Futbol

So down here futbol really is life, or at least a huge part of it. Other than chisme and how hot it is down here soccer is the main focus of conversation, especially with the World Cup coming up so soon. There is a Honduran soccer league and everyone has strong affiliation to their home team, which, second only to politics, can be a very hot topic, fortunately I haven’t been forced to affiliate myself with a team… yet. After their Honduran soccer team everyone has their favorite international team, usually one of the big teams from Spain, Italy, or England. Usually at any given time you can find at least 2, sometimes up to 5 different games on TV, your choices are really soccer, telenovelas, or music videos. It’s great with the start of the World Cup less than a week away and Honduras being in it for just the second time ever and the first time in 28 years. Even though Honduras is going to get murdered, even the Hondurans agree upon this, just making the selection is reason to celebrate. On all three days that Honduras will playing work, school, and pretty much everything is going to be canceled even though the games take place super early and people could easily work after the game…but I’m not going to complain, it’s awesome being in a place where just making it to the competition gets more attention than winning the world cup would get in the US. It’s also funny because the only reason Honduras qualified was because of a last minute USA goal against Costa Rica, knocking CR out and advancing Honduras, people actually thank me for that goal, they say It’s one of most important goals ever scored for Honduras soccer and it was scored by an American… Soccer has also been a great way for me to meet people, every night in the central park there are 3v3 games from 7-10 PM, there’s usually about 15 guys that play, it only takes one goal to win so everyone cycles through pretty quick. Also most days at the town stadium a bunch of guys play, last week over 100 guys came through, everyone is really chill and it’s a great time. Even though it’s not necessarily work related, soccer is helping me tremendously in terms of community integration, exercise, and it’s giving me something to do which is always good.