MatejaPintar’s Weblog

Zadnja dva meseca sta minila kot bi mignil, mimo je tudi že prvi septembrski teden, in ker se v tem času praktično nisem uspela oglašati, naj vam, preden ponovno začnem bolj redno poročati o svojih dogodivščinah, ponudim kratek povzetek mojega poletja:

* Takoj po evropskem prvenstvu junija v Genovi so me na faksu čakali preddiplomski izpiti, ki sem jih uspešno opravila in se zdaj že prijavila na drugo stopnjo študija (Masters), s katerim začnemo oktobra;

* 16. julija sem se postarala na 24 let – polovico svojega rojstnega dneva sem preživela v avtu, drugo pa pri namiznoteniškem kolegu v Muenchnu, kjer sem naredila enodnevni postanek na poti v Luksemburg;

* Luksemburg je bil namreč letos moja počitniška destinacija, čeprav sem se tam pravzaprav ponovno počutila povsem doma in seveda še posebej uživaja v preživljanju časa s svojimi tamkajšnjimi prijatelji;

* Le-ti so tudi “krivi”, da imam na svojem telesu 2 novi luknji: za rojstni dan so mi namreč podarili čudovit komplet verižice in uhanov s svetlomodrimi Swarowski kristali, jaz pa do sedaj uhanov sploh nisem nosila, saj sta se oba moja mladostniška poskusa, da bi si preluknjala ušesa, klavrno končala z vnetji, ker imam menda predebele ušesne mečice (tale podatek bi bil najbrž zelo dober za kakšno rubriko “10 čudaških stvari, ki jih niste vedeli o meni…” ). Kakorkoli že , novi uhani in grožnje enega od kolegov, da mi jih bo v nasprotnem primeru kar sam preluknjal z vilicami, so bili dovolj dobra spodbuda, da dam svoijm ušesom še eno priložnost, in tako imam že dober mesec dni nove piercinge (sem si pa morala zaradi prej omenjenih debelih mečic dati narediti večje uhane …);

* Takoj po vrnitvi z dopusta sem začela nov kondicijski in prehranjevalni program pod vodstvom osebnega trenerja Marka Mraka, ki je trenutno tudi moj edini trener, ker…

*… začetek avgusta je moj dosedanji namiznoteniški trener Gorazd Vecko prevzel položaj direktorja britanske reprezentance, s čimer se je najino zelo uspešno sodelovanje v tem smisku zaključilo, še vedno pa nimamo zamenjave zanj;

* Nekaj dodatnega “prostega časa” sem zato izkoristila za intenzivni tečaj francoščine, saj je znanje tega jezika že dolgo moja želja, poletni obisk Luksemburga pa me je spodbudil, da končno nekaj naredim v tej smeri;

* V delu imam svojo novo spletno stran in ustanovitev fan kluba, ki bosta (vsaj upam) zaživela še do konca tega meseca, z njima pa bo ponovno bolj intenzivno tudi dogajanje tule na blogu.

Dolgčas mi torej, kot vidite, ni bilo, ni in ne bo

The last 2 months passed very quickly, the first September week is also already gone, and since I haven’t managed to let hear from me during all this time, let me, before I start reporting on my goings-on more frequently again, offer you a short summary of my summer:

* Right after the European championships in June in Genova I had 2 pre-graduation exams waiting for me at the university; I’ve passed them both and now I’ve already applied for the Masters studies, which will start in October;

* On the 16th of July I turned 24, spending the first half of my birthday in the car and the 2nd one at a TT colleague’s place in Munich, where I made a one-day stop on my way to Luxembourg;

*Luxembourg was my this year’s holiday destination, although I once again felt completely at home there and of course especially enjoyed spending time with my there-living friends;

* It’s their “fault” that I have two new holes on my body: they gave me a set of beautiful necklace and earrings with light-blue Swarowski cristals as a birthday present, but I didn’t wear earrings at all up until then as both my childhood attempts to pierce my ears miserably failed with infections, because I allegedly have to thick ears (I guess I could easily include this info under “10 weird stuff you didn’t know about me…” ). However, the new earings and threats of one of the friends that he’ll make holes in my ears using fork unless I do it were good enough reasons to give it another try. And so I’ve had the new pearcings for about a month now, but I had to buy custom-made earrings due to the above mentioned thich ears I have…

