without words.

south korea vs. nigeria
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you know what i love about the world cup? imean, besides waking up at the crack of dawn to sit on my couch wrapped in my huge blanket, besides cheering loudly when korea does well and groaning in disgust when the other team scores, all while my dad screams all sorts of vulgarities at the screen. besides yelling at the television when the ref makes a bogus call and besides running to the bathroom during halftime because i dont want to miss a second.


besides all that, what i love is watching the interaction of all the players. i mean, it's crazy in itself that so many players from countries all across the world come together for a couple of weeks to just.. play soccer. i mean, i guess since there are so many nations and so much national pride (exhibit a: the picture to the right, native koreans doing what they do best to show support. swarming) it's a bit bigger than "just a soccer game" but i dont think i've ever really realized what an interesting idea the world cup (and the world series) is.

204 nations entered and 32 qualified/ have been playing these last two weeks. throw in the refs from their respective nations and the fans and it's insane to imagine how many languages there probably are on the field at one time. just think about the last world cup game you watched and try saying 3 names from each team. there's peter odemwingie with nigeria and his buddy (and my personal favorite) danny shittu, lee sung ryul from korea (easy for us koreans to pronounce, extremely difficult for the irish commentator to pronounce), mariano andújar from argentina, and luisão from brazil. what a mouthful. (ps: while looking through team rosters i happened across a country called mozambique.. where is that? kudos to anyone that can answer without googling)
i've always wondered how anything happened when there was such a multidude of cultures/ languages on the field. well, ive discovered that there are translators.. loll yea AND i've noticed a lot of communication is done nonverbally. it's amazing to consider how universal body language is. a helpful hand from the other team or angry shirt pulling (or head butting lol zidane) is literal body communication. but the look of exasperation and head clutching when a goal is THIS close before being expertly blocked by a goalie, the explosion of joy and excitement when a goal slips in, the shock and angry bewilderment when a silly ref gives a foul, the fierce yelling of a coach to his players (only intensified by the slow motion and epic music that espn loves to provide) and, of course, the exaggerated grimace when somebody "trips you". such raw sentiments. though the color of their skin, their language, their soccer playing style, their uniform, and their home nation may be different, their emotions and feelings are so clearly portrayed! CRAZY!

and i LOVE how the players switch jerseys with the other team when the game is over. it's such a sweet and cool gesture. and how amazing is it to know that by the end of the world cup you'll at least have 2 jerseys-- albiet 2 sweaty jerseys-- from a person from another country. hmm, on this note, im assuming, then, that the players get new jerseys EVERY game? weird.

anyways, that is all. i hope everyone is keeping up with the world cup! it's so exciting! and so many nationalistic feelings! WOOHOO OH PILSUNG KOREAA!
CONGRATULATIONS TO THEM FOR MAKING HISTORY AND MAKING IT INTO THE TOP 16! for the first time on foreign soil, and the second time EVER.
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