On Wednesday, I found a bar with many large TVs and many channels, including 3 different Olympic channels, so when it came time for the Canada/Slovakia semi-final on Friday night, I knew where I was headed. I told a few people about it, and the event snowballed until a whole whack of us showed up for the game ("whack" being a scientific term meaning between 10-20 people, composed of 1-4 Canadians, 5-12 Americans, and 3-9 Colombians).
After finding a corner of the bar to settle ourselves, the waiter turned the channel to the women's gold medal curling match, which I had been watching while waiting for the others to arrive. This was instantly met with groans from the Americans, who requested a change to hockey. I didn't really want to argue with them, so I held my tongue, but eventually they realized there was no hockey on - the USA/Finland semi-final had been played in the afternoon, and Canada/Slovakia wasn't until 9:30. So eventually, when it became clear that nobody was paying attention to the TV, I sneakily got it changed back to curling.
At first, nobody except me was paying attention, but after a while one of the Colombianos got curious and started asking me questions. This led to the Americans tuning in a bit more, and making jokes about how weird/dumb curling is. Many of these jokes, while derisive, were actually in the form of genuine questions, and by being able to answer them, I was able to get the Americans truly interested in the game. By the end, they were fully invested and even sort of understood it, and since it was such an exciting game (by curling standards), I think I may have made some converts.
After the curling match ended, we had a short break before the hockey game started, but when it did, everyone was rapt, since that was what we had all come for. Once again, I was the focus of many questions about the game, though this time the questions came exclusively from the Colombians. And once again I was able to make a convert, my co-worker Mario, who was hooked by the physicality of the game. He didn't really follow the puck movement and didn't understand many of the strategies, but every time there was a bone-crunching body-check against the boards, Mario was on his feet cheering.
I'll be heading back in 2 hours for the final. GO CANADA GO!
Nice work, honey. You are not alone in convert-makin': http://www.cbc.ca/olympics/curling/story//2010/02/26/spo-nytimes-curling-wallstreet.html?ref=rss
ReplyDeleteI heard the Cndn guy being interviewed on As It Happens early in the week; it was hilarious. He said people were showing up at his office in a steady stream with questions, and that he'd had to hold quite a few info workshops. And he's putting out the idea of getting the real thing going in Manhattan.