Futbol!

It's every bit as crazy as you imagine. We hit a Boca Juniors match yesterday ... and it was pretty interesting.

The Juniors are one of two BA teams in their professional league ... the most popular perhaps and also very blue collar fans. The stadium is kind of in the slums. I mean, not really the slums but a very blue collar hood called Boca.

First up was the task of buying a ticket from scalpers and trying to find one that wasn't a fake and a price that wasn't hilariously high (cuz this game was sold out). Mission accomplished on that, we hit the cheap seats (after being funneled through a war zone of police in riot gear and searched three times). The place was packed and going OFF. Like ... a sea of people all chanting and going crazy in unison.

There's a repertoire of songs that the crowd sings. Like ... the entire crowd in this rollercoaster of singing and drumming at the top of their lungs. Like ... the ENTIRE section of a stadium singing in unison. I've never experienced anything like it. Apparently there's a drum section ... and the drummers play a certain beat and that beat corresponds with a certain song and the whole crowd starts belting that song out. Old people ... little kids ... everyone. The whole 1/4 section of the stadium singing in unison ... super loud ... and for the ENTIRE MATCH. Song after song after song it was nuts. I've never seen spirit like that.

The game was a game. Boca tied the opposing team 1-1 ... but that meant they didn't make the point spread so the other team ended up winning the tournament ... and people weren't super happy. The riot police were deployed (full riot gear, shields and helmets and sticks, etc.) on the field and weathered a constant barrage of bottles, cans, seats, pallets and so forth thrown by the crowd (from behind a high barbed wire fence) ... and they responded by bashing the fence with nightsticks and spraying the crowd with mace and water. Firemen were on the field with huge fire hoses pointed at the crowd. It was a slow burning riot after the game. Relatively only a few people were fucking with the police but it was still kinda shocking. Nobody could explain why the people were doing it. I guess there's just a lot of beef between the cops and the people. I got the impression that it wasn't an unusual thing, actually. The cops acted like it was mostly just another day in the life.

After the game we had to wait in this huge crowd to get out, cuz they don't let the cheap section out of the stadium until everyone else in the other sections (including the section reserved for the opposing team's fans) and the players get to leave. So we were locked in the stadium for a long twenty minutes or so ... kinda creepy. Something else that could/would never happen in other places like the US. I can only imagine what issues they're trying to prevent by locking certain sections inside.

All in all it was interesting and the passion for the sport these folks have is intense to see and experience but it was also kind of unnerving. Though the other more expensive sections of the stadium weren't nearly as rowdy (and they actually got to leave after the game was over). Pretty interesting shit...

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