Es Para Vos

Coming to Argentina as a footbal fan, I had prior knowledge of how big the sport is in this country. I had to check out a game. But which team? Argentina has dozens of clubs. Furthermore, because buenos Aires has two HUGE rival clubs, I had to pick.

BOCA JUNIORS, or the team Maradona played for has won six Copas Libertadores (one of the South American championships). based out of a barrio near the docks, the original club members painted their jerseys and clubs and houses with leftover ship paint (blue and gold). Today this club is an international fixture in Futbol and is considered one of the world's best.

RIVER PLATE, Boca's chief rival, is based out of the Núñez, is their chief rival. They are of equal renown in the world and have won two Copas Libertadores. Their most famous player is Enzo Francescoli, o el Príncipe (prince). Playing in the '86 and '90 World Cups for Uruguay as well, Francescoli won River Plate the Copa Libertadores in 1996. French footballer Zenadine Zidane even named a son after him.

Nicholas, the owner of our hostel, offered to get us tickets, so I accepted. When I found out that he was going to charge us one hundrd and fifty pesos, I quietly changed my mind. I didn't want to spend fifty dollars on a futbol game. I could do better. So I went to Emanuel about my problem. His friend Holli (with whom we went to the parilla) took us to the River Plate stadium and we bought tickets for sixty pesos instead. Yeah, I like that price a lot better too. But I suppose you can't blame a guy for being opportunistic.


Our game last night started at nine thirty. Wind changes had pushed the wild fire smoke back into the city, so the game was pitched against a city wide haze. The other side of the stadium was even difficult to see. No matter, River Plate took to the field against San Martin, a Peruvian team, that had to win or was out of the Copa Libertadores.

Eighty some minutes later, River's five goals sealed the fate of a scoreless oponent. Coimpletely dominating, Emanuel said it was a baile for the team they were having such an easy time. In Peru, something that is easy is called Papaya, though they didn't say this tonight. Peruvians usually don't travel all the way to Argentina for futbol games, so the stadium wasa not half full. Barras, or chants were still the rage though. Everytime river scored, all its fans would chant-

Es para vos, es para vos, bostero puto puta que te parió! I don't know, I'd rather you translate it yourself.

The funny thing about chants with River is that they are usually not to support theteam. Rather, the chants are to disparage Boca. Not any other team, just Boca. And when it is another team, fine. Those chants will do to.