Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Losing it

Three players did not travel to Honduras with the Mexican national team. Two had legitimate excuses as Ricardo Osorio (stomach flu) and Giovani Dos Santos (groin) were physically unable to go.

Edgar Castillo, though, did not get to go because he lost his passport. Seriously.

I lost my passport once. I had come back from Japan after the 2002 World Cup and a week later moved from one apartment to another. I swore for years that I had left it behind in the old place because I never remembered seeing it in the new place. Since then, we bought a house, and then another, in a span of about five years, maybe less. While rummaging through my closet here in my current house, I grabbed a camera bag that I hadn't used in a while. I figured I'd put my camera in there since, well, that's what it's for. I wondered what else was in there, since we'd bought that camera bag in 2000 or 2001. I shuffled through the pockets and found my passport. Of course, I'd replaced it in late '03 before a trip to Europe.

I felt like a dumbass. I'm sure Edgar feels like a dumbass too, and one day he'll probably find it. The only difference of course is that my dumb move did not cost me the chance to travel to Honduras for a World Cup qualifier, nor was it publicized until right now. And even then, I'm sure nobody cares.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Edgar seems to have lost the plot lately.

Anonymous said...

Oh I care, I care plenty. LOL

PaulO said...

Losing my passport is something of a personal nightmare, so I carry mine with me at all times, in foreign climes. I have, however, lost some other very significant stuff, while overseas. In 2002, while covering the U.S. team in the World Cup, I left my laptop in the backseat of a Korean cab. I sent my final stories on Ives Galarcep's machine. And in November I left my wallet on a bus in Hong Kong, losing credit cards, money and my driver's license. The laptop eventually was sent home to me. The wallet was not. ... And in El Salvador on Friday, I came this close to losing my tape recorder, having left it on the seat of a cab. The cabbie spotted it and called me back. I tipped him generously. So, yeah, it happens, especially when you're lugging around a lot of documents and equipment. Though I should note, that players usually have an aid who carries all their documents for them.