Fnatic - A profesional gaming team

I apologize for not blogging sooner, I went to sleep when we got back to Langfang as I was exhausted, even after sleeping on the 10 hour train ride.  Then I was woken up and we had to go out for lunch, which was amazing!!! If you ever get the chance to eat peking duck...order it twice...you wont regret it.  It is so amazing, especially with sugar : O  I was the only one to eat it with sugar..its good, trust me! Now onto the day of the ESL IEM Shanghai GC FINALS.  Well...the day started very early as we headed to the venue to play Natus Vincere on the last map of the semi-finals.  I can't speak for the guys, but for some reason I was nervous...I stood there watching them play, and it was too close for me, way too close. But in the end they ended up winning, and I let out a yell of joy involuntarily.  But it was a great moment, and I was very excited to be a part of it.

It was a few hours wait until the grand finals versus Tyloo.raw, one could say my old team.  --I used to work for wNv in 2006, and Savage was a part of one of our Counter-Strike teams at that time, and as you probably know, he is now on Tyloo.raw.--  So, it was a rather exciting match for me personally, even if the guys treated it as just another match.  The finals came and went, and nothing too exciting happened to be honest, Tyloo.raw was no real match for the Fnatic boys.  Fnatic won 2-0 rather quickly, giving us all time to take photos, talk to fans, go to the bathroom, and watch the Warcraft 3 finals between Lyn and ReMinD.

I was cheering for Lyn of course, and he won thankfully :P Right after that, the awards ceremony came, and WOW there were so many people piled up right in front that I had to take up a spot towards the side.  There were so many film crews, and photographers there, it was a madhouse.  But I got a few decent photos, and then after, myself, Bruce and the ESL guys had a private photo-shoot with the Fnatic team in a closed room afterwards, so that was nice. Although the lighting was not ideal for my camera : (

After that the guys took some photos, and I was talking to Paul and Lyn before Paul went to go do some ESL work.  At this time I finished congratulating Lyn and turned around to watch Moon who had been hiding out in the ESL supply closet in order to avoid all of the raving fans.  The entrance to his little haven was guarded by two ESL staff members.  I turned around and commented to them on Moon and his current predicament, and then a Chinese girl had pushed her way to the front of the fans and requested a photo of me.  As usual at China Joy, I explained that I was not one of the players and asked if she wanted me to get one of the guys for photos.  The ESL staffers did not aid me as they egged on the situation.  As it turns out, the girl just wanted a photo of me, so I said okay, she took her photos, and then asked for one more thing; my msn.  "oh, I cant do that, sorry" was my response to her asking for my msn. After that I went to go take photos and catch up with the guys as we were going to do that private photo-shoot I mentioned earlier.  As I was standing waiting for the guys to finish with photos and autographs, that girl came over with two of her friends, they also wanted photos.  So I took some photos, and then as the last girl was posing for a photo with me, her friend was shaking while holding the camera...it was a little weird that they would be that nervous just taking a photo of me...her shaking ended up ruining a few photos, so we took some more until it was okay, and then they went to walk away when the original girl leaned in and told me I was cute.  I said thank you and then they left. I have to say, this sort of attention does not come easily..or at all, in North America.  I find it rather fun to be 'famous' in China, even if it is for a rather idiotic reason. After that, we took the photos with the guys and then headed back to our hotel where me gux and f0rest hung out in their room and did an auido interview with f0rest (just a short 3 minute thing with some simple general questions) and then they took off for food at a Korean BBQ and I headed to starbucks. From there I went back to the hotel in order to wait for RoRo and her mom.  So I sat in the lobby as I had a killer headache from not eating or drinking anything properly.  And there were these kids.....screaming, at the top of their lunges, it was enough to make your head hurt...and mine already did.  Their dad didn't even do anything, he just left them there sitting next to me and walked off to the other side of the lobby.  It was awful.  I finished my gatorade and walked outside to wait.  They picked me up and we went off to the train station, and then back off to Beijing. I hope you are all doing well, I will talk to you all tomorrow.

One last note, I would like to give a shoutout to bruce for my new display photo : )