10/20/2008 - 14:38
Europe Live...A Tale of Two Cities
by Tyson Chandler

Overall, the trip for Europe Live was something that I'd definitely love to do again if I had the chance. We got a chance to play in front of people who normally only get to watch us on TV and never get to see us in person. They're such great fans of the game and they were appreciative of everything that we were doing. We got to talk to them, we ran a clinic, and it was just a great experience totally. I definitely think it helps the game by doing it.

NO SLEEP TILL BERLIN
We played the Spurs in San Antonio the night before we left, got home by like 1:00 in the morning, finished packing around 3:00 in the morning, woke up, had breakfast and had to leave for the plane around 12:45 or 1:00. We take off, fly into D.C. and then fly into Berlin, which is a loooong flight, especially with my wife being almost eight months pregnant. She did well though. I was really happy, because I didn't know how it would be. She had to get an ultrasound before to make sure she was OK to fly, and it was OK. The only thing was that her back was a little stiff from all of the flying, but everybody's back was stiff.

I don't think these were real referees (Getty Images).

And since it was during the day, I couldn't get any sleep. So, we get to Berlin and when we finally got to the hotel, it was probably about 11:30 in the morning. Everybody was exhausted. And then we have a practice at 2:00. So basically, we're on 48 hours of no sleep with a game and then a practice.

Everybody was dying at practice. It was probably the toughest practice that we've ever had. And Coach Scott ran us, because he said he wanted to get the jet lag out of us. So, it was like a semi-training camp practice on top of 48 hours of no sleep ... and being cramped in the plane for 12 hours.

So, that's how we began the trip.

But Berlin was a great experience. It was more Americanized and easier for us to communicate than Barcelona. It was easier for us with the food and knowing where to go, because we could ask people questions.

I didn't eat in the meal room at the hotel until we got to Spain, until I couldn't figure anything out. I didn't eat in the meal room at all in Berlin, because I wanted to get out and experience the city. And it was a very nice city, a very clean city. The people were nice and there's a lot going on with the history of the wall and stuff like that. It has a metropolitan city feel. So, it was cool to see a lot of different things and learn a little of the history.

GOOD AND BAD DAYS IN BARCELONA
For the second leg of the trip, we went to Barcelona, Spain.

The NBA did an excellent job of preparing us for both cities with what you should be worried about or beware of this and that. On the way to Barcelona, they told us to be aware of pickpocketers, that the majority of crime there is pickpocketing. But I wasn't worried about that, because I was thinking that I wouldn't be going to any places where I'd run into that.

And everybody was telling me how they love Barcelona. So, on the second day, we all wanted to go out with our wives, walk around, see the sights and eat.

So we go to Las Ramblas and it's like this loooong street. We're walking and Melvin Ely and my wife are really picky eaters, and they only wanted chicken, rice and beans. We're trying to find somebody who speaks English to ask them where we can find it.

But nobody speaks English and the only thing that I can think of is "El Pollo Loco," and at first, I'm asking for "Polo," mispronouncing it. And they're looking at me like, "What? What's polo?"

My wife says, "No, it's pollo." And people in the restaurant are like, "Oh, no chicken here." And I'm wondering, "There's no chickens in Spain?"

So we keep walking and we see Kentucky Fried Chicken. There were these girls in front of it and we asked them if they knew where we could find some chicken. They pointed to KFC and we said, "Yeah, we want that, but not from here. We want it from a restaurant." So, this girl says that she'll show us a spot.

So we start walking through all these side streets, and I'm thinking, "I don't know about this." We're following this girl that we don't know and it's starting to get darker. My brother-in-law just loves people and didn't see any harm in it. I told him that maybe we should turn around, since we were getting away from all of the people. But as I say that, she stops and points, "It's right here."

So, we had a nice dinner and Mel and my wife got the chicken they were looking for.

We walk out of the restaurant and the whole time, I had been taking a bunch of pictures with the camera I had bought. Taking pictures is one of my hobbies. So, I'm taking tons of pictures, running ahead of everybody and getting those angles of them walking.

So after we left the restaurant, I took off, walking faster to get ahead of them and take pictures. I'm taking pictures and all of a sudden, I hear somebody start cursing at me. I'm looking through my camera lens at the time, so I can't see anything but the pictures I'm taking. I come from up under, and this dude walks up to me, cursing me out.

I put my camera down and I'm like, "Am I not supposed to be taking pictures here?" He starts yelling in Spanish and I can't understand him obviously. He looked homeless to me, and I'm saying, "Oh, I'm not supposed to be taking pictures here. I'm sorry."

He's just screaming at me and I put the camera away and walk away. But then he's still going off and I see like 10 more homeless people up against the wall with dogs and stuff. It looked to me like the other 10 people were asking him what he was doing, but they were speaking Spanish, so I don't know what they were saying.

The guy's walking toward me and I'm putting my hand out like, "Stay back." I walk backwards and start to turn around, but then, in the corner of my eye, I see him reach back to throw something. I kinda ducked and all these coins hit me.

He threw a bunch of coins at me.

At this point, I wanted to just go at it. This dude just hit me all over my back with coins, and he's still screaming at me. But I told him, "Listen, you had better stay back."

And I look at my wife and that's the only thing that could calm me down. I see my pregnant wife and realize that I can't have a situation go down like that. My teammates were in shock, because they saw what happened. I didn't want anything else to happen so I tried to calm myself down. I started walking away from him and he kept his distance.

But that just ruined my whole day. And I go back to our hotel and I'm telling Mama Paul and Papa Paul (that's what I call Chris' parents) what happened. And they're like "You gotta be kidding me." And the security guard was down there listening to the story. He told me that I did the right thing by walking away from it, because it sounded to him like a setup. Basically, they sent the dude to start an incident so they could rob me.

And I was like, "This is not what I was thinking of Barcelona to be." My wife and I were upset, but the next day, we regrouped. I didn't want to have a bad taste in my mouth about Barcelona and I wanted to do something else.

We went out to this long strip that reminded me of Michigan Avenue in Chicago. They had Louis Vuitton, Gucci and all of those stores down there. It was a great street and we ended up walking for a long time, seeing a fashion show and sitting at a cafe, drinking some tea and coffee. It was a real good Europe experience. We really enjoyed it, so I actually had a good day.

The day after that, I went to see La Sagrada Familia, the church that they've been building for 100 years now. It was incredible. I took a bunch of pictures of that. So, the last two days ended really well. I just had a little bump in the road in the middle there.

5-0
We played extremely well in the games, so that was good for us. And regardless whether it's preseason or regular season, to be undefeated right now ... that's what you want to do, win games. So, we're excited for that.

I tweaked my ankle in the Berlin game, so come the Barcelona game, our coach really didn't want me to play on it out there. He wanted me to take the days off and get ready for the last couple of preseason games.

We've got two more preseason games left. We're pretty much just practicing, trying to get things together and putting our game plan together for opening night. We're gonna take these two last preseason games serious as if they were regular games, playing the rotation the way it's gonna be in the season.

I should be ready to go tomorrow. I practiced yesterday.