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Making our way to the game
Looking completely inconspicuous and demure. We managed to be in our house for 24 hours before we had our first social gathering, albeit consisting only of only a dozen people. It was held Sunday morning, the morning of the greatly anticipated match (or perhaps party) of Brasil vs Australia. The warm up game beginning at 10am was between the other two teams in our group, Japan and Croatia and the ‘reason’ for our little get-together.
On Saturday I had taken receipt of 40 t-shirts I’d had printed with the Australian flag and the text “Go Aussies Go!!!” and in smaller print underneath “FIFA World Cup Germany 2006, Brasil vs Australia, 18th June 2006”. This was a last minute organisational task on my behalf as our initial plans had been somewhat foiled when one of our co-workers who had returned to Australia to have his visa stamped was delayed, along with our case of flags and associated Aussie paraphernalia. This aside, we were still set to look resplendent, shirts combined with small flags on sticks and the mandatory aussie flag tattoos for the face. (Many thanks to Natasha who had the forethought to bring these items with her).
Around 10am we were cracking the first
The calm before the storm
Brett & Wayne - Preparing for the arrival of our guests and the big match. beers of the day, completing the mandatory guided tours of our new abode and firing up my newly generated playlist of all songs Aus (our national anthem, Waltzing Matilda, I Still Call Australia Home, I Am Australian, Land Down Under etc).
Naturally we were all singing loudly and since it was such a beautiful day we had all of the windows open. As previously mentioned the living area is one level above street level, so as guests were arriving to the party being held directly across the road they were pleasantly greeted by our singing and flag waving. This was clearly intriguing for all concerned and it wasn’t long before we were out in the street introducing ourselves to our new neighbours. They seem like a really nice family, both children (in their early 20’s) speak good English. They invited us to their party, unfortunately we had to turn them down as we already had plans, although they did say we could be friends as long as Australia didn’t win the football.
At 11:30 (about an hour and a half before kick-off) we headed off for Krug Bier, the bar where we were going to spend our afternoon.
New Aussie Fans
I'm not sure Dad would have been paticularly happy when these kids arrived home at match time with their new flags! Krug is about a 20 minute walk, at slow pace, from our house which includes crossing one and travelling along another fairly major road. Needless to say that we were received many car horn honks and waves from motorists clearly bemused by the odd looking bunch of Australians wandering the streets.
Arriving at Krug we moved to our upstairs (balcony) location and over the next 30 minutes or so were joined by our fellow Aussies and some other Brasilian friends. We had about 50 Australians and another 20 Brasilians in our group and a lot of noise making potential. (Needless to say the rest of the bar was filled with Brasilians). T-shirts were adorned (mine on my head in a very attractive bandana fashion with the flag showing as I was wearing my shirt I’d previously made for Australia Day), flag tattoos adhered and we were looking good!
I had also come equipped with the CD of Aussie songs, so with the assistance of our friend Andre (who is from Brasil and is thus fluent in Portuguese) we soon had Land Down Under sounding out throughout the bar and some interesting interpretive dance being performed by members of
Cintia's a very optimistic kinda girl
Cintia with her tip for the match - thankfully she had to revise it later on! our group.
The other important item that I had prepared was a ‘song list’ containing a number of chants that provided amusement throughout the match. Although ‘Aussie Aussie Aussie’ did raise its head, we were thankfully saved from it being our sole vocal show of support.
I must also add that throughout the whole afternoon there were photographers from four newspapers and television cameras from the station that broadcasts the game (as well as its other programs) nationally. We were the Aussie crowd that the station crossed to during the game and during their news breaks for the next 24 hours we also got airtime!
That aside the match began and our partying continued. Much singing, chanting, beer drinking and general frivolity ensued throughout the first half and the 0-0 score was to be celebrated by a conga line snaking through the bar.
The second half was much the same (except that Brasil scored, but we weren’t going to let that spoil a good party!) In fact it was quite entertaining when it happened as a bunch of Brasilians (that we didn’t know) started hopping around like kangaroos. At full time even though we didn’t win,
Half Time Celebrations
0-0 at half time and everyone is having fun. we were very happy with the way our boys had played and were ready to continue to enjoy the party and celebrations.
It was now that the real party started. We were straight downstairs to congratulate the Brasilians (and make new friends) and all start celebrating, dancing and drinking a few more beers together. I now need to order a few more t-shirts as they proved very popular in general, with numerous being lost to Brasilians in exchange for their green and gold garb.
After a while it was time to move on and head to the street party held after each (victorious) match. We arrived at the top end of the street and started walking towards the crowd. Along the way we stopped to have a chat with some people who looked nice (and turns out they were as they shared their stash of beers with us!) Moving down towards the serious party and the density of people increased exponentially until you could hardly move. You could look down the street in both directions and see only people. The music was pumping, there were people all along the street selling beer and everyone was getting into the
I always like to look my best!
Enjoying the match with one of the Brasilians we work with. party. I was still wearing my Australia shirt so that prompted numerous conversations (all good though) and plenty of fun. I was also very thankful for the hamburger stall that sold me the world’s best hamburger (well it was at the time) for about $2.50 Aussie. The only downside was a reasonable amount of beer and no toilets. I was thankful for the side street and my friend with a large flag which was used for shielding purposes (sorry Mum!)
The next morning we got into the taxi to go to work (to be on time for 7am Portuguese class - aahhhh) and there was a newspaper on the back seat. I was greeted with an interesting page facing upwards - covered in pictures of us and an article about us watching the match the day before. One of the pictures was me on my own looking just lovely (t-shirt on head, yelling something). Brett pointed this out to the taxi driver who was most amused and insisted I took the piece of paper with me. We found out later that day we were in all four papers. Between this and the television coverage the Brasilians kept informing me
Ross & Selvia
Having a good time that I was now famous (and one way of doing this is walking past your desk singing under your breath ‘you’re famous, you’re famous’). At least we are creating some entertainment here!!!
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