When I first started playing football in the Mexican league, I introduced myself as Julia, with the Spanish pronunciation of the 'j' as an 'h.' I think it confused my teammates because though my name is Spanish, my features clearly aren't Mexican. They took to calling me Chinita, and for the next few years, I was known as la Chinita not only by my teammates, but by spectators and opposing teammates as well. I didn't mind; my teammates knew I was Korean and appreciated that fact, but the nickname stuck, and I rather liked it for its staccato sound and uniqueness.
It was a couple seasons ago that another chinita started playing in the leagues, first in the Ecuadorian one, then in the Mexican. Since she played defense and I played striker, we were often matched up against each other. And after a couple games, my teammates and I observed the same thing: this other chinita was also named Julia. We got a pretty good laugh out of the coincidence, and Cecy even teasingly asked me if all Asians were named Julia.
This summer, I came back from Los Angeles and was told by Vanessa that this other Julia was now playing with us. I met her at the first match and immediately got on well with her. I found out that she's Russian, and her biological mother was Mongolian, thus her Asian features, and we joked about an "Asian invasion" into the Latino futbol leagues of the Twin Cities. But our identical names (and similar features) presented a problem to our teammates, because any time they called for Julia, both of us instinctively answered.
Solution? My teammates christened me Maria, and the other Julia, Lupita. When I'm sprinting for a loose ball on the pitch, they yell "Vete Maria!" and when Julia goes for a header against an opponent, they yell "Fuerte, Lupita!" I get a kick out of it every time, and I know my teammates do as well, and they've persisted in it so much that both Julia and I are starting to respond to our newly-given names. I've put up a token protest, but to be honest, I don't really mind, it's all in good fun.
And really, if you think about it, what are the odds that two women of Asian heritage, both adopted, and both named Julia, would end up playing in the same Mexican futbol league in the middle of the American heartland?
Monday, July 21, 2008
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Fin de semana de futbol
Something I've found very interesting in the past couple years playing in the Mexican and Ecuadorian futbol leagues around here is the overlap between leagues, and how playing in one league often leads to playing in another, and then another, and then another, and if you play in more than one league, you tend to run in to the same players time and time again.
Up until last weekend, I was playing for two teams--Club America in the Mexican league, and Virgen de la Nube in the Ecuadorian league. This weekend, one of my America teammates asked me to play with a third team in another Ecuadorian league, Santa Picosas. I agreed, one, because I love playing futbol in these leagues, even if it isn't of the highest quality or skill, and two, because she was desperate for players, and I know how hard it can be to be in charge of a team and not have players show up consistently.
So this weekend, I played one game on Saturday, and two games today (Sunday). We won the first two games, but lost the third, and the really amusing thing was, in the two games today, I ended up playing the same team. For whatever reason, it just worked out that, with Virgen de la Nube we played Gualacero, and with Santa Picosas we played Gualacero. The fact that my team won the first but lost the second simply has to do with skill level. The girls on Picosas are beginners, most haven't been playing for very long, have had no coaching beyond very basic stuff, and considering that, they have a great attitude toward it all. To be honest, I enjoyed the game we lost as much as the game we won.
I read an interview awhile ago, maybe by Fernando Torres, but I'm not sure, where the player was saying that, no matter where you score a goal, the feeling, the joy and euphoria is the same, whether it's on a tiny patch of grass in a backyard, or on the biggest stage under the brightest lights. And truly, I think he was right. All of the girls on these three teams, we're just women with jobs and families and many, many more things to attend to than futbol. But for us, just playing the game is in itself a joy, a kind of escape from the daily grind and a chance to do something out of pure love of and dedication to the game itself. We'll never be great, we'll probably never even be very good, but sometimes I think we get even more joy out of playing than the pros.
Up until last weekend, I was playing for two teams--Club America in the Mexican league, and Virgen de la Nube in the Ecuadorian league. This weekend, one of my America teammates asked me to play with a third team in another Ecuadorian league, Santa Picosas. I agreed, one, because I love playing futbol in these leagues, even if it isn't of the highest quality or skill, and two, because she was desperate for players, and I know how hard it can be to be in charge of a team and not have players show up consistently.
So this weekend, I played one game on Saturday, and two games today (Sunday). We won the first two games, but lost the third, and the really amusing thing was, in the two games today, I ended up playing the same team. For whatever reason, it just worked out that, with Virgen de la Nube we played Gualacero, and with Santa Picosas we played Gualacero. The fact that my team won the first but lost the second simply has to do with skill level. The girls on Picosas are beginners, most haven't been playing for very long, have had no coaching beyond very basic stuff, and considering that, they have a great attitude toward it all. To be honest, I enjoyed the game we lost as much as the game we won.
I read an interview awhile ago, maybe by Fernando Torres, but I'm not sure, where the player was saying that, no matter where you score a goal, the feeling, the joy and euphoria is the same, whether it's on a tiny patch of grass in a backyard, or on the biggest stage under the brightest lights. And truly, I think he was right. All of the girls on these three teams, we're just women with jobs and families and many, many more things to attend to than futbol. But for us, just playing the game is in itself a joy, a kind of escape from the daily grind and a chance to do something out of pure love of and dedication to the game itself. We'll never be great, we'll probably never even be very good, but sometimes I think we get even more joy out of playing than the pros.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Crazy times
A number of things have happened since I last posted. So, a quick summary:
Last Saturday I flew to Los Angeles to attend an orientation at the Taiwanese Consulate for this scholarship I received from them to study Chinese at National Taiwan University next year. I stayed with a friend, and got to see a bunch of other friends who either lived in L.A. or were around for the weekend. I just got back yesterday morning, after taking the red-eye flight out of LAX, so I'm still a little weird from lack of sleep, but I went to work today and got through it okay.
