Futbol and the End of Civilization

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That night when we got home, Marcelo asked me what I wanted to do the next day. He said we could either go to a party or we could go to a futbol (soccer) game that he had mentioned to me a few days previous with his friend Jesus. He warned me that Jesus took the game rather seriously and was the kinda guy who would get ready for the game by consuming sufficient beer to get wild, paint his face, swing his jersy in the air, and spit curses at the top of his lungs from the stands. The answer naturally was, "Oh, I wanna go to the soccer game!" It seemed to me that soccer and culture in Brazil were almost one in the same; so if I wanted to understand what made Brazilians tick, I should go to a soccer game. Besides, what could be unenjoyable about watching a bunch of dark, lean young men running around in shorts glistening with sweat? I know!!! I can´t find a single thing either! Heheheh! Later that night Marcelo said to his friend Ricardo (I haven´t told you about Ricardo and his wife Brenda yet, but they are the most wonderful young couple - you´ll hear all about them soon), "Jennifer thinks it´s better to go to a futbol game than a party, heh heh." They gave eachother a knowing look and laughed. I had absolutely no idea....

The next day Marcelo and I went back to Grandma´s house for lunch. Zelia had prepared loads of food. Again Grandma stared at me silently. After some time she turned to Marcelo and spoke softly to him. Immediately Zelia and the other aunties jumped into the conversation. Marcelo´s eyes became fixed on the plate in front of him. I knew exactly what was being said. So, who´s going where? Are you going to Canada, or is she coming here? Poor bastard. I began laughing hysterically. "Oh," they giggled, "she understands what we´re sayng! Do you understand what we´re saying?!" "Yes I do," I laughed, "I understand." I turned to Marcelo, put my hand on the back of his neck, gave it a reassuring squeeze and winked at him. He smiled back at me sheepishly and blinked his gigantic brown eyes.

Before we left I bent down next to Grandma to say goodbye. The old bird couldn´t figure out where the sound of my voice was coming from. The aunties chirped, "Mom! Turn to the other side, she´s at your other side!" She still couldn´t find me. Zelia grabbed Grandma´s face and turned her head toward me (I love South Americans). The moment Grandma found herself face to face with me she burst out laughing, as did everyone else in the room including me. I grinned at her and took her hand. She said, "God bless you," and smiled back at me. I kissed her face and sqeezed her hand. When I looked up Marcelo was standing over us watching. His big brown eyes were glistening and he smiled down at me gently. As I was leaving the aunties told Grandma to say goodbye to me in English. "Mãe! Fala bye! Fala bye!" After much coaxing she squeaked out the word, "Bye," and then started to laugh at herself. Everyone roared. "Awe! Bye Avó!," I giggled, "Bye!" Marcelo´s mom tells me that every time she goes there Grandma asks about me.

When we got back to the apartment, Marcelo and I quickly got ready for the game. He instructed me to take out all my jewlery and dress down for the occasion. The price to enter a futbol game here is $R10.00, equivalent to about 6 bucks er´so Canadian. It´s cheap because the poor need to be entertained enough that they don´t burst into rebellion. All forms of entertainment here move rapidly and don´t afford people a single moment to consider the incongruancy of their own surroundings in comparison to those they view on, lets say, TV. TV here is made up of variety-type shows, soap operas (which fill all the prime-time slots and are watched by both men and women), and of course reality TV. Lives of the rich and famous, home video clips of people injuring their nether regions through various unfortunate mishaps, and of course, Big Brother Brasil (the most popular show of them all). Purely low-brow entertainment. People sit in front of their TV sets, many of them living in single-room shacks, fantasizing about what it would be like to live the way the celebrities do. Contrast. Contrast. Oh beautiful Brasil!

