Last week I was in Lima (Peru, not Ohio) visiting my Peace Corp volunteering daughter. The timing of the trip was based on the Metro Nashville Spring break (my wife is a teacher). Had I planned the trip and timing was not an issue, I would have opted for the previous week - cheaper airfares because the week of Easter is bum-rushed with touristas and, much more importantly, the fact that the first week of the NCAA March Madness tourney began the week we visited Peru. Those first two days of the tournament are as much fun as just about anything other than consensual sex or watching UT fans leave Vandy’s gym after the Orange is peeled.

By the time Thursday rolled around, I was jonesing for a way to watch just a little b-ball. Granted, Lima is an amazing vibrant city and there is more to see there than can possibly be seen in one week, but I had so many great meals and cultural experiences that I was more than ready for a simple hamburger and a large-screen TV with satellite connectivity.

Luckily we ate lunch on Thursday with another Peace Corps volunteer who happened to be a sports freak. He tipped us to an establishment called ‘The Corner Bar’, near the ocean in the same neighborhood in which we were staying. Even luckier,  my wife and daughter were also longing for a hamburger and were willing to watch a little basketball wishing for something to shut me up re said basketball tourney.

We ambled into the Corner Bar with about 10 minutes to go in the Belmont game. At this point, I need to let you know that I went to Lipscomb and normally am an arch-enemy of the Bruins. But, once another Nashville team made the tourney, I was more than willing to set aside my animus* for the followers of the headless harbinger, and cheer for the local team.

To my amazement, the bar full of mostly native sports fans began rooting for Belmont. Most of them had no idea where Belmont was located, but everyone knew that they were underdogs AND pretty much everyone I know LOVES to see Duke lose**. Suddenly, every TV in the bar except one***, was tuned to the Belmont-Duke game. The crowd became as one, cheering for each Bruin basket, and groaning when Duke scored. My wife, the only person in Nashville in 1999 who didn’t care that the Titans were in the Super Bowl, was cheering and groaning with the crowd. The last minute was met with shared frustration and not a little cursing. I wish Belmont had won, but it was amazing being in another continent and sharing those moments.

*Actually, some of my best friends include Baptists, Anti-Baptists and truly anti Baptists.

**Apparently, our experience coincided with ‘The Sports Guy‘. He had watched four games in Anaheim (in person), and checked into a bar after the games to watch the Belmont-Duke game. From his column:

‘…everyone at that same bar had more fun drinking and watching the K-State/USC and Duke/Belmont games on TV than anything we witnessed in our four games. It’s absolutely incredible how many people despise Duke and how the entire place galvanized behind Belmont at the end like it was the 1980 Olympic hockey team. If Belmont had pulled off the upset victory, there’s a 25 percent chance that we’d still be there drinking and celebrating four days later.’

***There was one dude who insisted on watching some dumb futbol game..go figure.