Soccer thing happens

So, soccer happens here a lot. For my American readers, soccer is a sport played on a rectangular field in which players kick a thing into a net. Whoever accrues more goals after five hours wins the match, although bonus points are awarded to whichever team has more players fall to the ground after incidental contact. Much like mate, fernet and any other terrible, terrible beverage they adore here, you could call soccer an "acquired taste" for me.


I couldn't live in Buenos Aires without seeing what all the fuss was about, so two weeks ago my friends and I headed to the barrio of Boedo to see San Lorenzo take on Vélez Sarsfield. (The fact that I am just now writing this, I assure you, is because it took two weeks for the excitement to taper, and is in no way related to my interminable sloth. Not to be confused with this interminable sloth.) 


The game went surprisingly un-hyped considering it was played between the top two teams in the league (standings as of September 24). But that's the dynamic of the league in Argentina. Of the seven clubs based in Buenos Aires, two dwarf the rest in popularity: Boca Juniors and River Plate (linguistic side note: other English team names include Racing, All Boys, Old Boys and Arsenal). No city in any American major league has more than two teams. It's like Los Angeles: Boca Juniors are the Lakers, River Plate are also the Lakers and every other team is the Clippers. 


Tourists and foreigners are expected to choose one of the two clubs as their adoptive team, as they win a lot, are resoundingly popular and have tourist-friendly stadiums. My friend Ian, who is in his second semester here, inexplicably roots for San Lorenzo, a team whose stadium he is fearful to enter alone. He told me the stadium's the team's hooligans — who stand in the expansive "popular" section of bleachers behind the goal — are notorious for mugging people, starting fights and peeing on the people below them mid-game. Pshaw, I thought. Sounds like an average Thursday night. 


So we got a group of four together and took a bus down to the stadium, stopping at a cafe to enjoy a local microbrew before the match. The microbrew happened to not be a microbrew at all, but five liters of Quilmes, the Budweiser of Argentina. Or at least that's what we expected; turns out the only beer available was Budweiser, the Quilmes of the United States. Ah, Budweiser, my old friend, I thought. I haven't seen you since college.


The four of us then headed to the stadium, which was conveniently located in the heart of an area I affectionately referred to as "Shantyland." I'm sure the throngs of people walking to the stadium made the place safer for the day, but that did not stop Anthony and me from getting a bucket of water dumped on us from a second-story window. The culprit escaped unidentified, which is lucky for him, because I was giving some pretty menacing (read: terrified) looks from below.


The game was slated to start at 4:30 p.m., so we were a little puzzled when we arrived at 4:27 and it had the action had already begun. This fact is memorable in that is the first known instance of something in Buenos Aires starting before its scheduled time. We found our way to our section (not the hooligan zone), but our seats were occupied. We squirmed our way through our row and showed the seat-takers our tickets. They apologized and relinquished the seats, and after the game we talked football over a nice microbrew.


But then I woke up, and I was still standing awkwardly in front of a bunch of guys passively showing them my ticket, blocking rows and rows of fans behind them, who judging by their looks of consternation and implementation of an impressive array of vulgarities, were none too pleased with our display of courage. We retreated to the stairs, where we stood for the remainder of the first half. 


While standing, I was able to take in the scenery. To my left was the notorious popular section. Thousands were packed in there, all jumping, waving flags, banging on drums, pumping their fists and shouting their team songs. Practically everyone was decked out in a San Lorenzo jersey, which I was considering buying but was dissuaded when I saw their prominently displayed corporte sponsor.


All Walmarts aside, the energy in the stadium was contagious. When the popular section started a chant, the rest of the stadium joined in. When a San Lorenzo player got knocked down, the stadium erupted. I didn't even know the words. I just shouted a sustained "ohhhhhh" and threw in a "San! Lo! Ren! Zo!" every now in then when it seemed appropriate. I got into the fist pumping as well, which is done with the index and middle fingers pointing out, almost as if taunting the opposing team's fans. Because apart from the game being played on the field, the fans are also competing against one another, and are equally competitive as the players. Every San Lorenzo shot that went just wide of the goal was applauded and cheered almost as much as if it had gone in the net.


Not that I would know, of course. The game ended in a 0-0 draw, so I have yet to experience my first goal. I suppose this means I have to go back now.

The popular section

Highlights of the game:

• Getting our seats back. The guys in our spots left at halftime and didn't come back. I jumped on the opportunity and reclaimed what was rightfully ours. I even offered to sit in the seat closest to the aisle, so in case they did come back, I would do all the talking. I spent much of the second half praying that wouldn't happen.
• The near-brawl that occured after the game. Once the final whistle blows, the opposing team's fans, who are allotted a sliver of seats in the corner of the stadium, have 30 minutes to exit the stadium, while the home team's fans must remain. (I imagine the type of environment that produced that rule is brawl-conducive.) While the Vélez fans were exiting, some San Lorenzo fans attempted to break through the barrier separating the two sides with a makeshift battering ram before they were stopped by police. Several fans from both sides began throwing chairs and other objects over the tall metal barrier. Nothing became of the altercation, although apparently the cops resorted to teargas at some point. 
• This kid:

I had my camera on him for much of the second half but was unable to catch him during one of his adorable angry fist pumps. 

The next day, I told another international student I went to my first game. "Cool!" she said. "Boca or River?"

Are you ready for some (American) football?!

