July 24, 2010
(Editor’s Note: Vanderbilt All-American Brittni Hamilton is competing at the World Youth Bowling Championships in Finland with the Junior Team USA.)
Tervehdys Suomi! (Greetings from Finland!).
Right now it is about 10:30 p.m. in Finland while only 2:30 p.m. back in Nashville. It is quite the time change to try and get used to, which we are all still struggling with it. I have been chosen to represent Junior Team USA in Finland for the World Youth Bowling Championships. It is the biggest youth bowling tournament in the world. It is such an honor to be able to bowl over here and represent my country!
We got into Helsinki Wednesday night (afternoon back in the States) and have had a busy couple of days so far. The trip getting here started off very interesting, an extremely long day with some bumps in the road with getting here. My journey started at 6 a.m. (EDT) when I flew from home in New York to Chicago and then from Chicago down to Dallas to meet up with the rest of my team and coaches. I got into Dallas at about 10:30 a.m. and our flight did not leave there until 6:30 pm, so it was a ton of fun sitting in the airport that long … NOT! But to pass the time we got some food at a sit down restaurant and played cards.
Our flight at 6:30 was to Paris, a wonderful nine-hour flight! It was a red eye but yet we all still struggled to get much sleep. Our flight got into Paris a little late, which was not good as we had very little time to catch our connecting flight to Helsinki. Needless to say we missed our connection and had to get a later flight. But I guess there could definitely be worse things then being stuck in Paris! We finally got to Helsinki at about 8 p.m. Wednesday night, totaling about a 31-hour travel day for me.
We went straight to the hotel, got some dinner and went to bed. Thursday morning we had an unofficial practice session to help us get loose and get used to the bowling center. We’re bowling in a very nice, 36 lane center. They built it large enough so that if it failed as a bowling center, it could then be used as a hockey arena. They have arena like seating behind the lanes making it very easy for spectators. We practiced for about an hour before we headed back to the hotel to change and freshen up a bit.
The coaches then took us to go walk around the city. The weather is awesome. The temperature is perfect with no humidity and it doesn’t ever get above about 85 degrees. Actually they are having the warmest weather that they have had in 50 years this week with temperatures in the 80s for consecutive days. Crazy! The city is very pretty – looks like a park everywhere you go. It is extremely clean and pleasant. We walked just to get out and fill some time. We later found out the coaches wanted to keep us busy just so that none of us would go to sleep in the middle of the afternoon. LOL! We walked for a few hours before coming back to the hotel. We ate some dinner and then hung out for a while before going to bed.
Today (Friday) we did some shopping and had another practice session in the morning before doing some more sightseeing. This morning we went to a flea market to do some shopping. We all got some little souvenirs and in the culture of the city. The people here have all been really nice to us; everyone that we have been in contact with speaks English. They also speak Finnish, which is extremely hard to understand. The Finnish words look and sound like nothing I have ever heard before and I don’t think that there is any chance of learning any Finnish before heading home.
Practice seemed like it went pretty well and we have our official practice tomorrow afternoon, which will be on the conditions that we will be bowling on throughout the week. After our practice we came back to the hotel to change and then headed off for some more sightseeing. This time we went down to the waterfront and took an hour and a half on a boat tour. It was a nice way to relax and also see some of the beautiful scenery of Finland. We ended the night by playing some cards and hanging out as a team.
Tomorrow is another busy day of practice and the opening ceremonies. Competition for the girls starts on Sunday with the singles portion. The boys singles are Monday. Tuesday is girls doubles, Wednesday is boys doubles, Thursday the first three games of team competition, Friday comes the second three games of team competition and next Sunday are the semifinals and finals of team competition. The Masters competition also starts that Sunday, which includes the top 16 boys and top 16 girls with the highest total in all bowling events. We end with the semi-finals and finals of the Masters competition and closing ceremonies. It will be a long week ahead for Team USA but I’m looking forward to it. I will do my best to keep everyone back home updated.
What team is this USA!