Day 1 Craziness

We landed to Joburg airport 7am on Saturday. Already started making
friends on the plane with Americans and many of them were going to
Rustenberg for the Ghana game. Even though I was offered many US game
tickets they were all jacked up prices and the fact that we had to
figure out our accomodation stuff and Rustenberg is 2 hrs away from
Joburg made it tough for us to make it to the game.

We got all the tickets from the Fifa ticket machine including the
final game tickets!! As we are heading to our lodge we already started
to negotiate with the taxi guys. You learn that only way to go around
without going bankrupt is negotiate the hell out with these guy and
the prices are tripled than the normal rates just for the WC. It's
good that I have some good skills that i built from the Istanbul days
so I feel comfortable:)

For our first day we wanted to experience the local culture and went
around the city how locals transport. Two Europeans right in the heart
of downtown with everyone else Afrikan made me feel pretty unique to
say the least but experiencing how the locals communicate and act was
pretty cool. Joburg has very poor population in the dowtown area
besides the Bevery Hills-look-a-like Sandton where most of the whites
live. Country is still pretty much seperated in the class and race
level but given that it was only 14 years ago that the Apartheid ended
they are doing pretty good. Hosting the World Cup made them a lot more
shinier as the rainbow nation. Watching the USA vs Ghana game at a
local bar called SiX in Melville, which is the artsy district of
Joburg, allowed me see how well blacks and whites were living in
harmony. It was a well balanced, cosmopolitan vibe that I enjoyed as a
tourist even though the entire bar was rooting for Ghana for obvious
reason.

To touch abit on the USA game I wasn't getting in to the mood until
an hour to the kick off for some reason. What was awesome is that at
one point there was group of us eating dinner where table was
represented by an Armenian German Brit Puerto Rican South African and
Kenyan. We were all sipping our local South African wine which was
quite delish.

I had to buy a USA flag from the guy on the street to really get
pumped up as I was the only guy supporting the Yanks at the entire
district. US didn't play as I wanted them to play but give credit to
Ghana for their amazing performance and two awesome goals that they
scored to advance to quarter finals. Getting knocked out by the same
team in two WCs hurts a lot but I think we can know call US and Ghana
rival teams...

Last nite at the bar in Melville, at one point there was a Spanish
looking girl sitting on my lap who said was from Swaziland originally,
made the night a lot more interesting for me as I was watching the USA
lose but I won't get in to too much detail on that really:) o

What a way to start the 20 day trip! Off to the crazy post WW II game
with Germans and Brits following it with the live action on the battle
of Tango and Mariachi dancers!