This week, I travelled to my favorite country abroad - Japan, to compete in the DHC International Bowling Championships at Inazawa Grand Bowl, just outside of Nagoya, Japan. Inazawa
Grand Bowl is the largest bowling center in the world, spanning 116 lanes
straight across.
Inazawa Grand Bowl
The trip was very eventful right from the start. My travel
day to Nagoya was very long, stressful and scary at times. I was traveling with
my best friend Scott Norton and we thought that we were booked on all of the same
flights through to Narita airport in Tokyo. However, upon a late arrival into
San Francisco and a brisk walk to our connecting flight to Tokyo, we realized
that we were not on the same flight.
So splitting paths, I quickly boarded my plane for my nice
10 ½hr flight to Tokyo (minus a personal TV in the headrest in front of me…NOT
happy!) To make matters worse, the flight was then extended another hour due to
horrific turbulence upon arrival into Tokyo.
We circled the airport and attempted to land two different
times before successfully landing on the 3rd attempt. Side not…I’m
not a nervous flier and I was pretty scared and started saying some prayers... Then we finally landed to find that Narita airport was covered in a winter
wonderland with blizzard-like conditions. Another 45 minutes crawling to our
gate and then we finally were able to get off of the plane.
The airport was a zoo with flights delayed, immigration
lines incredibly long and everyone trying to get somewhere in a hurry, with
little success. I couldn’t get ahold of Scott, whom I hoped had also landed
safely in the mess outside. Finally after getting through immigration, getting
my bags, going through customs, getting lost in finding the rebooking area
(since my flight to Nagoya had been cancelled), I finally rebooked my ticket
and was only told “hurry” to get to my next flight.
Running through another airport, getting through security
and finding the bus to my gate and plane, I finally arrived as one of the last
people to board the last flight of the night to Nagoya. Thank goodness as soon
as I got on that flight, I saw Scott.
That was just the first of many crazy events on this trip to
Japan.
Scott didn’t receive any of his bags and the airline had no
idea where they were (which is always a good thing.) So long story short, that
next day, the only way for Scott to get his bowling balls and lugagge in time
to actually compete in the tournament was for him to take a bullet train back and forth from Nagoya to Narita airport in
Tokyo (which is 265 miles away.) Taking the Shinkansen or bullet train is NOT cheap in Japan, so I was
not able to go with Scott to help him out. Luckily our very amazing and helpful
friend Mr. Noda met Scott in Narita and helped him sort everything out. He
arrived back at the hotel with all of his bowling balls and luggage around 11pm that night.
The next day, Day 3 of our trip, I watched Scott bowl the
qualifiers. I had been invited to the tournament and was therefore seeded into
the main event. Scott successfully qualified on his first attempt but bowled
another squad for practice, while I practiced for about 2 ½hrs trying to work
out some kinks.
The next day, we had the official practice session followed
by the opening ceremonies and then started our first block of qualifying.
Qualifying consisted of 9 games, in sets of 3-game blocks. Then the field was
cut to the top 24 players and then another 6 games were bowled to determine the
top 5 stepladder finalists for the TV show.
I had a VERY rough start to say the least. I played the
lanes incorrectly, missed some easy spares, left a couple pocket 7-10s and just
simply didn’t throw the ball well. Meanwhile, the rest of the field was
shooting 300 like it was nothing and the scoring pace was extremely high. I dug
a HUGE hole for myself, shooting -67 with the cut being around +70. So needless to say, not a good start. The only good thing about the day was that afterwards, Mr. Noda graciously took Scott and I out for some yummy Shabu Shabu, which is raw meat cooked in boiling water with vegetables - my favorite!
Mr. Noda preparing our shabu shabu
After talking with others that scored well, thinking about
things I didn’t try and just re-evaluating everything, I made some major
adjustments for the next day. Needing two big sets, I started out with a 233,
followed by a clean 192 (never missing the pocket) and then shot 239 to be -3
overall. They didn’t re-oil for the next set and I needed a big set to make the
cut.
Changing hand positions and opening up the lanes, I shot 244
and 247, putting me at +88 going into the last game. I needed one more big game to make the cut, and then I hit a bad pair. Starting out with a
double and then leaving a pocket 7-10, it was all downhill from there and I
missed the cut to the top 24, which ended up taking +135.
I will say that I was especially impressed with 14-year-old Japanese youngster, Shion Izumune who nearly made the championship TV show. She did, however, qualify for the trios event representing Japan.
Shion Izumune and I
Immediately after getting done with my final game, I was heading over to see how
Scott was bowling (the guys took a lot longer to bowl each block and were
therefore still bowling), when Kelly Kulick ran up to me and said “Missy, Scott
is looking for you, he wants to go to the hospital.” Being completely stunned
and in shock, I quickly ran over to his pair to find out what was going on. He
looked like a ghost and was still attempting to bowl his 2nd game of the block.
He quit after that game and I with the help of our friends
and the staff of the tournament, rushed him to the nearest hospital. Thankfully
we were seen fairly quickly and he was super dehydrated and needed an IV for an
hour and received some medicine. He got his color back and slept for the next
13hrs once we got back to the hotel.
Thankfully that was the end of the craziness. The next day,
Scott was much better and we went to watch the TV show and attended the farewell
party.
Big congratulations to Shayna Ng from Singapore and Tommy
Jones who won the tournament.
Tommy Jones during the title match
Although this was a very short, yet eventful trip and
definitely the worst I’ve ever bowled in Japan (prior worst finish being 6th),
I still enjoyed seeing all of my friends and eating yummy Japanese food. I just
hope that it’s not too long before I venture back to my favorite country
abroad!
