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It wasn’t so many days ago that I was sitting in my apartment in Seattle, seriously hating the idea of packing up my life again. I think one of these days I might really leave the country with only my passport, a book and the clothes on my back. Everyone around me seemed ten times more excited than me about my imminent seven months in Greece. It felt so routine. Another year, another 15 hour flight.

The upside of leaving for the airport at four am. Is that your body gets a preview of how shitty you are going to feel for the next week. About five hours into flying I was still asleep, about six hours in I would have paid a lot of money for a shower, and about ten hours in I was an international currency dealer, fiddeling through coins in euros, litas and liras, exchanging a single dollar for a euro with the Greek next to me who needed a dollar to complete his duty free Bombay Saphhire Gin purchase. Probably the only time I got the better end of an exchange with a Greek.

The only real significant part of leaving America for Greece again was that it wasn’t significant at all. I had no anticipation, no nerves, no excitement, no dread, I was totally apathetic and it probably wasn’t until halfway over the Atlantic that it really dawned on me that I’d just left my life back there.

The highlight of the flight, however, was at the very end. A man in front of me was removing his bag from the overhead bin, I was just about to reach up and help him when I decided against it. Opening jars and throwing around luggage seem to be written into the man code and I try not to emasculate men except when given the opportunity on the basketball court. Clearly I should have helped him as his bag dropped directly onto my face. My glasses went flying two rows up ahead as I stood there too shocked to be mad. In fact, for some reason I found the situation to be amusing, probably because I somehow avoided needing stitches.

As usual, I walked through customs with my baggage, hoping someone would be there to pick me up but realizing it was 8 in the morning in Greece and the designated person might not have had their coffee and cigarette yet. I thought I might be sitting and reading for awhile. Much to my surprise, I walked out to meet couple of fans and a journalist.

I’m playing for the biggest and most popular sports club in Greece, which might explain why fans picked me up at the airport and why any journalist knew or cared about my arrival. People go crazy for Panathinaikos Unfortunately for me, they also wanted to take pictures and I wished I’d gone diva style and wore sunglasses. Nothing like a photo shoot after a cross Atlantic flight. I never checked but I really hope those photos didn’t make the paper.

Speaking of photo shoots, we had the first of what will be multiple modeling sessions for our club magazine. Two days into practice and I get directions for the next day: ‘be here at one o’clock, bring stilettos.’ Seeing as this is Europe, I wasn’t at all surprised but also seeing how this is Europe, I was a little nervous. So far the wardrobe for the shoot consisted of high heels, and nothing else. This was going to be interesting.

The next day I sponged on globs of makeup and actually blow dried my hair for once. Teammates had gone to the salon and gotten done up by the professionals so everyone was photo shoot ready. Our coach was running around like a little kid on Christmas morning, completely overwhelmed that his dream had come true: he had the hottest women’s team in Greece. I was just happy there was going to be clothes involved.

The designer had brought bags of dresses, most of which I would have laughed at if I’d seen them on a rack. The first option was a piece that looked like grandma’s afghan, okay in a guest bedroom but not paired with stilettos. Finally I found a dress that was classy chic, a black and white retro double breasted buttoned dress. It didn’t at all go with my shoes but I figured it would work and I wouldn’t be showing anything that would compromise running for political office sometime in the future.

As luck would have it I went second, which meant I followed up my Serbian teammate who has the longest legs I’ve ever seen and actually has modeling experience. This girl was posing like Heidi Klum; I was wondering how long I had to keep on the transvestite looking makeup.

The photographer decided to get funky with me though and I found myself holding onto the long curtain of nets that protects the stands from errant volleyballs. I was supposed to be looking sexy and mysterious; I felt like a fish. My teammates called me a mermaid which sounds better so I’m going with that. By the end, I was certain the pictures were either going to be sexy or utterly ridiculous and I’d put my money on the latter.

Then it was time to join the others and watch as each player got embarrassed. We were there to boost people’s confidence and/or make fun of them, and be the crotch police, ensuring that camera angles didn’t include a little extra visual. Finally it was time for the group shot. The theme of the photo shoot was ‘Charlie’s (Giannis’) Angels’ so we all had to crowd around our coach like groupies while he stood front and center trying to look tough but really being the happiest guy in the world. Us girls basically had to hump each other in order to get in the picture. Fun times.

