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June 10, 2005
Futbol Nationalism
I know that this is less work-related, but I have to give an account of my experience at the World Cup Qualifier match between Argentina and Ecuador in Quito last Saturday. I walk by the stadium to work everyday, and I witnessed the intricate process of cleaning and the development of the stadium in its preparation for readiness for the weekend. First, the stadium employed huge amounts of people to scrub, clean, repaint, hang banners, inflate giant beer bottles, take care of the field, pick up trash, etc. By mid-week, about 20 vendors selling counterfeit Ecuador National team apparel were in place, and the next day even more showed up, along with food vendors, ticket-scalpers, and more people wanting to purchase one or more of these products. It only increased, and on Friday I decided I had to go to the game, buy tickets (which apparently sold out months earlier) from a scalper for only 1.5x face value.
I showed up at the stadium on Saturday and met my friends. The surrounding streets were blocked off and all I could see was a sea of yellow (the colors of the Ecuadorian national team). The amount of vendors had quadrupled, and there were people flyering for every sort of event imaginable. This was the informal economy in action. I weaved my way through the crowd, wondering why I was told to get there 4 hours before game time, when everybody and their entire families seemed to stay outside of the stadium. I was one of the few without a yellow jersey, but I instead bought an Ecuadorian flag to wrap around myself before entering the stadium. Upon entrance, I soon realized why I was told to get there so early: despite the thousands outside the stadium, all of the better seats were already occupied. But I found some decent seats and began the long wait. The Ecuadorian sun (9000ft in altitude) was scorching, and those hours of waiting were truly a test. I luckily had enough water but soon became ravenous; vendors were hawking all kinds of differents foods, from gum and cigarettes, to whole meals of pork and corn to candied apples and popcorn to beer and soda and illegal sales of hard cane alcohol. I opted for a pork sandwich, a bad choice considering it was out in the sun. Indeed, I had a small bout of food poisoning a few days later.
At one point, a giant Ecuadorian canvas flag was unveiled and spread across a remarkably large section of the stands, giving me some respite from the burning heat. But there was a fight for the shade, and the people at the ends of the canvas were pulling as hard as possible: A communal mass pushed this good thing until they spoiled it and the canvas ripped.
The game started to huge amounts of excitement, throwing of rolls of paper streamers, the wave, chants. The fans were actually quite tame, sitting for most of the game until some exciting breakaway or shot on goal. I’ve been to club games where the fans are a lot rowdier, pushing and shoving and lighting paper torches and flares throughout the entirety of the game. But this match was certainly more controlled, a symbol of which could be seen by the procession of policemen who installed themselves around the perimeter of the field, followed by another set of policemen in riot gear. The first half was uneventful, but then Ecuador scored twice, once at the beginning of the second half and once right before the end of the game. At each goal, my heart skipped a beat, and I’ve never felt so excited at a sporting event in my life and 40000 fans and I jumped up and down for minutes on end.
Ecuador beat Argentina, the best team in South America. It was unprecedented. There were parties in the streets throughout the night. But what was most interesting to me were the tales about Ecuador’s advantage (they haven’t lost a home game in 2 years and lose over half of their away games), and the nationalism manifested in this event. First, the Ecuadorian team clearly has an advantage because of the altitude. But I’m so fascinated by other explanations, especially that all games in Quito are at 4pm because that is when there exists the least oxygen and most smog in the air, giving the Ecuadorians, already accustomed to the altitude and smog, and insurmountable advantage.
Secondly, the nationalism of futbol is peculiar, and I don’t fully understand it. The Ecuadorian president declares a national work holiday any time a national game falls on a weekday. Over half the people walking in the streets wear their yellow jerseys, and they are united for the singular cause of the glory of their country. It is war on a field, and the once-unified mass often breaks ranks and erupts into violence against each other should the team be defeated. This produces some double losers, the victims of the loss of the match and the victims of violence by their own countrymen. A foreign war can develop into a civil war instantly, and I don’t really understand the mechanisms of it. I’m quite glad that Ecuador won, and that the glory of victory of its team and its nation carried over into quasi-hazardous jubilee rather than dangerous unrest.
Posted by Lee Gilman at June 10, 2005 05:30 PM
