Moldovan Sport...

Baseball came to the former Soviet Union in 1989.  By 1991, the Kvint team had won the CIS Champoinships.  It was the only year of the series; the CIS fell apart soon after.  It was not, however, the end of Kvint's sponsorship of baseball.  They sponsor teams from little league to senior men's teams, and do very well in competitions.  Their men's team went to the US for a tour last summer, and their pony league team won second in the European championships last year, too.

Supposedly, they have a 16 year old on the pony league team that regularly hurls an 85 mph fastball.  This is also, partially, your tax dollars at work.  Transnistria is the poorest part of the poorest country in Europe.  USAID and the US embassy have worked to help make real baseball diamonds (about the level of upkeep and upgrade of a regular little league field) in the city of Tiraspol for these athletes to practice and play on.

Kvint is very, very proud of its sponsorship of this American sport, despite having been a Soviet concern for fifty years.  It's nice to see reminders of home, and I hope to see them play this summer.