Practice makes perfect.....Tons of practice

Blog series:

Blog #1 - March 11th

Blog #2 - March 19th

Blog #3 - March 25th

So this is blog #4 and just a heads up, this one is a novel! Yesterday was our 2 week mark here in Romania, wow time is flying. We're officially settled in, used to the jet lag and practicing our hearts out daily. There has not been a dull moment for RaNgeD and I and we have experienced quite a bit already.

The last few weeks we've been taking care of alot of different things as far as fully settling in and getting situated. One of the things we had to take care of, which actually i enjoyed doing in the U.S., was grocery shopping. Let me just start by saying, grocery shopping here is like going to the damn Zoo on the opening day of a new attraction. The grocery stores here i think are worse than LA traffic. You have people bumping into each other with carts, piles and piles of people down one aisle and it's complete havoc. RaNgeD and I almost got ran over a few times while in the center of the store, not down any aisles. It was INSANE! It didnt help that we had no clue where anything really was and the store was bigger than a super target. It was pretty funny just watching people cruise around aimlessly. They might as well of been playing some kind of trance / rave music in the store, i might've got a little bit more pumped and started running around as well. Definitely a very interesting experience.

Our wash machine had been broke since day 1 and we havnt had clean close for a bit. I was at RaNgeD's house for a week before we left Washington and used up half of my clothes just there, so I was walking around in some pretty funky smelling clothes for about a week =\ If you read the last blog you saw the picture of my clothes drying after I had attempted to hand wash my jeans and socks....didn't work too well they just became crusty after drying and smelled a bit worse. Anyways, one of our co-workers was nice enough to let us go ahead and let us use his wash machine one night after work. We hauled our clothes over there after walking a few blocks and were able to start washing. One of Alex's neighbors was online and was talking to him while we were over and told him that he was going to swing by. I can't remember the guy's name but the as soon as he walks in he's telling us that he already drank 4 beers and was a bit tipsy. Next thing we know he sits down and knocks Alex's beer all over his keyboard and just starts laughing about it saying "I told you I had 4 already" and then busts out 4 more Becks and hands us each one and opens another for himself. The guy was hilarious, definitely a character. He was showing us funny youtube videos, clips for jay and silent bob and was overly excited to show us his World of Warcraft playing card game haha. What started out as just a laundry night, ended up being a ton of fun and we made it our own little kickback.

When the weekend hit, RaNgeD and I wanted to do something a bit exciting and get out of the office for a change of pace, so Andrei said he wanted to take us "on a walk" around the town. We met up with his wife and 2 kids and went to old town Bucharest and checked out all the cool sites. There were huge buildings everywhere that were super old and very distinguished looking. There were old churches, banks, taverns and more and more banks lol. We learned alot about old town and got a little history run down on the city from Andrei himself. We saw ALOT of beautiful women there and alot of interesting looking bars. Andrei had told us at night the place gets really poppin' every night around 9 pm and Austin and I decided we had to check it out sometime. Now, we had learned a few words (not necessarily the nicest words) from some co-workers and had been using them to communicate with people. Just basic words such as hello, thank you, bye and a few a tad bit more vulgar. So we were walking around and this poor lady had asked RaNgeD for money and he didn't reply to her and next thing we know she calls him a "pula" (I believe thats how you spell it). We started busting up laughing because it's a vulgar word used here and I guess it's used a bit often. We thought it was neat how we were able to recognize it though.

After the weekend it was back to practice for us. RaNgeD and I have been practicing non stop pouring all we've got into the game and not letting ourselves get side tracked. We're still playing on average 8-12 hours day which averages about 25-35 games depending on the length of the game. On top of that we're keeping up to date by watching GSL since the time that it is on is alot more reasonable than in the U.S. RaNgeD has been practicing a bit with NightEnd for some PvP action and also running alot of ladders / watching replays still. It's amazing how some days you will have a slump and feel like you didnt learn much during the day, then the next day when you are refreshed you realized how much you actually took in. The small things are what counts. It can get a bit frustrating at times when it feels like you arent progressing or learning. I didn't realize how much effort and concentration striving to get better would take. I believe that understanding Starcraft, different strategies, learning what to do in certain situations and how to react is possibly the most complicated thing I have tried to learn in my life because it takes so much patience and so many games. I only have about 3.5k games under my belt for my entire Starcraft career and the more I learn, the more I respect other professional players. On top of working to improve and solidify our gameplay, we also started hitting the gym so we could stay in shape mentally and physically. Physically being in shape allows for you mind think a bit more clear and gives you more energy for the hard work put into the whole process.

Yesterday some of the guys from work had asked us to go out and get a few drinks with them after work and RaNgeD and I agreed as it was our 2 week mark and we deserved a nice little break from the office. When 7pm hit, we all got off and jumped on the tram and took the tram back to old town where we went into this bar that our coworkers had picked. This place was completely loud, people were laughing, talking and just enjoying themselves. RaNgeD and I had a blast. We weren't too sure what to order, so the guys just ordered up a bunch of beers which was served to us on this wooden circle thing that somewhat looked like a steering wheel to a pirate ship haha. You can check it out in the picture below. After enjoying a few beers at this place, the guys wanted to go to a hookah lounge and relax a little so we decided to join them instead of go back to the office. The hookah lounge was really small and tightly fit with tables and chairs. We just sat back, had another beer and got to converse with our new friends, it was definitely alot of fun. Afterwards on the way back home we stopped to get a shaorma which is like a sandwhich type deal in a tortilla. I can't get enough of them they're absolutely amazing!

It's been a very interesting and exciting week and we can't wait for what else our trip enfolds. This week MLG Dallas is starting and I'm excited to see some results and watch some good games being casted. It should be pretty interesting. Best of luck to ReSpOnSe, you're going to kill it with all the time you've been putting into practice. RaNgeD and I also want to let everyone know that we are working on a short 10-15 minute video blog that we should hopefully be releasing within the next week or 2 if I can find an adapter to charge my camera a bit. Other than that, we are out until next week! Take care and good luck to all the teams and players in MLG =)
~sLeEpy

Photos, Photos, Photos
There's ALOT of photos this time
Be sure to check them all out

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