Days 21-22

Since both days were pretty much the same, and VERY similar to Day 20, I'll just combine them. Yesterday was again a day of rest. However, I had to try and find a laundromat as I have now run out of shirts to wear, and I don't want to take them to a waschsalon like Knuckles, because I'm just afraid that they will screw up the last remaining clothes I have. If they mess up the shirts, I guess I'd have to run around without any shirt for the rest of the trip, and for the sake of everything German, I think it's best that I find a washing machine so I can do my own laundry.

FINALLY, I found one. I drove to a neighboring city next to our apartment, and was headed towards one when I spotted one on the corner. After taking four rights, I parked the car and hauled my clothes into the laundromat. Stuck my clothes in several different washers but couldn't figure out for the life of me how to turn them on because there was no slot to insert money. So, being the observant scientist I am, I watched and waited until another lady doing her laundry went over to a panel with buttons all over it...some lit up, some not...and the panel looked like it might control a nu-cu-lar reactor. I saw her put some money in, push a couple of buttons and wah-lah, her machines across the room came to life. So, I tried to repeat the steps I saw her do. I also found that you get free laundry soap with purchase of a wash, but unfortunately for a couple of the loads, I poured the soap into the wrong recepticle. Thus, the couple of loads got washed with only water and no soap, so I transferred them to one of the machines I KNEW worked (in a way that I understood) and finished them there. Oh, adventures at the laundromat. No, I didn't see any college hunies that needed "help" washing her clothes, so I'm safe for another day! Finished washing the clothes and got back to the apartment just in time for another nap! My favorite part of the last couple of days.

Later in the afternoon, Knuckles decides he's hungry and asks me what I'm hungry for...which I knew meant that he had already decided what he wanted and knew that I probably wasn't going to agree...which meant only one thing: CHINESE. Not that I hate it, but I'm just not a big fan of it as I can't ever find anything that is at least edible. I've found that General Tso's chicken, or something with a similar name at any Chinese restaurant, it usually a safe bet...but they don't have such a thing here in Germany. We ended up finding a Chinese/Thai restaurant where the waitress couldn't even speak German very well, which I personally found amusing. Here I am in a different country where I can barely speak the language (if that's how you would describe my abilities), the menu is in German (again, a language I can barely understand), and the waitress doesn't comprehend even the little German I do know...so, Knuckles and I were pretty much reduced to pointing and nodding at what we wanted. Yeah well, we got the point across, and she still brought out food that I don't like!

After dinner, I suggested trying to find the "Drei Gleichen" - which is translated roughly as "three of the same." This is in reference to three castles that are very close in proximity to each other as well as the city where our apartment is located. In short, we found all three, and all three required a trek up a footpath which isn't really the greatest of ideas at night as it's getting dark. But it was sure nice to see these castles up-close as opposed to just seeing them from afar from the highway.

This morning was much of the same as the last couple of days - stay in bed until late morning, get up, eat breakfast just in time to take a nap! However, I've been trying to catch up on posting here to the blog as I got pretty far behind when we were four days without internet access. It's hard to post pictures or comments without it. I've also been doing some research on some washers/dryers as my girlfriend says that both of them in my new house pretty much need to be replaced. I have also been researching different sites and hotels in various locations throughout Germany in preparation for the arrival of my sister and my girlfriend. They are getting on the plane shortly, and Rico and I are headed to Frankfurt in the morning to pick them up and then head up to Hamburg so Rico can catch the match with the last set of tickets we have in our possession.