I was flipping through the channels last night when I landed on ESPN Deportes, the Spanish-language offshoot of the Worldwide Leader. I was pleasantly surprised to discover they were broadcasting the Redskins-Cowboys game, as yesterday was the first full day of the NFL season.

I quickly related my excitement to my housemates, who, being from Colombia, Spain, the Netherlands and Austria, didn't care.


But what a relief it was for me. Argentina revolves around soccer. Multiple matches are broadcast nightly, whether Primera Division, minor league or even European. The country's field hockey team just won the Women's Hockey World Cup but caused only a minimal stir here. And although Argentina had the top-ranked basketball team in the world entering the FIBA World Championships, the team likely never drew more attention than a regular-season soccer match.


So my shock at seeing an N.F.L. football game is understandable. Both commentators spoke in Spanish, which allowed me to pick up some useful translations of football terms, something that will come in handy when talking to absolutely no one about American football. (On a related note, this glossary is coming in handy when talking to myself about baseball.) One of the colormen was also fluent in English, based on his pronunciations of player names and his usage of terminology like "the cluster," which I'm sure leads to some crazy on-the-job code switching.


Anyway, I watched the final Cowboys drive with my Spanish housemate Jorge, who had never seen an N.F.L. game in his life. I took it upon myself to diagram as many of the rules of football as possible in 90 seconds. And I did a decent job, until the game-ending holding penalty, which I tried my best in broken Spanish to explain, although I'm pretty sure Jorge left more confused than he had started. Poor guy. We'll work on it again next Sunday.


All this came a day after my first-ever Argentine futbol game. Reflections on that coming later. People got teargassed though.

Temple-hopping

I've been to three synagogues in two weeks and each has a completely different feel. Which is good — I expected quite a bit of variety in a city with one of the 10 biggest Jewish populations in the world. At times I would stare into space blankly during the Spanish-language sermons, but when the Hebrew prayers started back up I felt right at home. With prayers in Hebrew, Jews can participate anywhere in the world. I also spent much of services zoning out and thinking about things more entertaining than synagogue, which is something I do in American synagogues quite a bit as well.


The fun came after services, though. After kiddush at the first synagogue, the Conservative Kol Amijai, the 25 or so congregants filed upstairs into a small room to talk some Torah. I sat in between two gentlemen whose combined age was likely in the low 200s. Torah Talk also included Snack Time, so while the Rabbi said some Jewish stuff I didn't understand, I was keeping my eye on the bags of candy and biscuit cookies circulating around the table. 


At least three of the oldsters had brought their own alcohol, which quickly began making its rounds. I went for a yummy smelling red liqueur that tasted exactly like Cherry NyQuil, only it made me feel better. 


I spent this past Shabbat evening at one of the Chabad houses in Palermo, my district of the city. I felt slightly sacrilegious pulling up to shul in a taxi but I'm pretty sure no one noticed. I was able to walk right in this synagogue, unlike Kol Amijai, where as a newcomer, I needed to sound a buzzer and talk to the security guard, who essentially interrogated me about my character and intent, and even threw in a few Jewish trivia questions, before granting me access to services. I don't blame them though. With radical Islamic terrorist groups setting up shop in neighboring Paraguay and Brazil, in the middle of Catholic country, I'd probably be cautious too. 


Throughout services I was distracted by all the glorious facial hair surrounding me. I don't know if beards grow at a faster rate in Latin America but I'd be willing to wager a buck or two. The coup de grace came when I saw the rabbi and his interminably long, gray beard for the first time at the pulpit in the center of the room. I did a double take. I swear I thought he was wearing a novelty beard from Party City. ZZ Top has nothing on Rabino Shlomo Levy. The thing stretched easily down to his belt buckle. His beard can't even be captured on camera in its entirety.


After services I stuck around for Chabad's patented free Kosher dinner and singling out of an uncomfortable Mark Abadi. I picked a seat in the crowded room and was asked to scoot down one, unaware I would now be sitting next to Rabbi ZZ Top. He slapped me on the back and rubbed my head a few times throughout the night but I think he did that to all the guys. After some small talk he turned to the person on his other side and I let out a sigh of relief that nearly blew out the Shabbat candles. 


Luckily for me I was not the only foreigner to receive a L'chaim; also present were a Brazilian woman and a group of Israeli girls who sounded awesome when they said "muchas gracias" with an Israeli accent. The meal was incredible, and very well may have constituted my first portion of vegetables since arriving in Buenos Aires two weeks ago (I'm up to three now!). I spent the majority of dinner studying the individual strands of ZZ Top's beard as they cascaded down his face and meandered onto his pants.


Saturday morning I took the subway to a Sephardic synagogue that had the most people of the three, at least 150. I actually had no idea what was going on during services as people were either talking or shushing the people that were talking, making it impossible to hear. However I was impressed that the book rack in front of each seat came installed with a  drop-down shtender, one of my favorite pieces of Jewish equipment.


I stuck around for a small lunch. A kid asked me where I'm from and when I said the United States he asked me if I liked the L.A. Galaxy soccer team. He's not the first person to ask me that, so I'd imagine Major League Soccer officials would be happy to hear their brand is making its way overseas. The reason is most likely David Beckham's short stint with the team, but I'd like to think Landon Donovan's World Cup performance sparked an international interest in American soccer. 


I imagine wearing fancy clothes makes you a target so I tried especially hard not to get mugged on the way home.