Once appropriately dressed for the ocassion we ran down to the street and jumped into the back seat of Jesus car. Jesus was a skinny, fair skinned dude with long brown hair that was tied in a pony tail. In a scratchy voice he grinned and said in English, " Hello Jennifer! How are you? This is my girlfriend," (I can´t remember her name now). I said hello, hands were offered for shaking, cheeks were kissed and away we went. On the way to the stadium I looked out the window at the droves of people walking toward the game. A massive parade of poor folks walking along the side of highway BR101 which runs along side an endless beach. Also running along the length of the beach, on the other side of the highway, are the homes of many poor people...and the sewage treatment plant. One of the most beautiful beaches one can possibly conceive. Kilometers of white sand and green water, divided only by two massive piplelines that carry human shit about a kilometer or more out into the ocean. The smell that comes off of the water is disgusting. From inside the car, the beach appears to be heaven on earth, but when you open the window and breath in the air, you suddenly realize that the notion of heaven is only a fantasy here, and you are actually in hell. Oh Brasil! Frightening contrast. These same people who were marching to a soccer game as if to war, are the very same people who swim in this water because they don´t have the money to drive to beaches that are more clean. The poor swim in the shit filled water. My eyes hardly ever believe what they see in this place.

We parked a block away from the stadium across from a gas station where the boys bought some beer. I brought a little vodka in a water bottle which I poured into a can of diet coke. The moment we stepped out of the car Marcelo pulled me very close to him. After the boys procured their beer we walked through a tense crowd of people drinking our alcoholic beverages, Marcelo gripping me with intensity. Although I felt the tension in the air I was still unaware of the dangers present. We came to rest in front of the metal gates barcading the doors of the stadium. He turned to me and told me that if for any reason we became separated I should go back to the gas station, not the car, because it would be the safest place to wait. I agreed and turned back to the crowd in fascination sipping my vodka. I absorbed the atmosphere, utterly perplexed by the complete disorder surrounding me. There were cops seated atop horses with macheties strapped to their waists and extremely long black billy clubs in their hands - faces carved of stone with eyes constantly surveying the crowd. The air was absolutely electric. Marcelo´s eyes darted around busily in observation. I could see that his eyes were trained to detect the slightest indication of potential danger lurking in the crowd. I puzzled over how anyone could possibly make any sense of the disorder we were standing in the middle of. Suddenly all Marcelo´s muscles tensed like an animal and a group of people went running through the crowd. In a split second the police were in pursuit. It was all more than I could comprehend. Right in front of me police were galloping through the crowd on horses, swinging billy clubs and grabbing young people arbitrarily. It didn´t appear to matter who they grabbed, somebody had to be made an example of. It actually wasn´t clear to me which had happened first, the people running or the police pursuing. What was clear to me was that the intention of the police was to remind the crowd who was in control. To intimidate. The people in Brasil are the enemy of the state, and the state the enemy of the people. Neither feign affection for the other. Police don´t protect the public, they control the public, or at least they try. Suddenly a horse jumped the meridian in the centre of the road directly in front of me carrying a cop who was swinging a giant machete in the air above his head. The crowd divided and the realization hit me: no one was safe, including me. I jumped through the gate to protect myself. I felt frightened, sure, but more than anything, things felt utterly surreal. The reality I was experiencing only trickled into my consciousness at first. The machete weilding cop went through the gate to my left and all the hair on the back of my neck stood on end. Marcelo pulled at my shirt indicating to me to come toward him. Everyone waited in a state of the highest alert, reading the slightest twitch in the facial muslces of the military police officer for an indication to retreat. The cop plucked a young boy from the line-up and dragged him away. The boys toes barely touched the ground as the cop dragged him by the scruff of his neck. The cop dropped him on the ground next to some other innocent bystanders who had also been made an example of and poked him with a billy club, yelling at him and threatening to hit him with it. I looked at Jesus´ girlfriend and we burst out laughing! "Holy Shit!!!" I shouted! Marcelo looked at me, laughed and exclaimed, "Brasil! The police are the biggest danger you have to watch for!"