We went into town tonight to a "local" restaurant that seems to serve typical Thuringian food - VERY rich sauce and potatoe-like dumplings. The food is very heavy, but absolutely delicious. I'm really becoming pretty fond of these potatoe dumplings which are about the size of a fist. They are very light and airy, but sticky when they are cut. It's like they take potatoes, mix them with some bread, add some binding agent, then boil them. All I can say is YUUUUUMMMMMMY! They come with different kinds of meat, depending upon what you're in the mood for. Tonight, I chose the rinderroulade, which is like a pork flank shaved and wrapped around an onion-bread mix and cooked. It is then covered in a very dark brown gravy, which of course goes extremely well with the kloesse (the potatoe dumplings)! Of course, a meal like this makes me very tired, but instead of taking ANOTHER nap, Rico and I went for a drive through the town and beyond. We ended up in a city about a half hour away and saw some really nice houses. I think I'm going to have to try and take my girlfriend over to this town to look at some of the houses as this is something we both like doing - admiring other people's houses...but it gives us an idea of what we may want somewhere down the line.

Well, I'm off to bed for another night, but tomorrow my girlfriend arrives so I'll get to spend some quality time with her that I haven't been able to do for about a month.

Cheers,
Rocco

Here's a nice photo collage of my boo:

Day 20

What a day! Just chilling out in the apartment. Don't want to do a whole lot except for catch up on sleep the best I can and rest my ankle. I SLEPT ALOT today, but I'm feeling a bit more "with it" so I'm not going to complain. I even fell asleep during both matches on TV. Oh well, I know my body needed the rest. Can't really report much from today since I didn't really do anything. Maybe tomorrow...

Cheers,
Rocco

Day 19

Well, I think John made his flight this morning, but I haven't heard back from him yet...

I was trying desparately last night to trade our tickets for today's Italy-Australia match for some tickets to the Brazil match tomorrow to no avail. I am really wanting to watch the Brazil team in action. I think that they are fielding probably the best team ever to grace a pitch...but I guess I'll just have to wait and see.

We are travelling from Frankfurt to Kaiserslautern today, which is only a short trip. We arrive at the stadium with plenty of time to spare. At this stadium, which we have been to a couple of days ago for the Spain-Saudi Arabia match, there are no parking lots near the stadium, so we have to park several kilometers away and take a bus to the stadium. As it turns out, of all the stadia that we've been to, this has been the easiest access in terms of parking, transportion, and congestion. As we were walking in, I took a look at the tickets to get a gauge as to where they were located...row 66...that's right, row 66! I knew that this stadium was somewhat small compared to several of the others, and row 66 would definately be a hike. We got into the stairwell, walked up about 4 flights of stairs...and this was section 21.1 and we were in 21.4...oh boy...we kept climbing and climbing. I don't think I've climbed that many steps since...well, I don't think I've ever climbed that many steps before just for fun. Our seats were 5 rows from the absolute top row; we were almost the "Mr. Irrelevants" in the staium (you know, the person in the top row in the corner...who would ever buy those tickets on purpose). Here's a shot of things around us:













(yes, that's an inflatable kangaroo...there seemed to many of them around the stadium)













(that's surely a manequin head...don't know the story behind it, but they painted it the Aussie colors)













(these are the same blokes celebrating with the head)














(I'm not quite sure what's on this guy's head, but I think he must have swiped it from one of those fiiiine Swedish gals...but wait, he's an Aussie...well, I guess the colors almost matched at least)
















(our view from the top!)

After the match, we headed back to our apartment. Got in pretty late, so off to bed it is.

Cheers,
Rocco

28 JUN - Lazy Day 2 (Day 21)

This is my typical vacation. Lying around, reading a good book and listening to music. I did get some things accomplished today though. As I promised, I was awake at 06:30 this morning and prepping for the oil change ordeal. I only got 5 hours of sleep since I had to finish The DaVinci Code last night. I told you that I would finish. The movie was VERY true to the book. I saw very few differences. I could almost watch the movie again in my mind as I read the book.

Anyway, I was at the gas station at 7:30. The mechancic said that he couldn't change the oil today. He may have said not at all; I didn't quite understand everything that he said. I did understand that there was another garage just down the road so I headed that way. Of course, they weren't open yet. I grabbed some breakfast at McD's since it was right there and headed back to the apartment.

