The World Basketball Tour

Here's some BIG NEWS: Our 4-year trip has reached its end and we're now back in Japan staying with Son's mom here in Kofu, not that far from Mt. Fuji, which we can see from here. We're having a good time visiting not only with Son's family, but also with all of our friends. On December 9th we fly back to Canada - to Toronto - just in time for my mom's 60th birthday bash on December 15th. And then, after a few weeks of visiting with her, her husband David and my sister Liz over X'mas and New Years, we'll be heading out west to B.C. No date for that yet and no idea exactly where we'll live in B.C., but that's all part of the Great New Adventure.

And now for the EVEN BIGGER NEWS:

When you think of Syria what do you think of? Whatever may come to mind, I bet it's not basketball. But basketball is exactly what Syria has become to us. Well, that and Mohammed.

Now, as promised, it’s time to tell you about “The 10 Days”: our full-on festival time from April 10th to 19th when we celebrated the many cultures of India. In those few short days we celebrated a 2-day Hindu festival, a Sikh festival, a Jain festival and a special only-in-Jodhpur local festival, which was the definite highlight of them all. There was no Muslim festival around that time (they didn’t have one until last week when they celebrated Mohammed’s birthday), but it was still pretty diverse, exciting and interesting. And, by the 10th day, it was a downright blast!

We've had a lot of amazing experiences here in Tibet over the past few weeks, but the undeniable highlight has been hanging out and partying at the home of one of the friends we made at Tibet University during our first week here in Lhasa.

On our very first visit to the campus to play basketball we met these three young guys, all of whom are students at the university. In total, I think I ended up playing hoops with them and other students at least 6 or 7 different times. I even got The World Soccer Tour rolling again for a few hours one day. The basketball was definitely great fun, but the most amazing times were all had back at our friend Tenzin's place, eating, drinking, talking and partying with him and his mom, brother, friends and neighbors. And, man, what an incredible experience each of those visits turned out to be!

So we're wandering around Lhasa for 5 days surrounded by warm, friendly Tibetans with the biggest warmest smiles we've ever seen anywhere and we're wondering how in the hell are we ever going to befriend any of them considering half the people on the streets are tourists. The answer: The World Basketball Tour, of course!