Casualty Count: Week 3

As always, no guarantees as to the accuracy of the following numbers - 

9,000: temperature and humidity in Manaus for USA v POR

40: reais for admission to As Cataratas do Iguacu; maybe best real-for-real purchase of the trip

30: reais for admission to Parque das Aves; maybe the best real-for-real purchase of the trip

600: gallons of water in the wave our captain drove into to swamp Sergio and Amy riding in the prow

6: feet of rain that fell during our 2 1/2 days in Iguacu

6/2/6/4,600+: cities/hotels/beds/miles racked up by Brothers Chapman in the Rio-Belo Horizonte-Brasilia-Manaus-Brasilia-Foz do Iguacu-Rio run last week

100's: more beers killed, but they seem to just keep coming; we'll keep up the efforts

9,000: calories consumed in brigadeiros; pray we don't make these when we get back...evil little buggers

Worth the trip if for no other reason

Spent the whole day on Praia Sao Francisco, across the bay from Rio proper. May be the most beautiful beach we've been on the whole time. Don't believe me, see for yourself.

We Did Come Here For Games

To date, here are the games seen in person:
Daniel - Spain x Chile in Rio
Sofia - Argentina x Bosnia in Rio
Veronica - USA x Ghana in Natal and Colombia x Uruguay in Rio (she doesn't know this yet)
Jose - Argentina x Bosnia in Rio, Belgium x Russia in Rio, Colombia x Uruguay in Rio
Sergio - Belgium x Russia in Rio, USA x Ghana in Natal, Colombia x Uruguay in Rio
Ryan - USA x Ghana in Natal, Argentina x Iran in Belo Horizonte, USA x Portugal in Manaus
Devin -  USA x Ghana in Natal, Spain x Chile in Rio, Argentina x Iran in Belo Horizonte, USA x Portugal in Manaus

Devin and Ryan leave in a few days for Salvador for the USA x Belgium game.

Lions and Tigers...Wait Tucans and Macaws and...

Parque das Aves in Foz de Iguacu.  Awesome!!!!!

Stop talking about summer in DC...just stop (USA v POR)

So, normally I'd try to give some kind of recap about the game attended, but given the reports we're reading from back home, it appears a safe bet that anyone reading this blog also watched Sunday night's game. Nearly 25M viewers in the US. Fan-freaking-tastic!

Manaus, though...wow, Manaus. Up to now, must of the games we've been to have been on or near the Brazilian Atlantic coast. Not Manaus. Manaus is way, way, WAY up river in the Amazon jungle region. It's a little over 210 miles from the equator; like Albuquerque to Roswell. We'd spent the night before in Brasilia (more on that later), which felt very like home. It sits at a higher altitude and cools off noticeably after dark (see what I mean about sounding familiar?). Walking out of the airport in Manaus was like walking opening the door and walking into a sauna. Our very gracious host chuckled when we mentioned it, saying that "today is actually a cool day."

The game that night was the brand spanking new Arena Amazônias. The place is gorgeous as you can see from the stadium shot, and, much like Natal, it was full of Americans. But it was hard to enjoy it too much. Walk around the stadium, you're going to sweat. Climb the stairs to your seats, you're going to sweat. Jump up and down cheering, you're going to sweat. Turn your head to follow the game or talk to the folks next to you, you're going to sweat.  Breathe, blink, think, you're going to sweat. When Portugal (and Pretty Boy) jumped out to a quick lead of a just terrible piece of defending by the US, it looked like we might be in for a horribly long night. But amazingly our boys suddenly turned it around and liked like the team we'd all hoped they one day could be. Unlike Natal, the mid-field controlled the game and dictated the pace. It was very encouraging, but still Portugal would break away and scare everyone with the possibility of them jumping out to a 2-0 lead. And then, this happened:

Suddenly, we had a team. Whatever it was that we saw in Natal for 80+ minutes was not present in Manaus. They played like a real team, and completely shut Pretty Boy & Co. down. At least until about the last 45 seconds when we decided to take a picture to commemorate the 2-1 win we were about to post. And, well, roughly 25M of you back home saw what happened then.

We Made It!!!

 


More...and I mean many many many more to come.

