Jeremiah Boswell (J-BOS) Bball, Music, Writing & Adventures

Our game on Saturday was a big game.  We played the 1st place team in the league in front of our home crowd.  But what actually made it a big game was that we were raising awareness and money for someone in need.  A young man by the name of Igor was recently in an accident.  The accident left him paralyzed and in need of good medical help.

His parents sold their house and everything they had to send Igor to the U.S. for surgery.  Now, their hometown has rallied behind them as they try to pay for his rehabilitation which could lead him to walking again.  His family has moved to America to be with him and help him through the process and though our tickets sales may not have been millions of dollars, hopefully it will help.

Even though I’m halfway around the world, I have many things to be very grateful for, and Thanksgiving 2010 was very special.  I am very lucky to have Americans teammates to experience Macedonia with.  And perhaps I’m even luckier that 3 of them are married!  The women never let a holiday or holiday cooking pass by without a little hoopla.

Since our coach is American, we only had 1 morning practice (I began jogging)  to free up the day for food, football and falling asleep.  David and Anna Buchberger hosted our Thanksgiving at their apartment and Anna, Halee Stimson and Sara Jakus did the cooking.  They had to get creative with some recipes but their creativity was perfect.  We had a huge Turkey which Sara went to the capital (Skopje) for, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, stuffing, corn, a pretend sweet potato dish and 3 amazing desserts!  I probably left a few foods off the list but it was all phenomenal.

It’s not very often that it hits me that I’m so far from family, but it did.  I always miss them, but it only hits me from time to time because I have years of experience in being away.  But I spent some time walking around the city and actually stopped by a small Orthodox Church and enjoyed some alone time.  Then I was able to talk to almost everybody in my immediate family on the phone which was great. I also received some Happy Thanksgiving messages on Facebook which was nice.

All in all it was a special Thanksgiving.  But I again forgot to get the camera out for pictures…

We had a big win last night to finish the first round of games.  We played solid throughout on defense and had a lot of guys step up. The final score was 80-77. The win was important because it put us in 6th place to start the second round of games, and it proved that even through all the injuries and adversity thus far in the season, we are still a playoff team.  We are improving and are excited to play our next game this Saturday against the number 1 team in the league.

Last night we collected another home win making us 2-3 overall.  The final score was 78-71 but it was definitely a game that we will just take the win and forget about.  We did not play the best basketball but we will use it to grow.  To see the box score click HERE.  If you are wondering why I didn’t play, it was because I had a banged up knee.  I should be back for our next game on Wednesday.

We recently had a photo shoot and made posters of each player to be displayed in the gym.  I have attached a few of the photos from the shoot including one of the team on top of the local mall called, Global.  Luckily the photo is from far enough away that you can’t see me clinching my teeth in fear of heights!  Another photo is of a local guy I met here after one of our games, Vasko.  Vasko took a photo with my poster and used it as his profile picture on Facebook.  I thought that was pretty neat.  Vasko plays handball here in Strumica and seems to be a very nice guy.

A Fan, Vasko, Sent this to me

We lost 78-68 on the road to the 3rd place team MZT.  It was a TV game and their crowd was crazy.  We put ourselves in a place to win, only down 3 with a couple of minutes left, but we couldn’t get over the hump.  My apologies to anyone who tried to watch the game online because I heard that it did not work.  Click HERE for the boxscore.  We play again next Saturday.  This time we’ll be at home against a team we are expected to beat.