Italian Roller Hockey

Sun. Feb 26 - I finally got to sleep in today. I really needed it, but after I woke up I headed over to the library for a few hours to work on some homework and update my Blog of course. Matt called and asked me if I'd like to go to his roller hockey game down in Siracusa today. I had nothing else better to do and his roommate, Matt, had duty today. I told em yes and he picked me up around 1pm. We went and grabbed some Subway before we left to go meet his team at a stop off the highway. We had to follow them because this rink was in the middle of no where and the town is about 2 hours away. We got to the highway stop and I met all the people from his team. They are all locals from Messina and two of the guys are from Sigonella. Matt and this guy Kevin are the only Americans on the team. They were a really nice group of guys and their wives were really nice too. We started driving there and the ride was beautiful. The scenery of castles and ruins on the sides and tops of mountains is amazing. We got there in about 1 hour and 45 minutes and the rink was seriously hidden in this town. It was a giant dome made of strong plastic and supported my metal poles. The inside was nice and he said that this was one of the better roller hockey floors he's played on here in Italy. We had to sit around for an hour before the game was going to start and after he got dressed I went on the rink and practiced with him. I didnt do too bad I don't think. I'm excited to see Jeff start playing again when I get back home. The team they were playing against was a professional Italian team and they were called Team Noto. Noto is the town next to Siracusa. These guys were no joke, they were all young, tall, and really good at hockey. Matt's team is a group of older guys and it's just a hobby for them. They told me that they'd lose, but after the game I was surprised how bad they lost. Matt is the youngest at 19 and the only other younger guy is 21. Everyone else is over 35 years old. The game was really good eventhough they got killed by the other team. There was one huge fight and man was it crazy. I think 50% of the players got hurt throughout the game. Those Italians sure know how to put up a fight. It was funny and the crowd was going crazy. The game finally ended and the score was a disappointing 21-2. Oh well. They just like playing hockey and its free for them cuz they have some big sponsor guy that pays for everything. After the game, I tried to learn how to drive a stick-shift in the parking lot. I did alright, but it was soon time to go. The team was going to eat, but here in Italy that means a 2-hour affair. I wanted to get home since it was already late and I still had a lot of work to do. It was dark and this was going to be a guaranteed adventure getting back home. Neither of us know the roads very well and in the dark, everything becomes more complicated. We got lost in about a half hour in Siracusa because roads were being blocked off due to the Carnevale ceremony and some other religious events. That definitely didn't help. We eventually found some road signs pointing us to Augusta. I am kinda familiar with Augusta so I knew that if we got there we'd be in better hands. He works the cranes at Augusta too so we could figure it out, hopefully. About 2 1/2 hours later, we finally made it back to Sigonella. He dropped me off and I went over to the barracks and played Dance Dance Revolution for an hour before heading to bed. My legs were tired from sitting in a car all day, but the day was a lot of fun. I never thought I'd be watching a hockey game in Italy. That was really cool.