Sunday, June 20, 2010

Fußball Craze


Brandon had duty on Tuesday, so Elora and I went up to have lunch with him at the dining facility on base.  It was nothing fancy, but it was good to get to spend some time with him since he had to stay overnight at the Unit.


Oh, I just love it when he's in uniform.  Right after I snapped this picture, Elora took his hat and put it on her head.  I was so mad that I'd already put the camera away!


On the way home after lunch, I decided to snap some pictures of all the flags that have appeared around my little town.  The started cropping up just before the start of the World Cup, and now I see them everywhere.  There are more German flags than anything else, but there are a lot of flags from elsewhere too.


I wasn't expecting to see the Stars and Stripes, though, and I can't tell you how good it made me feel to see it.  I'm not sure who put it up; I know there are several other families in this town who are stationed here just like we are, but we've been strongly discouraged from anything that might identify us as Americans lest we be identified as targets.  So it makes me wonder if it might be an American expatriate who just happens to be living in my town, or someone local who happens to favor the American team.  Whoever they are, it was very good to see someone flying our flag.

With the World Cup on, it's like a portion of the German population has gone temporarily insane.  In addition to all of the benign flag waving, people go around screaming, yelling, and blowing their car horns during games, every time Germany scores or wins.  One of our neighbors even has a vuvuzela, and they aren't so discerning about when to blow it.  Anytime seems to be a good one, though they do go craziest with it during games.  There was one night last week that I laid in bed and listened to the ruckus for a good hour after I turned in.  It was after 11 before it finally stopped or I tuned it out and fell asleep, whichever happened first.  It's exciting, and I'm glad that people are getting so into the spirit of things, but I must say that I'll be glad when things settle back down.
 
Happy Father's Day to dads and dads-to-be!

6 comments:

  1. Such cute pics of Elora and dad.

    Vuvuzela, a word I didn't know until a couple of weeks ago and now I cringe when I hear it.

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  2. precious moment photos of Elora with Daddy :) They are adorable Those vuvuzela's are extremly loud. When Ivan is watching the game I tell him to lower the volume on the tv if he wants me to stay in the same room with him because those things can be annoying!!!

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  3. Pics are cute! Vuvuzela....... I don't know how you found the word..... but we have one! Uh yeah, it's all fussball, all the time.

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  4. that sound is like a million ca-trillion bees.

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  5. I love father/child pictures, maybe bc my dad was so crappy? It fills my heart when I see a man love his family.
    The first time I went abroad was before 9/11, everyone seemed to love the US. Each time I went back, it felt like that was changing. When I went to chile in 05, people there hated out govt. There was actually a best-selling book called (something like) 'bush: an evil man.'

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