Day 8 -Second Day of the Sanix Tournament

Today was another hot day in Fukuoka. We stayed near our hotel in the morning and then caught the train and shuttle bus back to the Global Arena to catch the second game for Earl Marriott. Today they played a team from a high school in Osaka, Japan. This team is the Japanese National champs!! We know that our boys are a good team in Surrey but here, every team is huge, experienced and good!! Earl Marriott played their best and were awesome today. They had to battle very hard and were very strong against this team. The score was quite close in the first half and then our team made a few mistakes and the Osaka team was so quick to score when we did. No matter what the scoreboard says, when Earl Marriott leaves Japan, they will be a much better team. They are learning so much from playing against these strong teams! And the experience that they are getting is incredible.

If anyone would like to watch the boys play, here is a link to the first half of yesterday's game. If you would like to watch more, let me know and I can send you more links...Can you see Nick score his try?

http://youtu.be/brCu59jLjvA

The final score in today's game was 31-0...here is your challenge of the day...what are all the possible ways that Osaka could have received 31 points?...remember it is 5 points for a try and 2 points for a conversion kick. Teams can also get 3 points if they make a penalty kick (this is just like the problem solving problem we did with the stamps and coins...you can do it).

 Heading onto the field to play the game.

 Nick is in the middle. He plays a position called hooker. The two teams join together to make a scrum. Each team links together with each other and then the referee says, "crouch, touch, set" and the 2 teams come together, head to head. Then the team that has possession of the ball has one of their players called the scrum-half put the ball in the middle of the scrum, along a tunnel on the ground between the 2 teams. It is the hooker's job to "hook" the ball with his (or her...girls play rugby too!) feet to get it backwards to a player outside of the scrum. Both teams are trying to hook the ball so you have to be strong. Once it is outside of the scrum, the team can pick it up and start passing and try to move forward down the field.

This is a scrum.

 Nick after the game...he is pretty sweaty and stinky!

 A photo with Earl Marriott and the team from Osaka, after the game. Our Earl Marriott boys brought 6 extra green and orange tye-dye t-shirts with them. After each game, they give one of their t-shirts to a player on the other team. These t-shirts are VERY popular here and everyone wants to play Canada so that they can get one of the t-shirts. In the evenings, the teams all hang out together outside of their dorms. Some of the teams trade things that they have brought with them and they are all trying to get these t-shirts but the boys do not have extras to trade!

 Earl Marriott after the game...they played so well, even  though they lost!!

 Go Canada Go!!!

 Nick was so stinky and sweaty!!!

 Some of the boys heading back to the dorm after the game.

 Nick

 Yeah Canada!

 Some of the boys needed to put ice on their sore parts.

 Inside the dorm...they even hung up a few things.

Nick again, see you tomorrow!

Day 7 - First day of the rugby tournament

Today was the first day of Nick's rugby tournament. We got up bright and early to travel to the Global Arena where the boys are staying and playing. But first I had some breakfast.

My bento box breakfast...I wasn't too sure what the slimy, squiggly thing in the bottom right hand corner was...

You seem to get rice with every meal! And miso soup for breakfast was interesting too! What did you have for breakfast today?

A pipe band from Scotland played at the Opening Ceremonies for the tournament.

The Earl Marriott team during the Opening Ceremonies. Nick is number 2.

There are 8 boys' teams from Japan, and teams representing Canada, England, Korea, New Zealand, France, South Africa, Russia, and Australia. Can you find all of these countries on a map? 

There are also 4 girls' teams playing in a 7s tournament.

Earl Marriott Secondary representing Canada at the Sanix World Youth Tournament 2013 in Fukuoka, Japan.

The teams marching forward as they are introduced.

Japanese representative giving the player's oath during the Opening Ceremonies.

This is the humungous team from England that our boys have to play on Wednesday...yikes!

Representative from New Zealand giving the player's oath in English!

The boys leaving the Opening Ceremonies. That is Nick at the end.

The boys chillin' in the stands after the Opening Ceremonies...actually, it was really hot there so it is more likely that they were sweatin'!

Don and Nick

Don, me and Nick!

The tournament schedule for the first day on the stadium field. There are 3 fields...one is grass and the other 2 are turf. Have you ever played a sport on a turf field? It is hard to play rugby on artificial turf because it hurts when you slide on it. Our team gets to play their first 3 games on grass...yahoo for them!

This is a map of the Global Arena where the boys are staying and playing. This place is huge and out in the middle of nowhere. We are staying in an area of Fukuoka called Hakata. We had to take a 40 minute train and then a 20 minute bus to get to the field. There are beautiful grounds where people can come to play and picnic. There are shops, restaurants and all sorts of playing facilities for numerous sports.

