Copa Voleibol

We flashed back to our former life as we attended the Copa Voleibol Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo 2013 Tournament today. There is no way to accurately count the number of volleyball matches we watched during our years in the United States. None of those, however, were ever like what we experienced today.

Hot does not begin to describe the gym shown here. Even sitting perfectly still, we spectators had sweat rolling down our backs. The players, or course, were drenched, but there was no towels to wipe the floor after a roll or dive. The lighting was abysmal. I had to crank my ISO to extreme levels and even then it was much too dark to get good stop-action photos. Some teams had nice, matching uniforms, while others wore athletic shorts and t-shirts or board shorts and tank tops - many times on different players on the same team - without any kind of number. Vendors were selling food and beer in the stands (plastic chairs and metal bleachers), while I remember being allowed only water in the gym at U.S. tournaments.

Even with all the differences, the game on the court was instantly recognizable as volleyball and it brought back a flood of happy memories.