cuba

Felicitaciones a los Cubanos por su victoria sobre la Republica Dominicana en la semifinal del Clasico Mundial de Beisbol.

(I sure hope that's correct.)

Not only did Team USA fail to make the semifinals, but the little island that the US is so afraid of will play in the final game. Too sweet.

The other semifinal game is tonight, Japan vs Korea. The winner of that game plays Team Cuba for the championship on Monday. I will have to root for our Spanish-speaking Communist neighbours. I enjoy Latino cultures, and I love to love whatever the US hates.

Sometimes in New York, when we watched a Yankees-Red Sox game - which meant the local Yankees announcers - we'd listen to the Spanish-language broadcast instead. That way we got the crowd noise, but Allan didn't have to listen to the announcers he hated, and I didn't have to listen to Allan complain. I would try to follow the Spanish, and I could do well for a while, but it was too exhausting to do for more than an inning or two.

Which reminds me, guess how much progress I've made on my Spanish study for Peru? That's right: zero. When we went to Mexico, I enjoyed speaking my rudimentary Spanish so much. Without brushing up on it for a moment, vocabulary was coming back to me - from high school! I swore that the next time we went to a Spanish-speaking country, I would prepare, and enjoy it even more. I've been intending to; the book is right here at my side. With five weeks to go, I'd better open it.

Here's an excellent English-language Cuban baseball site. Not much to look at, but very thorough.

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