* Right after having returned from my holiday I started a new fitness and nutrition programme with the personal coach Marko Mrak, who is at the moment also my onla coach, because…

*… my TT coach Gorazd Vecko started his new job as a performance manager with the British national team, which ended our very successful work together in this sence, and we still don’t have a replacement for him;

* So I used the extra “free time” to take an intensive French course. I’ve wanted to learn the language for years and the summer visit to Luxembourg was again a good engouragement to do something about it;

* I’m working on my new website and establishing a fan club. Both will hopefully be in full operation by the end of this month, bringing more “life” also to this blog.

Boredom, as you can see, hasn’t and will not be on my schedule

Zveza prijateljev mladine Slovenije v sodelovanju z enem od mojih sponzorjev, trgovsko družbo Mercator, v naslednjih tednih organizira internetno dobrodelno dražbo z naslovom “Odprimo srca”, v okviru katere na spletnem portalu bolha.com lahko med drugim kupite igro namiznega tenisa in kosilo z mano. Celoten oglas si poglejte na http://www.bolha.com/oglas383148893/mateja-pintar-podarja-igranje-namiznega-tenisa-in-cas-ob-kosilu-v-govindasu (v kolikor povezava ne deluje, na omenjenem portalu v iskalni niz vtipkajte moje ime in priimek), več o celotni akciji pa je na voljo na http://www.zpms.si/aktualno/#CmsC17E1C204E3. Izkupiček bo namenjen otrokom, ki živijo v socialno ogroženih družinah, varnih hišah in materinskih domovih ter Azilnem domu v Ljubljani, zato vas iskreno vabim k sodelovanju!

Prejšnji vikend sem skupaj s kolegico preživela v luksuznem hotelu Livada Prestige v Moravcih. Dvodnevno razvajanje je bila zelo dobrodošla sprememba od mojih siceršnjih izkušenj s hoteli, zanjo pa se imam zahvaliti mojemu letošnjemu novemu sponzorju, skupini Mercator, ki me je z vikend-paketom nagradila za lanski olimpijski bron. Tule pa še nekaj posnetkov:

I spent last weekend in a luxorious 5-star hotel Livada Prestige. Being spoilt for 2 days was a nice change from my usual hotel expriences and it’s my new sponsor this year, the Mercator Group, I have to thank for it as they awarded me with the weekend package for my last year’s bronze olympic medal. Here some snapshots:

Na letošnjem evropskem prvenstvu sem še drugič dobila nagrado za najboljšo evropsko igralko leta – 2005. Tistega leta sem bila namreč res nagrajena z omenjenim naslovom in zelo lepim steklenim loparjem, ki ga je mami po moji vrnitvi s turnirja vestno razstavila na vrh stopnišča.

Sama sem takoj za tem odpotovala na turnir v Južno Korejo in ko sem po treh tednih prišla domov, me je mami dobesedno zvelkla v mojo sobo z besedami: “Nekaj groznega sem naredila, prosim oprosti, ne bodi preveč jezna…!!!” Kot bi mi govoril šesti čut sem takoj odvrnila: “Razbila si moj lopar, a ne?”

In res je bilo tako, stopnišče je seveda treba redno pometati in med eno od tovrstnih “misij” je mami z omelom zadela lopar, i je padel iz stojala in se prelomil na pol. Zadeva niti ni bila tako katastrofalna in ati se je odločil, da ga poiskusi vsaj za silo zlepiti nazaj kar s sekundnim lepilom, na žalost pa je bil lopar med sušenjem ne ravno posrečeno postavljen in je ponovno zdrsnil, pri čemer je z nnjega odpadla še steklena žogica, zaradi lepila pa tudi ni izgledal ravno najlepše in bil zdaj dejansko bolj ali manj neuporaben. Zato smo se odločili, da pri glavnem tehničnem delegatu naročimo repliko; in trajalo je torej 2 evropski prvenstvi oz. 4 leta, da sem jo v Genovi dobila.

