Winning a Lion

Never, ever, mess with SAO; I’m pretty sure they will kill you if you mess with their scheduled events. The big activity for evening was the all important Ice Breaker Games, a byzantine collection challenges intended to promote “breaking the ice”.
While the challenges themselves were quite doable finding willing participants to stay on your team proved nigh impossible. Starting the race you were asked to roll a dice to determine what terrible concoction you would be ingesting before being spun around in an office chair before you sprinted to the next stage. Unfortunately no matter how fast you were personally it was still required to have the entire team past the line before phase two. Phase two involved filling a jug with water from a leaking bucket. Part three was a devilish two man sack race where two players had to hop in concert. Next was the sand crawl, players were asked to move a basketball from one side of a sand pit to another, not too difficult until you consider the net that kept you close to the ground. After each player got through they had to toss the ball back to a waiting team member. Personally I considered the bobbing for ping pong balls the most degrading, we were asked to pick ping pong balls out of what I think was flour and water, place the ball in a spoon, and then carry the spoon in your mouth across the line. All of this just to run down a slip n’ slide.

My first team spent a healthy part of the evening’s activities trying to find someone willing to actually run the gamut, while I started on a team made up of myself and five Moroccan girls; by the time we were running the list of players on the team had changed too many times to properly keep track. It must be said that a team founded in fire and tribulation has the potential to be the diamond in the rough that you always hope for. With a strong start team six was able to keep the lead for the entirety of the challenge. Even after getting a face full of sand during the belly crawl it felt good to win the match. After my first race I was asked to help a group of Moroccan students flush out a team, but like the my first team player retention before the event was rather difficult, but “God Bless America” we were able to find two more Americans to flush out our team, to say that we played well would be an understatement, we were miles ahead of the team we raced against, providing us with the 2nd fast time of the night. With that wonderful time we had earned a glorious title and a stuffed Lion, the mascot of AUI and the city of Ifrane.

Holding my prize Lion