World Cup Fever Has Arrived – Except in America

By Steve Bouey in

June 13, 2006 – 9:12 pm

Sporting fans around the globe are leaving work early (or not going at all), buying new T.V.’s, gathering in groups and basically ignoring the rest of their responsibilities for the next 4 weeks as the 2006 FIFA World Cup winds its way through Germany to the finals on July 9th in Berlin.  I am leaving for Germany in 10 days and will be fortunate enough to catch some of the action first hand in what is without a doubt the most popular event in the most popular sport in the world – football. And I am not talking about touchdowns and pads here folks. La Copa Mondial draws a staggering number of viewers. It is estimated that there was a cumulative audience of nearly 29 billion during the last cup tournament in South Korea and over 1 billion tuned in to watch powerhouse Brazil beat Germany 2-0, dwarfing viewership of the Super Bowl which snared a relatively sparse 140 million viewers.

So why is everyone outside of America so excited about the Cup and most people inside America clueless to what it even is? I played the sport in the youth leagues back in California and Shoppman played in high school here in Colorado. I think it would be safe to bet that the majority of kids in this country, male and female, played some organized form of the game at some point or another, yet the interest and viewership has never experienced any real success here. A poll of sports fans in the U.S. revealed that only 10% plan to follow the Cup action and over 65% didn’t even know where it was being played. The U.S. men’s team made it through 2 year of qualification matches to make the final cut of 32 teams in Germany and will be representing America in the world greatest sporting spectacle, however, in a country that likes to flex its muscles and show everyone how great it is, support for the U.S. team is virtually non-existent.

I have done some thinking and can posit a few ideas as to why the sport enjoys such a low level of enthusiasm here in the U.S.

1) The sport is an import. Americans didn’t event the game and therefore, there is a built in resistance to it. We even had the arrogance to come up with another name for the sport – soccer. On the other hand, American football, basketball and baseball enjoy huge popularity in this country.

 2) If it doesn’t happen here in America, it doesn’t tend to exist. The media coverage is getting better, but is still lacking – the best coverage right now is on the Spanish language networks and something tells me "Joe Six Pack" won’t be willing to sit through that even though the commentary is some of the most energetic in all of sport. GOOOAAAALLLL!!!!

3) It doesn’t cater to the score hard, score often, offense, offense, offense mentality of the American sports nut. Football is a a defensive sport as evidenced by low scores and if there is not a lot of scoring going on, even that Ritalin scrip won’t help most people out, even though the players are some of the most athletically gifted individuals around.

4) Finally, it doesn’t help when the U.S. enters Cup play with a number 5 ranking and ends up getting embarrassed by the Czech Republic 3-0 in their first match with a strong Italian team on deck, leaving them with little chance of surviving Group Play.

For a sport that throughout the world signifies so many powerful things above and beyond the game itself – pride, patriotism, nationalism, unity, etc. it is ironic that people in the U.S. are so disinterested in it. The viability of the sport in America I think does and will continue to reside with immigrants who bring the energy and enthusiasm with them from their home cultures… that is unless we decide to build that wall and isolate ourselves even further from the scary outside world and it’s strange traditions.

By Steve Bouey | Posted in World News | Comments (0)

Some facts or possibly fiction?

By Steven Shoppman in

June 8, 2006 – 11:08 am

Most of this sounds right.  If anyone sees something that is not true in this post, please let me know.  I did not have time to fact check this stuff, but it is interesting all the same.

Alaska
More than half of the coastline of the entire United States is in Alaska.

Amazon
The Amazon rain forest produces more than 20% the world’s oxygen supply.
The Amazon River pushes so much water into the Atlantic Ocean that, more
than one hundred miles at sea off the mouth of the river, one can dip fresh
water out of the ocean. The volume of water in the Amazon river is greater
than the next eight largest rivers in the world combined and three times the
flow of all rivers in the United States.

Antarctica
Antarctica is the only land on our planet that is not owned by any
country. Ninety percent of the world’s ice covers Antarctica. T his ice
also represents seventy percent of all the fresh water in the world. As
strange as it sounds, however, Antarctica is essentially a desert. The
average yearly total precipitation is about two inches. Although covered
with ice (all but 0.4% of it, i.e.), Antarctica is the driest place on the
planet, with an absolute humidity lower than the Gobi desert.

Canada
Canada has more lakes than the rest of the world combined. Canada is an
Indian word meaning "Big Village."

Chicago
Next to Warsaw, Chicago has the largest Polish population in the world.

Detroit
Woodward Avenue in Detroit, Michigan carries the designation M-1, named
so because it was the first paved road anywhere.

