Monday morning

Monday was great! After breakfast we (boys and girls) took our team bus into the center of Amsterdam. From there we split up; the girls went to Ann Frank's house and the boys headed into the bowels of the city. The girls did not actually make it into Ann Franks home, but they saw the outside. Then the girls went to see a "haunted house".

After that we all headed to Ajax soccer stadium. This stadium is enormous! All 52,000 seats were filled with screaming fans. Ajax was playing against Heracles. It was a great game. Ajax scored just 3 minutes into the game. And it was really interesting to watch the fights that broke out in the stands (I never thought Coach Chris could throw a punch like that!)

The final score was 5 -1, Ajax. All the kids were excited. After the game there were fireworks in the stadium. Cooool! Unfortunately this other team (PSV) won their game, so Ajax ended up in 2nd place, and PSV won the championship. So we all headed back to our bus and headed south for our next destination. The bus was going to drop the ladies off in Eindhoven, while the boys continued south to Maastricht.

As our bus was headed south, we saw a huge line of buses ahead of us. We ended up passing these buses and saw they were filed with PSV fanatics. There must have been 30 of these huge buses in a convoy. We could see people drinking and dancing in the buses. Some of our boys took their Ajax scarves and hats and pressesd them against our bus windows. When the PSV fans saw our Ajax stuff, they immediately smiled and pointed up with their middle fingers. All our kids roared!!!

We dropped the girls off in Eindhoven at 6:30 pm, then continued to Maastrcht. We got there about 8 pm. The hostel kept its cafetreia open late to accomodate us. And, I have to be honest, this was the best meal so far! They had patsa and red sauce, and lots of chicken dishes, which was a big hit with the kids. And this hostel is a lot newer than the Amsterdam one. And this one is located on the edge of the river. It's beautiful. Dr. Charlie and I are roomates and our room overlooks the river. Phil and Chris are a bit jealous.

Its almost 9 am. Today we have practice from 9:30 - 11:30 and again from 2 - 4 pm. Then our first game is tonight. The boys are a bit nervous (a) to meet the Dutch trainer Leo, and (b) about tonight's game. Phil and Chris have a meeting wth all the boys every night, right before bed, and the message they gave the boys last night was "Don't worry about how good the other team is, just play your best." Sage advice!

The weather? Its 55 degrees and overcast.

I brought my movie camera and I plan to fim the game tonight.

Dr Charlie and I have taken many photos so far. The reason I haven't put any on the blog yet is I simply don't know how! But Charlie and I plan on attacking that challenge this evening, so hopefully you will have some pictures of your critters soon!

All the kids are healthy.

You should be VERY proud of your sons!

Jim