Scared of the rain, but serious about fútbol

So I knew Paraguay was serious about soccer, or fútbol, as they call it here, but I didn’t realize what that meant until I started playing with 7 and 8 year olds who are better than me. And by better than me I mean they have moves that make me feel like I’m just filling up space on the field. They dance around the ball and get it down the field while I’m still standing there just trying to keep my eye on the ball and that’s after the goalie that comes up to my waist kicks it all the way across the field and two or three kids hit it with their heads to pass it. I feel like they are all born with some sort of fútbol intuition or instinct and us Americans really only play with them because we have some sort of celebrity status and they like to hang out with us. Also, if you want to get into a long, serious, and most likely heated discussion, ask a Paraguayan which professional team in Paraguay they support, Cero, or Olympia. You might get answers like “because they have black and white uniforms” or “the other team is all ugly” as well as reasons like one team has money and the other is the underdog. Whatever reason they have picked to support their team, they will defend that team to the death and they are as serious about supporting their team as serious as they are about drinking tereré every day.

In addition to supporting their professional teams, there is an enormous support for local teams, most of which are named after dates that have some political or religious meaning. Our community team is named 8 de diciembre and now that season has started, they will be playing games every week for the next 10 weeks. Last week was the beginning of season and there was a huge opening ceremony in Villeta, a nearby city and all 18 of the jounior teams were supposed to be presented parade style on the field. Our community had a special bus come through just to take us and our team to the field because so many people were going. It had looked like it might rain all day, but people kept saying “no, no, it will pass, it’s not going to rain.” About 5 minutes before the presentation was going to start, my family practically dragged me and a couple other trainees from the bleachers to edge of the field because they had finally realized that it really was going to rain.

Now before I continue the rest of the story, I have to explain something about Paraguayans and rain. They might tell you all day that it will rain or that it won’t rain and sound like they are absolutely sure of it even if they really don’t know what they’re talking about. I swear though, they have a sixth sense with the rain, because even if they have been telling you for the last hour that it won’t rain, about 60 second before it starts raining they run out and grab all their laundry hanging out to dry so it doesn’t get wet. They will wait until the last second before they bring the laundry in, but I have never seen someone grab all their laundry and then not rain, if they bring in the laundry, it rains. And usually in Paraguay when it rains, it rains really hard… like really, really heavy rain with big fat drops and there is usually thunderstorms. Oh, and when I say thunderstorms, I mean louder than normal thunder and it sometimes feels like it’s right over you even if it’s miles away. Paraguayans also have this weird fear of rain, or actually weather in general, so when it starts to rain, they all run inside, literally, and turn off all electric appliances because they also have this weird fear of being struck by lightning and then they just sit there until the rain stops.

So when my family practically ran down the bleachers, they ran because they knew it was going to start raining within the next 2 minutes because they have that weird instinct/timer system. As it started to rain, the wind also picked up and we soon realized that if we didn’t find shelter soon, we would be drenched, so my family ran to the campo bus that had driven us there. We proceeded to watch from the inside of the bus the worst storm I have thus far experienced in Paraguay. The thunder was so loud it was scaring half the people on the bus, and the wind was so strong trees looked like they would fall over and we had rain making puddles in our bus because half the windows were of course leaking. The storm lasted for about 40 minutes and after people had changed their minds about 5 times about whether we were going to stay or not, and whether the presentation was going to continue or not, we all filed back onto the bleachers and waited another half an hour before the parade started. Half the people had found somewhere to be protected from the rain, and the other half were soaked and there were rivers flowing down the streets. About 3 minutes into the parade of teams, it started sprinkling again, and over the next half an hour, neither the weather or the people watching the parade could decide their course of action. It kind of sprinkled and kind of stopped and people climbed up and down the bleachers and walked into some sort of shelter from the rain and then back again. I think I climbed up and down the bleachers about 5 times in that half hour because my sisters didn’t know what they wanted to do. The fact that people had even stuck it out just to watch all the teams walk by, considering their fear of getting wet, was actually quite impressive to me. I thought it showed how dedicated they are to their local team and to the sport in general.

There had been a game scheduled, but whether the field was too soaked to play or because they somehow knew it was going to rain again, they decided to cancel the game. So after the parade was finally over, we all piled back on the bus and it almost immediately started raining again… hard. Team 8 was exhilarated, whether it was from being dripping wet from the rain or from the thrilling parade of teams and they began to sing at the top of their lungs for the entire 30 minute bus ride back home. While the thunder was cracking so loud that mothers were putting their hands over their ears, our wonderful boys belted out, “¡olé, olé, olé, olá! ¡Ocho!”