On the way, I found some parking near one of the hair salons so I decided to get the ol' mohawk shaved off. I really like the 'hawk but it was getting long and I need to start growing my hair again. The lady in the shop didn't believe me at first when I said I wanted my head shaved. This seems to happen quite often. The barber thinks it's a shame to cut my hair. I assured her though that it would grow back. It's always done so before.

After my haircut, I took a nap and I slept like a log. Contextually, I know what that means but I've never understood the references. Do logs sleep? Are they alive? I would think that they are dead trees. Whatever it means, I slept very well.

Rocco was able to find a laundromat where he could wash his own shirts while I was sleeping. He is very picky about who washes shirts. I can understand that he doesn't like to have them dried but I don't understand about the washing. Maybe he as some special Rocco powder that he uses. I think it makes him taller or more attractive to women and probably a little of both. He gets winked at quite often here.

Once Rocco returned from his laundry foray, I took the SUV to the other garage. The mechanic wasn't in today but his wife was very helpful even though she said he wouldn't have the right filter. She knew there was a Nissan dealership in town and she called to make sure they could change the oil today. I was very glad that she did that. The dealership was able to change the oil for me for which I was extremely glad. We have driving around 5000 miles on a new engine and I'm sure the engine really needs the new oil.

I usually avoid dealerships if possible. This was a case in point. It cost about $130 to get the oil changed. I expected it to be more expensive even if I wasn't at a dealership. Owning and operating a car in Germany is an expensive enterprise.

For dinner, Rocco and I found this nice Chinese restaurant on the north side of town. The Chinese waitress didn't speak German very well which was bad since my Chinese is even worse. We were able to communicate our orders though. She understood German numbers VERY well. I really appreciated Rocco eating Chinese with me. He doesn't really like Chinese food. Our waitress couldn't understand why he was picking out the bean sprouts or why no ALL of the vegetables had been eaten. I'll make it up to him tomorrow night. He wants to go the German restaurant downtown again tomorrow night.

After dinner, we spent about 3 hours driving around the country side. I took a picture of this beautiful field with purple flowers. Hope you enjoy it. Rocco also took a picture of me with my dancing clothes on and my new haircut.



Rocco was very intent on visiting one of the three castles in the area. We attempted to drive up to all three. The first two could only be visited by climbing the large hills on which they sit. The third one you could drive right up to but it was almost 11PM and I didn't feel like scrambling around a castle and then driving back down a very tight and twisty road at night. Maybe tomorrow.

Calm and relaxed,

Knuckles

27 JUN - Lazy Day 1 (Day 20)

Well, we are back in Weimar now. We've got a few days downtime before we hop back on the horse. I've done a whole lot of nothin' today. I take that back. I've accomplished a lot of things on my To Do list. I tried to get the oil changed in the SUV but had no luck. Supposedly, you have to have an appointment to get that done. The lady at the gas station to come back tomorrow morning at 07:30 and see if the mechanic could do it. I don't have a lot of confidence. At least I got the SUV washed. It was looking pretty bad. If I were smarter, I would have taken some before and after pics. I can do that next week after we are done travelling.

I also tried to get to a barber shop. I saw a couple. Even though one said that it was open the doors were locked. The other one had no parking near so I just came back to the apartment.

I made spaghetti for dinner tonight. I guess I don't have the magic of the gas stove figured out. I took me about 12 matches to get it going again. Now we really are out of matches.

The rest of the evening I have spent reading The DaVinci Code and updating the blog. This doggone book! It is so intriguing that I am probably going to finish it tonight which leaves me 2 days until my replacements arrive. I guess I'll have to read one of the other books again.

Rocco and I had a little chuckle while were lazing tonight. Our apartment is the former attic or children's rooms of this 3 story home. It has beautiful hard wood floors. Well, hard wood floors creak and I feel sorry for the people below us. We also noticed that the wood floors don't have the thickest wood. We can feel the boards bowing as we walk along. It would be absolutely hilarious if one of us fell through the floor after we stepped out of the shower. I could just see the scene. We would be standing there in the nude drying off while our neighbours were at dinner with their forks half-way to their mouths. "Would you mind getting my back?"

