Nine young men. Five nationalities. One spectacular day.
It was Saturday, May 26, 2007. Xavier High School, of Chuuk, Micronesia, had just completed its 52nd commencement ceremonies. With the end of the ceremony came a torrential downpour, adding volumes of water to an already soaked field in the centre of the school’s campus. Nine young men decided there could be nothing better to do then go sporting in the muck.
Greg, Tim, AJ and Chris from the United States, Nick and Paul from Australia, Nan from Japan, Marcos from Mexico and yours truly from Canada all decided that, given the lack of a frisbee (obviously the first choice of sport to be played in the wet mud), American football would be the sport of the day. Tackle, of course.
The field was probably 40 yards long, with a halfway marker that, if passed, gave you a first down. We played three downs before a turn-over, and disallowed quarterback rushes except once per set of downs you could do a blitz. Otherwise, you had to wait through ten Mississippis. All other rules were as normal. Only one on-side kick was attempted.
There was everything. There were running plays, throwing plays, interceptions, hard tackles, missed tackles, diving catches, diving misses, sprinting, jogging, walking. We only lost one player to injury (he was fine the next day) while we had an assortment of other small mishaps. Paul got a rock stuck in his heel, put he pulled it out. Marcos played with a wrapped up hand. My face got planted into the ground by Chris, who is a foot taller than myself (people keep asking “what happened to your face?” So I tell them). In short, all very manly.
But seriously, it was awesome. Rain, mud, slipping and sliding and just so, so much fun. I can safely say that I’ve never had more fun playing a game of football in my life. I hope that we all remember that when it is raining it is then that we should go outside, and run around in the mud! Yippee!
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