The dorm where some of our boys were staying with the Australian team.

Along one of the walkways, they had these boxes filled with flowers. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that each one was the flag of one of the countries represented at the tournament...very cool! This is Canada's.

Japan's flower flag. Which other countries' flag can you see below?

Getting ready to start their first game against the team from Nagasaki, Japan. Can you find Nagasaki on a map? I will give you a hint, look south of Fukuoka.

The team from Nagasaki, Japan that our team played in their first game.

The first game begins

 Nick is #2

 This is called a line out. The Nagasaki team got to throw the ball in. He thrower has to throw it right down the middle of the 2 teams but his team knows where he is going to throw it after he gives them a special word that only his team know what it mean, like a secret code.

 Nick's friend, #8, gets the ball and he is going to pass it to Nick, #2.

 Nick has the ball...

and he scores! Nick gets the first try (goal) of the tournament! A try is worth 5 points and then the team's kicker tries to kick it through the posts. If he makes it, the team gets another 2 points. Our kicker got this one!

Nick's team ended up losing the game but they played really well against this strong Nagasaki team. Our team got 14 points in total. Who can figure out how they got their points?

One of the favourite things that I have done on this trip is try to connect with people. It is so easy to say hello, or Konnichiwa (Kon-ee-chee-wa, to people. Everyone here is so friendly!

 On the shuttle bus home, I started talking to a young man who was sitting next to me. He did not speak much English but he and his two friends sitting behind him, tried really hard to have a conversation with us. I was trying to ask if the field around us were growing rice. I am not sure about everything they said and they did not understand everything I was saying but it was so cool that people who speak 2 different languages tried to communicate. It turned out that there were more of their friends at the back of the bus and they were all taking the same train as us. One of the other dads, Tino, and I continued our attempts at communicating all the way back to Hakata station. It was such a fun experience and they were such nice boys!!! They were from a school called Chikushi High School.

Day 6 - Kyoto to Hakata (Fukuoka)

Today was another travel day. We had to leave Kyoto to go to Fukuoka, where we will stay for the rest of our trip. We took another bullet train (Shinkansen) today. This time we actually had to transfer from one train to another. The first train took us to Shin Osaka and it only took about 25 minutes and then the next train took about 2 1/2 hours. Who can guess what I did on the long journey?

 Our train coming into the station.

 The people getting off the train.

 Here comes our next train to Hakata station.

 We arrived at the Hakata station in Fukuoka and went to check into our hotel but we were too early so we went to wander around the area. In the train station, there are 10 floors. The top 2 floors are filled with little restaurants, serving a huge variety of different types of food. On the bottom 8 floors, it is filled with small shops and big department stores.

 These people were taking a class to learn how to make their own ukulele. It only cost 1000 Yen!

 This girl was finger painting on a canvas bag. This looked like fun too!

 In the busy train station.

Just outside of the station they were having a rose sale. There were many roses and other plants for sale. A few people were selling crafts as well.

Roses for sale

They were having an auction to sell some of the rose plants.

Beautiful rose!

Later in the day we decided to try the subway system in Hakata. It turns out that it is a lot less complicated than the subway in Tokyo! There are only 3 or 4 lines. We had read about an area that was recommended for tourists so we bought a day pass and hopped on the subway. It turns out that we only had to go 2 stops and then, once we got there and walked around a bit, we discovered that we were only one kilometer away from our hotel so we didn't need to use the day pass after all! We had a beautiful walk along the Hakata-gawa, which means Hakata River. Who knows who to say river in another language?

The floral shop in Hakata was selling a bouquet of a dozen teddy bears and roses.

Another teddy bear bouquet.

Night views of Hakata-gawa, which means Hakata River

Another view of Hakata.

Don forgot his baseball hat so he was thinking of this as an alternative.

A modern neoprene rice field hat (or sugegasa). How many different languages can you find for the word hat? Send me your answers!!

We found a huge shopping centre called Canal City Hakata. This was the view from across one part of the centre..

The Japan Rail train station at Hakata. It is about a 6-7 minute walk to our hotel.

Don enjoyed the Okonomiyaki that we had last night so much that we found another restaurant right beside the train station. The Okonomiyaki are also known as Japanese pancakes. They are delicious and made from flour, water and cabbage. We were sitting at a counter right in front of the grill where this chef was cooking them. He would start with a layer of the cabbage, flour and water mixture, then he would add an egg, or seafood, or cheese. Then another layer of cabbage mixture and cook for about 10-12 minutes until golden brown. Finally, he added some Okonomiyama sauce, which is a sweet thick soya type sauce and cut it into pieces and put it on a plate! Don and I shared one, along with some chicken stir-fry and some fried rice and the whole meal cost about $17. I think we will be going back!