Time for another little update of this past week. Not too much has happened but certainly some stories to share.
Alli and I went out for some drinks anddinner on Monday since we were both off and thought it'd be fun to hop around to different places. We started at this fancy cafe/bar/dance club? on the ocean. It was very small and basically a big room right on the beach that looked like any other cafe except there was a huge DJ table in the corner. Needless to say there was no music or dancing going on when we were there. Alli tried to take me to the Moroccan restaurant after that but it was closed and didn't open until 9 so we just went to my favorite pizzeria where I get the pizza topped with ham, salami, bacon, and egg. We got our picture taken as we were walking along the boardwalk as well.
One thing I forgot to mention in the last blog was something really amazing that I got to do in my trip to Madeira. So my teammate Rui is a flight attendant for TAP Air, the Portuguese Airlines. When we got onto our flight heading out to Madeira, he asked me if I wanted to sit in the cockpit during the takeoff. OF COURSE I WOULD!! So Kleber, our Brazilian middle, and myself got to sit during takeoff. It was a great experience. There was buttons and switches everywhere and I also was amazed by how much the planes fly themselves. The pilots obviously know everything that is going on but they basically just monitor the situation the whole time while the planes do the work.
My team had one match this weekend against Esmoriz whose starting outside hitter was none other than Michael Jackson circa 1980's! He was black with a jheri curl and looked just like MJ in his Thriller days. We started off poorly in game one as our passers were fighting the sun out of their eyes which was coming through the windows. We lost game one but when we switched sides, our game immediately picked up. Took the next 3 games with them never scoring more than 19 on us. After the win, Hugo came up to me and said that since I didn't have anymore hair (I buzzed it off this week) that he would just slap me in the back of the neck. After a few solid hits, I started hitting him back then had him in a minor headlock while we cheered.
Yesterday marked the big professional debut of Alli!! Her team played a team from Madeira that looked much more impressive in warmups. However, Alli's team came out showing some actual hustle and effort which many of those same girls never do in practice. They managed to pull out a win in 3 games! Alli didn't get in but I think her coach isn't the most intelligent around. For example, the other team was coming back in game 2 after one OH shanked several passes in a row. So he made a substitution (the only one of the match) taking out his front row middle for another middle. I was baffled in the stands. Oh well, a win is a win and Alli is now undefeated!
Not sure if we have mentioned it yet but the people are crazy drivers here. It's amazing the amount of car accidents that result too. When we drove to and from Alli's game yesterday, we came across 6 accidents! It was crazy. People try to drive fast and brake fast here, yet clearly they don't seem to be getting the message that that doesn't work. Even today when we were walking home from weights, a guy on the motorcycle tried to turn right into a traffic circle and fell off his bike. Luckily he wasn't hurt bad, but still crazy. The weather has been lousy lately so the roads are slick but nobody seems to adjust their driving style because of it. Oh well, hopefully nobody gets seriously hurt that we know!
We hope everybody is well back home! Maureen (Alli's Mom) is coming to visit us next week so we are very excited to have her come stay with us and get to experience some of this unique and interesting European culture! Also, Stevie has a big volleyball match tomorrow so good luck to him and hope he does well!
Love,
A & D
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