Playoff Beards

(PICTURE: The guys and our facial hair after the USA vs. Algeria game.)

You may have noticed some funky facial hair in my recently posted pictures. For the last three weeks, none of us have shaved (although a couple of the guys did some trimming). We all agreed a few weeks ago to grow out our Group C playoff beards for fun. After the itching started, we decided to axe the beard idea and change it into not-so-stylish playoff mustaches. Here's a closer look at our individual styles:


(PICTURE: Me wanting to be Johnny Depp.)


(PICTURE: Devin with his Harley Davidson handlebar look.)


(PICTURE: Dave's imitation of Bull Hurley from the film classic "Over The Top.")


(PICTURE: I like to call this "The Rat".)

USA vs. Algeria

(PICTURE: Me and Oguchi Onyewu's family at the World Cup in Germany. I also talked with them at this World Cup.)


(PICTURE: Devin and I traded jerseys with two Algerians after the game.)

By now everyone knows that the USA beat Algeria 1-0 on an amazing injury time goal by Landon Donovan. I received about a dozen emails from people (including Masumi in Japan and Kristy in Australia) congratulating the United States on our big win.

I can say that without a doubt, the ending of this game was the best finish to a sporting event I have ever been to (just edging out Donovan McNabb's last second touchdown pass against Virginia Tech at the Carrier Dome). I think I hugged about twenty strangers just because they were wearing USA gear. However, before we scored the winning goal, this could have been one of the most frustrating games I've ever attended. The USA should have put home at least two or three more goals, not including the goal that was mistakenly called back for being offsides. Regardless, all's well that ends well -- the USA won our group, edging out England.

One of the traditions in soccer is that players exchange jerseys after the game. Well, when walking around Pretoria after the game, two Algerians came up to Devin and me and asked to swap jerseys. I've had my "Gooch" jersey for four years but felt no hesitation in exchanging it with the two guys. Now I've got an Algerian jersey to remember our victory forever!

Mexican Americans

Before coming to South Africa, I read a few articles about how Americans bought the most tickets to the World Cup. When I first read this, I assumed I would see American flags and jerseys everywhere I went in South Africa. However, I didn't account for the fact that many Americans weren't coming solely to root for America. Based on nothing but my own observations, I would say that 50% of the Americans who came to the World Cup are rooting for other countries. The most obvious case of this is with Mexican Americans.

There are tons of Mexican Americans here pulling for Mexico. I would say that without a doubt, Mexico has the largest fan base at the tournament. You can't go a block without seeing a Mexican flag, a guy in a wrestler's mask or a sombrero. Our hotel, which is filled with people who bought their tickets from an American travel agent, is packed with Mexican Americans. I've met Mexican Americans ranging from places from Los Angeles to Jackson, Mississippi.

I don't want this blog to sound like the Mexican Americans are being unpatriotic because they're not. Every single Mexican American I've met is also rooting for America to win. Besides the Mexican Americans, I've met Americans rooting for Italy, Argentina and even...Algeria (the team America is playing in our third and final game...which will have already been played by the time this is posted)!

Congratulations to Benjamin August and his Asian Wife!

What's with Benjamin Augusts falling in love with Asian women? Three people sent me this link this week to the New York Times Weddings/Celebrations page:

Penelope Tang, Benjamin August

Published: June 17, 2010

• FACEBOOK
• SIGN IN TO E-MAIL
• PRINT
• REPRINTS
• SHARE

Penelope Tang, the daughter of Patricia P. Tang and Henry Tang of New York, was married Saturday evening to Benjamin Meyer August, a son of Barbara L. August and William August of Cambridge, Mass. Judge Denny Chin of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit officiated in Sutton Square Park in Manhattan.

The bride and bridegroom, both 28, met at Princeton, from which they both graduated.

Mrs. August is a senior designer in the interior design department of Selldorf Architects in New York. Her father retired as a partner in the New York office of the Houston law firm Baker Botts, and now works in private practice. Her mother is an art dealer for E. V. Thaw & Company in New York and a trustee of the China Institute, also in New York. The bride’s parents are also on the board of the American Friends of the Shanghai Museum.