To sem povedala očetu tako kot tudi ceno loparja, 45 evrov, za katero je rekel, naj jo le zahtevam od mami. Moj trener, ki je bil med pogovorom ravno tako zraven, je v šali izjavil, da bi se morala zlagati in reči, da stane dvakrat toliko, pa bi zraven še malo zaslužila; moj oče je za idejo hitro zagrabil in mi naročil, naj mami za lopar zaračunam 90 evrov, pa bomo s preostankom denarja šli na družinsko kosilo in mami šele po njem povedali, da ga je pravzaprav plačla ona. (Ko bo ati tole prebral, se bo verjetno spet pritožil, da na blog pišem same neumnosti o njem, ampak naj v svojo obrambo že kar takoj povem, da do sedaj ni bila še nobena izmišljena ).

Kot pridna in ubogljiva hčerka sem seveda sledila njegovemu nasvetu, iztržila dvojno plačilo in prejšnji vikend “moje tri” (starša in sestro) povabila na kosilo v našo priljubljeno kitajsko restavracijo, ga tudi plačala, doma pa sva se z atijem ob kavi mami zahvalila za kosilo in ji, začudeni, razložila potegavščino. No, njej se ni zdela ravno tako posrečena kot nama, zato bom vse v bližnji prihodnosti najbrž še enkrat peljala jest – tokrat zares na moje stroške

AT this year’s European championships I was for the second time presented with the award for the best European player of the year – of 2005. That was namely the year when I was actually awarded with the title and a beautiful glass table tennis bat, which my mother proudly displayed it on the staircase in our house. I went to a tournament in South Korea right after that and when I returned, my mother dragged me into my room saying: “I did something terrible, please forgive me, please don’t be mad…!!!” As being guided by the sixth sense I immediately replied: “You broke my bat, didn’t you?” And that indeed was the case, the stairway of courswe had to be swept, and during one of those “missions” my mother hit the bat with the broom, it fell off the stand and broke in two. It wasn’t all really that bad so my father decided to try fix it at least a bit with a super-glue. But unfortunately the bad wasn’t lying in the very best position while drying and it slid again, and this time also the glass TT ball fell of it, also leaving it quite unattractive-looking because of all of the glue, so now the bat really was fairly useless.

Therefore we decided to order a replica, and it took 2 more European championships or 4 years for me to get it now in Genova. I told my father the news and the price of the bat, which was 45 Euro and supposed to be paid by my mother. My coach, who was alos present during the conversation, remarked that I should have told my parents it was 90 Euro and earn some money with the “sell”. My dad took to the idea at once, instructing me to charge my mom with the double price and with the extra money take us all for a family lunch, and only afterwards telly my mom that it was in fact her who paid for it. (When my father reads this he’ll most likely complain again that I always write unflattering things about him here on the blog, but let me say in my defence that not one of them was made up so far ).

Anyhow, a good obbeying daughter I am, I took his advice, got paid double by my mom, took “my three” (my parents and sister) for lunch to our favourite chineese restaurant and paid for it, and when we got home my father and I thanked mom for the lunch, explaining her, all confused, the prank we pulled on her. Well, she thought it slightly less funny than the two of us did, so I guess I’ll soon take them all for a meal again – this time really on my expences

With the new/old trophy

Z malo zamude, pa vseeno, tule nekaj posnetkov z minulega evropskega prvsnstva v Genovi:

Quite delayed, but nevertheless, here some shots from this month’s European championships in Genova:

Prejšnji teden smo torej »spravili pod streho« prvi turnir letos na novoustanovljene serije Pro Tour, in sicer na Slovaškem. Tam se je zgodilo zame nekaj precej neobičajnega: prvi dan sem v odprti konkurenci kot tretjepostavljena igralka turnirja izgubila in izpadla že v prvem krogu in to proti igralki, ki me do takrat ni še nikoli premagala.

