Now that the excitement of the world cup is over, I'm going
to write a bit about football (no, not soccer.)
For anyone who's been living in a cave for the past 60 or so
years, Brazilians tend to really like (love? obsessed by?) football and are
usually fairly good at it. There has to
be some talent to win the World Cup five times; more than any other
country. Of course not everyone likes
football (I've met two, maybe three people that don't particularly like it) but
there are enough fans to support a broad generalisation or two.
Now, if whilst in that cave you have been hiding under a big
rock for the past couple of months, you might have missed the 2014 World Cup,
which was hosted by Brazil for the second time.
I have already written about the mixed feelings I had to the World Cup
and why my wife and I didn't go (http://maried-a-brazilian-support-group.blogspot.com/2014/05/why-were-not-going-to-world-cup.html)
so I won't go into that here, but of course we got into the spirit and watched
as many games as possible. I'm going to
just gloss over England's performance
(AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!) and move onto Brazil. Some people picked out Argentina as
favourites to win, some Spain, some Germany... I fancied Brazil's chances: a
young team on home soil, fresh from a Confederations Cup victory in 2013, it was theirs to
lose. And they managed that spectacularly.
I was in England for the semi-final against Germany, so I
watched the game with beer in hand. With
no Neymar and no Tiago Silva, it was never going to be easy but it takes 11 men
to form a team, surely these 11 could do it?
When the first goal went in, I thought "never mind, there's still time." The second was a shock, but I've seen teams
recover from worse. Once the third went
in, I had no idea what I was watching, they were disintegrating. By five nil, the result was a foregone
conclusion.
The media had a field day. 7-1 was everywhere - triumphant Germans,
distraught Brazilians, tears streaming down their faces, the entire nation was
devastated...
Or were they?
While everyone I spoke to was certainly disappointed (what
football fan wouldn't be?) the truth is they had lost a match and exited from
the World Cup - never mind, you can't win them all, better to lose to a good
team. Practically every Brit or American
I've spoken to has asked how my wife felt about the result and my answer was
always the same. I show them this short
video that was sent to me by three different Brazilians halfway through the
second half...
No matter how you look at it, that is NOT uncontrollable
grief! That is seeing the funny side and
having a laugh about it and that is what I love about Brazil and its
people. The next day, a friend re-tweeted
a comment about predictions for the Netherlands vs Argentina match:
"somehow, Germany wins!"
Then in the final between Germany and Argentina; of course
everyone was watching the match. Were they
supporting their South American hermanos of Argentina? Hoping for some revenge
and the cup at least remaining in the continent? Were they hell! The semi-final was one game, but the
footballing rivalry with Argentina runs deep!
So this may have been a post about football, but maybe it
was a post about the spirit and sense of humour of the Brazilian people.
If you like football, what could be better than a World Cup
in Brazil? Being there...
Go back a year or so and Sheila and I had a plan, we would
go to Brazil for as much of the world cup as possible, enjoy the atmosphere and
go to one Brazil match and one England match.
I'd been told about the atmosphere in Brazil during any world cup and
with them hosting, we were sure the atmosphere would be electric. We would watch the games with friends in
bars, surrounded by people passionate about the beautiful game, share the
celebrations and collectively commiserate the losses (well, I do support
England...) Neither of us had seen our
national team playing live and this is something that should surely be put
right. The only doubt in my mind was
whether or not England would qualify! It
was not unlikely that they would be left at home.
We visited Brazil in September 2012 for a week or so. We were surprised to see that Guarulhos (São
Paulo's main international airport) was chaotic as ever, this close to the
World Cup. We imagined thousands of
football fans flooding into the country through here and Rio de Janeiro and
wondered how they would cope. Finding
the hire care office was a challenge and that was being accompanied by a
Brazilian; the staff in the immigration line seemed clueless; the signs in the
airport were confusing at best. How
would they cope with masses of foreigners, many of whom would not speak a word
of Portuguese? Don't worry, we thought,
with all the investment in infrastructure - every major stadium in the country
was being renovated, surely they had budget for infrastructure? - it must
improve. By this point, Fantastico was
running features on what must improve if Brazil is to play host to the World.
We drove from São Paulo to Curitiba, which was a hair
raising experience. The road is
nicknamed Rodovia do morte - motorway of death - for good reason. The tight turns in the mountains and some
psychotic lorry drivers made it a real edge-of-the-seat experience. Next I'll take the easy option and fly, as
I'm sure most fans would do anyway.
Arriving in Curitiba is always a relief. This is a city that has been very well
organised and has been recognised as one of the world's best examples of urban
planning. The bus network is well
thought out with dedicated bus lanes, bendy buses and covered bus shelters (to
keep out the constant threat of rain) and a fare collector so that boarding and
disembarking is a quick and efficient affair.
