An exciting and eventful weekend

After two nights back home Markus was picked up early Thursday morning again for the airport for a two day trip with company visits to Poland's capital Warsaw. The fact that the Polish basketball team was well on track in the European Championship tournament hosted by Poland was visible everywhere, but the local euphoria about a pretty impressive tournament was extinguished on Wednesday night with a clear defeat against Spain. The Spaniards, having started weakish into the tournament got really rolling in this game against Poland which they won by a 21 point margin, and cruised on to crowning themselves European Champion by winning all further games by an at least 18 point margin. The final on Sunday night against the young Serbian team which reached the final a little bit by surprise, was basically already decided in H1 when Spain, led by the tournament's MVP Pau Gasol, built a 13 point lead and dominated the game just as they wished.

On Saturday the three of us got into our car early afternoon and made our way to Stefan's birthday and farewell party. At the age of 24 he decided to end his career as active semi-professional basketball player in order to focus on his studies and life outside the court - a difficult step to make, as he was playing hoops for the last 16 years and with high intensity for the past 9 years. Not surprisingly the majority of his friends at the party were somehow related to the sport, including all his current as well as many of the previous season's teammates of the Oberwart Gunners. Apart from Stefan also our "little Buddha" Jakob enjoyed the evening and the many guests a lot, made friends with Fabio, Viki's sister's son who is 6 weeks younger than Jakob, and we got even more convinced now that he is simply glad when there are many people around him.

6 weeks age difference are still visible

A late night on Saturday requested some additional hours of sleep on Sunday morning for all of us especially as we were invited for lunch with Nikolaus, Michi & Klaus. For Jakob that meant that he had to be fit for more attention that was guaranteed as Andi & Sissi also joined us with a delicious "Jakob" cake prepared by confectionery Kaplan am Kurpark. Lateron Anna & Clemens together with their son Nik showed up and while enjoying the food, excellent wines and the beautiful weather we somehow forgot about the time and therefore got into the weekend traffic on the way into Vienna. After all the weekend was though very nice and relaxing, but unfortunately it went by far too fast.

Jakob, Kerstin & Markus