Happy Halloween

Halloween isn't quite the event here that it is in the U.S. - no trick and treaters here, and people aren't going around in costume. But the sports bar behind our house, which has turned into a disco, is certainly having a noisy party tonight as is the other disco in town. All Saints Day and All Souls Day are much more important here - All Souls is a national holiday, the day when everyone goes to clean and decorate the family graves.

I marked Halloween most appropriately, by watching a local futbol (soccer) team, named - why I don't know - New Place San José - get ready for a game in their gorgeous orange jerseys, recycled from the Everett Evergreen by Ellen Hawks. Ellen is a dental hygienist who cleans my teeth twice a year, and she's also President of a soccer league. So when their coach Alcides (back row, left) asked me if I knew anyone who might help his team get jerseys, I knew just where to go. The sixteen jerseys Ellen donated from the league have now become official good luck charms: before they began wearing them, New Place had lost 5 games. They've had two games in their orange jerseys and won them both. And don't they look great?

A field of dreams

A few months ago - sometime back in the early months of 2010 - Sister Peggy had an inspiration. There was the Centro Arte para la Paz with a big empty field, and there were the kids of Suchitoto with few places to play and use up kid energy in healthy ways. As anyone who knows Peggy can attest, she knows how to turn dreams into realities. Yesterday a small army of Suchitoto kids inaugurated the new skateboard park - a wonderful skateboard park with all the necessary jumps and rolls, painted by this summer's volunteers, waiting for fun.

Camilo showed the kids a skateboard routine including jumps and a handstand, and then it was their turn. Each hopeful skater had to pay attention to a careful list of rules, and each one got to try out the outfit - helmet, knee pads, elbow pads, wrist guards - and one of the new skateboards or scooters, and they were off to the races, a bit unsteady but learning fast. This morning, Peggy says, there were 42 kids waiting for their turn. This field of dreams has become a field full of joyful energy. Keep dreaming, Peggy!

Goooooooooooooooool!

A couple of days ago La Prensa Grafica noted that very possibly there could be four South American teams in the World Cup Semifinals (we're talking about futbol, aka soccer): Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay all made it into the quarterfinals, and it seemed like a dazzling prospect.

Alas, no. Argentina and Brazil, heavy favorites here, lost - Argentina in an astonishing 0 - 4 loss to Germany. Paraguay played well against Spain, but also lost. Only Uruguay - who barely won in overtime in an astonishing game with Ghana - will uphold the honor of Latin America in the next round.

Maybe it's because of this, or maybe it's in spite of this, but the hopeful futbol players of my neighborhood are out in force tonight, kicking the ball up and down the street, shouting "Goooooooooooooooooooool" from time to time with great fervor. And when it comes to registering a goal, the Latino announcers would clearly be first in line for a World Cup. I imagine them spending months doing deep breathing exercises to prepare for the glorious moment when they can draw that "Gooooooooooooooooool" out for moment upon moment upon moment.

World Cup!

I'm in a country obsessed with Futbol (that's soccer in the US) and entirely consumed with the FIFA World Cup games playing in South Africa, so I decided it was past time for me to learn something about this beloved game, THE game in Latin America and in most of the world's countries.

This morning I decided to see which game might be on TV (I could hear the roar from the converted theater that backs up to our house and must be offering a big screen view of the games), and came on the Spain/Switzerland match which almost instantly had me riveted. I knew Spain was one of the heavy favorites going in, and they certainly seemed to be dominating with much more time in possession of the ball...........but, amazingly, the Swiss made the first goal, and even more amazingly the Spanish missed on a number of attempts in the second half and ended up the losers.

I've never been much of a sports fan (except for baseball, where I stubbornly and forlornly root for the Seattle Mariners), but futbol! What a game! I have a lot to learn about it, and happily there's many more World Cup matches to come.