USA II’s dinner last night was delicious. We went to Figueira Rubayat which I highly recommend. The menu had an assortment of seafood and steak but the bread was the highlight of the meal. They used a wood-burning oven to bake the bread and it really makes a difference in the taste and texture of the bread. USA II now has the carbohydrates it needs to keep up their stamena the next two weeks! Thanks to Cynthia Kung and Lara Coser (Sharon Shapiro’s friends) for recommending Rubayat!
Enough about food … Today’s agenda for USA II has a practice match at 1pm against the German team. Interestingly, the USA is the only country that has two teams in each event. This is determined by the bridge-population base of the Zones. Our Zone (Zone 2) has enough members to grant us two teams. Thus USA I and USA II. The other Zones include several countries; and, therefore you might notice that among the 22 teams there are a lot of countries missing! Every other Zone only sends one country. This doesn’t make us very popular amongst the other countries…
This evening USA II will attend the Opening Ceremony and musical show at 7:30pm. During the opening Ceremony, all of the teams walk across a stage dressed in their team uniforms led by someone carrying their country flag. It is quite a scene. Our uniform is tan pants, blue shirt, blue jacket and red tie (scarf for me).
Meanwhile, check out the Brazilian home page for the tournament. There are lots of interesting facts about Sao Paulo and the history of Brazilian Bridge. http://www.brazilbridge2009.com.br/index-i.php