Tomorrow, I'm going to try again and get the oil changed in the SUV and maybe get a haircut.


In a certain sense of the word, shaggily yours.


Knuckles.

Day 18

Today was a day to relax. We checked out of the InterCity Hotel somewhat late in the morning. I needed some internet time, so we went downtown to the Hauptbahnhof (the main train station) because Knuckles said they had a Starbucks, and everyone KNOWS Starbucks has internet...well, when we got there, they had a whopping 4 round tables set outside of the "shop" which was nothing more than just a small bar-looking thing. Not like the S-bucks you see in the states. So, we tried to find somewhere with an internet connection and ended up at MickieD's. We quickly found a nice hotel online that had internet access! WOO HOO...four days being disconnected from the world sure can take a toll.

Here's the TV as I entered my room:











I thought that was a kind reception! I figured that using my real last name, Luciano, might give my identity away, so I used some alias that sounded "American." How did I do?

The rest of the day was pretty much maxin' and relaxin' in the comfort of air conditioning for the first time on the trip...it was worth it too. A pretty uneventful day, sorry.

Cheers,
Rocco

Day 17

Today's the first day off from major travelling in a week, and I'm pretty spent. We've been sleeping in hotel after hotel, and waking up (fairly) early to get on the road to make it to the next city for another match. While the matches have been exciting, the travel has taken a toll on me. I'm feeling pretty beat up this morning. I did get to sleep in, so I did get a bit of rest last night. I got up and went downstairs for some breakfast. After eating, I decided to take a short walk (or more like a limp) around town. Here is the hotel at which we were staying and the main street on which the hotel was located:

















I first ventured toward the river as it was downhill, and I figured it was only a couple of blocks. As I approached the river, I noticed that there were a couple of towers guarding the bridge (no cars allowed). Here are the towers and a nice view of the "old city" and castle from the bridge:















I left the bridge and headed back into the old town to see what was around (as my laundry was being done!). I came across these two jokers (ha!...get it, jokers...):












As I meandered further into town, I heard some pretty good piano music coming from somewheres, so I tried to figure out from where it was coming. I kept getting closer and closer until I looked in this window and saw a young kid practicing some pieces. My first thought was that it might be a piano store and the kid just stopped by to try some pieces out, but I read the printing on the window and it was a BARBER SHOP! I had been debating on whether or not to get my mohawk cut before my boo comes over here, and it just seemed like the right place to go...get a cut and some entertainment. The girl who did my hair was quite beautiful (but nowhere near as beautiful as my girlfriend!), but to stay out of hot water, I just took a picture of the piano player with the window that indicates it's a barber shop:















After getting my hair cut and picking up my laundry (finally, clean draws!!!), we headed back to Frankfurt because my friend John had to catch a flight back to Spain the next morning. We checked into the Intercity Hotel at the Frankfurt airport and went down to the bar in the hotel to watch the evenings' games with others. As it turns out, I pulled up a chair at a table with some Aussies who were in town to watch the Italy-Australia game tomorrow, the same game to which we are going. I chatted with them a bit and found out that one of the gents was also a lawyer and had sat for the New York bar when he was there working on a big tobacco case.

Overall, it was a nice relaxing day.