Damascus, Syria
Damascus, Syria, was flourishing a couple of thousand years before Rome
was founded in 753 BC, making it the oldest continuously inhabited city in
existence.

Istanbul, Turkey
Istanbul, Turkey is the only city in the world located on two continents.

Los Angeles
Los Angeles’s full name is El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de los
Angeles de Porciuncula – and can be abbreviated to 3.63% of its size: L.A.

New York City
The term "The Big Apple" was coined by touring jazz musicians of the
1930’s who used the slang _expression "apple" for any town or city.
Therefore, to play New York City is to play the big time – The Big Apple.
There are more Irish in New York City than in Dublin, Ireland; more Italians
in New York City than in Rome, Italy; and more Jews in New York City than in
Tel Aviv, Israel.

Ohio
There are no natural lakes in the state of Ohio, ever y one is man made.

Pitcairn Island
The smallest island with country status is Pitcairn in Polynesia, at just
1.75 sq. miles/4,53 sq. km.

Rome
The first city to reach a population of 1 million people was Rome, Italy
in 133 B.C. There is a city called Rome on every continent.

Siberia
Siberia contains more than 25% of the world’s forests.

S.M.O.M.
The actual smallest sovereign entity in the world is the Sovereign
Military Order of Malta (S.M.O.M.). It is located in the city of Rome,
Italy, has an area of about two tennis courts, and as of 2001 has a
population of 80, 20 less people than the Vatican. It is a sovereign entity
under international law, just as the Vatican is.

Sahara Desert
In the Sahara Desert, there is a town named Tidikelt, which did not
receive a drop of rain for ten years. Technically though, the driest place
on Earth is in the valleys of the Antarctic near Ross Island. There has
been no rainfall there for two million years.

Spain
Spain literally means ‘the land of rabbits.’

St.. Paul Minnesota
St. Paul, Minnesota was originally called Pigs Eye after a man named
Pierre "Pig’s Eye" Parrant who set up the first business there.

Roads
Chances that a road is unpaved in the U.S.A.: 1%, in Canada: 75%.

Texas
The deepest hole ever made in the world is in Texas. It is as deep as 20
empire state buildings but only 3 inches wide.

United States
The Eisenhower interstate system requires that one-mile in every five
must be straight. These straight sections are usable as airstrips in times
of war or other emergencies.

Waterfalls
The water of Angel Falls (the World’s highest) in Venezuela drops
3,212 feet (979 meters). They are 15 times higher than Niagara Falls.

By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Before the World By Road (2005-2006) | Comments (0)

Sometimes email has its drawbacks.

By Steven Shoppman in

June 6, 2006 – 10:15 am

My recent post about the Tiger and Piglets was only half true.  Unfortunately the fake story is a little more heartwarming, but I feel it is my duty to let eveyone know the real story, which one of our readers so generously brought to our attention.  So I would like to give my apologies to anyone who has been decieved by this story.   Apparently, Tigers and pigs can get along, but this instance was simply for entertainment:

http://www.snopes.com/photos/animals/tigerpig.asp

As often happens, this appears to be a case where someone came across some unusual photos with no explanatory context, so the viewer decided to make up his own background story. The pictures are real, but the accompanying explanation about a mother tiger in California being given piglets to ease her through a depression stemming from the loss of her own cubs is fiction.

The images displayed above were taken in 2004 at the Sriracha Tiger Zoo in Chonburi, Thailand. Although the Sriracha Tiger Zoo hosts one of the world’s most successful tiger breeding programs, unlike most western zoos it also offers circus- and carnival-like shows, exhibits, and interactions, including (as evidenced here) the mixture of adults and young of quite different species in the same enclosures. As described by the AWI Quarterly, a publication of the Animal Welfare Institute:

The Sriracha Tiger Zoo, an hour outside of Bangkok, Thailand, is truly an amazing place. Boasting more than 400 tigers, a handful of Asian elephants, piles of crocodiles, camels, snakes and other exotic animals, the zoo has some intriguing, yet troubling exhibits.

In one glass room, a farrowing crate entombed a pig who, lying on her side, nourished both her piglets and tiger cubs. Across the hall, another glass room housed a female tiger, who fed piglets adorned in tiger-print costumes. This incongruous display was replicated elsewhere, where enclosures housed tigers, pigs, and dogs together.

In another area, a visitor could feed milk to a young tiger resting on his or her lap — a young tiger still in possession of his claws … There was a tiger circus, not dissimilar from a circus anywhere else: tigers leaping through rings of fire, walking across a double tightrope, parading around the ring on hind legs, and riding around on the back of the horse.

