Ole Ole Ole!

If there's one sin that I need to exercise control over it's gluttony. I put this particular case down to a couple of factors. Firstly, living in the big brother house (aka Baron Garden House) has forced me to start doing some cooking of my own. Given the limited duration of my stay, I've skipped out on a couple of essential items that should be staples in most kitchens. Salt, sugar and pepper are some that come to mind. Best way to describe my cooking would be ad-hoc, temperamental, experimental cooking. Most of the staple food groups are there and with only soy and honey to flavour my meals it does start to get repetitive. I think the other reason for my constant hunger could be the weather, it warrants a lazy lifestyle of waking up, doing a couple of activities, eating, sleeping and repeat until the day is over. Finally being in a new country opens up the new variety of different foods and dishes. Those are the excuses that I put down to the over-indulgence.

Tonight was no different, we somehow ended up at an all you can eat Pizza and Crepe place. Those words "all you can eat" and "pizza" should at the best of times never be used in the same sentence. Consequently here I am nursing a sore belly as I ready myself for bed, what better way to digest food than to type up my Sunday exploits.

Woke up rather late this morning, which my only excuse was "because I wanted to sleep in". Nothing terribly exciting to report which kind of explains my lack of blog posts. Headed down to the local shops to grab my weekly groceries. A couple of items that are missing from the shelves of Brazilian supermarkets that I have been craving are: Mushrooms, non-UHT milk, peanut butter and Mee Goreng. Still I managed to grab a couple of fruits, vegetables, meat and cereal for the week before heading back to Baron Gardens for a leisurely swim.

Now here comes the exciting part. Today was the first leg of the Rio De Janeiro Football Final. Two Brazilian heavyweights were set to do battle at the legendary Maracanã Football Stadium. The finalist Botafogo FC and Flamingo are two arch rivals in the city of Rio. We managed to score tickets to the final for 30 Reals (Approximately $20AUD) and headed in with the Volunteer coordinator and the other volunteers who are mostly all Botafogo fans (Black and white Jersey). We were stationed with the rest of the black and white army who abused Flamengo fans whenever they passed, throwing verbal insult and hurled objects to anybody wearing the Flamengo colours (Red and black).

Brazilian fans are by far the most vocal I have ever seen bear in mind this was my first football/soccer match ever. At one stage the Botafogo army fell into possession of a Flamengo jersey. What proceeded was an attempt to show true team colours that ended up in comedy. First they tried to burn it, 5 minutes later they were still trying. Since this ultimately failed, the next best thing was to try to shred it to pieces, again this failed. So they resorted to blowing their noses on it. After countless more attempts to burn, attach fireworks and deface this jersey it finally began to singe. The crowd erupted in jubilation!


The amount of paraphernalia at these games is ridiculous, flags, banners, streams, coloured flares. Botafogo fans were indeed outnumbered today, but the noise that was generated from singing, cheering and the constant beating of drums was extraordinary. The actual quality of football has to be said wasn't outstanding but was played at an entertaining level. Each time the other team failed to score the fans would give the opposing fans the finger. The final score was Flamengo 1 - Botafogo 0. The red and black army at triumphed for today.

Leaving the stadium was no easy task, the place was swarming with fans, both sides still extremely vocal, shuffling through the many team songs. Even the losers were still belting their lungs out in anticipation of the second final the following weekend. To avoid confrontation fans were split up among the trains. Botafogo supporters to the front, Flamingo to the rear. Unfortunately one unsuspecting Flamingo fan rushed onto our carriage only to find it full of black and white. What eventuated was a mild scuffle resulting in the flamingo fan being punched in the face. Despite not understanding Portuguese I can only imagine it to be over something trivial. Here's my take on the situation:

"Your team is dumb"
"Oh yea?"
"Yea!"

He got punched in the head and immediately fell to the ground in self-preservation. So I took a photo (See above). The train was stopped and the persecutor was removed from the train. What an exciting way to be introduced to Brazilian football! I can't wait for the second final next week