Monday, September 22, 2008

Brown, big, and strong

No, it's not a bear! It's how I'm feeling since I have been playing so much soccer and doing my PT in the mornings. 100 and 100 seems to work with my body quite well, provided I am not choking on dust. The brown part relates to my skin color...need to use the sunscreen and moisturizer more often.

Unfortunately, Garry, the PT fanatic from our security company (AKA Caveman Garry), is leaving soon, as the security team is downsizing due to the drawdown in contracts for their clients. My company has not been affected so far, but we'll see.

In other news:

I am now up to 32 boys playing soccer. They are theoretically divided into two groups, and they are supposed to come on alternate evenings. However, most of them show up every day anyway, and I have to send the 'other half' away. There just isn't room on the field for all of them. Half of the boys would end up sitting on the sidelines during the scrimmage games. And they would be yakking and joking and distracting the attention of the coaches/referees and their teammates.

Luckily, on any given day, some boys can't come because of homework or whatever, so we generally sort things out without too much problem.

The Kurdish Pesh-Merga and the Iraqi army are still at a standoff, waiting for their political leaders to sort things out. Fat chance.

My 'ready bag' is packed. My protective gear is all set. I will probably be the first scared ex-pat to bug-out if it hits the fan here. We'll probably have at least a day's notice before they really go at it.

Iraq has a nascent air-force (planes and choppers), so they could get here pretty fast and start some nasty you-know-what from the air if they don't sort this out.

Anyhoo....learned some Assyrian last evening. I sat down with a shopkeeper who has been promising me to find an alarm clock (my poor cell-phone has no chance of waking me up at the right time when I'm pooped from playing soccer and staying up late). He was very impressed with the football thingy I am doing here, and wanted to bring his son. Unfortunately, his son is 14 and big, and my boys are smaller and younger, so I can't let him play with us--he'd kick the ball over the T-walls anyway.

So, the guy told me about his daughters who play volleyball, and his nephew who is on a semi-pro soccer team, and we chatted about life, Christianity, the divisions in Iraqi society, etc.....nice chat over a cup of tea.

And he taught me the two most important words for a soccer coach:

itu=sit down
lahkat= be quiet

Combined they are 'Sit down and shut up!' Perfect.

Until next time, insh'allah.

Peace and love to all!

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