First free weekend

It's finally here.  No I'm not talking about the regular season.  I'm talking about two.. Yes two days off without running miles upon miles and doing some REALLY tough drills I have never even heard of before.  A lot of these drills that we do I keep thinking would be fun to introduce to some of the teams I'm associated with back in the states.  They are very different but it definitely makes your legs feel like jello.. Which seems to be a reoccurring theme here.

Despite the fact that we have two days off.. We still are required to go to the mineral water pool tomorrow at 9:30 am.  This place is pretty cool because it has a sauna, a jacuzzi, a massage place, and the mineral pools are hot water so it feels pretty good on our jello legs.  Then on Sunday we are going  hiking up one of these mountains I've been seeing in the distance.  We were told to wear our "hard shoes".  Unlucky for me I left my hard shoes back home.. Whatever hard shoes are.

My American teammates and I are starting to get used to people trying to speak to us in Bulgarian even though we tell them right away we speak English.  I'm sure the puzzled look on my face  gives that away before we even say anything.  We had a run in with an older man outside of the gym the other day who wouldn't accept the fact that we had no idea what he was saying.  He eventually just started saying Barack Obama.. So we just started saying random things back.  He seemingly understood "Barney" and "Orange juice" as acceptable responses to "Barack Obama.".

It's crazy for me to be over here and see the influence that America has on the entire world.  People here are walking around with lakers jerseys on and listening to tupac and eminem in their cars.  I don't think I ever realized that being in my little bubble in Missouri.  Of course like I've said before they really emphasize Dallas, Texas and California and New York City.  I think to myself um excuse me there are other great places in the U.S..  like Missouri.. And Ohio.

Some of the coaching staff speak little to no English.. And I always catch myself saying things in conversation like "ah come on" or "no way" to them thinking that certainly they at least know THOSE phrases.  Blank stares.  It's fun teaching each other new phrases everyday though and laughing at the attempts.  One of the guys here told me he felt embarrassed because his English was not so good.  I told him he was doing fine because I can't speak a lick of Bulgarian!! His response was that English was universal and Bulgarian is for such a small area.  Touché.

Oh and one more thing.  Highlight of my day today was making a trick shot at the end of practice for an ice cream cone.  Sweet sweet victory.

Bulgarian word of the day: Haskovo = хасково

Until next time,
Jess