There were periods of relative quiet where the crowd merely buzzed, and then periodic bursts of ecstatic energy where people would run throught the crowd pursued by cops. Fathers gripped their sons as they walked through the crowd. No one´s children were safe from the police. In the eyes of a cop, all children look the same and they´re all a menace. In fact it seemed to me that it was more likely they would grab a child than an adult. Here and there firecrackers were lit making loud bangs that sent police horses bucking in the air. In all the confusion I couldn´t make out who was responsible for lighting them, but whenever the sound was heard, it signaled that police would soon be galloping throught the crowd sending people scattering. I thought to myself, Marcelo holds onto me like the fathers hold their sons. He´s protecting me. What a good boy. I kept looking at his beautiful brown face and his incredibly beautiful brown eyes when I suddenly I felt my awareness open up until the trickle it had been only moments before burst forth into a river that poured into my consciousness like the Amazon. I now understood something that hadn´t been clear to me before. My heart was racing! In this moment I felt my love for my life, for my freedom, for my beautiul friend Marcelo, for all the beautiful children of this country who are treated as a mere nuisance by their government, and my love for the whole world pouring uncontrollably from my heart. I was certain that if I looked down at my chest I would see a river of blood gushing from it. Here I was in this place I had dreamed of since I was a child, a place I had read so much about, and now I was really experiencing it, the truth of it!!! The cruel truth about the world. Tears were brimming in my eyes, and I was conscious of my whole perspective shifting. I felt both fear and absolute joy all at the same time!!! This is what passion is made of: stark contrast!!! I was conscious that I was witnessing myself evolve, and bloody hell, what an incredible feeling! Everything I was feeling was being intensified by the surrounding environment and the adrenaline surging through my veins. I understood the passion of these people, why the people here love and hate with so much intensity. As I looked at Marcelo´s handsome face I felt a new respect for him that made my heart pound. Beautiful children of Brasil, you simply cannot afford to be innocent.

Marcelo and Jesus finished their beer. Marcelo asked me if I was finished with my drink. I told him I wasn´t, but that vodka was cheap in this country so I wasn´t heartbroken about abandonning it in the road. I bent down, placed it on the pavement, and we darted toward the doors. Ahhhh!!! What a beautiful adventure!!!

Beyond the turnstiles where we had our tickets verified, there was a massive line-up of military police searching people and checking them over with metal detectors. They shouted orders at people. I felt just like a political prisoner entering Guantanimo Bay. Marcelo told the cop searching him that I didn´t speak Portuguese, to which the cop responded No Problem, gave me a quick once over with the detector and signalled us through. As we headed up an overpass toward the stands I looked at Marcelo and said, "I feel like we´re going to jail!" "Yeeees!" he replied and we giggled. He put his arm over my shoulders and held me tightly to him. We made a quick stop at the washrooms. Marcelo didn´t remove his hands from my body until I was through the bathroom door. The bathroom was dark, filthy and consisited of a few stalls containing holes in the floor. Lovely. Once reunited, Marcelo bought a beer and we headed down to the stands.

The stands were blistering hot: everything cement and facing the hot afternoon sun. Within moments my skin was dripping sweat from every pore. There was absolutley nowhere to retreat from the sun. I looked around the stadium and observed. It was like everything else in this city: very dusty. I peered over the railing at the bottom of the stands and noticed that the field was surrounded by a moat of filthy, garbage filled water about 6 feet down inside a cement channel. Inside the channel there were a few cement bridges protruding many jagged metal spikes in order to keep people off the field. There were piles of garbage impaled on the spikes. A troop of military police dressed in full-out riot gear: helmets with masks, guns, sheilds, and billy clubs; marched around the track surrounding the field. I´m telling you, soccer is SERIOUS business here!!! Behind me drummers pounded Brazilian rythyms from the top of the stands and people shouted chants at the top of their lungs:

Alá lá ô ô ô mancha chegôôô!
Há há hu hu o CRB eu wo comer seu cú!
Galinhada filho da puta, shupa roca e dá ocú!
Uh Mancha é rei!

I´ll translate:

alá lá ô "Mancha" arrived
há há hu hu o "CRB" (red team) I will f@%k your ass
Hey chicken´s coop son of a bitch, suck my d*$k, f#!k your ass..
Uh "Mancha" (Blue team) is king.


Imagine: more than 8000 people shouting these words in unison. Hahahaha!!! I´m telling you, this country is extremely raw! It´s bloody raw!

