The First Day of Volleyball All Over Again

It's my third blog post today!  Lucky you! ;)

Today I rode my bike to volleyball for the first time.  It was really fun, and for some inexplicable reason I felt really cool.  Everyone bikes everywhere here, and I wish we could do that at home.

I got to volleyball about ten minutes early and was getting ready next to another girl from my team.  Then the coach came in and changed everything with these words: "You're going to play with the women today."  The women, as in the adults, as in the best.  Gasp sputter gulp.


So I followed him into the other gym and stood awkwardly on the side and watched everyone else get ready.  The women's team is about fifteen-year-olds to twenty-five-year-olds.  I was the youngest and the smallest.

Then the coach of the women's team was like, "And the girl standing in the corner is Julia.  She's from America."  And then I was forced to step out and say hi to everyone.  People were really interested that I was from America and talked to me and asked me questions.  Everyone was really friendly.

The warm-up was sort of foriegn to me.  After a few laps around the gym, people kinds of clustered up and stretched.  Everyone was doing something similar but not quite the same.  I just pretty much stood there, clueless, until a girl helpfully told me what to do.  Then another girl invited me to join their stretching group, where they talked to me about America and volleyball.

Then, for a large portion of the time, we did a drill with three people that involved passing, setting and hitting.  Two girls (women?) invited me to join them.  I was seriously so grateful for everyone helping me out.  I wasn't even half bad at the drill! ;)

After that we did hitting lines for a while.  They do it a little differently than I'm used to in that someone behind you or in the line next to you throws the ball to the setter for you, so I was all sorts of confused at the beginning.  But once I figured it out and could actually focus on my hits, I was pretty darn good, if I do say so myself.  Obviously they weren't the evil laser hits of a few of the others, but they weren't epic failures that go limply flopping into the net.  One time, as I ducked under the net to go get my ball, I heard someone behind me say, "Hey, she's actually pretty good!"  You have no idea how good that made me feel.

Most of the time was then spent in a game situation.  Thankfully, they play with six players, and I was even semi-familiar with the type of rotation they were using!  I had some really good plays and some really stupid ones, but I think overall I was good.  Someone told me that I was really good for thirteen, and I'm definitely cool with being told that. :)

I think in the other group, I was the best one.  Although that can be fun, I'd rather be the worst in a better group because I can learn so much more.  And get used to the terrifying spikes of the girls and women, one in particular, so I can be better at that when I get back home too.  I'm pretty excited to play with the women!  Yes, they're big and bad and scary when it comes to volleyball, but I can learn from that, and everyone is really nice off the court.