la cupa mundial

I have a couple updates on the whole futbol front. First of all, let me correct myself in saying that Paraguay has qualified for the world cup before, but you can probably find better facts on the internet than I can asking people in my site. My current host dad told me they have qualified the last 4 World Cups, but I’ve also been told by more than one Paraguayan they’ve never qualified before, so I really don’t know what’s happened.

Second, the closest thing I can compare watching Paraguay’s opening game is watching the Super Bowl. Unless you had to work, you were watching the game, even if you never follow futbol. I went over to my neighbors house and watched it with them, laughing at them freaking out every time Paraguay almost made a goal or someone stole the ball from Paraguay. When they made the one goal of the game, almost everyone jumped out of their seats screaming because they were so excited. The 6 year old started running around the room doing a victory dance that had some resemblance to Michael Jackson style dancing. We made popcorn for the second half and one of them started throwing popcorn at the TV every time something happened in the game that she didn’t like. The whole thing was quite the event, and quite exciting.

Lastly, I would like to tell you how being in the World Cup has suddenly made the neighborhood boys much more serious about our front lawn pick up games. We usually spend an hour or two playing two on two or three on three and I spend approximately half of that time listening to them yell at each other in Guarani about whether or not it’s a corner shot, whether or not they have 3 goals or 4, or whether or not they get a penalty shot. The games usually spontaneously start and people join in and leave in the middle of the game. On Friday we played 4 on 4 and not only did we have an official start to the game, but we had everything from line up and the national anthem, to shaking hands, and warm up exercises. They decided one team would be Paraguay and the other would be the United States in honor of me. We also had to choose which famous soccer player we wanted to be for the game. They asked me who the most famous soccer player in the United States was. Um, I don’t know… David Beckam? I don’t even think he’s in South Africa right now but he’s honestly the only soccer name I know. Luckily they were satisfied with only one name and I got to be David Beckam while they all fought over which Paraguayan soccer player they would be. We all stood in two lines and then they told me that I had to sing the national anthem of the United States because that was our team. I made it through two lines before bursting into laughter. Apparently just singing, “Oh say can you see, by the dawns early light,” was good enough for them and they all put their hands over their hearts to sing the Paraguayan national anthem. I don’t even think the game actually lasted for 5 minutes before the ball got stuck in the tree, or one of the boys ended up on the ground fake crying because he got kicked… I don’t remember which happened first, but after that happened, I just sat around listening to them yell at each other in Guarani and chase each other around to beat up the kid who kicked the boy lying on the ground. I guess the ceremonies were more important than the actual game.