ARGENTINA

CONTINENTAL DRIFTER
Birth of an Argentinean soccer fan
by Elliott Hester
click on photos for enlargements

I went to a riot and a soccer match broke out.

It happened in Buenos Aires on a warm day beneath a blue sky at Antonio Liberti Stadium. After the match ended and shirtless revelers burst out in song, after policemen gripped tear gas launchers, after passion whipped the air like so many swirling T-shirts, I had been converted from a non-believer into a raging soccer fan.

Like many North Americans, I had never attended a professional soccer match. I rarely watched soccer on TV and could not understand why the rest of the world was captivated by a low-scoring sport that seemed best appreciated during 20-second highlight clips on ESPN. So when Sandy Suppa invited me to one of the most anticipated fútbol matches in Argentina, I went along, hoping to find an answer.

Argentineans are split down the middle in fanatic devotion to one of two soccer teams: River Plate (red and white), and Boca Juniors (blue and gold). Sandy and her friend Carolina Dalhman, two Buenos Aires locals, are rabid Boca fans.

As we approached the stadium, the air crackled with an energy I have never felt before. Groups of shirtless men danced in the street. Cheering clusters waved colorful banners and burst out in song.

A distant roar from the stadium spurred the crowd into a sudden frenzy. We ran with the masses and were stopped at two security checkpoints at which backpacks were searched, purses squeezed, intentions scrutinized.

Policemen in riot gear sat atop fidgeting horses, scanning the throngs with slitted eyes. Policemen stood in skirmish lines, holding German shepherds on taut leashes. I saw hundreds of policemen. Policemen clutching rifles.
Policemen gripping tear gas launchers. A row of policemen with ammunition belts slung across their chests like Mexican banditos.

At the entrance, the crowd surged. The heaving mob forced our bodies through a rusted turnstile and into the stadium.

Thirty minutes before game time and the stands were already packed. Red and white banners hung across a sea of River fans on the far side. Hundreds of red and white balloons shook to the rhythm of a warring drumbeat. In response, hundreds of blue and gold flags waved on the near side. Blue and gold balloons shook wildly.

The two opposing fan groups had been separated near the middle of the stadium by a barbed-wire fence that began at the first row of seats near the playing field and ran to the top of the bowl. As an added measure of prevention, truncheon-wielding policemen were positioned every few rows along the lengths of both fences.

Eight months earlier, a local fourteen-year-old boy was beaten to death by rival fans at a match between Estudiantes and Gimnasia. That same day, according to Sports Illustrated, “pre-game violence at two [Buenos Aires] soccer matches left two men dead and twelve others injured, including six police officers.” Argentine soccer violence is directly responsible for more than 150 deaths and countless injuries since 1930.

And yet, fifty thousand spectators roared as the players rushed onto the field. Before realizing what had happened, I was jumping up and down along with Carolina and Sandy, shouting “Bo-ca! Bo-ca! Bo-ca!”

When the Boca Juniors scored an early goal, Boca fans went crazy. But River Plate responded with a score of their own. Thousands of Boca fans fell silent.

With the score tied 1-1, the match remained a defensive battle. Each time a player attempted a goal, fifty thousand fans gasped collectively.

Shortly before time expired, Boca scored what turned out to be the winning goal. The Boca section exploded in celebration the likes of which I’d never seen. Perhaps twenty thousand cries shook the rafters. Men kissed each other on both cheeks, dancing in circles, arms flung around one another like Allies after the fall of Berlin.

As we headed toward the exits I saw a man, a wild-eyed man. Beer-bellied and bursting with an emotion that could have been anger or joy, he removed his T-shirt and began to swirl it in the air. Singing a song and swirling his shirt, the man jabbed his finger at me again and again. Inexplicably, I ripped off my T-shirt, swirled it in the air, and jabbed my finger back at him.

Separated by a few dozen revelers, the two of us jabbed and swirled, working ourselves into a frenzy that began to spread. I let loose the familiar chant: “Bo-ca! Bo-ca! Bo-ca!” The pot-bellied man chanted with me. More voices joined in—dozens, hundreds, a thousand maybe—transforming the chant into a thundering drumbeat. “Bo-ca! Bo-ca! Bo-ca!”

Suddenly, I knew what it meant to be an Argentinean fútbol fan.

Next stop: Chicago, USA

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