Free Post: McMinnville, Oregon

“Wow,” I said walking out of the airplane into the airport lobby with an I-can’t-believe-I-am-actually-here face on at about 11:00 P.M., “this place is so huge”. We were there for the regional tryouts for region 4. Region 4 has about 12 states in it. I first made the state team for my age group (just like all of the other people on my team) and know I am here. My 18 teammates and I grab our luggage, and mine was the easiest to find because it was bright blue like shave ice on a summer day. After we got our luggage we got to stroll through a gigantic revolving door, but that’s not the best part. We had to wait for a long, boring hour.

The bus finally arrived and we boarded the bus. We drove for about 20 minutes to one of the many hotels. We crashed there for a night and ordered some Boston’s Pizza. The next day we took a 2-hour bus ride to McMinnville. For most of the ride I was sleeping and listening to my iPod shuffle, but near the end of the ride we passed something out of the ordinary. It was a huge building with the Spruce Goose in it. The Spruce Goose is huge airplane made out of wood made by Howard Houghes. We only passed by it so I only got a quick glance. Once we got to the actual dorms it was close to 2 o’clock P.M. Then we found out our dorm buddies.

My coach handed out the keys and I found out that I was dorming with Paul and Kody. We were the only boys that had three people in our dorm room. Everybody else had two people per room. Our dorm was also the biggest (because we had more people). Our room had a normal bed and a bunk bed. The bunk bed was kind of scary because the top bunk was only supported by a small piece of plywood. I slept on the bottom bunk.

After we all got settled in our dorm, it was time for dinner. Our coach made us strut in two lines so we looked more “professional”. Once we got into the dining room, I got an orange tray and went for the pizza line. I got a greasy cheese pizza and a side of hot French fries for lunch. I sat next to my team and we looked at our competition.

They all looked huge and strong and very good at soccer. One guy was even staring me down. It was pretty scary because he was like the biggest guy on his team and I am one of the smallest on our team. After dinner was done it was time for some fun soccer practice. We got on the field at around six or seven and went for two hours. We mainly did possession drills and it wasn’t that hard of a practice. After practice we took a short walk back to our cozy dorms and had a good night rest.

The next day we had a big meeting with all of the teams at this camp and the coaches. This meeting was just a welcoming greeting and it took a long time. It was basically the region coaches talking to all of the teams about what could happen if you made the region team. It was kind of boring though. My team was close to the front so I had to make sure that the coaches didn’t see me bored out of my shoes. “Finally,” growled my teammate David, “that’s over. It only took like forever!”

That day we had two more practices, one right after the meeting and another two hours after lunch. Lunch was still the same and had the same old greasy pizza but not the fries this time. “You guy’s can’t be eating all of this junk food. It’s bad for you. Ohh, and no ice cream,” shouted my coach. This didn’t make me angry because at home I only have ice cream like every other week. The other guys on my team were whining and mad about coach’s decision.

That night after our long and arduous practice, my roommates and I played a good game of cards and then it was lights out at 10:00. After we closed the door and had our lights out, we still talked but we stopped playing cards.
The next day was different. We got to have our first game! It was against Arizona. The game was very different from all of my games in Hawaii. There was way more possession on the field and some of the Arizona kids looked as though they could have been playing professional. We didn’t lose that bad though. The final score was Arizona 2, Hawaii 1. We then shook their hands and then had a talk with our coach “You guys had a lot of chances.” my coach went on “ You just can’t put the ball away in the back of the net. I think we should have won that game.”

At lunch again guess what I had? Some grease pizza + a side of salad and three cups of water. We had to stay hydrated so everybody was drinking about that much. The afternoon practice was mainly shooting and dribbling.

A couple of days later something terrible happened. I had a bad case of my asthma. It was in the middle of the New Mexico game so I had to come out of the game and take a couple of blows from my inhaler. Then once I felt better I went back into the game. Then guess what happened. I had another asthma attack. I had to come out again and get a blow of my inhaler. This time the trainer came over to me and asked me if I was all right and if I needed medical attention. I said I was fine but I didn’t go back into that game. The final score of the New Mexico game was, New Mexico 3, Hawaii 2. Our goalie Chris made some bad mistakes and I think the score should have been 2 to 1 us.

Our next game was against Alaska. I thought they didn’t even play soccer up there. I found out that they didn’t only play soccer; I found out that they play soccer well. We played hard this game. We didn’t give up till the whistle blew. The final score was, Hawaii 3, Alaska 1. We celebrated after the game at the dining hall and our coach finally let us have ice cream! But something happened to the ice cream maker so still nobody could have ice cream.

The trip was coming to a close and I had had a great time. We had to wake up at 4 o’clock so we could catch the bus. The bus was 45 minutes late so we almost didn’t make our flight. We ran into the terminal and jumped on the plan. We had a great time in Oregon and I will never forget that experience.

I wrote about this experience because this past week, I just finished up my State try-outs for ODP and it just made me remember about the last trip I went on for ODP. I hope I can make the state team again so I can have more great experiences with my comrades.