Hey Mizzou fans! I hope you're all having a great summer!
Wow! It has been quite a whirlwind these past three days. Traveling all the way to London to play for my country is such a tremendous honor. Some of you may be wondering how I am able to play for Great Britain since I was born in the United States. Well, my dad was born and raised in Scotland and moved to the U.S. when he was an adult. Because of his citizenship, I am able apply for and gain citizenship in Great Britain! The cool thing is that I have my normal U.S. passport, as well as a British passport!
My long, long trek to London started on Tuesday morning when I left my house in California. It started out with a four-hour plane ride to Houston, followed by a nine-hour flight from Houston to London. I left California at 10 a.m., Tuesday, and got into London at 10 a.m., Wednesday. On top of that, from California to London is a nine-hour time difference. That made for a very exhausting two days of travel!
Once I got to London, a couple of my new teammates picked me up from the airport and brought me to one of their houses. I was able to get a little rest since I hadn't slept in over 24 hours. That same day (yes, this is still Wednesday!), we drove to our hotel accommodations in Slough, England, unpacked really quickly and got ready to go to the softball fields. We did some cool softball-related, team-bonding activities so we could get to know each other. Finally around 9 p.m., we got back to the hotel and as soon as I hit my bed, I was asleep. I have never been so tired in my entire life!
The past two days of training (Thursday and earlier today) have been long and exhausting, but very necessary! Unfortunately, it has been England's hottest two days all year the past two days.
Being that we have girls from Australia, Italy, the United States and Great Britain, we all do things a little differently. Trying to come together and mesh as a team in five days is quite the task, but we are all in it for one thing... to qualify for the World Championships next year. The team has a lot of talent and we are already looking really sharp. We have six pitchers and tons of different options in the field.
Also, the team gets along great! I can't believe I have only known my teammates for two days because it seems like I have known them for much longer. They have all been so inviting to us "foreigners", and we love to talk about the differences in our countries. The Great Britain natives always talk about how they love our American accents, and I think that is so weird that they say I have an accent. We love to argue about which country is right and which country is wrong when it comes to pronunciations of words. It is really interesting to discuss the differences in our softball, schooling and social life between all the different countries.
Anyways, it has been an absolutely amazing three days, so far, and tomorrow we get to take the afternoon off from training and go into London. I can't wait to share the rest of my trip with you all. Thanks for reading!
-Kirsten
