Day 1 - Wilkommen Zum Fussball!

From Pele's lips to the world's ears! After getting a comfortable 3 hours of so of sleep on the flight, I arrived in Zurich at around 7:00am local time. I had a nice little five hour layover in the country of watches and chocolate and did plenty of meandering through the duty-free designer and watch stores, only to remind myself that I couldn't, or wouldn't, afford any of the items. Unless there was something I really wanted....but there wasn't. I was tired and annoyed that I could be in Germany but instead was stuck in Zurich. I gorged on some pastries and a sandwhich that was painful to eat because my teeth were still sore and, for the first time in a while, drank a cappucino. Not surprisingly, I was awake after that and unable to sleep despite listening to my sleepy-time mix on the hurting iPod. I think I brushed my teeth about three times, washed my face twice, and bought some rum at the duty-free. Other than that, I was just wasting my time away.

Enough about that. I arrived in Germany and, with the coffee worn off, was feeling a bit sluggish. But as soon as I walked through the exit gates and saw Stefan and Alex waiting for me, as was intricately planned, I got a burst of energy that carried me through the night. This was the moment who's brainchild was launched almost four years ago and was what I'd planned for for over a year, and it was finally here!

We rushed out to our waiting ride with Alex's dad and headed off to Dreiech to Alex's parent's house. Minutes into the car ride, our orders were taken on how hungry we were and how many weisswursts we would eat. Weisswurst is the breakfast sausage of choice for Bavarians, which they wash down with a nice half-liter of hefe-weizen beer. Alex's mom had some damn-tasty weisswursts ready for us when we walked through the door. And the mustard? Ahh, it felt good to be home :o) ! Following regional traditions, we obliged ourselves to drink a hefe-weizen as well.

After lunch, we quickly unpacked and donned our soccer gear in preparation for the Argentina vs. Germany game. I was wearing my newly acquired Germany soccer jersey and Stefan was in his "tricolor" Azzurri Italy jersey for the Italy vs. Ukraine game that followed the initial game. But everyone knew that would be a blowout and wasn't too interested in it. The viewing destination for the Germany game was to be at the local Dreieich Rathouse (city hall) with Alex's friends and a few hundred other locals. We were rushed down there by car and secured some seats with some of my old Germany buddies like Sven, Steffi, Daniel, Alex (she was looking good!), Katherine, and we ran into some other familiar faces like Jonas (my parent's exchange student) and his sisters Sarah and Janina.

I was totally pumped for the game and was high on football euphoria and soaked up the environment. Quality beers were purchased and drinken by everyone there and we watched as Argentina took the lead in the tense game. In the 80th, the crowd was jumping and screaming as Germany's lead striker tied the game up and sent the game into overtime. Thirty minutes later, they won the game when their goalkeeper blocked a penalty kick and the crowd went ballistic. THIS is what I came here for!!

After the game, we loitered around the Burgerhaus, played some kicker with some of the kids who were mimicking their favorite stars with the ball on a grassy patch before we headed back home. Famished and delirious from the excitement of the game, we put in our orders for a doener with Alex, who rode his bike down and picked up some of the Turkish specialty dish (aka shawarma or gyro) from the local Imbiss. We scarfed those down like we hadn't eaten for a week and, like always, it hit the spot. The Italy game started and we watched it with mild interest as Italy decimated Ukraine, as expected.

We went back to the Burgerhaus to watch some more of the Italy game with the few Italian fans in the area before we departed for a house-party at Irene's house. Irene was a friend of Alex's girlfriends who I'd met a few years previous in Portugal when she met up with us with her boyfriend. The weather was fantastic and the outdoor party was pretty mellow with some beers and some new people to meet. At some point, probably around midnight, we decided that the day had been long enough and we wandered back to Alex's house and crashed hard and heavy.

Justinho, I've found the best way to beat eastward jet-lag is to stay up as late as possible the first night. It worked!

[Edit] Pictures are now available to the general public at http://justin.sixpak.org/pictures/06-World%20Cup/index.html