Hotel Panorama Trento

I was born and raised in Calgary, home of the C-train. This is the only train I have ever taken. If the train doors are open, the train stays put and the conductor yells at you over the intercom to clear the doorway.

Not so in Italy.

We had a stopover in Verona to get onto the train in Bolzano. The stopover was very short, and I was a bit ahead of my mom so I figured I'd load my bags, which are heavy, on while she caught up. my bags were all aboard and I was waiting ...

... why the name has both an Italian and a German spelling. This is a very quaint town that looks to be fairly old with small winding pedestrian only streets. Street signs are here are written in Italian and German, and a vast amount of people walking around are speaking German. I took some pictures and got myself a quick bite to eat. I have seen a lot of people walking around carrying backpacks with hiking boots and trekking poles ...

... br>
Let me put this win in perspective for you. No one has beaten Bergamo in the playoffs since 1997. For Panzani and some of the older guys, drawing the Bergamo side of the bracket in the last decade means that you won’t reach the Super Bowl. Meeting Bergamo in the Super Bowl? Well that means you had a good season, but now they go home with the trophy.

We finally got off the field and into the locker room - it was bedlam. Jugs of vino ...

... Beppe. Reggie was having a barbecue at his apartment. The guy can grill. I ate very well.

Beppe drove me back to the Giant’s Cassa to grab the Playstion so we could get down on some Madden 2003 at Reggie’s. I thrashed Beppe a few times before Reggie took a break from grilling to get on the sticks. Reggie had played Coach Marty a few times (Recently Edwin and I created ourselves, [Reggie had already created himself on the New York Giants] and ...

... him were vacant; his long grey hair was frazzled and disheveled making himlook more like a mad scientist clinging to his failed invention than the coach/owner of the IFL's number one team scouting a game.

 

Between the broken camera, Wood writing on scraps, and metaking snapshots, I felt more like I was a member of the Bad News Bears.

 

It got worse was when Tisma had the bright idea to film withhis cell phone camera.  And thenexcitedly turned to us to ...

... is often is too much.

 

Wednesday 27th

 

Tisma had decided to fly out Mike Wood, former GiantsDefensive coordinator, and current Chapman University defensive linecoach.  He was the reason I wasable to get out to Bolzano in the first place, he recommended me to Tisma.  I don't know what he did, but Tisma andthe older players out here LOVE him, so everyone was very excited for him toget in.  Andrea the DC threw abarbecue and we watched the European ...

... lineman just walked right passed it because the refs were already signaling touchdown.  I however wasn't as convinced so I squirmed out from under the RE players and dove after the ball.  My frantic actions alerted another RE player who dove as well and ended up with ball.  The refs didn't care, they said I was in before I fumbled, so I was just flopping around on the ground like an idiot for no reason.  But I'm sure those that saw me play sports growing up know that flopping ...

... dive to our new fullback, Klosh, but he was stopped at the two. Tisma called for the quarterback sneak, and on third down, I wormed, and squirmed just inches across the goal line. Our two-point conversion failed and we were now up, 18-13. I was having flashbacks to the Parma game I crushed the kickoff over the returners' heads, they had to retreat to the 5 to pick it up, before making it back out to the 19. They had 81 yards to go ...

... the Volcano. It was an amazing place. We sat down and discussed our plan when Tavar, the American receiver called me about the party. I told him we'd try and get up to his place and meant it, but really I knew between Mike's state of exhaustion and having to try and catch a bus or a cab we probably would just call it an early night. Greg had told us around our B&B would be cracking to because it was a national holiday, Italy's independence from fascism ...

... around 6 or 7 in the evening and found my hotel. The caretaker meet me at the front door and shook my hand. I was taken back by her ability to pronounce my name and could tell she was kind of taken back with my inability to speak German with a name like Beyerlein. She showed me to my cozy room that over looked the city and I dropped off my bags to meet Paolo for dinner. At dinner I was use to speaking in Italian to the waiters who do not speak English and had to stop myself on ...