For the past few weeks, I’ve been going out on the pond for two hours of pickup hockey on Sunday afternoons. This is the first winter I’ve kept it up for more than two weekends in total. Now, while I’m having a lot of fun out there, and getting better each time –as perhaps would be attested to by the increasing number of times I am managing stick-puck contact and the decreasing number of times I am forced to perform a butt-ice contact– I am certain I wouldn’t be a welcomed addition to any team playing in the World Pond Hockey Championship, which is held every winter in Plaster Rock, New Brunswick, Canada. This year, the championship attracted 120 teams from every Canadian province, as well as 23 U.S. states, and such countries as England, Ireland, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, and -get this- Egypt! Naturally, I was curious… I know Egypt is quite good in field hockey, but pond hockey? I mean, there are quite a few more fields –as few as they are– than there are frozen ponds.

Turns out the contact person for the team “from” Cairo is a Mr Schofield, Bill. Hardly an Egyptian name, I’d say… So, unless, the name was lost in translation from something like ostaaz Bilal Shafiee, the Egyptian connection is still a mystery to me.