Argentina: Horses and Pudding
3/18/2011 8:45:57 AM | Field Hockey
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Day 5 was a day for horse lovers and bread pudding haters. We got up at the crack of Argentinean Dawn, ok I lie it was 9 a.m., and set off on a bus to a traditional farmy- resort. When we arrived we were greeted with, wait for it… EMPANADAS. The place we went to had horses, bikes with flat tires, a swimming pool and lots of manure. Everyone on the team, apart from Leonie Geyer and I, like horses, so everyone apart from us went horse riding. Leo and I put not liking horses down to not having pets while growing up. The only time the Holloway household ever had a pet was when I looked after a stick insect for a friend, who definitely isn't my friend anymore. Stick insects really suck! Anyway, everyone was mounting their horses, and complaining about the smell of manure, and I was on video tape duty documenting the whole experience. I then decided that it would be a great idea to creep underneath one of the horses (as in through their legs) which, unbeknownst to me, is not good horse etiquette. The horse kind of reared up and kicked a bit. Poor Adrian Chambers, who has just had double hip surgery, was on the horse whose legs I walked under. I would like to apologize whole heartedly to Adrian and her extended Greek family for potentially endangering her life. I will never walk underneath a horse again.
As I was not on the horse ride I can only provide a watered down account of what happened. Needless to say no one was given any sort of safety advice regarding horse riding so when the horses started randomly galloping Liz McInerney nearly ended up face planting in a pile of manure. Holly Cram used her decidedly weak muscles (she can only bench 80 pounds… so Scottish) to save Liz from this embarrassing situation. Haley Bomboy and Laura Hahnefeldt's horses decided to make a break for freedom and nearly carried two of our team mates off into the sunset. This would be most unfortunate as that would leave us with 10 field players! Erika Wachter claimed to be on a 'demon horse' and was actually crying about the whole experience. She nearly got stampeded by a foal, rather like Mufasa getting trampled by wildebeest in the Lion King. Someone else who was crying today was Rachel Sayer. Amy Kee has well and truly passed her Lobby the Lobster status onto our freshman goalkeeper. Rachel is currently the color of a popular condiment eaten with French Fries. She claims to have put on Factor 50, but I definitely saw her applying a thin layer of cooking oil to her skin.
We were provided with a traditional Argentinean barbeque for lunch. Everyone 'really loved' the blood pudding, but strangely enough, no one had more than one bite. Serious protein intake occurred. The majority of our team probably ate a whole cow at lunch, apart from Amy, who put some lovely bleeding steak in her mouth, chewed a bit with her nice big teeth, and smiled somewhat unconvincingly. She is more of a refined carbohydrate kind of person. We then enjoyed a protracted song and dance session, and Erika Wachter and Martina Loncarica performed a rendition of When you Say Nothing At all. All sarcasm aside Erika's voice was amazing and grown men were crying in the audience. Steve and Martu also tangoed together. It was a touching moment. We then went outside to watch a horse show where the riders have to spear rings on the end of long sticks, and then present the ring to a girl and kiss her. Milka, one of the riders, basically proposed to Martu. Everyone was praying that Horacio (the other rider) would try and kiss Lynn Farquar but, unfortunately, Lynn and Holly had decided to go on a run in the fields. We saw them through a dust cloud in the distance and, it's true, Lynn really does run like a girl. As Ange Bradley pointed out, no wonder she has knee problems.
Just before we headed home the topic of hypnotizing chickens came up in conversation. Amy Kee mentioned it is very difficult to catch a chicken. Apple Crumb replied that it wasn't a proceeded to creep up behind a chicken and grab it very successfully. She is such a hick. In contrast to this moment of individual heroism, Anna got very upset when she ordered dinner this evening. She ordered a 'bread pudding' for dinner (she was totes proteined-out after lunch), thinking she was going to get a traditional bready custardy dish. Initially it didn't arrive, although Haley Bomboy got a rather heinous desert dish that tasted and looked terrible. After 20 minutes Apple re-ordered her bread pudding. Lo and behold the desert that Haley had ordered was presented to Anna. Said dish was, according to Apple 'NOT BREAD PUDDING'. Team mates have noticed that Anna can get quite irate about food, and this was no exception. We kindly pointed out that Mommy Crumb's bread pudding is slightly different from Argentinean Restaurant on the Corner bread pudding. Needless to say this was little consolation.
Just in case anyone was concerned about Haley starving she ordered a second desert to compensate for the initial disappointment. Unfortunately her 'flan' was nearly as terrible. Desert disaster aside at least we know our team will never starve to death because, even if we can't get bread pudding when we ask for it, our resident hick Apple Crumble will always be on hand to snare chickens for us. Adios amigos, I will hopefully be reporting another Syracuse win this time tomorrow! Ham and Cheese!
