Well, this post certainly should have been published earlier (like 2 weeks ago..!) but I had so much to write and just didn't know how to write it. I hate that. I feel like I continually have tons of things in my head that I just cannot seem to write down in a semi-coherent manner. And what does come out just always seems so juvenile.... whatever. *chuckle*
So Spain finally broke the 88 year curse and even went on to win the Euro Cup 2008... The were a favorite but no one saw them getting past Italy, since they haven't won a single tournament game against the Azzurri since 1920...! But they did it, via penalty shoot out (neither have good reputations with penalties, but the 1994 World Cup final always comes up in my mind when Italy gets into a penalty shoot out.) And to be fair, Italy has been crap the entire Euro Cup. They deserved to get the boot (hah, pun intended :P ) although I was secretly hoping for an Italy-Germany final (World Cup revenge!!!)
Anyway, soccer fever is a weird thing that I still continue to marvel at while soaking it up as much as possible during my time here. In short, national soccer teams embody the hopes and fears of their entire nation. At least in Germany (and well as in many other European countries,) players are more popular than pretty much any actor/actress/director/journalist/political figure. They are national heroes. Imagine the pressure!
...And they say that it's just a game...
The US is pretty much the only country on Earth that didn't contract the fever. We kick ass at the Olympics but that doesn't generate half as much passion as baseball, American football, hockey, or basketball does. But even so, you don't see/hear people honking their and waving flags down the streets of your town when [insert team here] wins the first game of any playoff in any sport. Sure, people went ballistic when the Giants won the Superbowl, but the Superbowl's the "final" and it was basically David vs Goliath, so it was totally warranted and would have been weird if people didn't go completely bonkers for the Giants around the NJ/NY area.
Football (or, auf Deutsch, Fußball) here in Germany has united people in ways that nothing else can. First and foremostly, it really is the world's sport. Then, when your national team plays, it's a vehicle of patriotism. Under normal circumstances you'd pretty much never choose to support any other country than your own in a tournament such as the Euro Cup. And then, in any other situation, it would be awkwardly dubious to witness people randomly dressing in, and painting their faces the colors of the German flag, proudly waving their flags. Even if it is the German version of Independence Day (which is the Day of the Republic here, actually.) And for any other country it would be a bit weird as well, but especially in Germany, where time has certainly past since their dark times, but not that much time. When do Americans get particularly patriotic? Usually when you start bashing their country, for one. A bit for Independence Day. Uh....hmm. That's about it, isn't it?
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Studying cultures has always been extremely interesting to me. One of the reasons I study/teach languages is because I believe that language is culture and vice versa. Take a stupid but pretty luminous example (when I realized this, a while ago, I actually sort of did a mental double take.) Italian doesn't have a word for "it". Everything is he or she, him, her, his or hers. Books are masculine, pens are feminine, shoes are feminine, belly buttons are masculine. I also realized very recently that they don't have word for half-brother/sister, step-brother/sister/etc. How interesting is that? If that alone doesn't give you a little snippet of insight into their culture without experiencing it with your own eyes, then I don't know what can. There's a huge connection, but it's one that's not so easily put into words. (That's something I'll work on for my doctorate...)
Anyway, back to Berlin for a moment.
In the 2006 World Cup, when Turkey got knocked out, Turks in Germany began to root for Germany and the country saw a drastic improvement of cultural/race relations. In fact, I heard some Turks (adults that had been living in Germany for a long time or even born and raised here, by the way) who said that they finally felt German and part of Germany because of the spirit of the World Cup bringing people together. That's pretty amazing in my book.
So in this Euro Cup, when Germany and Turkey were scheduled to play, the air will filled with suspense not only for the game, but for the people who were going to watch it here in Berlin. The country focused on the capital, where an estimated 200,000 Turks live (the population of Berlin is about 3.4 million.) Were the Germans and Turks going to beat each other up (especially after getting "beer muscles"?) Will racial riots begin? Will the game cause some sort of cultural chasm between the two groups or will it unite them? Really, these were the spectrum of questions being asked and it was clear that the city had braced themselves for the worst because police in riot gear were present all over.
Fortunately, the Germans and Turks passed the test in race and culural relations with flying color, a pretty beautiful thing, considering the very complex issue at hand. I'll give you a quick summary: the Germans basically imported tons of Turks into the country in the 60s, after Germany realized that they literally had no manpower because of the decimated population post-war. So now there are immigrants, 1st and 2nd generation Turks living in Germany but since Germany probably has some of the strictest immigration laws on the planet, even kids born in Germany to Turkish immigrants parents aren't given the right to become German citizens. So these kids consider themselves German, born and/or raised, but have either Turkish, or in some cases, even no citizenship. So you can imagine the frustration and identity confusion if you're in their shoes. That's sort of the tip of the iceberg.
Here's some random soccer pics/videos I took over the past 2 weeks or so:
Walking through the woods single file to crash the Fan Mile!
The Fan Mile quickly filling up with about 700,000 peeps.
Two dorks. I have to get a picture of us on our bikes, since we now have the same ones. Dorks on bikes!
Riding home on my bike after the Turkey - Croatia game.
The Germans have myriad soccer chants and now I can actually understand them all when I hear them. But my favorite one has to be the one they sing when the rest of the audience doesn't join in and sing along with the other participating revelers. It's sung to melody of "Yellow Submarine" (yea, the Beatles) and the lyrics are "Ihr seit nur ein Tennis publikum, ein Tennis publikum, Tennis publikum" which means "You're all just a tennis audience, a tennis audience, a tennis audience..." Hahaha. (They also substitute "tennis" occasionally with "scheiße" but I'll let you figure that one out.)