The mixture of tiger and piglets depicted in the images above therefore was not something undertaken for functional reasons, but rather it’s a common form of visual entertainment provided by the zoo for the amusement of its visitors. According to the Pattaya Mail, these tiger-pig nursing relationships have also been reciprocated to the extent that the mother tiger shown suckling piglets was herself nursed by a sow:

Visitors recently witnessed some bizarre feeding habits of the zoo’s most famous inhabitants. A two-year-old female pig named Benjamaj is a blended pedigree of parents, Land-Less and Las-White, that were imported from Norway. Benjamaj is a kind and maternal porky. She has taken 4 baby tigers under her care and along with 3 tiny piglets is nursing the tigers as though she were their mum. She loves those cats and they love her back.

Unbelieving, wide-eyed tourists pressed their noses up to the cage to get a better look. As they moved on to the next cage they were in for another surprise, as there, a great Royal Bengal tigress was lolling on her side and suckling 6 tiny piglets.

‘Momma’ tiger Saimai is two years old and as a baby was suckled by a pig until she was 4 months old. This democratic start in life allowed her to form a loving relationship with other pigs and even a dog. Food in the wild, maybe — but at the zoo, tourists who witness these amazing scenes come away with food for thought.

Although these pictures might appear charming and innocent, the AWI noted back in 2004 that there may be a darker side to the Sriracha Tiger Zoo, as press reports stated that Sriracha was under investigation for illegally breeding protected wildlife for commercial export and had been implicated in the sale of a hundred tigers to China (where there is strong demand for tiger body parts for use in traditional Chinese medicines). The AWI also noted that in late 2004 the zoo was closed for a month when between 80 and 100 tigers died or were euthanized due to an avian influenza (probably spread via the raw chicken carcasses fed to the tigers) that swept through the facility.

By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Before the World By Road (2005-2006) | Comments (1)

You’re Crazy and You’re Going to Die

By Steve Bouey in

June 1, 2006 – 11:36 am


In talking with countless people about our upcoming jaunt around the world, many people are extremely excited about it. However, there are also a lot of people who think the Steve and I are out of our minds given that we are willingly going to drive through some very "interesting" places. My own apprehensions early on about some of the places we were going to led me to keep my parents in the dark about the trip we were planning for quite a while. (Interestingly enough, my parents are now equally excited and have been truly supportive of TWBR) 

Steve and I have been doing a lot of research about the countries TWBR will be visiting over the next few years and there are some interesting statistics.  The U.S. State Department  maintains a list of countries that they recommend people, and American’s in particular, avoid. This list is constantly evolving and at any given point in time, there are anywhere from 10 to 20 countries on the TWBR itinerary that pop up on that list for a variety of reasons: rebel attacks, famine, violent crime, etc. However, just because certain areas of a country may be a little bit more dangerous than others, should we avoid the country in its entirety and just how dangerous is the outside world?

If you are one of those people who are constantly glued to CNN or other news networks, you would be led to believe that most of the outside world sucks and you will probably be kidnapped, blown-up, tortured and killed if you venture outside of the safe confines of our national borders. In order to prepare for the certain death that Steve and I will face on the road, I have been reading an awesome book by Robert Young Pelton. In Pelton’s book The World’s Most Dangerous Places, he describes in great detail over the course of 1,100 pages the truth about the outside world: the truth that you can’t get from the news, a Fromer guidebook, or our own government. It has tons of information and provides links to sites and other resources that also have tons of information.

There are truly dangerous places out there, but the bottom line is if you are smart, savvy and exercise a good dose of common sense, the likelyhood of getting killed out there is relatively low. In fact, when all risks to personal safety are considered, Steve and I are more likely to be killed driving down to the local grocery store than we are traveling abroad. True we are taking some risks by traveling to places where the 12 year old kids are equipped with AK-47’s as opposed to PsP’s but given the right approach and the appropriate knowledge, these are calculated risks and can be mitigated to a certain extent.

I like to think that Steve and I are pretty smart guys. We are doing our homework, taking the necessary safety precautions and obviously we don’t want to pad the numbers of the unfortunate few who do die traveling abroad. After all, a successful measure of the trip is traveling around the world, and this does not mean driving half of it and then finishing it off from a box in the cargo hold of an airplane. However, if we do for some reason beyond our control end up becoming content for another doom and gloom episode of Nancy Grace, at least we did it traveling and doing something we love. This is more than I can say for a large percentage of Americans. In all likelihood, nearly 40 percent of Americans will expire sitting on the couch from heart disease while clutching a Doritos bag and contemplating all the horrible things that might happen to them if they do get the steel to venture outside of their "comfort zones."