The fans on the other side of the stadium, CRB fans, would taunt us with their own chants and run side to side in the stands. The chants and the running were the way the fans did battle. As much as it was done for fun, it was equally done in seriousness. The fun and the resentment blended together like sewage blends with ocean water, and in this environment where people had a place to aim all their frustration, it poured out of them profusely. I felt like I was witnessing the coming of the end of civilization (which I´m certain I was). In Canada we have this idea that everything is fair. Well much of the world doesn´t live in that prestine reality. People here have come to accept that things simply aren´t fair......

.....Ricardo, Brenda, Marcelo and I were sitting at a beach side bar one night having a discussion about the state of the world, when we were approached by a very old woman who asked us for money. Marcelo turned to me and said, "See, she would probably like to go home and rest her old body, but she has nowhere to go." I thought to myself there is no reward for survival here. People get old, it´s a fact of life, it happens to everyone. Can´t expect people to feel sorry for you.....

.....In the stands I looked around at all the people. So many people to look at! So many different appearances. People of every shade: from white, to carmel, to bronze, to deep chocolate brown, and every color of eye matched with all the colors of skin. Dark bronze men with big lips, high cheekbones, and huge pale green eyes. African looking men with muscular bodies, hard round asses and crystal blue eyes. There were so many beautiful people, both male and female, that if each one was a shot of tequila, I was drunk out of my mind!!!! I felt like my eyes were eating cake!!! I was ashamed of my greedy, glutonous self, gorging on beautiful flesh until I became dizzy. I was like a child who is given the opportunity to eat as much sugar as they can stomach - I couldn´t stop myself!!! The best looking men I´ve ever seen in my life were looking me up and down and devouring me with their eyes. I looked at Marcelo, one of these incredibly beautiful people, and felt more attracted to him than I had ever felt before. I thought back to the women who had stayed in my Grandparents home when I was a young girl. They belonged to a Brazilian choir that was competeing in an international choral festival that takes place in my home town. It´s called Kathaumiux. Meeting these women is when I first felt the desire to travel to this country. They were the most beautiful women - so kind, so talented, so full of life. The music and dancing performed by their choir caused everyone who watched them to fall in love. The women said to me, "Oh Jennifer, you must come to Brasil! The men are so beautiful!" Well, I gotta tell ya, they weren´t lying. I felt, as I melted under the equatorial sun, breathing in dust and listening to profanities being chanted to the vibrant rythym of drums, that I was fulfilling my destiny. I couldn´t believe my good fortune to be here in this country with my beautiful Marcelo, who´s existence I had no awareness of when I was a young girl, living a childhood dream and witnessing the truth about the world with my own eyes.

To our left, some men came marching out holding a long blue cloth. They walked along the bottom of the stands. The blue cloth just kept coming from the left in the arms of more young men. Marcelo told me that it was a giant flag for their team. "This is the first time we have this flag," he added. It spanned the entire length of the stands. The men tucked it under the bottom step and Marcelo told me that when the time came we would lift it, send it backward to the people behind us, who would do the same, and then jump up and down pushing the flag up above our heads. Marcelo put the remainder of his warm beer down on the stand behind his feet. Next thing there was a group of little bad-ass boys passing it around and gulping it down. I giggled. As wrong as it was I couldn´t help but feel amused. I just love boys and their trouble making ways! Marcelo looked at me and said, "Yeeees, Brazilian style! Very fast!" Brasil: not the land of "opportunity" - the land of "opportunism". All around me I observed the masculinity of the Brazilian youth. Little men, who swore, walked with swaggers, smoked cigarettes, and leered and the women they passed by. I was entertained and thoroughly charmed! Macho was in full force all around me. The streets of Brasil are tough - even the soccer games are rugged! The young boys earn the right to behave like men just by surviving in the harsh world they grow up in. Street smarts errase their innocence and when you look into their eyes you can see that there is no childhood left. At one point I heard the tiny saprano voice of a child speaking from below me. I looked down into the face of a child who was no more than 8 years old. He was standing with two other little boys younger than him - his brothers I assumed. He pointed at me and speaking urgently pointed at one of the other little boys standing by his side. "He wants something Marcelo, what is he´s asking for?" "Do you need your water? Because he is asking you for it." Oh my God, he´s pointing at my water. I immediately handed it to him and he passed it to his brother who gulped it down. He almost walked away without saying another word when he remembered himself and came running back to me. He repeatedly thanked me with absolute sincerity. Marcelo gave him the thumbs up and said, "Beleza." ("Cool.") My heart felt like it had been reduced to pulp. This little 8 year old man was looking after his brothers. They were all alone in this dangerous environment without adult supervision, and this little man had assumed the the responsibilties of both supervisor and protector of his little brothers whom he loved. This is how the boys become men so young. I turned to Marcelo and whispered, "Oh the children. The children are hardly children here."

