Chapter 23: Wheelchair Sports in Toluca

We meet in Atlacomulco at like 8:30 in the morning. A little bus is there to pick us up. There are like 15 or maybe 16 of us there, all there to participate except Liam, myself, and Juan Pablo’s sister Laura. I lift all of them into the bus, one by one. All of them. Maybe Liam helped some. And then we folded, took the wheels off, and stacked all the chairs on the bus too. And then we rode with Laura all the way there, facing backwards on a wooden plank leaning against the bumping speaker in her beater Volkswagen van.

When we got there, we jumped out, unloaded unfolded and reassembled all the chairs. We got all the seat cushions down and into place, and then all of them down and into their chairs. Some did it themselves.

So I’m not always gracious; I don’t always like this job. Judge me if you must.

We get into a real gym, with real tennis courts outside. It is a nice 70 to 80 degree day. Liam and I both get chairs to play in. We wheel around and shoot hoops. The best part of the day. This is actually the first time that I have ever been allowed to play wheelchair basketball in a real gym with real hoops and real wood floors. It is difficult, but awfully fun. Shooting from outside of 15 feet is extremely difficult, and I could only do it using momentum from my lower body which of course they don’t have. Juan Pablo is built like a horse and can easily throw the ball that far, but with little accuracy. I teach them how to shoot the ball from immediately under the hoop, spinning it up off the backboard. They teach me how to move in a wheelchair. They knock me out of it at their own will.

There are maybe 20 to 30 people in chairs total. We dominate the chaired numbers. There are two guys teams and two girls teams that are made up of deaf individuals. They play both basketball and soccer. We got play tennis while they play basketball, and then we finally get a sweet full game of wheelchair basketball going while they go play soccer outside.

The funniest part was the awkwardness of the political situation. What happened is that the event was sponsored by both the city of Toluca, which is the PAN political party, and the state athletic department which is the opposing PRI. Kike pointed this out to me as soon as we got there, and said that both the mayor of the city from the PAN (who I knew from his huge billboards) and the head athletic chair from the PRI (who Kike knew from TV) were there, and both wanted credit for helping these poor unfortunates. And they both gave speeches to that end. All the local and national TV stations were there, who were all interested that Liam and I were there. Not to get on TV, but interested to chat.

Don Memo was invited up and gave a long pompous speech about being there. I love the guy, but he is way too into himself. I think he just wanted to be on TV.

Kike ended up being on TV. He got a great interview (he is definitely the most photogenic of the group, with maybe the exception of Juan Pablo) and was totally relaxed and himself, talking about how much fun it is and how people need to stop thinking people in wheelchairs are contagious and start building more ramps and sidewalks and stuff. We saw him on TV that night, as did a lot of friends who told us later.

And we loaded up the people, chairs, and equipment and headed home. This is the day: from 8 AM to 8 PM we spend a total of three hours on the road, one hour loading and unloading, an hour listening to bogus politicians rant about who deserves credit for helping people out, an hour awards ceremony that was fun but way too long, an hour waiting, an hour eating for lunch, an hour for dinner, an hour for TV interviews, and whatever is left over for playing. This is not good or bad. It just is a different style. It’s patient and slow and no one is in a rush to do anything. It’s just what it is. Some days I love it. Some days I hate it.