Nad tem seveda nisem bila niti malo navdušena, še posebej, ker mi ni bilo najbolj jasno, kaj je šlo narobe (razen seveda pomanjkanja treninga in slabe vidljivosti, s katero pa imam večkrat težave in je konec koncev vedno za vse enaka), a vseeno zaradi poraza nisem bila pretirano, recimo temu, »čustveno vznemirjena«. Tako sem se malo da ne zabavala ob reakcijah na pripetljaj s strani ljudi okrog mene: nekaj prijateljic je zaskrbljenih prišlo do mene in me spraševalo, če sem v redu, pri tem pa so na obrazih imele tak izraz, kot da se mi je pripetila kakšna grozna tragedija in razmišljam samo še o tem, skozi katero okno naj se vržem. Eden od soigralcev in na tem turnirju moj cimer, ki tekme ni videl, me je, ko sem mu sporočila novico, obtožil, da se norčujem iz njega oz. lažem, še eden od prijateljev pa je od smeha skoraj padel z vozička. Predvsem pa je vse zanimalo, kako je na poraz reagiral moj trener, ki sicer zna hitro »eksplodirati«; no, v zvezi z mano sicer navadno ne in tudi tokrat mi ga ni uspelo pripraviti do tega – seveda pa sem se do konca turnirja zato še bolj trudila, da mu ne bi dajala preveč razlogov za to

Precej duhovit je bil tudi SMS odgovor mojega očeta: »Čestitati ti ravno ne morem, lahko pa ti zaželim lep dopust« …

Last week we got through the first in the new series of Pro Tour tournaments, which was held in Slovakia. And on the first day something quite unusually for me occurred: as the 3rd seeded player of the tournament I lost in the first round of Open, against a player who’d never beaten me before.

I was, naturally, anything but thrilled about that, especially as I wasn’t quite sure what went wrong (besides the lack of training and problems with visibility, but which I often have and is after all the same for everyone), but I still wasn’t hugely, let’s say, “emotionally upset”. Therefore it was almost amusing for me to see other people’s reactions to my defeat: some worried friends came over to me, asking me if I was ok and with the look on their faces as if a terrible tragedy had just happened to me and I was only looking for the nearest window to jump out of. A team colleague and my room-mate at the tournament, who hadn’t seen the match, thought I was making fun of him or lying when I delivered him the news, and another friend almost fell of his wheelchair because he was laughing so loudly. And most of all they all wanted to know how my coach, who is known not to be a clam person, reacted to the whole thing; but he rarely gets upset with me and didn’t this time either – but I was trying extra hard till the end of the tournament not to give him an additional reason for it

My father’s text reply also was quite humorous: “I can’t really congratulate you, but I can wish you a nice holiday instead!” …

... se včasih sprašujem, ko pakiram prtljago pred turnirji.

Ta teden sem imela na faksu enega zadnjih in hkrati najtežjih izpitov, kar me je poleg namiznoteniških obveznosti če ne že fizično pa vsaj psihično zaposlovala večino časa. In kadar ima človek kot tokrat jaz občutek, da ni niti približno dovolj pripravljen (no, pa tudi sicer), se z veseljem posluži  tudi raznoraznih »pripomočkov«, ki naj bi mu prinesli srečo (pa v tem primeru ne mislim na »plonk listke«, moj izpit je bil ustni ). Šport oz. namizni tenis ni pri tem nobena izjema, zato tale post namenjam mojemu športnemu vraževerju.

Eno takih obsedenosti sem začela na svojem prvem evropskem prvenstvu v Zagrebu pred 6 leti, ko sem v posamični konkurenci osvojila bronasto medaljo, kar je bil zame takrat ogromen uspeh in tako sem se »odločila«, da so komplet športnega spodnjega perila in nogavice, ki sem jih takrat nosila, zame »srečni«. Nekaj dni  za tem sva z Andrejo igrali v finalu ekipnega tekmovanja, za katerega sem si nato prihranila par istih nogavic v drugi barvi, dan prej pa posebej za to priložnost kupila še ne komplet istega spodnjega perila prav tako v drugi barvi. Ker sva z Andrejo v finalu zmagali, je omenjena »oprema« postala moja srečna za ekipne tekme in od takrat naprej na vsakem turnirju igram posamični del v enem kompletu, ekipnega pa v drugem. Na OI  Atenah, kjer je tekmovanje potekalo več dni zapored, sem perilo in nogavice med enim in drugim celo na roke prala v umivalniku in na srečo je bilo tam dovolj toplo, da se mi je čez noč do naslednje tekme tudi posušilo. Za srečo pri mojih atenskih nastopih mi je takratni fant podaril plišast obesek za ključe, ki sem ga od takrat naprej prav tako vedno nosila na mojem namiznoteniškem nahrbtniku (a ker mi omenjeni medvedek ni ravno prinesel sreče s fantom, sem ga prenehala uporabljati tudi pri športu ).

