Soccer In America Getting More Popular - What A Nice Surprise!

Ciao a tutti,

When I was invited by my friend Tricia to a professional soccer game in Los Angeles, I had to stop and think about it. Soccer in America? I knew there were soccer leagues in America but I had just never thought of going to a game and thanks to Tricia, I did. Actually, I had been to the Olympics when they were in Los Angeles and I saw the US Team play the Italy Team. That was a hard one, who was I to cheer for?

This time it was hard too because though we were in Los Angeles, the people we were guests of were cheering for the visiting team. There were about 20,000 people cheering for Los Angeles and about a hundred of us cheering for Salt Lake. 20,000, can you believe it, and that's before David Beckham joined the Galaxy Team. It's good to see soccer gaining popularity in the US.

In the end, Galaxy beat the Real Salt Lake Team 3 to 2 but that didn't stop our hosts from having a good time, if for no other reason than they had been drinking their "happy juice," and for that matter so had I. (I'll explain that). Actually, how could we not have fun no matter what when you are invited to a game at the Los Angeles Home Depot Center in grand style.

Little did I know that we were guests of Sandy DiGiovanni an Independent Distributor of Xango, with seats in a box, catered, "happy juice," and the whole nine yards.

Evidently, like HerbalLife is a sponsor of the Los Angeles Club, Xango is a sponsor of the Salt Lake Club and to support their team, both on the playing field and in their business, Sherman and Sharonn Unkefer had bought out three boxes at the Stadium.

In fact, they bought out two boxes to thank their underline of Xango distributors and one to donate to their charity of choice. In this case their charity of choice was the very worthwhile Cheshire Project of Los Angeles of which Aras Baskauskas, the million dollar winner of the popular "reality" TV show "Survivor: Panama - Exile Island," Season Twelve.

Before I go any further, what is the "happy juice?" Well, that is what I heard a couple of the distributors call Xango and the name stuck. It is a juice made from the Mangosteen Fruit. I got to meet some of the key players on the Xango sales team and got to drink the juice and join all the happy people in a toast to our health.

By the way, it was Father's Day, and the teams did something really special. They walked out on the field with their children before the game started. Now that was a nice touch.

And speaking of nice touches, I made my way over to the box that was reserved for the Cheshire Project, and met Aras and several of the benefactors of the Unkefer's generous gift and had a great time with all of them. You know me, I had to make my way to the third box too filled with Xango Independent Distributors to see if I could find any Italians, he, he.

There I not only found Sandy's husband, Mike DiGiovanni and their son Johnny, both Italian-Americans, but I learned that two of the Xango company's founders are Italian-American. Now that I know that I think I will have to learn more and do some more reporting in a future post.

In the meantime, above you see in the first picture a moment in the game between the LA Galaxy Team and the Real Salt Lake Team. Below that are our hosts Sherman Unkefer, Sharon Unkefer, and Sandy DiGiovanni, and myself, of course. Immediately below that is a picture of my lovely hostess and I during a moment when we should have been watching the game because we heard cheering and missed one of the bigger plays of the day, he, he. Oh well, we had taken our share of "happy juice," and we were fine.

In the picture above you will find a man who needs no introduction to you die-hard "Survivor" fans, its Aras Baskauskas, and Sandy and I. And finally, the Italians of the bunch in this picture, Mike and Sandy DiGiovanni and their son Johnny.

If you're like me and never thought about going to a soccer game in the States, I would say, give it a try, you might like it. For that matter, you might want to give Xango a try also and see if it makes you "happy" too.

Filippo

P.S. Speaking of missing some great moments in the soccer game, here are some great moments that you might not want to miss if you are a soccer fan. I got this video off of Youtube.com and some of these are priceless. (In English).