Player Diary - Joe Rokocoko

Thursday 18 June 2009

Dear Diary

My wife and baby came into town last night.. She asked me what I wanted for breakfast in the morning. Awesome words to hear. So I woke up this morning and she brought me up four pieces of toast and some eggs. I had tea with my wife and we chatted a bit, then I came to the hotel about 9.30 because we had to meet at 10am.

At 10 o’clock we headed to training. We went through all the moves again for the new guys to just to make sure everything’s clear leading up to the weekend. The forwards did their mauls and their scrums. Today’s training was short but explosive and we came off the field feeling confident and ready for the weekend. It wasn’t as cold as Tuesday. It was freezing that day.

After training eight of us guys and Graham (Henry) jumped in the minivan to come back into the city for a Telecom promotion at Queen’s Wharf to launch their new sponsorship of the All Blacks and New Zealand rugby. It was a cool promotion outdoors and hundreds of people turned up. People had registered their numbers online and then they had to turn up at Queen’s Wharf. We had to call a number and if they were at the Wharf they won tickets to the game and a new phone. I got an answer machine on my first call so I left a message in Fijian: “Hey it’s one of the players from the All Blacks, I’m just ringing up to say you won a prize, but you’re not here at Queen’s Wharf, so sorry bad luck.”

Ted was the one that made the call to give out the main prize of a trip for two to Paris and Marseille to watch the All Blacks play on the end of year tour. The guy who won it was stoked. He got a call up from the All Black coach and the big trip. At the end we chucked out heaps of mini rugby balls to the fans. If they caught a ball with a number on it they won two tickets to the game at Westpac Stadium. That was quite cool. We threw out about 800 balls. My shoulder’s still stinging.

Then I had the player’s media session, where I had to do quite a few interviews. Once that was over I headed to the gym to get my gym session done. I was able to see my wife and baby for an hour before I headed back to the team. One night of the week we are split into mini teams and go out of the hotel for a meal. I got a good group today and it wasn’t too quiet at dinner. It’s great when you get a joker like Ma’a. Kev (Mealamu) wanted their mini team to stick together as it’s the front row club.
It was a busy day today but cool. Enjoy the rugby.

Cheers,

Joe

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