Volleyball Update

Yesterday marked the start of the annual Busan Teachers Volleyball Tournament.  This tournament as I have been told numerous times over the past few weeks is a really big deal and is taken very seriously.  I have also been told numerous times that I am our school's only hope to win the championship this year.  At our staff meeting this past Monday, our Vice Principal was talking and the only word I could understand was "Eran" which is how they pronounce my name so I knew he was talking about me.  After he was done, the entire staff looked at me and starting clapping.  After some translation from my co-teacher, I learned he was telling everyone he was supremely confident in my ability to lead the team to the city championship and that he would be disappointed if that didn't happen.  Fast forward to Wednesday.  Our first match was against a school whose name I can't pronounce and which is about 2 times larger than my school (my school has 600 students and is big for my area).  Right before we left for the game, my co-teacher comes in my office to wish me luck and tells me that the rest of the teachers are going to watch and cheer us on.  As I walked into the other school's gym, I was shocked at what I saw.  The men's team were all under 40 years old (we have 4 over 50), had 4 players that were over 6' and one of them was at least 6'6". Considering I am by far our tallest player (and youngest), I knew it would be a long day.    Before the match started I was given a little brown bottle by one of the women teachers and was told it would help with my stamina.  It tasted like diesel fuel and I saw no increase in stamina.  The very first play I spiked the ball over their tallest player (thankfully he was only a body and couldn't jump very high) and the place erupted in celebration.  The very next play I blocked the same guys spike attempt for a point.  More celebration.  This trend continued throughout the first game and much to my surprise we won.  The second game started the same, with our team winning the first few points.  After a timeout, the other team smartened up and started to spike the ball on the opposite side of the court from me which was disastrous for our team.  We lost the second and third game, thus losing the match.  I was so disappointed that we didn't win, and even though I accounted for 90% of our points, I couldn't help but feel that I had let them down.  After the game, both the men's and women's teams went out to dinner.  We ate "seumgupsal" which is thinly sliced pork neck that is marinated with garlic.  This was significant since it was the first outing I was allowed to attend since my first week here.  Our next game is on May 20th, hopefully with a different result.