World Cup Final

Copacabana Beach-our venue for watching the final game and the shenanigance that would ensue afterwards. Argentines were flooding into Rio. We had run into them taking public transit, out at night in Lappa, all over Copacabana and even in Barra. You can't miss Argentinian fans- they're loud, boisterous, seem to know all the words to every song and sing with passion. Or maybe that's just all passionate football fans :-) When we arrived with Nihad and Daniel, the beach was a sea of blue and the energy of the place was contagious! Even though I barely could see over all the towering giants in front of me, it didn't really matter. There were sporadic groups of German fans in the crowd but for the most part, it was all drums and songs and blue, white and yellow.  

The sea of blue erupted with cheering when Argentina scored, well that was before they realized that the goal was an off side. I could hear Ramanan from behind saying that it was a pretty obvious off side, but the crowd was hungry for a goal. Technical games such as this one, are not always the most interesting to watch, but the singing and energy of the crowd kept us entertained and soon we were into half time and then overtime. When Germany scored, we were on the outskirts of the crowd, just having returned from a quick washroom break. That's when people started running away. Things-cans, cups, chairs, were being thrown up in the air, within the crowd! It escalated quickly and then an explosion-our guess was tear gas. This was all a fair distance away from us, but when everyone started running, so did we! With plenty of police presence along the beach though, everything dissipated as quickly as it began, and we went back to catch the last final minutes of the game.

Once the game was over, we made our way into the neighbourhood looking for a place to eat, and taking in the frenzy of all the people around us. There were more German fans visible now, many of them had been at the smaller bars within the neighbourhood and quite a lot of them looked very Brazilian :-) Among the shouting and animated singing, photo and selfie taking, were many happy football fans, like ourselves, soaking in the experience of a World Cup final. There were the angry people too, and those rubbing salt in a very fresh wound. Hands were being held up, showing the number seven. At the time we didn't know exactly what it meant but the gesturing wasn't received kindly. I later Wikipediad it, and it has been seven World Cups since Argentina last won.  

I think this was a bittersweet World Cup for Brazilians. As a nation that loves football, they protested against the Cup they love to better social realities in their country, and their hopes of victory were dashed when Neymar was injured. But, if you've already lost, there is nothing better than watching your bitter rivals make it to the very end and then loose as well! That night, there were many happy Brazilians, on the streets, on the metro, and on our bus going back to Barra, happy to see their rivals, Argentina loose another Cup!  

  

With so many high scoring games, set in beautiful Brazil, home to some of the greatest football fans in the world, this was a terrific World Cup. I know my Argentinian friends might object to this, but the Germans deserved the win. I had hope a South American team would win, and even though that didn't happen, they definitely put on a great show for the world.