set up more or less like the World Cup; we had to advance out of our group first. We lost our first game and tied the other two. We tied for second place in our group with the team we had lost to, so unfortunately they entered the winner's bracket and we entered the loser's bracket. By this time, I had more or less figured out how to play. The first team we played in the loser's bracket was not good at all. So I scored a hat trick. And since girls' goals are worth two points instead of one, I score six points in that game! We proceeded to win the loser's bracket, officially placing in ninth (but I think saying we won the loser's bracket sounds better). I scored a fourth goal in another game, except this time the ball just ricocheted off my foot and into the net as opposed to me actually putting an effort into hitting the ball in the right direction. Since we kept winning games and advancing in our bracket, I was at the gym until 11pm, for a total of 5 hours of floorball competition. Which probably explains why I was still sore three days later. That, and the fact that I should probably go to the gym.

I also met a handful of new people by playing in the tournament. Two of the guys on our team are exchange students from Sweden, and one of them was actually in one of my classes. Another guy on the team is in another two of my classes.

Me and David after one of the games

The team

In other news, I've been super busy with homework lately. One of my classes only lasts half the semester, so the final essay was due yesterday and the final exam was today. My class that takes place over Spring Break as a block seminar also has memos due next week. I'm trying to finish those up before heading out of town. Thursday night I fly to London to meet up with Miller, my friend from USC! We're spending the weekend there, and then taking the Chunnel to Paris (checking that off my bucket list!). I'll spend three days there, and then fly to Madrid to visit Megan, another friend from USC, for the rest of the week. I am so incredibly excited for my trip! Until then, tschüss!