There is a phenomenon which transcends all political and cultural boundaries, all races, creeds, colors, genders, and ages. It can be found in any country in any part of the world and it has infiltrated every level of modern society, with the exception of middle America perhaps. I speak of soccer fandom of course.On the trip back to Saint Petersburg from Saransk, our train had the honor of hosting a small but exceptionally rowdy group of soccer fans from Samara. They were traveling to the World Cup qualifying game between Russia and Finland being held in Helsinki on June 10 (for those interested, Russia won 3-0). These three middle aged men added a welcomed note of color and vulgarity to the otherwise sleepy and tired crowd filling the cars. At every stop the convoy made, they got out their colorful banners, scarves, and shirts, purchased lots of cold beer and dried fish from the old women, and made people take pictures with them and their fan club's flags.
On about the fifth stop, I finally decided to go talk to them after the train left the station and found the group in an open-compartment car full of rather exasperated passengers from Samara. It was evening and I was not surprised to find them all fairly intoxicated, loud, and incoherent. They did not tell me very much about themselves and one man was even uncomfortable having his picture taken, because, he said "I'm not supposed to be out of work on vacation until next Monday!"Nevertheless, Evgeny, Yuri, and Aleksandr ended up explaining that they see 10 to 15 games live every year and take two or three big trips such as this one, which always include stops for photo ops with unsuspecting fellow passengers.
At one point, Yuri intercepted a pretty young train attendant and made me take a picture of her with him. "Come on, Lena!" he said, "It's for an independent newspaper called Tallinn 2000!" That this blog is actually a newspaper called Tallinn 2000 was news to me as well.
In their intoxicated exuberance, the men would break out into song every time one of them said something which reminded someone else of a song lyric. This would occur every couple of minutes. In my half hour or so with them, the only thing I was able to discern, aside from their destination, was that the coat of arms of the city of Samara features a goat. But alas,they could not explain the meaning of that symbol.Before I left them, they did give me all of their numbers and email addresses, urging me to contact them at any time. I also got the official card of the "Volga Bastion", the Samara region's soccer fan club!
Posts