In that same vein, I got my visa for Taiwan, so I can actually get into the country. The biggest issue now is finding housing, and more and more, it's looking like I'll just have to search for apartments once I get to Taipei. Being at the orientation actually got me more excited about going, because everything I heard about Taipei just sounded awesome. I'm looking forward to being in a proper big city, not a sprawling mega-city like Los Angeles.
My personal computer is infected with massive amounts of viruses, so I'm writing this on my parents' computer. I just dropped my computer off at the tech guy today, and hopefully it will be alright when I get it back on Tuesday. Unfortunately, I think I will have to do away with my blog at LiveJournal, since that's apparently where I picked up all the viruses. I mainly use that blog as a writing journal, and it's kind of a nice way to have a community of writers that are more international, so it's kind of frustrating to have to give that up. But my dad is saying that perhaps after a few weeks, whatever viruses are on the site will get picked up by the system's firewall or security system and just go away. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
And, in football news, Juve have more or less called off their pursuit of Xabi Alonso, so I feel like I can breathe a bit easier. There are a few rumors bouncing around about Arsenal maybe showing some interest, but I can't see that happening. I think if Juve have cooled on the deal, Rafa is just going to keep Alonso on and maybe scrap the deal with Barry to focus on bringing in Robbie Keane instead. Liverpool are back in preseason training, and it sounds like the younger players are showing some good stuff, albeit against lower level competition. It's great to see Daniel Agger back on the pitch, and I'm just super excited to see the Reds backline give opponents hell this season. Agger, Carragher and Skrtel = toughness epitomized. I've found a pub in Taipei that shows Reds games, so you can be sure that, no matter the time difference, I will be watching as many matches as possible this coming season.
Last Saturday I flew to Los Angeles to attend an orientation at the Taiwanese Consulate for this scholarship I received from them to study Chinese at National Taiwan University next year. I stayed with a friend, and got to see a bunch of other friends who either lived in L.A. or were around for the weekend. I just got back yesterday morning, after taking the red-eye flight out of LAX, so I'm still a little weird from lack of sleep, but I went to work today and got through it okay.
In that same vein, I got my visa for Taiwan, so I can actually get into the country. The biggest issue now is finding housing, and more and more, it's looking like I'll just have to search for apartments once I get to Taipei. Being at the orientation actually got me more excited about going, because everything I heard about Taipei just sounded awesome. I'm looking forward to being in a proper big city, not a sprawling mega-city like Los Angeles.
My personal computer is infected with massive amounts of viruses, so I'm writing this on my parents' computer. I just dropped my computer off at the tech guy today, and hopefully it will be alright when I get it back on Tuesday. Unfortunately, I think I will have to do away with my blog at LiveJournal, since that's apparently where I picked up all the viruses. I mainly use that blog as a writing journal, and it's kind of a nice way to have a community of writers that are more international, so it's kind of frustrating to have to give that up. But my dad is saying that perhaps after a few weeks, whatever viruses are on the site will get picked up by the system's firewall or security system and just go away. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
And, in football news, Juve have more or less called off their pursuit of Xabi Alonso, so I feel like I can breathe a bit easier. There are a few rumors bouncing around about Arsenal maybe showing some interest, but I can't see that happening. I think if Juve have cooled on the deal, Rafa is just going to keep Alonso on and maybe scrap the deal with Barry to focus on bringing in Robbie Keane instead. Liverpool are back in preseason training, and it sounds like the younger players are showing some good stuff, albeit against lower level competition. It's great to see Daniel Agger back on the pitch, and I'm just super excited to see the Reds backline give opponents hell this season. Agger, Carragher and Skrtel = toughness epitomized. I've found a pub in Taipei that shows Reds games, so you can be sure that, no matter the time difference, I will be watching as many matches as possible this coming season.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
A little heads up: computer virus
Picked up a nasty, nasty spyware on my computer yesterday, and spent a good part of the day screwing with my antivirus software (Norton). Judging by the information I looked up on the net, this spyware (Sakora.exe) is a variant of a Trojan horse, and was so new that a number of forums had only seen it once or twice, and the official Norton website didn’t have it in its definitions. I guess I was one of the lucky ones who got an early hit, and I have no idea where I got it—I hadn’t opened any e-mail attachments or visited any new sites.
I couldn’t delete the damn file off my hard drive, and was getting all set to fork over three hundred dollars or so for a tech service to strip my computer down and nuke the thing. Then my dad suggested I take a look at the Processes running in my Task Manager. Lo and behold, there was the spyware, plugging away, no doubt digging through my computer for credit card numbers, bank account info, etc. I ended the process, then went back into my Program Files and was able to delete the damn thing.
So, if for some reason you have the same luck as me and find this thing on your computer (you’ll probably get a few weird popup things, or your antivirus will start going berserk, look for it in your Program Files), go to your Task Manager (ctrl+alt+del), click on Processes, and End Sakora.exe. Then go back to your Program Files and delete the thing. Simple fix, but it appears to have worked for me.
I couldn’t delete the damn file off my hard drive, and was getting all set to fork over three hundred dollars or so for a tech service to strip my computer down and nuke the thing. Then my dad suggested I take a look at the Processes running in my Task Manager. Lo and behold, there was the spyware, plugging away, no doubt digging through my computer for credit card numbers, bank account info, etc. I ended the process, then went back into my Program Files and was able to delete the damn thing.
So, if for some reason you have the same luck as me and find this thing on your computer (you’ll probably get a few weird popup things, or your antivirus will start going berserk, look for it in your Program Files), go to your Task Manager (ctrl+alt+del), click on Processes, and End Sakora.exe. Then go back to your Program Files and delete the thing. Simple fix, but it appears to have worked for me.
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