Day 8: The "Fútbol" Game

The fútbol, soccer, game today was pretty much the highlight of the day. I had a very relaxed morning, I chatted with Betty for quite a while, Judith had gone out earlier. She belongs to a women's society in Canada that had international contacts, and she was able to arrange a lunch date with a woman, and they also went touring a bit. I left the house at about 4.30 with a cellphone that Betty lent me. I had to stop in a corner store to top up the minutes on the phone and stop by the "Farmacity" to buy a couple things before getting onto the subway. I had to change lines for the first time, but I had no problems. I rode the blue "C" line up north to Retiro station were I met up with Andy by the Red Tower.

We took a bus from outside the train station, we took one of the dozens of buses that had stops there. It was quite confusing. The bus was a grand total of 1.20 pesos, and we were able to ride it within a 3 minute walk of the stadium. We bought tickets for 80 pesos (which we will not do again, since there are cheaper seats higher up where there are more enthusiastic fans with drums, whistles etc.).  But we could see the field very well from our seats and it was a great experience. There must have been about 30,000 people there, and there was plenty of room for more; I think that the stadium can hold close to 50,000 people.

The game was very exciting, it was between the teams "River" y "Rosario Central." River was the home team, so we were supporting them along with all of the other red and white wearing fans. There were a large amount of men with tattoos of their team on their shoulders and backs. Betty says that is the new and cool way to support your team....forever. The game in general was a little sad because the final score was 0:0, but River played very well and had multiple close calls. I have quite a few pictures that I want to share because I think that will give a better feel of the experience:

The energy of the fans, the noise, the colors, was great. The crowd really acted as one singing songs for a large part of the game, yelling objections, whistling, drumming, clapping, and waving their arms from the elbow down in a sort of wave that was a combination of a beckoning shake and a dumbbell curl. A bit like the stereotypical Italian hand gesture but without the fingers pinched.

I will try to add a short video clip tomorrow, because tonight the internet connection is really slow. It shows the chanting and waving quite well.

Chao.