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The World Cup has begun. I think I'll hide till it's over. I do not understand soccer - sorry, football - at all. The vastness of the field, the infrequency of scoring, the incomprehensible rules, English soccer hooligans, the guy who yells, "Gooooooaaaal! Goal-goal-gooooaal!" (well, him I understand), even the look of the uniforms defies my sense of right and wrong. It all looks to me like a game invented for a sci-fi movie; it can't possibly be real. Last night, as I walked home from dinner, several cars passed with horns blaring. Someone had won something. This is a matter of nervous apprehension in Toronto...look through the list of teams playing in the World Cup and you're looking at a list of Toronto's major ethnic groups. Whoever wins, there's going to be a party and it's almost guaranteed to turn into a riot since the losing team will also certainly be represented somewhere in the city. A few years ago Portugal played Greece (I don't even think it was the finals) and the two neighbourhoods were at war for a week or two. Note: Little Portugal and Greektown are nowhere near one another. People had to drive across the city to taunt each other...and they did. And if the winner's country has a significant population in Toronto (as does Portugal) and that ethnic neighbourhood lies between you and your work (as Little Portugal is between me and the hospital) and that team wins? Well, there will be no getting to work that day. Streets will clog with cars (all of them flying the winning nation's flag), bikers will be grabbed off their bikes and forced to drink the winner's national beverage, pedestrians will be caught in huge dancing parties and all sense of order will be lost. And God forbid England wins it... |
