Today is the day after the day I
went to the Maracana Stadium, the mecca of the football, for the first time.
The clock had struck 63rd minute and Messi received the ball half way up the
opposite field. And then came his trademark run, dodging one, then second, then
third and finally ball went to the far post, beyond the reach of the Goal
Keeper. And the stadium lit up.
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| Poor defenders wondering what to do |
All were enthralled by the goal
and the fans stood up, giving their customary bow to the magician gracing the
Maracana Stadium on its birthday. For the fans all over the world, not so for
the Brazilians, the goal was the perfect gift to the Maracana stadium on its
birthday, 15th June 2014.
I will always remember the day I
went to the stadium. I woke up early in the morning around 7'o clock. I had my
tea and patiently started waiting for the clock to tick itself to 3'o clock,
the time we would leave the house. Finally it did. To reach the stadium we
first boarded a bus. The journey was an hour long but it was worth it. On my
way to the stadium, I looked outside the window of the bus and I was travelling
in, trying to understand the city which is playing the perfect host to me.
Favelas are the most paradoxical presence in the city.
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| Favela |
For the visitors they are a sight
to hold, something from which they cannot remove their eyes from. In a way they
increase the charm of the city and makes you talk about them for on and on to
people back home thus increasing curiosity among the future travellers. But for
the Cariocas, it’s a blemish. Favela literal translation is 'House on the
Hills'. The poorest of the poorest Cariocas, who can’t afford a house, live
there. The legend has it that the soldiers who didn’t have any place to live,
lived on the hills which then developed in to a big slum. But if we look closely,
I find favela, the slums, more developed than slums back in my country. And in
general that goes for the whole city itself. Strangely, the country has the
infrastructure of a developed country yet it’s a developing country, part of
BRICS.
We reached Vincent de Carvahlo,
the place where we switched over to the metro. In 30 minutes or so we reached
the stadium. All paths leading up to the mecca was littered with Argentinians,
again not a happy sight for the Brazilians. They were cheering and singing on
their way to Mecca. I could see few people with play cards
"Comprendo". They were looking for one seller. We marched on and on,
in the sea of fans, towards the Gate D. Our ticket had complete information
which helped us to reach our seats, without anyone helping us neither we
knowing, except for one, more than few phrases of Portuguese. A similar feat
back home will be impossible for any.
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| White - Blue wave |
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| Blue wave part 2 |
I will never forget that time
when I stepped inside and saw the field for the first time. I couldn’t close my
mouth for few minutes. It was a sight to behold. The brightly lit field, with
fans all over the stadium, Bosnian fans, with Brazilians counterpart, having
their shirts out cheering, and the Argentinians singing. A competition was going
on and I was a spectator. I wish I knew their language. The only negative thing
which I found was that the football field looked smaller than it appears on the
television.
Before the match we knew that
Bosnia was making their debut in the world Cup and no one expected them to do
much. Argentina, with names such as Gonzalez Hugain, Sergio Agüero, Lionel
Messi and Angel di Maria, can intimidate any team on this planet. But how wrong
we were. Bosnia played good, played much better than my expectation. I had
expected Edin Dzeko (No one is more involved in more goals than him in the
European qualifiers: 14 – 10 goals, 4 assists) to carry the team on his
shoulders but it wasn’t so. They had cohesion, discipline, stuck to tactics and
more importantly didn’t gave enough space to Messi. Except for the first corner
in which the own goal was scored on 3rd minute, Bosnia didn’t gave me any
indication or proof that they are newbies. Match went on. Argentina was playing
a passing game, building the game from the back. They would move the ball
around and around. But the third part was packed up by Bosnia, not allowing
either Messi or Angel di Maria to showcase their talent. Poor Agüero was most
of the times left alone. This didn’t mean Bosnia had come to defend. When they
had the chance they went on doing their business. Sadly apart from Dzeko, they
lack world class finisher hence nothing productive came out of it.
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| Maracana |
Since the start of the game I was
not hopeful and wasn’t expecting Bosnia to do much because I was aware of their
problems. Dzeko was well guarded. And that Messi goal in the 64th minute made
it clear to me that Bosnia will go home empty handed. But my youngest fufaji
had faith in Bosnia and since fifth minute he had been saying on and on that
Bosnia will score a goal. That moment came in the 85th minute when Bosnia
scored from open play. From there on it was game on. The whole stadium,
Bosnians and Brazilians stood up, cheering the men forward. Sabella, the
Argentinian coach, substituted Sergio Agüero and shut the shop. It was a nervy
end for them. All in all the match was money worth it. I got my own cup at the
end of the match, Budweiser, the official sponsor of World Cup :)
We should give credit to the
Brazilians for constructing such an amazing stadium. We were out of the stadium
in 15 minutes without any hiccups. We walked and walked, mesmerised. We had witnessed
history. I would surely recount it to my grandchildren. Walking out towards the
station came the first nervous moment. A team of riot control police was on
duty. They had the full gear on with the gun and the shield. I walked quietly,
trying to pass them quickly. At once I crossed, they changed their direction
180 degrees. It felt that something wrong is going to happen. I stepped on a temporary
bridge which was connecting to a concrete overhead footpath which then connected
to the subway station. The temporary bridge was jam packed but we still went on
walking. At this moment I was nervous and wanted to enter the station quickly.
The worst imaginable thing happened at that moment which made my heart race.
The bridge started to shake, just like in an earthquake.
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| On way to the Bridge. Notice darkness at the top. |
Dhakk! Dhakk!
All around me people started
shouting in Portuguese, Spanish, English and French. The only word I could make
out "Shaking". On and on I walked. I knew that that I cannot go down
and swim against a strong tide. I know I can’t. And since I was in middle of
the bridge, the only way out was up. Thankfully I am not back home, otherwise
there would have been stampede. Brazilians and the rest are cultured and we
managed to climb up without any other incident. With Argentinians singing and
we enjoying the music managed to board the metro. The metro at that time resembled
Rajiv Chowk which was a soothing thought. Through the metro, then the bus and
finally car, we reached home safe and sound.
Lo! What surprise. A birthday
cake was waiting for us at the home. Not that we reached home safely, neither
we were celebrating Maracana's stadium birthday, it was my eldest Fufaji's
birthday.
