An experience to remember..

The 2 weeks of utter busyness is finally over. Assignments, presentation, training and work. I can finally take a breather. It is something that i have been looking forward to for so long. Time seems to just fly by. It feels funny some times, because the fact that i have overcomed the 2 weeks alive i seem to miss the busy times i had. Weird kind of feeling, but it happens. Don't know why, but this sort of feelings just cant be expained. Anyway, i handed in my last assignment on Thursday and had badminton training in the evening. We were gearing up for the finals in Sheffield on Saturday. We left campus on Friday afternoon in our mini bus. To be absolutely honest, i didn't really know about any arrangements for our trip. The only think i knew was our final opponents were from Univesity of Leeds. I thought University of Sheffield was the venue and we were goin to stay in their hostel for the night. But, this is what it turned out to be.

We were actually playing at the National British University Championships. A total of 20 sports were participating at the largest sports complex in the UK for 4 days. All the semi final and final events were played during that weekend. The complex was massive. It even had an indoor 400 metre running track. Sports like Badminton, Basketball, Table Tennis, Tennis, Boxing, Judo, Atheletics etc were going on simultaneously. Camera crews, newsmen and photographers were swarming the place. It was really a proper sports event. We were given special tags as participants so that we will be able to pass security. I was thinking to myself:' This is totally cool man!' To top it up, we were put up in a real nice hotel for the night. Apparently, Brunel University booked a hotel for all its atheletes in this £90 a night hotel. Totally totally unexpected.

We had to wake up real early for our match the next morning. There was a relatively big crowd that turned up to watch the match. But it was a proper badminton hall with proper auditorium style seatings for spectators. University of Leeds were much better and beat us in the final. Anyhow, we still got a silver medal. It was actually our first loss of the season as we had also won our 1st division league unbeaten. Nevertheless, it was a very good season for us indeed. I'm actually all excited to play in the premiership next year, but i really need to improve. After the price giving ceremony, we watched the badminton premiership cup finals. Boy, were they good! We watched a couple of other events like Basketball and Atheletics which Brunel were also competing before we headed back.

My experience in Sheffield was definitely one to behold. I really want to thank God for giving me the opportunity to be able to compete. I was actually a reserve and only selected by default because the Jordanian guy could not play. Thank God for this experience that He has given through playing for the university that has enabled me to travel around the UK.

'Thank You Lord for your bountiful blessings that overflows even beyond what we expect and sometimes handle. I lift Your name up high. Amen.'