Many of my friends tease me about my school spirit from time to time. Granted, I may go overboard by painting my face for every basketball game. But being a junior transfer student who left high school with a GED and later funded my way through community college by working as a firefighter and paramedic, coming to UC Berkeley as a first-generation college student has been one my proudest moments.

I am one of the few who really gets a special feeling when reading the banners strewn around campus stating what people love about UC Berkeley. One of my favorites has always been the banner roughly stating, "If you can't find something you like at Cal you can start it yourself."

Well, unfortunately, I have found that to be simply not true in the past month. Since the beginning of the fall semester, I have been part of a great team on campus-the Hurling Team. I know many people do not have the faintest clue of what this sport is or even if it's the one on ice with brooms or not. Hurling is one of the world's oldest sports, with a long tradition in Irish mythology going back 2000 years.

In fact, hurling is probably one of the few sports you will hear about when studying a major, Celtic Studies, here at UC Berkeley. Hurling is an amazingly exciting and fast-paced game that has already made history on campus. If you are curious about hurling you should look it up on YouTube, where you can see the first-ever collegiate match in the United States played between UC Berkeley and Stanford last month. Did I mention we won by one point, not a bad feather in the hat of our campus.

But the administrative staff for sports clubs seems to think not. They have barred us from becoming a club here on campus. They have stated that there is simply not enough field space around town for us to play. The fact that we have been practicing for over seven months on campus with no problem did not seem hold much water.

Even when we offered to rent another field off campus with our own limited cash flow, we were told that would simply not be in the interest of other campus sports teams. We were also told there was not enough local competition. However, we have a three-game tournament against Stanford playing for a cup provided by private citizens.

Many other schools are also becoming involved including USC, USF, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, UCLA and many other schools in the East. Bay Area TV channels have taken a great interest in us and have featured us on the evening news. Again the administrative staff was not impressed.

After our historic win, when a hurley (the stick used in our sport) was put up on the wall of The Bear's Lair with the victorious score alongside a team photo, it was demanded to be taken down and confiscated by the sports club administration. It was a complete slap in the face to our team and all of our hard work. I was most devastated because I had thought I had become a permanent part of the campus I love so much and I didn't even have the time to show it to my family before it was taken down.

Just when I thought it couldn't get much worse, we were told in our letter of rejection that if we were to refer to ourselves as "Cal Hurling," we would be subjected to disciplinary actions. Well another one my mottos, "We are Cal," was shattered. I guess this only applies to some students and not us.

To be told that you will face disciplinary actions by referring to yourself as Cal frankly, really hurt. We have been in continual contact with the administrative staff and are faced with constant roadblocks and rejection with no end in sight.

To make my spirit even lower, the only help we have received is from the administrative staff at Stanford. I now appeal to you to please help me and my team be once again a part of Cal. I feel that some in this university have lost sight of what that corporate logo stands for-the students.

Tags: CAL ATHLETICS