Show & Tell: Sports

Erica's second theme is Sports: Do you have any favourite sport? Do you practise any sports? Is there any sport you absolutely do not like? Do you prefer doing sports yourself or watching it on TV?

I'm not going to answer those exact questions, instead I'll tell you about some sports that have featured in my life and still do in some way.


Badminton

Image from bendigo2004.thecgf.com

I really associate my childhood summers with playing badminton at our summer house or in the garden (belonging to the house where my parents still live). I played either with my dad or my friend Malin*. I can't really remember playing with anyone else. Well, when I was really young I think I played with my grandfather at the summer house. I did play a little bit in school as well, you know, once a year when it was friluftsdag, i.e. "sports day".

These days I don't play very often at all, only a few leisurely games in my parents' garden in summer, but last winter Peter and I started going to the university sports hall on Saturdays or Sundays to play, a habit I hope we take up again this winter. Actually, I did play indoors in similar style when I was living in Brussels back in autumn/winter 2002/03 (against some hardcore Danish badminton players), but before that I had hardly played between leaving school and last year.

Tying into Petchie's recent post on right- and left-handedness, I can proudly tell you that I can play badminton with both hands! I'm right-handed but for some reason I can play badminton pretty well with my left too. I can't really remember how it happened. I think I just started doing it at a young age to make the game a little bit more fun and interesting. I don't have the same strength with my left so I can't smash and my lefty serve is pretty bad, but I can play (when it comes to tennis I can play a little with my left, but not as well). Actually, when I think about it I played brännboll (rounders) as a left-handed person for years until someone told me that I was "doing it wrong". So I can still do both (though I haven't played rounders for years so maybe I have lost the skill?).

Football

But the closest relationship I have had to a sport is that with football. I started playing when I was nine years old - I still remember the yellow-orange jumpsuit I wore to my first practice. I started playing for the team Västertälje before joining (or maybe we merged?) with Tälje, both Södertälje teams (none of which exist anymore it seems?). Tälje was a club with girls' and women's team only, which had its advantages and disadvantages. I continued playing until I was 16 and in upper secondary school. By then I had acquired other interests, especially politics, and I didn't really have time to practice as many times a week I would have had to do in order to get to play matches on the weekend. Also - and here's the main drawback of playing for a women's only club, not to mention being a woman in a man's world, which football was then and still is today, unfortunately - it's not terribly motivating to practise on lower quality grounds (read: gravel pitch) and worse times than 12-year boys. So I quit.

I have lots of fun memories from my football years - especially the trips we made to Oslo for Norway Cup and to Gothenburg for Gothia Cup. On one of those trips I slept next to a girl who talked in her sleep and scared the crap out of me. I was pretty new on the team so I understand why they put me next to her! :) But I also remember pressure and the feeling you have when you don't think you're good enough for the team, or that you could be if your heart was 110% in it but it isn't really. So the decision to quit** was right even if to this day I can still miss playing and often become nostalgic and remember the good times.

But my football career wasn't completely over yet, as you can see in the picture above. I have actually been known to play once in a while over the years. I never played at university in Stockholm, Uppsala or London (unless I have completely blocked out the memory..?) but at Oxford I played both a little bit of indoors five-a-side and some regular football, and then as goalie, which is not really my thing but what do you do when your friends are begging! So I'm the one in the yellow shirt above in case you haven't spotted me already!

And in my current job I have played once a year when we have our traditional game against the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (which I have written about earlier)! Several times I have contemplated with the idea of joining a Korpen (= local, amateur) team but in the end I always decide that no, I have other things to do. A dose of football once in a while suffices! And I will always watch football of course! Even though I have played myself I have never been much of a football supporter - when I lived in the UK I watched a lot of matches at the pub but never actually went to watch a live game (I wish I had though) - but I watch most of the Swedish national team's matches (including the one against Denmark two days ago, which in all likelihood means Sweden won't qualify for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa), and sometimes local games, mostly on TV but sometimes live.

When I was growing up, even though I played football, I preferred watching ice hockey. This seems really strange to me now because nowadays I find it rather boring. Football provides much more "eye candy" as well. You can see the players' bodies, which is nice considering they are usually really fit, but also because I want to see them playing, their technique, etc. Ice hockey players are covered in protective gear and layers and (because of it) they are all sweaty and disgusting. And they seem to have either no teeth left or their teeth covered in snus (Swedish snuff). The only exception seems to be Henrik Lundkvist!


Lastly I want to tell you about a new sport that entered my life about three and a half years ago when I started my present job...

Corridor Cricket

Image from Getty Images

This is what you need:

• an English-speaking workplace (preferably)
• a batsman and a plastic bat
• a bowler and a ball (soft version)
• something that works as wickets
• a long corridor
• at least two fielders

You can then opt to follow simple or elaborate rules. Corridor cricket is usually played at around 4.30pm and it's really difficult to get out of it if the boss has already spotted you at your desk. Everyone must bat and bowl respectively at least once. It's fun and a time for bonding.

Actually, cricket is not brand new for me. At Oxford I did attend one cricket practice, but after that one time I decided it wasn't for me. I would much rather play baseball ,which is actually happening, both in terms of playing and watching (read: one game doesn't take three days!). Corridor cricket can be pretty exciting though, especially when it turns out some of your colleagues are of rather competitive character!

* I have similar memories of playing tennis. Malin and I used to play on the parking lot or against the wall of our block of flats. I played with my dad's old wooden racket. All that playing, again, matched with playing in a real tennis hall once a year on sports day, apparently gave me sufficient skills - or maybe I'm just talented - because earlier this year when Peter and I went to the Canaries we played tennis almost every day and I was pretty good! :)

** After I left the team I went to one or two rugby practices - as one of the girls from the team who had also left started playing rugby instead - but it wasn't really my thing. A bit too rough for me!