Mr. August is a bond trader at Susquehanna International Group, an institutional sales, research and brokerage firm; he works in Bala Cynwyd, Pa. Until 2009, the bridegroom’s mother was the director of the Kids of All Learning Abilities Program at the ARC of Greater Boston, a nonprofit organization serving people with disabilities. His father is a partner in the Boston law firm Epstein & August.

Last Sunday, Mr. August had to have an emergency appendectomy. The bride reports he has rallied, noting in an e-mail message: “He is on his feet and in marriageable condition.”

Diving

After the Beijing Olympics, Huyen and I gave a tour of Hanoi to my friend Grahame's friend Jeffrey Marcus who had been covering the Olympics for the New York Times. Jeffrey is a great guy and it was a pleasure showing him around the city (Huyen actually gave him and his now-wife a second tour of the city when I was out of town). Well, Jeffrey is now covering the World Cup for the NY Times and just wrote a great PAGE 1 article on diving at the World Cup:

Here's the link: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/21/sports/soccer/21diving.html

Ole Ole Travel Company

If you read my "Bus Odyssey" blogs last week, you'll know that I'm not a fan of our tour group Ole Ole (www.oleole.com). Frankly, this company is disorganized and just moronic (although many of the people working for them are extremely nice). If you recall, it took us six hours to drive to the USA vs. England game; a drive which should have been 2.5 hours. The straw that broke the camel's back that day was when the tour leader had forgotten to bring the parking permit for the bus. This made us have to wait an additional hour+ to get into the stadium. That tour leader has since quit or been fired but that hasn't stopped the constant mistakes by Ole Ole.

For the USA vs. Slovenia game, we were scheduled to leave our hotel at 12:30 for the 4PM game. As soon as we got on the bus, I said to the tour leader, "Do we have a parking permit?" The guy said, "I don't know" and turned to the bus driver and asked him if he had a permit. The bus driver said that the other Ole Ole worker had it. Well, the other Ole Ole worker didn't have it. Nobody had it. Once again, our tour company didn't collect the permit from wherever they were supposed to get it. This meant that our bus wasn't allowed through the road block set up near the stadium. This wouldn't be a problem if they let everyone off at the road block. It was only a fifteen minute walk from there to the stadium. However, the tour leader instead tried over and over to find an alternate way into the stadium which meant aimless driving for thirty or more minutes down roads which are not meant for big buses. Finally we convinced the guy to drop us off on the street and we walked. The point is though, they had four years to prepare for this event and continually are making idiotic mistakes. They say that insanity is when you try to do the same thing over and over and expect different results. That is exactly what Ole Ole is doing; this company is insane. So if you stroll on to my blog looking to book World Cup tickets for 2014, I highly suggest you find a different tour company.

South African Taxi Cabs

In Johannesburg, the locals usually take taxi cabs that look like this:

On our first day, our travel company told us not to trust these taxis. We took that advice and have since been taking "metered" cabs. I put metered in quotes because I have yet to actually see a meter in a cab. Every taxi driver has offered us a different price to go from the same location to the same location. We have been told that some cabs are government registered cabs and need to charge a certain price based on distance traveled. It seems to me crazy that the World Cup organizers didn't do a better job of legitimizing the taxi industry here in J'burg (in Cape Town the taxis were perfectly legit).

To sum up how ridiculous the taxi situation is, let me tell you a little story. After the USA vs. Slovenia game we decided not to take the Ole Ole Group bus back (see tomorrow's blog). At the stadium were signs for "metered taxis". We followed the signs, asked the volunteers at the stadium, and still ended up on a street with no taxis. There were a few police working the street and we approached two of them. We asked one of the cops where we could find a taxi and he replied, "Where do you want to go?" We told him we wanted to go to Melrose Arch, one of the fan zones near where we're staying. He told us that he would take us. We all looked at each other wondering just how far this guy took his public service duties. He gave his fellow policewoman a nod and told us to follow him. We walked a few blocks with this cop and then go into his personal car. As soon as we sat down inside he said, "How much you gonna pay me?" Devin, Chris, Dave and I all looked at each other as if to say, "Here we go again." The cop wanted 450 Rand, almost $70. We all told him there was no chance. The cop was willing to go down to 350 which was still absurd. We all got out of his cab, and luckily found another cab who charged us just 120 Rand.

The beauty of this is that the cop left his duty to try and extort us. I'm not sure if this makes me question the police as a whole here or whether people just think as taxi drivers they need to rip off tourists.