Basketball in a Shell

This is one more post about Lithuania intended to share information with my foreign audience. This time I will talk about basketball. You probably know that the Olympic Games are to be held in London this summer. The Lithuanian team has to compete at events held in Venezuela in order to qualify for the Games. Basketball is our sec...first religion. Our most famous basketballer Arvydas Sabonis entered Hall of Fame FIBA in 2010. London's Northern line station bears his name. An American group wrote a song in his honour.

Many kids learn to slam dunk before they go to school. However, the hero of this post is not a basketballer. In fact, it's not even a person.  It's a...

Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/30/Rainbow_crab.jpg

 crab. Yes, a crab. 

This creature became nation famous in 2011 when he (it's a 'he') started predicting basketball results for the 2011 European basketball championship held in Lithuania. The crab, named Lazdeika, is given a choice of either of two coconut shells with a flag. Lazdeika the crab is a representative of rainbow crabs. It's difficult to manipulate him with food but he responds to bright light and heads for a shadow shelter. All the predictions were filmed from the first attempt as exposure to bright light might result in unnecessary stress for the creature. He chooses the winning team as he gets into their shell. Last year he made only one mistake. It was really a sad moment when Macedonia won against Lithuania and now we have to compete to get into the Games. Half an hour after the match a new joke was coined:

"A geography teachers asks children:
-Where is Macedonia?
Peter puts up his hand to answer:
-In the semi-finals, Miss."

It was later brought to our knowledge that Lazdeika the Crab sustained a trauma of loosing one of his legs due to an accident in cleaning his den. This might have clouded his judgement, they say. Proposals of delicious way to prepare the crab came from all over the country, ranging from salad to stuffing. 

Rehabilitated, Lazdeika the crab has successfully predicted Lithuania's victory over Venezuela and he also predicts our victory over Nigeria. 

You can LIKE him on his Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Krabas-Lazdeika/253521774680339


You can read more about Lithuania and basketball here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithuania_national_basketball_team  
http://www.lithuaniabasketball.com/



If you have a post about oracle animals, I'd love to link to it.

Ele