Most of the people we interact with locally have never heard of it. Shock! If you aren't from a "Commonwealth Nation" it's just not on your radar. That covers Americans, Japanese, Finns, Koreans, Filipinos, etc. I've even had to explain what it is to our boys.
Even though I knew it was an event restricted to only Commonwealth Nations, it was an international event that was such a part of growing up in Australia (Brisbane hosted it in 1982 and we went to the closing ceremony) that it was a bit of a shock to find that many of my friends here have never even heard of it.
Ah, it makes me a little homesick (and usually homesickness isn't on my list of emotions at all these days). Especially when I've had almost no one to talk to about the games.
It was, therefore, a treat on Saturday to meet a new CAJ family—the mum grew up in South Africa. She knew about the Commonwealth Games and was shocked when she could talk about the sport of netball without explanation, till our American friend sitting nearby needed explanation. (If you don't know what I'm talking about, check out this video by Netball America for an explanation, though I question the assertion that boys and girls/men and women can play on the same team. And this video for some play action from the games. I didn't know that the game actually originated in the US, at least according to the first video I've linked to here!) Netball—another big part of childhood as an Australian girl, but again, no one's heard of it! We do have one sports-mad Kiwi around who was in shock that Australia lost the final and that her country didn't even get a medal...but I digress.
As I watched my FB page fill up with photos of the games, I really wished I could have been there. Many of my friends went to at least one session.
Our son was. He was a volunteer last Wednesday as they prepared for the start of wrestling. He had to play the part of a wrestler, which included using the change rooms, doing two wrestles and "getting" a bronze medal! He also had a ticket to see live wrestling on Saturday.
I've seen this quote about on parenting:
Your heart . . . walking around outside your bodyIt's true. Even though he's thousands of miiles away now, and we don't know what he's doing on a daily basis anywhere near as much. A part of my heart is still there. So I kind-of experience the games vicariously (though didn't get much of a "report" from our son).
We didn't get to see any live videos (for some reason media licences didn't consider Commonwealth citizens living in Japan), but mostly have seen a few articles and results. So, a bit of a downer, really. Not that we've had much time to be watching sports. I was, however, particularly pleased to realise that, unlike the Olympic Games, the Commonwealth Games has all their disabled athletes competing at the same time as the rest. Totally integrated, including the medal count. Love it!
Well, it's been too long between posts and this is a messy one. Sorry. I'm not sure, actually that you're going to get many posts from me between now and May. I've got CAJ's Thrift Shop starting this evening (runs till Saturday), then on Sunday I'm off to Hokkaido for a five-day workshop. Maybe some short, photo-heavy ones?
*What is the Commonwealth Games?
Nicknamed the Friendly Games, it is a four-yearly international event. It's been held since 1930. Here's Wikipedia's definition of the Commonwealth of Nations:
The Commonwealth, is an intergovernmental organisation of 53 member states that are mostly former territories of the British Empire.
The Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games (GC2018) will welcome more than 6,600 athletes and team officials from 71 Commonwealth nations and territories. www.gc2018.com
There are various sets of rules for mixed gender netball teams. Some limit the balance of genders. Most seem to require that a substitution is with a player of the same gender. I have even heard that there are some groups that don't even require men to wear the skirts. How progressive!
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