The Greatest Game That Was Never Played
November 26, 2006Some things in China just never go they way you want them to … tonight was no exception. Currently in our suburb of Kai Fa Qu the Chinese National Inline Hockey Championship is being contested. The sad thing about it is … no one in Kai Fa Qu knows about it. We (as in the teachers at Maple Leaf) are fully aware of it however and would desperately love to play but we cannot enter in the tourney officially because we are not Chinese. Seems reasonable so our fearless captain Adrian has being doing a lot of background wheeling and dealing (approx 40 phone calls in 3 days) to get us a side game with a team in the tourney.
Tonight was to be the pinnacle of success in foreigners cultivating guan xi (connections) and we had a game arranged with a team from Tang Shan. If you have heard of the city before it is because it was the site of a 1976 earthquake that killed more than 500,000 people. That however is not the focus of our story tonight though. As mentioned we had the game arranged for 7:00 PM but when we arrived the building was locked up with the lights out. We found the “turn the lights on guy” but no amount of offering alcohol and cigarettes was going to get him to open up shop. We tried to contact the big boss man to present him with the necessary “gifts” for it to happen but we came up empty handed.
The long and short of it was about 30 guys milling around for 15 to 20 minutes before finally accepting fate and going home. We are told that tomorrow at 4 PM conditions will be more favourable.
I would post photos or video or even a chinese press release about the championships but as none exist none can be posted.
