“Sisters Were Rolling, We Were Dying”: Adjusting to “Tripping” Culture, Young Kobe Bryant Once Found Comfort in “Weird” Times

It’s been 3 years since the world lost one of the greatest NBA Players of all time. Kobe Bryant left behind a legacy that would be quite difficult to surpass for the aspirants of this generation. While fans know the Black Mamba because of his talent on the court, they don’t know much about his story before joining the NBA. Especially about a time that helped to shape him on a personal level.

The former Los Angeles Lakers star spent seven years of his childhood growing up in Italy.

Kobe Bryant adjusts to life in Italy

Kobe’s father, Joe ‘Jellybean’ Bryant, retired from the NBA and decided to move to the hilltop town of Rieti in 1984 so that he could continue to play professional basketball. The soon-to-be legend was 6 at that time. Kobe and his elder sisters were shocked by the change.

“There was an Italian cartoon, and me and my sisters were rolling. We were dying,” said Kobe as per the New York Times. “It was on in Italian but they had the same cartoon in America. It was the same exact cartoon, but it had just had Italian words. It was weird, man. We were tripping, man.”

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Living in Italy may have been full of weirdness for the young legend, but he soon learned how to adapt to a completely different way of life. He became fluent in Italian and started to love the local customs and traditions. Along with Rieti, the Bryant Family also resided in Pistoia in Tuscany, and in the coastal city of Reggio Calabria. Even though Kobe started playing basketball at the mere age of 3, he didn’t develop his skills until Italy.

Kobe Bryant’s Journey as a basketball player begins

Kobe spent his Sundays watching his father play for his team, the Sebastiani Rieti. During intervals, he would help in mopping the sweat of other players from the court. Former Detroit Pistons player Leon Douglas once described how Kobe used to utilize the halftime period and go onto the basketball court in order to practice some shots. The players dubbed the event ‘The Kobe show‘.

After the Bryant family returned to the United States in 1991, Kobe was enrolled in the Lower Merion High School where he began a flourishing basketball career. The rest, as they say, is history.

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The trippy times helped to play a big role in shaping the person and athlete that Kobe would become down the line. The learnings from those 7 years would be something that the former player would remember for many years to come.