Chapter 7

Charly vs Immaculada

Home

TOCAYO
Part 1
Prologue
Playa Norte
Charly the American
A Catholic Education
Cold Showers
A Peruvian Name...
Tossing Armando...
Los Shorts de Bob...
Charly vs Immaculada
Warming the Bench...
A Little Socrates...
Running From Lola
Ping Pong Politics
A Perfect Basketball Day
A Man Needs His Friends
A Pig In a Hole
Condors Over Ticlio
Wrestling in the Plaza
Handcuffs and Curfews
Rochabus
A Hero Hiding
Hitting A Brick Wall
Part 2

I believe our conversation made him more relaxed. In the locker room he asked Coco Palotes, one of our forwards, whether the league had any good teams.

Three were excellent, Coco Palotes explained. Carmelitas, San Antonio, and Immaculada were the best teams in the league, with "many good players." In fact, he confessed, one of those three teams had won the championship every year since Santa Rosa's demise.

Charly stared at Coco. We had learned by then that it was Charly’s way of asking someone to continue.

“Santa Maria was the best in Lima,” Coco told him, “but most students don't remember. The bigger schools, then they learn to play. More students, you know? Santa Maria has not even been in the playoffs for six, maybe seven years, now."

"And there's always Lalo." Miguel added.

That comment seemed to interest the gringo. He turned his attention to Miguel.

"He plays for Carmelitas," Coco explained. "He is the best player in Peru. Nobody can beat a team that has Lalo on it."

Charly looked back at Coco, as if he were feeling something. It was so hard to know what he was feeling. Why don’t gringos show you what they are feeling so you can react, eh? A Peruvian, you know by looking at him when he is angry, sad, happy. A gringo? Impossible.

Our first game would not be against Lalo and his Carmelitas team, but against mighty Immaculada. The year past, Immaculada, they lost the championship to Carmelitas. Yes, but their best players were still on the team, especially the tall skinny boy who was so tall he caught all of the rebounds, blocked almost all of the shots, and scored so many points close to the basket. This boy, he was tall enough and good enough to dominate almost any basketball game. He was a champion, no? And his team, Immaculada, they deserved a championship, no? But he had been born in the same year as Lalo.

This is a difficult truth to face. But the Immaculada players, they face it. And it make them mad. Mad against all the other teams who do not have Lalo. So of course, they expected to destroy our little Santa Maria team, and had been developing an appetite for the victory all week long.

Of course, what our team had been working on all week is what I have an excellent American word for: trepidation. Yes, trepidation. I looked it up carefully. You see, for four years minimum, the players of Santa Maria and their fans took part in an experiment of psychology inspired by Mister Pavlov. We have been conditioned to associate the name of Immaculada with humiliation. I do not know why, and I do not know anyone else who knows why, but Immaculada teams destroy Santa Maria teams by so many points it is actually not polite. Even when the teams look like they are equal, no, we always loose by many points. So yes, we are impressed that Coach Rink, he know so much basketball, we are impressed that Charly is a magnificent player, but we are conditioned to expect defeat. Is that simple.