By Steve Bouey | Posted in Trip Thoughts | Comments (4)

Update on the 24 Hours of Boulder, etc.

By Steve Bouey in

May 30, 2006 – 12:38 pm

It has been a little over a week and I realized that I did not update what went down up in Boulder at the 24 hour race. I ran on a relay team with 8 other individuals and I am proud to report that Team Go Fast Addiction won the open division. As a team, we completed 168 miles in the 24 hour time period with most of us running 3 shifts or 21 miles. I ran a shift late on Saturday afternoon after Eric S. and I completed a nice ride in the Boulder heat. My next shift came at about 4:30 on Sunday morning and it was actually quite fun. The sun was just starting to rise and the temp was perfect for running. I then completed the last shift of the race at about 11:30 with 30 minutes to spare. With the exception of the last leg, when the mercury had risen into the 90’s, I was able to run fairly consistent 7 min/mile splits over the 7 mile course. All in all, it was a fun weekend, and I got to hang out with a great bunch of people. Congrats to Greg, Christine, Eric, Scott, Eman, Bobby, Carrie and Jenna!

I also met some truly amazing runners – those who competed in the 24-hour and 100 mile divisions. I don’t know how they do it, but they can take a beating, run forever, and do it with a great big smile on their faces. Many of these people have finished the daunting Leadville Trail 100, which makes the Ironman look like an afternoon joyride. (I actually finished reading an article about the Leadville race and some sick and twisted part of my brain got excited and wants to do it someday)

Eric S. also convinced me to run the Bolder Boulder with him this past weekend, although it did not take much convincing on his part.  For those that do not know, the Bolder Boulder is probably the largest 10k road race in the country, with about 47,000 finishers. It has been a Memorial Day tradition in Boulder for the past 28 years. I have run the race on several occasions and have always had a good time… not just in the race itself, but in joining thousands of others after the race in Folsom Field to celebrate members of the armed forces who made the ultimate sacrifice. It is also a great opportunity to bump into people who I have not seen in a while, namely my coach Mike Ricci. I have been avoiding him due to the fact that I have not really been putting in a great deal of effort towards training for this little Ironman thing coming up. I guess seeing him at the race showed him that I am committed to staying fit, although Monday was supposed to be an "off-day" so he obviously knows I am not following his schedules.

By Steve Bouey | Posted in Events | Comments (1)

TWBR blog is now the animal kingdom.

By Steven Shoppman in

May 26, 2006 – 5:36 pm

I hate to keep posting about animals over and over, but I keep getting these great forwards.  Check this out.

In a zoo in California, a mother tiger gave birth to a rare set of
triplet tiger cubs.  Unfortunately, due to complications in the
pregnancy, the cubs were born prematurely and due to their tiny size,
died shortly after birth. The mother tiger after recovering from the
delivery, suddenly started to decline in health, although physically she
was fine.

The veterinarians felt that the loss of her litter had caused the
tigress to fall into a depression. The doctors decided that if the
tigress could surrogate another mother’s cubs, perhaps she would
improve.

After checking with many other zoos across the country, the depressing
news was that there were no tiger cubs of the right age to introduce to
the mourning mother. The veterinarians decided to try something that had
never been tried in a zoo environment.

Sometimes a mother of one species will take on the care of a different
species. The only "orphans" that could be found quickly, were a litter
of wiener pigs. The zoo keepers and vets wrapped the piglets in tiger
skin and placed the babies around the mother tiger.

By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Before the World By Road (2005-2006) | Comments (2)

Buffaloes are tougher than Bears?!

By Steven Shoppman in

May 25, 2006 – 5:01 pm

I received these pictures from a good friend who lives up in Montana.  They are pretty amazing.  I love big burly animals.  The next couple of paragraphs explain where, what and when.

The pictures were taken in Fountain Flats, which is about 10 miles from Old Faithful. The buff-griz encounter is one of the coolest things that I have seen during the 15 years that I have lived in the park.

The pictures appear in chronological order. The bear walked across the road in front of me and started chasing the buffalo herd across the field. Eventually one of the cows challenged the griz and ran him off. The last picture shows how the cow and bear were running in parallel circles around the herd, with the bull on the inside track.

These photos and more can be seen on http://www.yellowstoneecology.com/, which is where the photos oiginated.

By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Before the World By Road (2005-2006) | Comments (0)

Malaria is scary.

