You must know I have a long-suffering boyfriend. While we have mountains in common (a liking of the same music, films and books, not to mention pizza toppings, YouTube videos of cute animals and European beers), two things I thought I'd never understand were his love of taking a walk late at night and his dedication to football. In the evening I'm tired and like to stay in, and I've always found football mind-numbingly dull. This is a story of how I came to fully appreciate both.
Old men dig me. I don't mean in a creepy sexual way, and I don't mean in the dating-a-30-year-old way (aforementioned longsufferer is three months younger than me) - I just mean that for some reason, above all genders and age groups, really old men in particular really dig me. Whether it's my SHARE resident telling me that he would have been mad after me when he was young, or the doddery old Dean giving me a double handshake after Easter mass, there's something between me and old men. Cos I love them right back. I love their suits and their stories and their sayings. This is a story of how I made friends with an old man and his dog.
And now we'll get to the real start. I was in my TEFL class today and I noticed two students wearing Barça jerseys, and thought to ask one if there was an important match on tonight. He answered that yes, Barça were playing Levante and if they drew or won, they would win the Spanish league.
Like I said, I've always found football extremely boring, but since moving to Barcelona I've realised that it's such a hugely popular and successful sport in Spain, I would have to show some interest and try to like it. To be honest, it wasn't all that hard. The enthusiasm they show and the sheer joy it gives Barceloneses is incredible - something which I've only seen rivalled by Irish people's love of rugby in recent years - and when the atmosphere is that positive, you only need to let yourself follow it and it will sweep you along with it. I've watched a few matches in bars, but only ever the big ones, and so I thought that tonight, I would take a walk, and see what the ambience was like around my neighbourhood.
There is a café/bar down my street called Coffeeing, which I've never been into, but I could see through the window a great image - the small bar was full of people in their mid-thirties, not talking, and all staring in the same direction - at the match on tv. Cue the thought in my mind "dang. I should've brought my camera, that would've made a lovely photo". Oh well. Carry on.
There is another café/bar further down my street, this one called Bar Mateo. From the outside, it's very unremarkable, and local Yuppies more than likely sniff at it, favouring their more upmarket bars with low lighting, candles and cocktails. To me, Bar Mateo is a gem. It has these really tacky neon fairy lights surrounding the sign. It is about the size of a postage stamp, which is why it has an open window and three stools outside. And on this night, it completely surpassed what I had seen through the window of Coffeeing. The bar was completely full of men in their forties and fifties, with the tv on in the corner, and every single one of them facing it - including the moustachioed barman. They had a sign outside advertising that they were showing the match, with a big loveheart next to "CAMPEONES DE LA LIGA". Cue the thought in my mind "...I really have to go home and get my camera".
I ran up my street. Like a flipping lunatic. I can't imagine what the Yuppies thought of this mad Irish girl pegging it up the street with the excited face - oh, look, her shoe fell off, what on earth could she be doing? Has she stolen something? Or is she just totally loopers?
By the time I got back down to Bar Mateo (walking calmly down the other side of the street), the scene had changed slightly - there were people sitting outside now, so the sign was partially blocked, and this meant that I couldn't take a photo completely unnoticed. And there was also a dog. A dog, watching the Barça match. I stood across the road and tried to get a good photo, but didn't really succeed. The lighting was bad, and I was slightly too far away, and a guy had noticed me and probably thought I was mad, like the rest of the street was probably thinking.
I gave up and went inside, ordered a Nestea and stood just outside to watch the final 10 minutes of the match. Barça were drawing with Levante 1-1, which meant that if they could keep the ball away from their opponents they would win. I soon befriended the dog, who was called Jumbo (pronounced Yumbo) and who was being petted and talked to in Catalan by his elderly male owner. The barman occasionally reached through the window to give the old man bits of ham to give to Jumbo to placate him, as between watching the match and barking a bit, I think he was a little bored. He gave me a curious sniff, and jumped up, putting his warm paws on me while I stroked his head and ears and gave him a gentle little push to sit down. I was one of two women in the whole bar, and the only person not drinking the local Estrella beer. Everything about the scene completely fascinated me. The match drew to a close, with the score remaining 1-1, so this meant that Barça were indeed campeones of the 2010-2011 Liga, and made everyone aware by singing campeones, campeones, olé olé olé (which they absolutely stole from the Irish). The men in the bar stood up and applauded, and as each filed out they gave Jumbo a rub on the head, some calling him by his name, others just calling him guapo. A barman came out of the bar across the street with a little party horn (the type that you have at kids' parties) and gave it a celebratory toot, in tune with the cars that were now speeding down the Avinguda Diagonal honking their car horns.
I walked down towards Diagonal to the sound of more car horns, and some motorbike horns, and even a girl joining in with her bicycle bell. Two lads in Barça jerseys sped past me on their motos honking like crazy. I walked back towards home, past all the bars and restaurants and closed shops, past the people who cared and the people who didn't care. Whether you did or not, this joy was now part of the city, the aural evidence now mixing with the sounds of traffic in the warm, dusty night air. The motto of FC Barcelona is més que un club - more than a club - and this is never more true than on the nights of victory, when it seems that the whole city is buzzing - in this case honking - with delight.
I turned towards home, enlightened by the knowledge that a) a nighttime walk can lead to wonderful experiences and b) football is more than just a sport for hooligans (like it very often seems to be in England). It unites people, if only for 90 minutes, and it's an inextricable and important part of the fabric of Barcelona. While walking up my street, I once more encountered Jumbo and his master. We exchanged big smiles.
And that's what it's all about. That's how you enjoy football, and that's how you befriend old men and their dogs.
