-^-for posterity-^-

two years living in vietnam and i have not seen one american football game.

i was raised on the stuff. my father used to coach the game and we would spend every sunday afternoon in our basement watching the eagles play whoever they were pitted up against. my father patiently explained the game and we slowly picked up the rules. eventually my brother and i came to cherish the time we would spend in the basement sitting on different chairs yelling at the television. dad never yelled. he sat with his arms folded.

this morning i woke up in my hotel room early and turned on the television. there, sure enough, were the eagles playing the vikings on monday night football.

it sounds kind of pathetic but there was something about watching a game and knowing my dad was watching it half a world away at the exact same time. he was probably sitting in his bedroom on the edge of the bed with his arms folded. i sat on a cheap wooden stool with the door open two stories above the noisy street across from a construction project. i sat and drank water and watched the game and, even though my dad and brother didn't know i was watching, it felt like they did.

the eagles won. by the fourth quarter they were soundly ahead and my father, i can only speculate, would have turned the television off early and went to bed. he never needed to see the end of games if the eagles were winning by too much or loosing by too much. i sat through the whole game and watched as the over paid athletes walked onto the field to congratulate each other at the end.

on another note, i was truly shocked at how opulent the whole event was. here were people, human beings, making millions of dollars a year. here was a new stadium that cost millions. i was sitting in the hotel room with my friend and he commented every time he saw a fat person. 'anh ay map.' 'he's fat.' over and over and over again. there was even a blimp flying above the stadium. if one though about what resources we had and how we used them and what people need and how we could use them, it could boggle the mind.

well, what can i do about it.