I have a time limit for wearing heels, makeup, or having my hair down and the time had long since passed. Soon we were all outside our gym having coffee, laughing about our crazy poses, and wiping foundation and purple eye makeup off our faces in anticipation of afternoon practice. It’s amazing how much makeup it takes just to look normal in a photo. I couldn’t wait to get in mesh shorts and a ponytail. So much for my modeling career.

Speaking of models. I’m surrounded by them. Models from all over the world are in Athens right now for the modeling season. Since they are living a similar transient life, the athletes and models all pass time together, sharing the same experiences in this unsettled life of ours. Our careers are more similar than we realize; all of us are mercenaries of our craft, traveling the world for resume building and paychecks. Basketball players just eat more carbs, and less cocaine.

The only reason I found the models is because a few male basketball players I know seem to find them easily, or the models find them. I’m not quite sure.. This of course is the one pet peeve of every six foot girl 180 lb girl I know….tall, athletic men going to waste by dating girls with the ass of a 12 year old Chinese boy.

To be fair, I don’t know the girls very well. They could be back at the hotel writing the next best American novel for all I know. Or German. Or Argentine. And I hope they are, because the whole modeling career sounds so very unfulfilling. I just see them out, a whole group of girls with a male promoter at the club, or smoking long cigarettes at the café or at the basketball games asking as many dumb questions as I would if thrown in a fashion show. They are young and living the life of drinking on an empty stomach, accessible drugs, eating disorders and European designers. At twenty years old in a foreign country, it’s difficult to avoid the no consequence lifestyle.


Like I said, I don’t really know the girls very well but after being around them for five minutes I concluded that the modeling industry seems like a bunch of really beautiful people with low self esteem. That being said, they do take really good photos. So, when they whip out the cameras to start taking pictures, I try to hide. Though I do maintain solid self confidence there is omething about standing next to 6 foot anorexics that makes me feel like a whale. I never knew a grown woman’s arms could be smaller than my ankles. Bench pressing any one of them wouldn’t have even been a workout.

Shockingly, I’m around girls enough in my ‘day job’ so I tend to gravitate towards the male models, some of which actually might be straight. So my perspective on the whole industry is really only from them but it sounds a lot like this.: the models all hustle around the world, their home base agent sends them to other agencies in various places for the designated ‘season’. They show up and then wait everyday for castings and jobs, running around foreign cities trying to get paid or waiting at the hotel, wasting the day away. Cafes and clubs and restaurants give them discounts or feed them for free so that their establishments are filled with beautiful people. They all quickly learn which photo shoot require gay guys because the girls are naked or which photographers or designers require sex to make you a success. If someone is seen on the side of a building in a Dolce and Gabbana ad for instance, everyone knows how they got there.

It sounds exhausting. They live in a hotel, moving around to different cities, waiting on faxes from their agency every morning. Sometimes they get the jobs, sometimes they don’t, sometimes they never even get a phone call. And so they wait. It makes me thankful for practice.

It also makes me thankful for a job that makes me feel better about myself and my abilities instead of worse. Sure there is a talent to modeling but a lot of it is about things you can’t control, how you look, having the look they want, whether the photographer or designer is dying to sleep with you, whether you ate bread the day before.

And so, if I ever thought modeling would be fun, I’m over that crazy notion. There is no part of me that wants to stand up in front of people and have them tell me to lose weight or that my eyes are too close together or my nose is too big; I can do all that in the comfort of my own home.

The funny thing is though, I do stand up in front of people and get criticized or praised, applauded or booed, told I’m good at this or bad at that. People like me for superficial reasons; I can be the star if I make four three pointers or the scapegoat if I make zero. In athletics there are extreme highs and extreme lows; its easy to base your self worth on external attention, success can inflate your ego, failure can make one feel worthless as a person.

Yikes! So what’s the difference between basing your self esteem on how you look, or basing it on your jump shot? I guess the obvious answer is that one you can actually do something about. But it’s more than that cause failure still feels like failure whether its based on genetics or not. For me, its all about perspective. I don’t necessarily mean that there are bigger problems in the world than a missed shot, though that’s part of it. I mean that I’m on a journey of self discovery through basketball. Makes and misses are all part of the process of becoming more of who I am. Not trying to be more, not striving to be more, but focusing on the present moment of being and playing in the fullness of who I am. A shift in thought brings about a shift in experience.

I’m going to be writing about this a lot…