Let the games begin!

I'm delighted to see the return of the World Cup, although the Euro Cup 2004 had its moments too.

For one thing, you really get a sense of what an international city Toronto is. People started flying the flags just about a month ago.

The game itself is beautiful to watch (although like any sport, it can decline into tedium). At its best, soccer is a flowing chess game on a great, green pitch combined with tough one-on-one battles and astonishing athleticism.*

* As a digression, a magazine article I read a million years ago tried to compare different types of athletes. For example, it rated the single hardest act as hitting a major-league fastball. The most intense one-on-one battle is heavyweight boxing. But the best all-around athlete, the article found, is probably a professional basketball or soccer player.

But the real attraction are the fans and the insane devotion that the game inspires.

From where I live, I can walk north to Bloor Street to watch games along Korea-dominant Bloor St., south to College and Little Italy, or further west to Ossington/College or the Dundas strip west of Ossington to watch games amongst the Portuguese and Brazilians.

The Korean scene was crazy in 2002. As I approached to watch the quarter-final against Spain, I started hearing the drums from Harbord St. Where people gathered on the street was at the Chaebo (spl?) 325 restaurant at Manning just north of Bloor.

There were hundreds of people, there singing and chanting. I believe the chant sounded something like "Dim yun gae guk!," but I stand to be corrected. Sorry, translation isn't available.

When South Korea defeated Spain in the shootout, the reaction was deafening. The hundreds of screaming Koreans turned to literally thousands of deliriously happy people* wearing red jerseys and waving Korean flags. The police shut down traffic on Bloor between Christie and Bathurst.

* Sometimes I wondered if the Koreans were new to this winning thing. At times, they were rather graceless. After victories over Portugal and Italy, they were on College St. within minutes, taunting identifiable supporters of those teams. :)

As I approached College St., I could still hear the crowd's roar -- surprising, because earlier in the tourney, a young woman almost blew my left ear out by screaming the equivalent of "Let's Go, Azzuri!" in one of the Little Italy bars (Azzuri is Italian for blue, which is the colour of the Italian team's jerseys).

Similarly, when Brazil made it to the finals, I heard the explosion of cheers from Ossington and College over at my place about a half-mile (0.8 km) away.

And when Brazil won, the partying started first thing in the morning (as it had to, given the time difference between ourselves and Asia).

I walked up to College and Ossington, and the Brazilians had that infectious samba beat blasting, along with the whistles, as they danced rapturously in the streets. The tragi-comic aspect of it was some of my Italian friends moping in the crowd, obviously thinking, "why couldn't this be us?" :)

Walking down to Dundas and Dovercourt was also interesting. The crowds were a bit smaller, but little groups broke out to perform celebratory capoeira, or Brazilian martial arts.

While eventually had to get on with my day, I had to go to the Dominion grocery story at College and Crawford about 9:30 p.m., 12 hours after I first sussed it out. The Brazilians were still going!

To me, this partly shows that while soccer is the world'sgame, hockey -- while not every Canadian's game -- is still obviously the great unifier for this country. When the Canadian men's hockey team won gold at Salt Lake in 2002, close to a million surged onto Yonge St. to celebrate. There were maybe a thousand or two at College and Ossington.

While the Yonge St. party was intense, I think on a person-by-person basis, the Koreans were even more crazed.

The Brazilians have done this before, so while they were ecstatic, they were also kinda cool about it. This was an affirmatory win, not a breakthrough. :)

If you get a chance, go catch some games in some of the ethnic 'hoods or restos. It's a learning experience!

Finally, if Canada ever gets into the World Cup and wins, it'll be interesting to see how many people show up on Yonge St. -- and what colour jersey they'll be wearing.