Tel-Aviv Women's Rugby

So apparently I've seriously neglected to inform anyone that I've joined the Tel-Aviv Women's Rugby team.

haha. whoops.

I joined the team about a month and a half ago. Here's a link to their website: www.tawomensrugby.com

I love it! The girls are awesome and the team is pretty good. They haven't been able to field a full team so they play 7's around Israel and also travel to Europe to play in 7's tournaments.

Practice is pretty hilarious because (I can't decide), either the coach loves me or hates me - he stands and SCREAMS my name at every opportunity. Last week we were doing a set of 200m sprints. And after about 2 sprints, he decides to play "cat and mouse" and run in front of us so that we have something to try and catch up to...and the whole time he's screaming "Come on Candace! Catch me! CANDACE!! Go!" Last night...same thing, and this time 2 of the Sackler girls that I recruited watched the whole thing and were pretty entertained by it all. You'd have to observe a whole practice to appreciate this.

The team is loads of fun. A few weeks ago, we had a guest coach from France lead practice. The following Saturday we were invited to watch the England vs. France rugby match at the French Embassy in Tel-Aviv. Appropriately, the French provided bottles and bottles of French wine for the match - I was in heaven. There was media present so there's a video summary of the event (it's in French, English, and Hebrew) http://www.sport5.co.il/lobbyvideo.aspx?FolderID=59&docID=26550&lang=he . Most of the women that you see in the video are on the team. Afterwards, we all went and got sushi. And I was taught the Israeli way to go out: Going out the night before work/school/etc until 2am...totally normal. There was one time I tried to go to a reggae/hip hop/dancehall party at 11pm and the place wasn't even open yet. haha.

Also, playing with the team has allowed me to get out of the Sackler bubble (it's really easy to a) never leave campus and b)only associate with Sackler students, particularly those in your class), and to learn some Hebrew. I dig it.