Casualty Count: Week 2

1: electric charger/converter confiscated along with deodorant and toothpaste by security outside Minerão

3 bazillion: number of obscenities uttered 9 hours later when I realized they'd taken the converter

100's: amount I would've lost betting on Spain at least making it out of group...you know, if sports betting was legal in the States

0: keys broken (we're clearly off our game)

1: lid-like sheet of glass on the stove (amazingly, neither Chapman was anywhere near the scene)

5ish: miles walked along the beach in Natal late our first night there, apparently right along a favela through which we were later told it was too dangerous to jog in broad daylight with dozens of other runners (there were no, repeat NO incidents during our three days there to justify this fear)

10: number of minutes the US team looked strong, in 5 minute blocks bookending the...

80+: minutes in the middle during which they looked like crap. Thank Almighty Cheebus for Tim Howard.

100's-1,000's: numbers of Skol beers killed at our favorite haunt in Natal, Casa de Matuta; highly recommended if you ever find yourself on Praia das Artistas.

1: item from bucket list, "See a game in Maracaná" in rather spectacular fashion

A trip to the Holy Land (ESP v CHI)

So the day we got back from Natal, we had three tickets to see Spain try to save their Copa against Chile after the drubbing Holland administered a few days earlier. One had to be used by a senior (in this case, dear Tio Paulo), and this was the game we got young Master Daniel into as well, so that left a lone ticket. We tried to find at least one more ducat for the game, but since the entire nation of Chile was bound and determined to see the match, ticket or no, we were out of luck. At that point, my hosts from Colorado laid down on the grenade and insisted that I take the last ingresso. It would be my only chance to see many of the players from my favorite club (Barça, Barça, Barça!) playing for Spain (especially since, as it turns out, the defending champions will be headed home very, very soon). And did I mention that it was at Maracanã? This is a debt that I never get to repay. I got into my seat just at kickoff and had trouble paying attention to the first minutes of the game. Like my first trips to Fenway, old Yankee Stadium and Wrigley, or even non-sports sites like the Mall in DC, I had to look around and just think about the history that had taken place in Maracanã. Like the Brazilian loss to Uruguay in the final of the 1950 Copa, referred to as the Maracanazo, before an estimated crowd of 210,000, all standing. It's all seats now, but still holds just under 80,000 now, and on this day it seemed like every single one of them, less me and the guy seated to my left, were Chileños.

Life in the Pit (ARG v IRA)

Landed in Belo Horizonte about an hour before kickoff and were lucky to find charter buses set up to haul folks to the stadium over 30km away. As we neared the stadium, the police presence became more and more pronounced to the point they were simply everywhere and everyone wearing full riot gear (including the horses and their eye/face shields).

Like Maracanã a few days ago, they'd set up an outer perimeter beyond which they only allowed ticket-holders. The guy I ran into went the extra step and asked for my passport to check it against the name on my ticket, the first time this has happened to anyone from our group going to a match (Ryan's convinced it's because I wear an al-Qaeda beard). Once we got past them, and then through regular stadium security (a pox on their houses!), we finally got near our seats right after kickoff. It's what we found there that went a long way toward explaining the show of force by The Man. Sorry, O Homem.

To say that Argentina fan is...enthusiastic would be a start. Of the 50K-ish announced attendance, I'd estimate 49.5K of them were Argentine supporters. And roughly half of them had jammed themselves into the area of our seats, about 8 rows behind the goal Argentina was attacking in the first half. About 10 minutes in, a while phalanx of polícia militar came in to shoo off those that didn't belong there. And most of them stayed away after that, for at least the next 10 or 20 minutes anyway.

This was actually a great experience for most of the game. They lived and breathed with every touch of the ball. They sang songs and chanted throughout, and even appeared to good-naturedly (mostly) call each other out based on home club allegiances. Short of sitting in the student section with the Cameron Crazies at Duke or maybe the Black Hole in Oakland, I don't think I'll ever find myself that enveloped in pure sports fan insanity (and even then, with Duke and the Raiders were talking rowdies in the tens or hundreds; here I'm talking thousands of them). Things started getting a little tense late in the game, though, when Argentina could not get through Iran's defense. Some Brazil fans in the stands started needling the Argentines as they got more and more frustrated (real genius move, by the way; maybe I mentioned how many Argentina partisans were there?). Things were getting more than a little tense and I was about to suggest we decamp to a spot further from the pitch when, thankfully, Messi cranked the game-winner in in extra time.

Not only did the entire house erupt, but it ended the shite-talk between the Brazil/Argentina contingents, and moments later sent nearly everyone home happy. I finally got to see Messi play in person and he scored the last second game-winner in front of an insane crowd. What's better than that?

USA v Ghana: The Experience in video

Just a short little MovieMaker magic of the game.

USA! USA! USA!

Natal, Navidad, Christmas...it's all the same. Or is it?

