Cultural Exchange Blog – May 23rd

Two entries today. The first is from team leader Tim Fader, and the second is from Alex Stewart.

We have arrived in Romania–landed in Bucharest this morning.  Night, morning, afternoon, yesterday, today–it all gets mixed up when you travel overseas.  Jake Fredricksen had a delay in his flight in from Chicago so we expect him to join us tomorrow.  We are staying in tonight. We had dinner and will get to work out tomorrow at the event center and weigh in is at 6pm.  They have many countries that are coming to compete here as well. We saw Puerto Rico and Canada at dinner tonight.  No one on our team is making weight as an issue–most are just wrestling the weight they are at and hope to wrestle both styles.  I like that attitude as it has already been stressed to take advantage of all the new things that we can try on this trip. It was great for me to see George again as it has been 7 years since I have been on this tour.  He has already had our team try Romanian food–mamaliga–something similar to wall paper paste but yellow.  We also got the first example of water with gas vs no gas.  It will be easy to sleep tonight and very exciting to get started tomorrow morning.
–Tim Fader, UW-Whitewater–

I am on a plane surrounded by Polish nationals. And while I may not have anything in common with these people, there are 5 other individuals on this flight that are indeed similar to me. We are Americans,  and although we come from all over the country we share one common bond – we are wrestlers. Two days ago at Newark, New Jersey, we began the journey of a lifetime, one that will present us with opportunities not available to most young people our age. The 2012 D3 exchange will take us throughout Eastern Europe, to places we would never have gone without our beloved sport. Despite  having known the majority of my teammates for less than 48 hours I can already tell that this trip is going to be a memorable one. Since meeting, we have already began to grow closer through the one thing we all know, wrestling. I, as well as my teammates, are all excited for all that we will experience in the weeks to come.
–Alex Stewart, Norwich–