More fútbol!

Last Wednesday I went with some friends to watch the movie, El Juego Perfecto (The Perfect Game), about the little league baseball team from Monterrey. It was dubbed all in Spanish!!! So I got to practice. I actually understood about 95%, so I think that's a good sign. Although it wasn't complicated Spanish since it was geared towards family audiences, but still...

Saturday afternoon I also had the chance to go to a Rayados fútbol game! They are one of the two teams in the city and actually won the league championship last fall. The stadium was packed with about 70-80,000 fans and a couple hundred police in full riot gear. We were frisked going in, and the security guard wouldn't let me take my camera into the stadium (pretty lame, as there were plenty of people with cameras on the inside). Unfortunately the game ended in a tie, but it was cool watching the hardcore cheering sections get really into the game.

Birthday parties

I actually played in the office fútbol game last Friday, and it was another great game. Only 10-1! The rules of the league are no glasses, so I basically had to play blind...pretty exciting. I managed to deflect one goal (a slow bouncer heading towards our goal), so that felt good.

Saturday I went to a birthday party for a friend. It was hosted in one of her friend's house, and her parents are American / Canadian--so they had a tetherball pole set up on the roof!! It was the first time I had seen one in 15 years or so.



The party was pretty cool, we filled up a room with about 250 balloons and had ton of silly-string. I got to meet lots of other Mexicans and try to explain what I am doing here, in Spanish.

Office Futbol

So a group of guys in my office joined a mini-futbol league in town with a guaranteed minimum of 9 games in the regular season. They play on a smaller field, with 7 or 8 guys on the field at a time. So far, they have played in 4 games and have gotten completely dominated. The scores go something like 19-0, 9-1, 12-1, 17-1. Understandably, they are at the bottom of the rankings. Well, this week (Friday the 19th), they played the second worst team, which had lost its previous 4 matches with similar scores. This was our chance at victory! I went to watch the game and cheer on the team, so some shots are below. Unfortunately, we still lost, 7-4, but it was a really good game and we had 3 or 4 almost-goals...so very heartbreaking. I plan on playing in at least one of the remaining games...

Concerts and Fútbol

One of my coworkers in the office teaches guitar and piano two nights a week, so she invited the volunteers to a free concert put on by her music school. It was a chorus of 26 female singing teachers, two violinists, and a pianist, with the theme ¨Songs sung by my grandparents¨. I wound up going with my host / counterpart. The concert was in this theater in the Parque Fundidora, at the end of the riverwalk. The songs were pretty good (though in Spanish), and the theater was so packed that people were sitting in the aisles! My counterpart only recognized 5 of the 20 songs, so just an indication of the era they came from...



Also, Friday after work I stayed late and played fútbol with some of the guys from work. They play almost every Friday, in the grassy area in front of the office on a miniaturized field. There was a wide range of skills, so I fit right in with my non-existent soccer skills. I lost track of the score, but it was good fun.