Na zadnjem evropskem prvenstvu pri nas v Kranjski Gori sem pri nemških igralcih opazila zelo vpadljive samolepilne povoje, ki so mi takoj postali všeč, zato je Christian, nemški trener in moj dober prijatelj, njihovi fizioterapevtki »ukradel enega roza barve in mi ga dal pred ekipnim finalom, ki sva ga z Andrejo prav tako dobili, tako da sem se s Christianom takoj dogovorila, da mi za olimpijske igre v Pekingu priskrbi še enega v moji najljubši modri barvi.

Tam je bila seveda tako kot pomembnost tekmovanja velika tudi moja zbirka »amuletov«: poleg že omenjenih sem imela na modro pobarvane lase (tudi o tem sem že pisala), trenerjev sin mi je podaril zapestnico iz zlatih perlic, da ostalih klasičnih priložnostnih pujskov, obeskov itd. sploh ne omenjam. Kot vedno pa me je tudi tam iz hotelske sobe spremljal uokvirjen glinen ptiček, ki sta mi ga za 18. rojstni dan podarila Andreja in trener, naredila pa ga je njegova hčerka.

No, za letošnjo sezono pa sem povsem nepričakovano dobila še eno maskoto: plišastemu kužku iz Disneyevih risank je ime Zorbas in je bil poslovilno darilo grškega kolega Alexandrosa ob mojem odhodu iz Luksemburga – in ker se je na prvem turnirju na Madžarskem ter dveh izpitih na faksu zelo izkazal, računam na njegovo pomoč tudi na naslednjih

... is what I’m sometimes wondering when packing my bags for tournaments.

I had one of the last and the most difficult exams at university this week, which was what kept me busy – at least mentally, if not physically – for the better part of it along with the table tennis things. And when one is faced with a situation for which they feel are not prepared enough (well even if not), people reach for any kind of help or luck available (and I’m not referring to cheating in this case, the exam was oral ). Sports or table tennis are no exception, therefore I’m dedicating this post to my sports “luck superstitions”.

I started one of those “obsessions” at my first European championships in Zagreb 6 years ago when I won bronze in the single event, which was a huge success for me at the time, and so I “decided” that the underwear and socks I was wearing on that day are lucky for me. A few days later Andreja and I were to play the team finals; I had saved me a pair of same sort socks in a different colour and had bought a set of the same underwear also in a different colour especially for the occasion; we won the finals and so that “equipment” became my lucky for the team matches and ever since I always wear the first set for the singles event and the latter one in teams. At the Paralympics in Athens, where competition was spread over several consecutive days, I even washed the underwear and socks in the sink every evening and luckily for me it was warm enough there for them to get dry during the night. My boyfriend at the time also gave me a teddy-bear key ring to bring me luck for my games there and I kept it on my backpack for all the following competitions (but as it didn’t exactly bring me luck with the boyfriend, I eventually stopped using it for table tennis as well ).

At the last European championships in Slovenia I noticed some German players wearing very colourful bandages and liked them so much that Christian, a German coach and good friend of mine, “stole” a pink one from their physiotherapist and gave it to me before the team finals, which Andreja and I won, so I immediately made arrangements with Christian to get me a bandage like that in blue for the Paralympics in Beijing.

The Games were obviously a special chapter regarding all kinds of amulets: along with the above mentioned I coloured my hair blue (I’ve also written about that onhere already), my coach’s son made me a bracelet with gold pearls and I won’t even start mentioning all the classic pigs and key rings… But as always, a framed sculpture of a bird, given to me on my 18^th birthday by Andreja and my coach, whose daughter made it, was accompanying me at the hotel room.

Well, quite unexpectedly I got another mascot before this season: a Disney-cartoon dog named Zorbas, which was a good-bye present from a Greek colleague Alexandros at my departure from Luxembourg – it did very well bringing me luck at the first tournament in Budapest and the exams, so I’m counting on its help for the next ones as well