By Steven Shoppman in

May 19, 2006 – 11:09 am

One of the main gripes I get from people close to me, especially my mother, is the danger of the trip.  More often these concerns stem from the media’s overreporting of war and crimes against humanity.  There is no doubt that crazy dictators, rebel groups, religious fanatics and terrorists are a threat and if we are in the wrong place we could wind up kidnapped or shot, but sometimes little things like disease get overlooked.  When I think about the journey’s adversities, I am more frieghtened by the idea of getting some mean disease that will make me suffer to death.  Since I have the world wide wonder to help me avoid high risk war zones and conflicts, I am moving mosquitos up on the list of unfriendlies.

Today there was a story on the bbc website that allowed the audience to voice there opinions about Malaria, how to fight the spread, and how it affects their communities.  I found it interesting that Malaria rates are higher than ever and on the rise and it does not seem to get very much news.  Over 100,000 people a year die from Malaria, which pales in comparison to the 3.1 million that died in 2005 from HIV/AIDS.  None the less 100,000 is still quite a few people and it is certainly something to think about when mosquito bites are a little more common than the causes of HIV. 

According to the WHO, "Up to 30% of malaria deaths in Africa occur in the wake of war, local violence or other emergencies. Malaria deaths often far exceed those caused by the conflict or problem."  With that said, have a read of the article, it has some interesting opinions on the subject.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/2/hi/africa/4927656.stm

By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Trip Thoughts, World News | Comments (0)

24-Hours of Boulder

By Steve Bouey in

May 18, 2006 – 11:50 am

Well,  my quest to complete Ironman #5 has forced me into fear-based training right now. In other words, I had better start doing some serious training because I fear what is going to happen to me if I don’t! With all of the work I have been doing trying to get this little around the world trip going and holding down my day job, I have only had the time to get in about 60% of the workouts my coach has given me. Basically I am going out to Germany to have a good time, and if there is a beer garden on the marathon course, I may stumble in for a few brews and pump up the crowd.  However, I still want to finish the race… I have yet to DNF a race (did not finish), and I am not about to start after flying 6,000 miles to do it.  I also do not want to end up in the Krankenhaus (hospital), therefore, fear-based training has commenced.

The race in Roth, Germany is now only about 6 weeks away and I felt that I needed to get some more running in. So what better way to get running in that signing on for something this weekend that most people would think is completely unnecessary- The 24 Hours of Boulder! This is a running race that simply put, consists of how many miles you can run in the span of 24 hours. O.K., relax now, I am not completely out of my gord… I am on a relay team – Team Go Fast Addiction – with some other runners and triathlete friends who needed some extra competitors. We each run 7 miles laps in shifts and right now, I can expect to run about 21-28 miles over the course of the 24 hours. I have at least three shifts depending on how others are feeling,  including one at 4 a.m. on Sunday morning, but hey, I have been up running that early in the past – back in my college days in Boulder except for the fact that I had yet to go to sleep and I wasn’t running towards something but rather away from the cops. (joke… sort of)  However, like a true crackhead, longcourse triathlete, I, along with a few others are bringing our bikes out to the race with the hope of getting in a 4 hour ride in-between my shifts. Hey, I said I was right in the middle of fear-based training. Stay tuned, I’ll let you know how it went.

By Steve Bouey | Posted in Events | Comments (0)

The camera is back.

By Steven Shoppman in

May 18, 2006 – 9:00 am

When you rely on electronics for work, it can be a really great excuse that "my computer isn’t working" or "the network is down" if you want to take an afternoon off.  On the other hand, the unreliability of electronics makes me look bad.  On our recent trip to the Blue Hole in New Mexico our nearly brand new video camera came up with the error code "cylider lock – auto off".  The instruction book contained no hints as to the reason for this, just "if you see this message, the camera will shut off automatically."

This was only half way through our trip.  So to say the least, it was a major inconvenience when you are trying to shoot a promotional video for your sponsors.  The worst part was still the fact that the only help we had was "the camera will turn off automatically", thanks instruction book man…we already got that from the fact that the camera automatically turned off right before our eyes.  Then we called panasonic to find out what we could possibly do to fix the problem. 

Response: Turn the camera off and on.

Great advice for someone using a very expensive professional grade camera.  They are really breaking ground in tech support these days.

None the less, we have the camera back.  Panasonic did pay for shipping and found us a special dealer that rushed the camera back to us, so all is good now.  By rushed I mean over 2 weeks without a camera, and by good now I mean I am still really annoyed but have come to grips with the situation.  I can’t say it enough times, electronics are the BEST!!!!!!

By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Before the World By Road (2005-2006) | Comments (0)