We were only in Natal for about 78 hours but...

• flew into Natal Sunday night
• saw one USA victory
• watched four other games
• walked around one cool beach
• checked out a nice little fort...that was closed (tourist or not, Brasil played today, granted they played four hours later but you didn't expect the biggest tourist attraction in town to be open did you?).
• walked into Fan Fest Natal...deja vou
• walked out of Fan Fest Natal...and still got a sun burn
• flew back to Rio Wednesday morning...3:35AM

I Believe That We Will Win! I Believe That We Will Win!

The game was....... hey we won, that's ultimately what counts.

BTW - Veronica got more compliments on her face paint than any other person in the ENTIRE stadium.  I am not exaggerating! Really, I'm not.

Devin slept with his tickets. He really slept with his tickets!

Getting closer!

Her art teacher must be sooo proud

Father and daughter!!!

there it is!!!!!

This girl is ready

Our seats...great view

Veronica and Devin...nice vest!

Get ready boys!!

Kick off!!!!

One of these things is not like the other

Nice souveniers

Family Time

Went to Tia Solony's house for a little birthday party for Vitoria. Que coisa gostosa!

Marcos, Vitoria, e Noelia

Tijuca National Forest

More pictures fr....make that all the pictures from at least one camera of our day in Tijuca:

Enjoy the pictures here

Technical difficulties, please standby...

We've run into some trouble with our old reliable Wi-Fi in Rio (our fault mostly-no sleight to Brazilian infrastructure intended), and cell data has been pretty spotty (some sleight to Brazilian infrastructure intended), so posts are a little backed up. Please be patient with us. We'll be back ASAP.

Obrigado.

From the mouths of gift horses (USA v GHA)

OK, so yes, the US won their first match of Copa '14. Yes, they did so in exciting fashion, scoring the winner in the 80-something minute off a corner kick at the end of the pitch nearest our seats. Yes, the building was more electric with anticipation and energy before the match then any stadium or arena I've ever been in. Yes the place was lousy with fellow Americans (as promised), and there was a much larger number of Ghana partisans than I'd expected, too. And yes, it was awesome being there to hear the final whistle and know we got the 'W'. But...

Clint Dempsey caught everyone in the joint off guard with the goal in the game's opening minute. There was actually a split second of shock before the place went nuts when he did it. It looked like we were in for a helluva show of force by the Americans.  And then Jozy went down with the hamstring strain. The wheels appeared to come off after that. 

The good part, our still-newly-constituted defense held up pretty admirably, and thank God, because our midfield was nonexistent. Arguably my favorite player, Bradley, was abysmal. Ghana outplayed us for most of the game, but couldn't get the ball in the net, mostly because Tim Howard is freaking nails.

Still though, a win is a win. Now, to make Pretty Boy swallow his lips in Manaus...

The Yankees are coming, the Yankees are coming! And probably some Ghanans (Ghanaians? Ghanites?), too!

Welcome to Natal.

So in about seventeen and half hours, the US will finally begin it's part in this year's Copa. With all the games that have been played so far (for those scoring at home, or even if you're alone, we're 11 games in as of this post), and all the drama that's taken place, both good (the first goal scored by Holland's Van Persie against Spain was an-un-bee-leev-able thing of beauty, even if you're not a soccer fan) and bad (what the hell happened to Spain?!?!), it'll feel like this show will finally be on the road after our boys get their first caps, and we get to be there to see it happen. Quite stoked, actually.

We got into Natal at about 6:45 local, so it was too dark to see any of the area that well as we pulled in to town. It was clear from the airport, however, that the place would be overrun with Americans, for both good and ill. We were met by reps giving away free 10oz cans of beer to any takers coming off the plane; how great would that be if it happened regularly in the States? Sadly, it was World Cup commemorative cans of Budweiser; oh, the terrible injustices we sometimes, and usually negligently, inflict on the rest of the world.

The three men on the trip shared a hearty meal of picanha steak with all the fixings, including farofa, rice, feijoes (in an interesting twist with which even Mr. D was unfamiliar, we got black eyed-peas instead of the expected black beans), and fries(?), alongside many Skol beers and a couple of caiparinhas that didn't survive their trip to the table. After dinner, took about an hour-long walk along the malecon (don't know the Portuguese equivalent), and happened across the Natal version of the FIFA Fan Fest of which we partook on Thursday. Given the matches were over for the day, the place was shut down tight, but this was just the calm before tomorrow's storm of red, white and blue washes up on shore.

U-S-A! U-S-A!