{"id":388,"date":"2016-04-06T08:45:03","date_gmt":"2016-04-06T15:45:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.evergreen.edu\/daykev10\/?p=64"},"modified":"2016-04-11T00:58:06","modified_gmt":"2016-04-11T07:58:06","slug":"fussball-thus-far","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/fussball-thus-far\/","title":{"rendered":"Fussball thus far\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"image\"\"image\"\"image\"Every where I go in this city I have asked people “wo kann mann spielen fussball?” Unfortunately my questioning has yielded no physical results. Until last night I had been unable to find anyone to actually play with. After biking around I came across one of the caged, basketball sized outdoor courts that I have been seeing everywhere. I saw a group of people warming up, not yet playing, and I jumped at the chance. \u00a0Approaching the gate and being eyeballed by the whole squad, I asked the first person I found if I could play. He asked his friend for a translation, then said yes. The playing soon began and I immediately realized the situation. This was a practice for a team of people with mental disabilities, or ‘handicapped’. From the way they talked and moved, I knew that this wasn’t the appropriate skill level for me, but then I realized something. I have played with many people with disabilities back in the states, and let me tell you, this group was competitive.<\/u>\u00a0They were busting moves, sliding tackles and even talking trash! This was completely unexpected, but should I be so surprised? These guys, and one girl who could ball by the way, cared enough about the game to come out on a weekday night, even though, I was informed, they would all have to wake up early the next morning and go to work. I saw jerseys and gear from the locale professional team Hertha BSC and a Barcelona Messi jersey. The sport of fussball had been so important in their lives that nothing could keep the, from playing it and enjoying it with each other. I had thought that I was going to head out after a little, but I ended up playing four games with them for an hour and a half!<\/p>\n

Although I seek more competitive, or rather ‘skillful’ play’ I am grateful for this encounter. Now I plan to follow up on some of the leads I have gained from my questioning. I have heard that pick up games can happen at Mauer, Gorlitzer, and Prenzlauer berg parks. I intend to make it to all of them.<\/p>\n

A few notes in the meanwhile on the fussball situation here. Like Seattle, this is a big urban city, and fields are somewhat of a commodity. I was under the impression that every field I came across, all day would be filled with people playing non stop, but this is unrealistic, people have to go to work, and students have to go to school. Fields I come across during the day are usually empty, but I have found two, near the CIEE, that are potential meeting grounds. The fields here are all made of a much harder, less forgiving turf surface which is unfortunate, no one would want to slide tackle on that or you would get wrecked. Only the field complex at Lichterfelde, near my homestay has a grass field and softer surfaces, but then again, it is the training grounds for semi-professional team FC Viktoria 1889 Berlin.<\/p>\n

Last note: there are tons of these little caged, concrete courts with mini goals everywhere. Perhaps these are the more common locations for playing. This difference between the courts and open fields are that a. they are much smaller so you don’t have to run as much, (but won’t build your fitness up either, or give you more appropriate game experience), however, b. they are small. In small places like this it is harder for you to dribble the ball around someone, so it is definitely a good place to work on your foot speed and control of the ball, which is essential. Maybe we need more of these in the states…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every where I go in this city I have asked people “wo kann mann spielen fussball?” Unfortunately my questioning has yielded no physical results. Until last night I had been unable to find anyone to actually play with. After biking around I came across one of the caged, basketball sized outdoor courts that I have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3223,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"geo":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3223"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}