Sports

Since being in Japan I have been amazed on an almost daily basis by the sheer number of "sports" that people take seriously. There are literally thousands of sports, and, like most southern born Americans, I was raised to accept the big ones i.e. Football, Baseball, Soccer, Basketball, Track and Field, Tennis, and Wrestling. After straying a bit from my father's "expansive" world of sports I was able to start to appreciate most of the pool sports, Rugby, and kickboxing. I actually love kickboxing and would love to study it.

Japan seems to be in love with other sports though. I have respect for Track and Field, but I could never sit in front of my TV all day and watch a marathon. I have students who do this and report the results of the marathons to me. I smile and feign interest, but I honestly don't care. Marathons just seem to be long and boring and full of frighteningly thin people who never get tired. Sometimes they look like a more human version of that child-eating creature on Pan's Labyrinth.

The Japanese also seemed to like Ping Pong or Table Tennis or whatever the hell you want to call it. As a person who has actually played tennis I refuse to refer to it as table tennis unless I am being paid to do so. Ping Pong in my mind is so far from tennis that to even openly compare the two should be taken by all within earshot as an open attack on their lives.

What really amazes me is the fact that Ping Pong gets televised here. It is actually showing TV right now. The athletes look really serious too. Are they athletes?

Forrest Gump breathed a little bit of life into Ping Pong in America, but its been over ten years now. Ping Pong is stupid unless there is an Atari involved.

If I remember correctly Badminton was played in a Disney cartoon by a chicken and a duck. I think it was in Robin Hood. I could be wrong though. That one little episode is responsible for setting me against badminton. I could argue a case for badminton being a real sport, but the fact of the matter is that when I was in high school playing in gym class my classmates and I were playing badminton on the same level as the people on TV.

Why did I not get my 15 minutes of fame on ESPN?

I'll tell you why. Badminton is not a sport. It is a game. A GAME!!! Only good games like chess get on ESPN.

I am sure that every man and woman in the world will agree with me that volleyball is only interesting if it is played at a beach with the smallest and tightest swimsuits possible. "

One can not hope to win at volleyball until one is naked while being clothed."

~wise old pervert