North Island Mixed Hockey Tournament 2012

Last Sunday I left for the North Island Hockey tournament.

I've never been away from my parents for so long before and so this hockey trip was pretty exciting for me.

The ride there was so long, I'm glad we had stops along the way. I slept for quite a bit, ate for quite a bit when we stopped and we sang along the ride.

Spending a week with people day and night, you're bound to grow closer. All the secrets come out at night with I find fascinating, maybe drowsiness just make you say many things you wouldn't normally.

We stayed up late every night and I'm still trying to figure out how we had energy to play hockey the next day. In between the game hockey games we got fun treats like laser tag, shopping, movies, hot springs and a bqq.

I even tried out a recovery pool for the first time (and died from the freezing half on the pool). I got my first injury that prevented me from playing. My knuckle was hit by a ball and swelled up like a balloon.

Everyone kept asking me how such a little girl can eat so much as I stock up on seconds every breakfast, lunch and dinner.

We didn't do too well in the games. It's a shame because we were doing very well in our Auckland regional games. Going down south, we get slayed.

We had 6 games, these are the score as best as I can remember them:
1-1
0-4
3-0
3-1
0-0 (but then lost in the tie breaker)
0-1

We did do better than our other sport teams from our school but that's not really something to celebrate. We have the excuse of being a new school, this is Ormiston's second year.

Some of the team had good sportsmanship and then you get the aggressive teams. I have bruises to prove it.

It was quite funny with one guy. I mostly played center back, which means I mark the other team's center forward. He was very good at ordering his team around, I guess that's why he was center forward but I don't think he was even trying when I was marking him. He was quite easy to mark and he got very annoyed because he couldn't receive anyway of the ball. He shouldered me a few times, I thought he was allowed to because I've heard coaches on the side ordering players to shoulder people, and so I didn't say anything. But after the game and after I saw him nearly getting into a fight with one of our player, I asked what happened and my player said the guy shouldered him because he couldn't hit me and so he took it out on my boy player. It was then that I found out shouldering wasn't allowed and I told them he shouldered me too and my team was telling me how I should have told them in the game and I could swap with any boy player since they're hard hitters and scare the guy off. At that moment they sounded like protective older brothers (I've always wanted an older brother, in case you need to know that personal but irrelevant fact about me), but hey, I want my own battle scars too.

In the finals, an Auckland team was in it, being townies our selves, we cheered for them on the side lines but sadly they lost. Man, both teams were so good. Henderson, the Auckland team, was amazingly good at blocking balls, it's like trying to pass through a brick wall, I was surprised they were playing at our grade and even more surprised that they lost.

On Friday we drove up to Taupo to stay the night there. We saw many other teams going back that day and when we went out for dinner, the whole town was basically filled with hockey kids. Appearantly, when I fell asleep in Taz's bed, I stole her blanket, spooned her and nuzzled her with my head, great.

The drive back on Saturday was uncomfortable for me, my neck and back hurt so much from being pushed up against the window. I slept all through out it all, I never stayed awake for more than 10 minutes because I was so tired from the previous night of only sleeping for 4 hours (everyone stayed up and played cards).

After studying the pictures for a bit, I have decided to post them in chronological order. The pictures are all different shapes, which really annoys me but what can I do, either it's chronological order or I can group them in sizes.

 Diksha's hair.

 Sporting my school colours.

 Bearing my first injury in hockey.

 Morning team walk.

 Diksha and I.

 Build a burger night.

 Before laser tag.

 Last day in Palmerston and so we went shopping

 What happens when I lend them my ipod.

Last night in Palmerston.

I don't have pictures after Thursday night because I was too busy dying from lack of sleep.

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