If you prefer to drive, you face that same problems as any other city in
the world. It's not the easiest of
places to find your way around if you are first time visitor (three letters for
you: GPS) but it's no more difficult than any other city I've driven in. Indeed, I have experienced a lot worse in
London, Brussels, San Francisco.... But if you're only visiting for a short
time, there is no need to hire a car, the bus network will more than suffice.
Arena da Baixada before it was torn down
As supporters of Atlético Paranaense, Sheila and I were
happy that the Arena da Baixada had been chosen as one of the venues. Dare we hope that England or Brazil would
play there? (Turns out, no.) The Arena was a great example of a modern
stadium; good access in and out of the ground, good seating and a great
atmosphere. All it was lacking was a
stand along the South side of the pitch.
Aparently the owner of a school there was Coxa fan and blocked the
building of another stand. I heard this
story, but have no idea whether it's true.
With the world cup coming, the club announced plans to upgrade the
stadium: finally, they would have that fourth stand.
To our surprise, the renovations went beyond simply building
a fourth stand. Instead, the stadium
that was built in 1999 was torn to the ground and rebuilt from the ground
up. I feel I must reiterate this point;
the Arena da Baixada which was considered among Brazils most modern and best
appointed stadia was torn down to be rebuilt from scratch. To add insult to injury, the construction
project was plagued by delays to the point that it found itself in the
spotlight of the world-wide media as an example of how poorly the preparations
for the World Cup were being managed.
For the people of Curitiba who are rightly proud of their city's
reputation for efficiency, this was a huge embarrassment; there was even
suggestions that the games to be held in Curitiba would be moved to another
venue. Thankfully, this appeared to spur
on the works and not long ago, the stadium hosted a test friendly with
invitations to all the workers that rebuilt the stadium
The Arena da Baixada is by no means the only stadium to
suffer setbacks, the story of the crane collapse in São Paulo that resulted in
the death of two workers was well reported around the world. But this pails into significance against the corruption
that has overshadowed the preparations.
The country promised massive improvements to infrastructure in order to
cope with the influx of visitors. There
was talk of a new high speed train line between São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, improvements
to public transport, Curitiba would get an underground train network. None of this has happened, the money seems to
evaporate somehow...
Then we come to schools and hospitals. Or maybe we don't... Instead of private investment, many of the stadia
were upgraded with public money. When
these projects inevitably went over-budget, with whispers about contracts being
offered to friends and family or being delayed until the last minute so that
the costs increase or maybe even due to money being pocketed (who does it
hurt? what's the harm?) then more money
is taken away from schools, roads and hospitals. After all, the last thing anyone wants is for
the stadia to not be ready in time, embarrassing the government.
Finally, in June 2013, the Brazilian people had enough. In the midst of the Confederations cup,
millions of people went onto the streets to protest against corruption and the
high cost of hosting the World Cup. The
protests started in reaction to an increase in bus fares but soon grew to
include corruption and police violence.
Social media allowed news to spread faster than traditional media (in
fact Rede Globo, the Brazilian telecoms giant, appeared to ignore the protests
on the first weekend) with people sharing photos and video of protests (see below) and
police reactions under twitter hashtags such as #changebrazil (as well as
#mudabrasil) and #semviolência (without violence.) One such video that I cannot forget shows a
gathering of protestors chanting ' sem violência' then being attacking by police
with pepper spray, rubber bullets and truncheons. The protests spread to every
major city in Brazil with many expats abroad demonstrating and forcing the
issues into the global consciousness.
So, in light of all this, how can we go to the World Cup? I have no doubt that the games will go ahead
and they will be as exciting as always.
Indeed, we will be watching every England and Brazil match on TV, as
well as many more. I don't want the World Cup to be a fiasco; part of me feels that
the best thing is in fact to go, to feed the economy that should be paying for
these projects. But to go would be to
justify the excessive expenses that Brazil cannot afford; to justify rebuilding
entire stadia to satisfy FIFAs demands and to divert funds away from needy
projects; to justify massive diversions while kids in the country's poorer
regions go to schools that have broken chairs, no toilets and no electricity - watch video.
Brazil has the potential to be a great country, indeed many
people have been raised from poverty into a growing middle class, but the speed
of change is hampered but these levels of corruption. By not going to the World Cup, we are not
really protesting, but after our initial enthusiasm we no longer have an
appetite for it.
I was in England for the semi-final against Germany, so I
watched the game with beer in hand. With
no Neymar and no Tiago Silva, it was never going to be easy but it takes 11 men
to form a team, surely these 11 could do it?
When the first goal went in, I thought "never mind, there's still time." The second was a shock, but I've seen teams
recover from worse. Once the third went
in, I had no idea what I was watching, they were disintegrating. By five nil, the result was a foregone
conclusion.
