My Blog

I am not a great writer. Never have been. So earlier this summer when I was presented with the idea of having a blog, I kind of wrote it off (pun intended). It almost reminded me of a task while on vacation to Wyoming when I was in the 4^th grade. Back then, I was not a great writer. Heck, I couldn’t say that I was a good writer, let alone a writer at all. My mom made me keep a daily journal to practice the art of reading and writing which I was not proficient at yet (embarrassing, I know, but hey, I finally learned and look where I’m at now!). Back then, I thought the task was stupid. But, while stumbling upon the journal during one of many ‘clean out the library days,’ I was able to read about days I had forgotten and I was able to see what a younger Addie thought was important to write about. So... here we go!

Since I decided to act on a piece of advice in starting this blog, I am going to share all of the advice I was given when people found out I was going to play basketball overseas. These are in no particular order of importance. 

1. start a blog
2. learn the language
3. be a good teammate
4. don’t forget to be a tourist
5. have fun
6. pave the way
7. represent PA and Princeton Ballers
8. find good gifts to bring back
9. don’t break the law
10. don’t lose your passport
11. try new food/like new food
12. stay in touch with people
13. always be aware of your purse
14. don’t look like a tourist
15. be proud to be American
16. take lots of pictures
17. write things down
18. crush it on the bball court
19. travel travel travel... and come back with zero dollars left
20. you can take the dougie anywhere 
21. become more euro (toms, skinny jeans, cappuccino sipping, dubstep dancing, (insert anything Bethany this is ‘euro’ here), etc.)

There's the advice, or all that I could remember of it. So in sticking to that advice, here is Entry 1. 

Day 1: Start a Blog/Write things down

My first flight from Philadelphia to Frankfurt went fairly well. I was in a middle seat, which was at first my worst nightmare for a 7 hour flight. But the travel gods decided to give me a break, and the man in the other middle seat next to me decided to move leaving his seat empty and his leg room all to me. To my left was a German girl who was my age and very interesting to talk to. She had just spent the summer in San Francisco working as a au pair. The flight went by surprisingly quick while listening to music and watchingThe Lincoln Lawyer. However, I didn’t sleep much, thanks to the man with a raspy voice in a row behind yelling about the seat cushions and the Bible (not sure how the second topic came from the first). Before I knew it, we had landed in Frankfurt. After about 30 minutes of wandering around the airport before finding my terminal, I found out my second flight was delayed, and this blog began. 

Day 1: Learn the language 

My second flight finally touched down. I walked right to the baggage claim, took my stuff, and walked out of the airport where my teammate, Michele, and another teammate’s mom were waiting for me. I was greeted with hugs and we hopped in the car to drive to my flat. On the way there I told them I would really like to learn the language. With a giggle, my new teammate told me that out of all of the places I could go and learn the language, Luxembourg might be the most difficult. I quickly found out that their native language, Luxembourgish, was only spoken, and that the children don’t even learn it in school. Instead, French and German are taught in schools. Since Luxembourg is a fairly wealthy country, much of their workforce is from outside of the country, and I was told to probably try to learn French, as it is a much more useful language. 

I was then given my first language tutorial. A word sounding like “moy yen” means hello, and my name “addie” means goodbye. In fact, my full name together sounds like a common phrase over here... Addie Micir sounds like the words to say “goodbye, thank you.”

We finally made it to my flat where I put my suitcases down, and then I was shown the gym and taken to lunch. My flat is very comfy, and the mother of my teammate even stocked the fridge and gave me all the necessary supplies she thought I needed. It was very, very thoughtful of her, and all I kept thinking was that this was probably all the good karma my family received from taking care of my Princeton teammates for four years. 

It was in the fridge where I received my next language lesson. By trial and error I am finding out what is in my fridge and writing down the names of the things that I like so I can find them again! 

After the ‘lesson’ I took a 4 hour nap and had to wake up fresh and ready for practice... I’ll keep you posted on how that goes.