Kevin continues to go to the sports complex a few times a week to meet with the baseball players. I would say "work out" with the baseball players--but that would be a very loose translation of what is really going on there! He's found the afternoon work out time to be quite varied, and quite honestly, pretty funny. He comes home with some great stories!
So after there was a big snow last week, the players used their afternoon work out time to clear the outdoor baseball field of the ice. Only instead of just pushing it off of the field, they made a sort of ice fortress around home plate! It was Kevin's first time of being a part of an igloo's construction during a scheduled baseball practice. (See photo.)
Today, he came back from the field sweating more than normal. The baseball team spent their practice time playing basketball.
During their weight lifting times, Kevin is continually amazed at how the team all does the exact same thing--regardless of size, strength, or the position you play. Rather than customizing workouts, as those of us from the States are so proud to do we even pay for personalized training, here in China they so value the collective identity that they take it so far as to have everyone doing the same workouts--even though it means that the stronger ones won't get pushed and the weaker ones either hold the group back or just do poorly executed exercises, not even helping themselves in the long run. It's amazing how different so much of the mentality is about so many things here!
Kevin had another first last week. He had a player come over to him during their stretching time and start tickling him! He came home and said that in all his years of baseball in the States, a "tickle bug" in the locker room was never a problem! I guess it's safe to say that male to male tickling here in Chin
a doesn't carry the same social stigmas that it would in a US locker room.Besides being good for a laugh or two when he comes home, we continue to be thankful for the relationships that Kevin is building on the field and off. One of the players, Lief--who is also the basketball team's mascot and wants to be Kevin's language partner--is coming over for dinner tomorrow night with his girlfriend (who speaks some English, ptl!). (His picture in the mascot uniform is attached.) We're excited and thankful for the new friends that He's given us already, and I'm sure we'll have some more fun stories as we continue to walk the road of Many Cultural Differences!!
