After a long Day 1, I was ready for Day 2 which was Friday. We got up and ate breakfast, Mikko (defensive back) was picking us up to go lift at a health club called Motivus. The club was very nice but we only did a light workout because we had a game the next day. It was hard for me to believe that it was only going to be our third day in Finland and only going to one practice and we were already going to play a game.
We walked back after lifting and it was just a perfect day: 75 degrees and a light breeze, just perfect. We came back to the room and turned on the television. We only have about 12 channels and only two of them are in English. One of them is BBC news and the other is MTV Europe. MTV Europe is similar to MTV in the states but they play more music videos and I haven't seen any reality shows such as Real World or Road Rules yet, which is good.
Mikko also wanted to take us out to dinner that night, so we went to one of the nicest pizza places in town. Mikko brought one of his good friends Mikka also known as Rio. He plays corner back for our team, but he couldn't make practice on Thursday. It was pretty good and we talked a lot about football. I was suprised to find out how much the players here in Finland know about the NFL. I was pretty impressed. We also talked about our Trojans team and what we need to do to win the championship again. It seems like we are missing a lot of people this early in the season. We will get a tight end back from NFL Europe, a defensive lineman, and a running back from Norway. We also have two starters hurt at the moment. After the Trojans won the championship last year their top six defensive linemen quit. Last year's team won the championship for the first time in a long time, so I think they just wanted to win a championship before they quit. Our coach and some of the players are trying to talk some of those players into coming back for the end of the season.
Mikko also talked about me and Scott going with him and Rio on a cruise to Sweden. It sounds like it is a pretty good time and we will get to see Sweden and go on a huge cruise ship. We'll go on that probably sometime in July. He also said that he was going to drop off a Playstation 2 for us. I think that will really help kill some of the downtime we will have through out the week. So far the players are being really nice to us. Thomas, Mikko, and Rio have been great just helping us make the adjustment and making sure we have everything we need.
On the way out of the restaurant, Mikko stopped and talked to some guy that was walking in. Once we got to the car he told us that the man was Saku Koivu. He plays in the NHL as a captain for the Montreal Canadians. He is from Turku and comes back to Turku in the offseason. Finland's main sport is hockey and there are some other players from Finland that play in the NHL. So in just a few days I saw NHL player Saku Koivu and NBA legend Bill Walton.
Then Mikko and Rio took us around the city and showed us some places on the outskirts. We drove past the cruise ships we will take to Sweden and we drove to Turku's best golf course. I will be playing that sometime in the next couple of weeks, so I will let you know how it is. Then they dropped us off and we went to bed to get ready for the game the next day.