I took a nap around 4pm. The game was at 6. Woke up at 4:30,
the room hot and dark. I had that electric calm, the kind I imagine boxers get
before a fight. Shaved close and careful to a soundtrack of slow, heavy beats,
taking all of it too seriously and loving it. Pulled on my favorite jersey: red
and white hoops, The Fighting Waldos. Game day had arrived.
Roused
my compañero Javi, and while he got his facial hair and jersey situation in
order, I kept the beats going while shooting hoops at our hotel. I was nervous,
and it was the worst kind of nervousness, where you know that your emotions are
about to be played and there’s nothing you can do but take it. I don’t feel
this way too often anymore, but that’s the genius of the World Cup: four years
is just long enough that the pain is forgotten but the desire undiminished.
Hope springs eternal, and that’s what kills you.
Javi is
ready to watch. I’m ready to watch. But is the game on? Of course not.
Colombians like to pretend that the US doesn’t play soccer, which willfully
ignores the last time that the two countries competed in a World Cup: USA 2,
Colombia 1. However since a player was
killed shortly afterwards, I don’t bring it up. The point is, Colombian cable
companies have no incentive to broadcast USA-Ghana. We need a bar with
DirectTV. And we find one. But we’re the only sorry souls looking for a piece
of this action, and it’s going to cost the barkeep good money to order the game.
We’ll buy beers, we say. He shakes his head, and proposes an unusual bargain:
he will purchase the game if, and only if, we buy at least a half bottle of
Aguardiente. Just so we’re all on the same page, Aguardiente is
licorice-flavored Colombian firewater. Not entirely my idea of a good time. But
he had us over the barrel, so we exchanged 30,000 pesos for two Dixie cups, a
half-liter of local hooch, and two seats near the TV. Game time.
Most of
you know what happened next. Deuce (Clint Dempsey) went through a Ghanaian
defender like a wet paper bag, and the US was up 1-0 before a minute was
through. It was, as the British say, a bit dodgy from there. Ghana had all of
the ball and all of the pressure, and we just sat back and took it. When Jozy
Altidore blew a tire in the 17th minute, I suspected we were in
trouble. When we finally reached halftime, I had just witnessed 45 minutes of
the worst soccer America has played in a while…and we were winning. But this
would not do. The Yanks were dropping like flies, the Ghanaians had what appeared
to be a warlock among their supporters, and the Aguardiente was going to my
head too quickly. We needed American counter-magic. I ran to the nearest
grocery store and found some: Oreos. We had no choice; Javi and I were forced
to demolish the entire pack in the second half. For America.
Not
much changed after half time, until everything did. It was like watching a game
of tennis, with the USA as the wall. And then, with a twinkle-toed back heel
and a mighty lash, Ghana tied it up. I hit Javi. He hit the table. Despair
threatened. And yet…still time. The USA awoke, nudged its way forward. A
corner, won cheaply. A perfect ball. A Germerican head to meet it.
People
looked at us from the park, stuck their heads in to see if the gringos were
carving each other up. Perhaps they expected a cockfight or some gunplay. What
they saw were two Americans, dressed in equally ridiculous jerseys, hugging
each other, jumping up and down, and screaming into the night. A win. Is a win.
Is a win.
We
celebrated like Yankees should: found the only BBQ joint in town, ordered a pig
slathered in sauce. Had a beer, shook our heads, still in disbelief. Started
walking home, encountered three tiny youths playing a game of street soccer. I
mostly played the enforcer to Javi’s playmaker, but I have not had that much
fun chasing and flicking and juggling a soccer ball since I was wearing a
bright blue shirt with a soccer ball on it, lo these many years (Wallenpaupack
youth soccer reference). We made it home, stayed up till all hours, were
shushed twice, and fell asleep with grins on our faces.
I know
I should have a more complicated relationship with the World Cup. John Oliver’s
rant against FIFA was spot-on. These sporting mega-events (World Cups,
Olympics) are devastatingly costly for the host countries, with only fractions
of the promised benefits. Over 60% of Brazilians are opposed to the World Cup,
according to a Pew poll. The new stadiums in Manaus and Brasilia are white
elephants, with no clear future use. Promised infrastructure upgrades never
came. FIFA just spent $27M on a film about itself, while thousands of Nepalese
and Pakistani workers are dying in Qatar to build more white elephants. I know
all of these horrible things, and I’m disgusted by both FIFA and the host
countries which kowtow to its demands. And yet…
…and
yet, my squad is my squad. I can deplore world inequality, and wish that the
passion for soccer in Honduras and Ghana and Tanzania was met with commensurate
resources. I can applaud Costa Rica as they knock off Italy, a country with vastly
greater resources dedicated to kicking a ball around a field. I can do all of
those things and STILL shout my head off for America when it takes the field.
There’s some cognitive dissonance involved, to be sure; more and more of it
every year as immigration and globalization transform the notion of a “national”
team. But I’ve spent enough time outside the country to realize how
fundamentally American I am. I can root for competitors who share my norms and
values and language, while still wishing that the competition did more good and
less harm.
Two
stories, then I’ll shut up: I watched the first Colombia match in Supia’s
central plaza. We watched the second one at our hotel, mostly because we couldn’t
handle the air horns going off next to our ears. It was a good decision: for
the second match the supports apparently brought a cannon. When Colombia
qualified, the fans spent all day driving up and down the streets, waving
flags, singing, fiercely proud of Los Cafeteros. For every goal they were out
of their chairs, hugging, dancing, and spraying fake snow. The same people,
when asked, have given me a litany of complaints about their government and
their society. But when it’s game time, they root for the guys who are from
where they’re from.
Second
story. On June 23, ten days after reporting for Peace Corps, I was basically
thrown out of a moving van. In front of me was a mud-brick house with a
decaying Acura in front. I spoke maybe 20 words of Swahili. My homestay father
knew less English. But luckily, he had a football poster up, and when he saw I
liked it, he said we would watch some that night. As we walked to the game, I
was quite literally overwhelmed: red dirt, mud houses, stars stars stars, a
strange new world. We arrived late, maybe ten minutes left. The village had one
TV and a generator. We men sat on the floor and watched the play flow back and
forth. 80th minute when we arrived. USA vs. Algeria, 0-0. A win
meant everything, a tie meant going home.
I’ll never forget that night, as
long as I live. It was utterly dark. We sipped coffee afterwards while old men
told old stories and I looked at the sky. I don’t believe that I’ll ever feel
that far away from home again, and writing that makes me both glad and very
sad. I wouldn’t have come home early if the USA had drawn the match and left
the World Cup. I wouldn’t have been a single mile farther away from my life and
my wife. But it mattered. When Donovan crashed that goal into the back of the
net, and I started yelling and the Africans started cursing, it mattered to me,
in a way that sports rarely does. I forgot, for a moment, that this was all
wrong and I didn’t belong. I know it’s ridiculous; I know that Seinfeld was
right and we’re just rooting for laundry. But we all get to choose absurdities
to care about, and mine paid me back one lonely night in Africa. For that, for
ever, I will say: Go Go Go, USA.
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