Tom feeling at home and having fun

Yesterday was one heckuva day and I can finally say that I feel like I’m heading in a direction.  In the morning I went with Marita and Jessica to watch my friend Bongi’s soccer (check football) teams, the Khayelitsha Firefighters, play some matches.  This has been something I’ve been looking forward to for awhile, because I think youth sports, especially for under privileged kids, are the most important institutions that a community can develop.  Lessons like teamwork and the simple fact that for a few hours a week these kids are away from the gangs and other hardships of Khayelitsha alone are justification enough for creating youth sports teams.  Suffice it to say, I was quite inspired by what Bongi had done in creating this soccer program and I look forward to staying as involved as I’m wanted to be until I go home in April.  On an even more base level, the games were fantastic, I was amazed at how good these kids were individually and in the context of the team.  I have never seen anything close to the teamwork displayed on that field by such young kids.  While, I was only at the game for a few short hours that was the most at home I’ve felt since I’ve been here.  I guess I’m just comfortable around sports and teams; I’ve been playing them since before I can remember and coaching them occasionally from when I was in the 16-17 year old ballpark.

Moving on to the rest of the day, as soon as Jessica pulled into the Loch Road driveway Joe and Taylor were on their way out to the driving range, I’m not one to turn down an invite to the range.  It was abundantly clear that I hadn’t hit a golf ball in a long time and while I may not be the next Tiger Woods there was something cathartic about hitting the ball (who the hell am I kidding I didn’t hit the ball near well enough for catharsis I was at that I just hit golf balls for an hour level of frustration, if you’ve ever played you know what I’m talking about).  Anyways from there some of us went out to celebrate Ashley’s birthday, what a grand celebration it was.  We went to a Kurdish restaurant, which was quite new to me, that had great food, hookah, and belly dancers.  Since I love all three of those things I figured it was going to be a good time.  I love being right, it was an absolute blast.  The highlight of the night was no doubt when everyone got up to belly dance during Shakira’s “Hips Don’t Lie.”  While this was not an entirely true for me, my hips do, on occasion, lie; it was still the most fun a guy could have with his clothes on.  There is just something special about having that many people up attempting, some of us succeeding, to belly dance together.  I know I’ll never forget it and I hope Ashley feels the same way.