Perhaps you do not know that in all major sporting events there is a space, called a ‘mixed zone’, in which journalists can approach athletes who are still sweaty as soon as they finish their competition to ask them the usual and to answer the usual . I clarify all this to indicate that my relationship with the mixed zones is complicated to say the least. You must understand that I have seen many more Third Party games than Champions and in those God fields there are no mixed zones or anything, just some charity bar with coffees, beers and chistorra sandwiches. If you want to talk to someone, you go up to the bravas, whistle, ask and holy Easter.
But in the foam of the world, everything is more complicated, you see what happened with Biles and even Djokovic, who goes on a rooster through life but also had a yuyu years ago. The fact is that the other day, when I had to go boxing, I went down to the mixed room. I obediently followed some arrows that said ‘mixed zone’. I showed up on the ground floor, walked the entire length of it following the printed signs, and ended up in a warehouse with two Japanese workers staring at me in shock, as if I had just landed in their room with a flying saucer. When I asked them, in my rusty English, about the mixed zone, they widened their eyes, sputtered two or three incomprehensible sentences, and bowed to me, so I understood that they took me for some Shinto divinity who had appeared to them.
I would have liked to stay with them and see if they lit incense sticks for me, but the boxer was going to get away if I didn’t hurry. I returned to the starting point and discovered that there was the same sign (“mixed zone”) in two different places: one marked to the right and another to the left. In Japan I often have the feeling that at any moment a guy with flowers is going to come out and tell me, with great fanfare, that I am participating in the ‘Innocent, innocent’ gala. I had to decide and, as often happens to me, I went to the wrong side. Nobody passed by and, after a few minutes, I left whistling to hide it. How much better would I have been receiving votive offerings and prayers from these ceremonious Japanese workers!
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