Its amazing the things you miss when you move away from home. I don’t miss the fact I’ve only had one glass of milk since I’ve been here and I can even live with the fact the pizza is horrible (think toasted bread, with some cheese and whatever else on top….that’s right, almost no sauce).
The big thing I miss in Hong Kong is that for the most part, no one follows sports. There are no local teams, so on the weekend or in the evening there is no sport everyone is watching. When I walk into the office the next day no one ever asks me about the game last night (although truthfully because everyone in my office is talking in Cantonese, they could be talking about sports and I would never know, but you get the point). I’ve tried to keep up with all aspects from home, and with the internet it’s quite easy. But for the NFL and Baseball, it doesn’t work very well. I do have my trusty slingbox, so on Sundays Erin and I have been able to watch the Badger football games that were recorded. But the NFL is on Sundays, so all the games are done by the time I wake up on Monday morning (and all the Brewers games are played while I’m at work…I watch many of them on the espn.com gamecast…not quite the same thing). Due to the fact I have fantasy football obsession, I need to check the scores and see how my teams did. I could never wait until Monday night to watch the games when I get home (ignoring the fact I usually get home from work around 8:15pm and I really don’t have 4 hours to spend watching a football game). Besides, part of the fun of watching sports (at least for me) is hanging with your friends, cheering during the good times, wondering what happened during the bad.
This gets me to the point of my story, on Saturday night I was informed by our new friends from the UK that we were going to a bar called The Canny Man in Wanchai (fairly close to our apartment) to watch rugby. It turns out the Rugby World Cup is going on right now and we would be watching England vs USA live. This bar shows all manner of European sports live no matter what time they come on. If there is a 3am Cricket game you want to watch, they will have it on. There is no bar time in Hong Kong (which deserves a completely separate blog entry) so time is not a problem. They also record all the late evening games and replay them the next day.
The game started at midnight, so a group of us went to a luau at the American Club Hong Kong (that’s right Polynesian dancing in China, it was more fun then it sounds, somewhat like the luaus Erin and I saw in Hawaii, but much shorter and much better food). We took off and arrived at the bar early which allowed us to watch the end of a Cricket game. I now understand Cricket and how it is played, let’s just say after you understand the rules its just as boring as before you knew the rules. Moving on…luckily Richie (one of the UK guys I’ve meet, please look at the Cheung Chau Island blog entry for more details) took the time to explain to Mike (an American I’ve meet, he’s from Chicago and follows the Bears and Ohio State…I’m trying not to hold that against him, its just nice to be able to discuss American Football with someone who understands what I’m talking about besides Erin. I think she is also thankful I’ve found someone else to talk football with!) and I the rules. Basically its like football but you never stop, there are no pads, and there are two 40 minute halves. So we all grabbed a couple of pints of Carlsburg and got ready to follow the action. It was surprisingly entertaining, and the entire bar was into the game much like an NFL Sunday. Since our table had the only 4 USA fans in the entire bar, we were a bit outnumbered. Did I forget to mention England is one of the best rugby teams in the world? I think you can guess, the US was one of the bottom tier of teams. In the end, England won 28-10 but the US team put up a good effort. It could have been much worse; I was told the US is on par with the Japanese team which had just lost 91-3 to someone. A moral victory for the Americans I guess. On a side note France lost to Argentina the night before; the French people were devastated. The Rugby World Cup is being held in France. France was a top three team and expected to compete for the title, and let’s just say Argentina is on the level of the US (hello Appalachain State!!!).
Richie and I are going back to The Canny Man tonight to check out the USA vs Tongo game and may also try to watch England vs South Africa (another very good squad) this weekend. Its a bit different from what I’m used to, but its great to be out with friends again enjoying sports, especially when you understand the game and its rules. Now if someone would just tell me where Tongo is……
Chris
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UPDATE - I found out the US was playing Tonga, not Tongo and apparently its an island off the coast of Australia. The US lost 25-15 to offically be the worst rugby team ever. I think they play Somoa on Saturday.
I am glad you are learning new sports. How fun! I must tell you Champs was an exciting time on Sunday during the Packer game. They offer $1.00 shots of Kamakazi each time the Packers scored. I never could figure out where the announcements were coming from and am glad I didn't have those shots.
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