When the soccer players entered the field madness broke out from every corner of the stadium. The chanting intensified. The flag was lifted from the ground and handed to all of us standing on the first level. We waited for the signal...and then...it came! Marcelo shouted, "Now!!!" We threw the flag up in the air over our heads, the people behind us did the same thing, and in seconds the entire crowd standing in our half of the stadium was jumping madly up and down under a massive blue flag, screaming their lungs out. Whoooohoooo!!!!!! After a few minutes the flag was lowered quickly in the same manner as it had travelled up to the top of the stands. From that point on, the madness never quieted for a single moment. Whenever something unfavorable took place on the field the profanities flew like ninja stars. Fists were thrown in the air. Jesus screamed from behind me, "Filho da Puta!!!!" I looked into Marcelo´s face and said, "Jesus!" We both burst into hysterical laughter. "In Brasil, when Jesus goes to a soccer game, he doesn´t want to share the bread, he only wants to spit the beer and start a fight!," he howled.

Things started to fall apart on the field, the other team scored against us near to the end of the game, and the crowd became increasingly enraged. I now understood the reasoning behind the moats, the spikes and the mp´s marching around the field in riot gear. Marcelo told me that people will actually try to attack the players if these precautions are not taken. If a player screws up, people wanna draw blood. Like I said: witnessing the end of civilization. Gnashing teeth and all. At the bottom of the stands, standing in a row with small weapons in their hands, about 15 police officers with tense faces were keeping their eyes on the crowd. We later found out that there had been 16000 people at that soccer game. More than half of those people were on our side of the stadium. More than 8000 people and only 15 ´er so cops to keep ´em all in check. No wonder their faces were tense. I felt a sort of pity for those poor bastards. If there was any one job I wouldn´t want to do in this country it would be policing. The police get paid very little for the amount of very real danger they are exposed to. Going to work each day for a Brazilian cop is like throwing oneself into a lions den on a $5 bet that you´ll survive. About this Marcelo said, "A little cocaine helps increase the bravery." He observed my reaction before he added, "Really. A lot of cops here take cocaine to help them do the things they need to do. To make it easier to hurt people and things like that. Things that people have a hard time doing normally."

Unfortunately, our team lost, inspite of the giant blue flag. Jesus sat in the stands, pulled his jersy over his head and cried - no, he sobbed - comforted by his girlfriend who lovingly stroked is back. On the way out of the stadium Jesus and other men continued shouting curses. Some men simply hung their heads low and sulked their way out of the stadium. We stepped through a large stream of water that wasn´t water (yes, it was piss coming from the washrooms - something wrong with the plumbing - and in wreaked). Jesus kicked a large metal gate making a very loud noise and Marcelo turned to me to say, "Jesus wants to go to jail." Fortunately Jesus didn´t go to jail and everyone got home safely.

By the time we did get home we were both exhausted. I felt like I´d run a marathon and had no energy left for nada. Marcelo and I hardly said a word to eachother before going to sleep early. As I drifted off to sleep I went over the day in my mind, savouring the best parts and repeating those memories a few times more. I kept thinking about the way Marcelo looked after me throughout the whole event. Sometimes men can be so wonderful. I fell asleep smiling that night...and changed forever...

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Photos

Grandma´s Table
The centre of all the action - always.