The Asiad

Some are still unaware that the Asian Games are now ongoing in Guangzhou, China as we don’t get the feed of the competition on Philippine television and the website of the Asiad does not seem to work.

In fact, I have to go to the Chinese and Japanese channels to see some video clips of the action.

The Philippines has already won one gold medal and three bronzes as of the other day and I am waiting for the day’s wrap up as of this writing.

Our basketball team lost to Iran late Tuesday night and one of our taekwondo jins also lost her match.

There is still hope for more medals with a big billiards delegation led by the legendary Efren ‘Bata’ Reyes and also our boxers.

The Asian Games is a competition that is one step lower than the Olympics and the Philippines has sent a very lean team this year.

We are trying our best to keep you posted about the latest on the Asiad and how the Filipino athletes are doing.

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While going through the stories on the Asian Games from the wire service that we are subscribed to, I found one that made me feel really good.

It wasn’t about a Pinoy winning a medal. It was not also about somebody’s triumph.

The story was about an athlete from war-torn Afghanistan, who competed in the golf event of the Asiad.

What made me feel good was that I realized that my golf game is not really that bad. The guy scored 130 strokes on the first round in the par-72 Dragon Lake Golf Club.

This is the first time that Afghanistan’s golfers are competing in the international stage. The other Afghan player shot 108 strokes.

Given the tough conditions that these athletes have in their country, the fact that they are competing in the Asiad is already a triumph.

If you complain about your golf club’s greens or fairways that are without grass during the hot months, in Afghanistan they only have one golf course, which is a nine-hole layout in Kabul.

Their course doesn’t have any water hazard or even trees, but I’m sure they still enjoy playing the game like we do.

Golf is one sport which makes masochists out of its players. We whack balls to places that break not only our backs but also our hearts.

We fall into traps that result to penalties or tough shots and see our balls fall into watery graves.

We shoot more than ten strokes in one hole at times or worse are paired with players, who seem to have failed in arithmetic as they can’t count.

After signing a scorecard that probably was good if it were our grade in high school, and losing more than half of the balls that we brought for the day, we still say we enjoyed what we did and would come back again the next chance we get.

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MILESTONES: Happy birthday greetings go to Rex Alenton, Gail Tabanao-Flores, Enrico ‘Ric Ryan’ Cardoniga, Derrick Manatad, and Ellen Joyce Soriano, who are celebrating today.

Advance greetings go to my nephew Nicholas Leon Quiñones and Ermabelle Acol-Amancin, who are turning a year older tomorrow.

More power to all of you! – THE FREEMAN