It's been a good few day building up to the tourament. We all met in Dublin airport at 5.15 am on Saturday morning and shockingly no-one was late! Everyone checked in and there wasn't a problem to be had. This was all going far too easily... We arrived in Frankfurt on time and found our bus driven by the fantastically named Herr Wolf. After a brief rest stop and paying extortionate prices for any snack we arrived at our accomodation in Helibronn. No hitches, no problems. All very efficient if you ask me.
We had plenty of time to kill and the team all split up, many spent most of the day throwing around. The local pizza place has been doing great business since we showed up. The immediate area was explored and we found that all the locations for the tournament are all within a 10 minute stroll of the school. This was fantastic as some of the team remembered the daily 30 minute trek too and from the pitches in Vienna. No real major incidences to report from Sunday, well that is up until about 11.30pm. About two thirds of the team and myself sat down to play switch (not Uno). Halfway through we were joined by a few curious guys from the Canadian Open team. We were quite boisterous. We finished up and went to see what other teams were doing and some of the lads joined some Colombians and Israelis playing a card game that I don't think anyone understood. It involved Robbie getting into a tug-o-war with a Colombian guy over a stick and Alf proving to the world he has really, really, ridiculously slow reactions. This game wrapped up and we saw some more of the Canadian Open team playing a game where you try to make each other laugh. We naturally joined in, some of us (not just me!!) naturally lowered the tone. So much of what was said is unrepeatable, the best players shall remain unnamed except for the out and out champion, a fine young upstanding Canuck named Keelan. Let's just say, we were all a little ashamed to be of the human race...
Today, we had nothing planned. We didn't need to meet for the opening ceremony until 4.30pm. The team had the afternoon free and used it well. Sleeping in until 10.30, we all breakfasted as a team and lingered over it. A fantastic buffet was on offer. After that again the team splintered and went their separte ways. Yet again an epic game of switch was played and yet again we were joined by some Canadians. This time from the Women's team. We carried on with more card games. I got Mooed (don't ask). After all this half the team hung around to play many, many games and had players from Iarael, Canada, Germany, Italy and some of the volunteers involved at one point or another. Lunch was had and we all made our way to the stadium for the Opening Ceremony.
This was good fun and featured a lovely German lady singing a few songs. She ended up draped in the colours of every nation as players wrapped flags around her. Various representatives made speeches and it finished up with some mass dancing by everyone on the running track. The opening game featured two teams in our pool, Germany and Austria, and was a decent game. Germany raced into a 9-2 half time lead and eventually won 17-9. \it was good for myself and Seamie to these two teams in action. After the game the entire team had dinner together, well, everybody was there except Pa. He now has a pink hat to wear. A small stage is set up beside the stadium and there was a DJ playing songs for a few hours. Most of the team took advantage of this and spent a while loosening up the muscles with some dancing as others had some fun playing 500s. All in all, the team has settled in well and is having no problems whatsoever mixing and mingling with other teams.
We're up at 6.15 tomorrow with the current European Champions, Finland first up at 8.30 followed by Belgium at 12.30. Time for me to find my bed.
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