Cheers,
Rocco

Day 16

Today I'm in more of a daze than anything. I'm still reeling from the loss that US soccer suffered yesterday. I was stoked coming over to Germany, thinking that our team would definately make it out of the group and into the knockout stage. If we faltered there, it was still successful. I think we ended up in 25th place...not very impressive. I'm disappointed because of all of the time and effort that I put into making plans and preparations for coming over mainly to see our boys advance into the second round...and they played like they didn't want to be here. It's like they thought they could just show up to the match and the other team will give in. The only time our boys played like they wanted to win was after 2 men were ejected from the game against Italy...that's the only time they decided it would be a good idea to put for any sort of effort. To me, it's almost a slap in the face that they couldn't give any more than what they displayed in 2.5 games. I have an EXTREMELY bum ankle/foot, but I was ready to strap on some boots, put on a jersey, gritted my teeth and gone out there and do it myself...but I'm afraid I would have made a couple of the players look bad (the ones just loafing around the field).

So, to get up for another game today wasn't the height of excitement it was 6 months ago. Besides, after standing for the 90 minutes at the match yesterday and the long walk back to the car, I can barely put any weight on my foot today, but I'm still gonna give it a go. We check out of THE CASTLE, got in the car and headed down to Kaiserslautern. This is where one of the major US bases (Ramstein) is located, and you could definately tell the American influence in the city itself as well as the me-first attitude of the Americans that we saw. Very disappointing.

We needed to get to the game early so that John could pick up his ticket. Unfortunately, I got his ticket after I had gotten Rico and my tickets, not knowing he was going to be joining us. The game was quite a shooting affair between Spain and Saudi Arabia. Not one of the "big" matches in the grand scheme of thing, but very exciting. Spain had put in some of their second-level players in order to save some of the stars for the next round, but the "second-tier" players are still playing some of the best clubs in the world. The poor, poor Saudis...it seemed like Spain took a shot every time they had the ball with some amazing saves by the Saudi goalie who, by the way, managed to hurt himself in the last 2 matches we have seen the Saudis play. Either he's prone to injury or just not a very good player who always wanted to waste time. All in all, the game was entertaining with the Spaniards winning 1-0.

After the match, we travelled down to a town called Heidelburg. It's a town on the Nekar River with quite a large, OLD castle looming over the entire city. It's set up on the hill/mountain side looking down toward the river with the town therebetween. Once we checked into the hotel, each of us was hungry and wanted to watch the late match that day, so we walked a couple blocks down to a bar/restaurant that had a TV AND FOOD. We watched the French shoot their way into the second round and then headed back to the hotel for the night. No pictures today as we didn't take many and Knuckles has already posted the highlights.

'til tomorrow,
Rocco

26 JUN - That da** ref ... (Day 19)

Today was a long and frustrating day. We didn't have to check-out of the hotel until 1PM which was nice. The match today wasn't until 5PM so we could hang-out at the hotel until it was time to go to the match.

Some unlucky soul left their WLAN unprotected so Rocco have been using that for the last 24 hours. This poor sap has to be thinking, "Da**, I thought this was supposed to HIGH speed access." At least I was able to update several more blog entries!

Since we were just at KL the other day for the Spain match, we knew what to expect concerning parking. It still doesn't change the fact that FIFA was planning on shuttling thousands of people from the stadium to a parking lot several kilometers away.

We were at the stadium WAY early, like 3 hours. It gave me plenty of time to read the second round program. I felt a little cheated which I should have expected. They kept ALL of the teams in the program not just the ones that made it to the knock-out round. They updated some of the articles at the beginning but not enough for another 10 euros.

Lemme tell buddy, we were in the BOONIES! I was surprised at how we could go from decent seats during the Italy v Ghana match to 6 rows from the top. It's a good thing I'm not a hemophiliac.




We seemed to be right in the middle of the Italy support section but there were some Australian fans around. They were the interesting ones to watch durinig the match.

I wasn't sure what this guy was going to do with a kangaroo wearing an Italian jersey and I'm not sure that I wanted to find out.


These chaps had a really unique way of support their team. They painted the face of a styrofoam head, gave it sunglasses and an Australia colors hat. They had a LOT of fun with this dumby. I'm not sure they noticed that it wasn't a realy girl. After as much beer as these guys probably drank, there probably wasn't much of a difference.



A side note about national anthems. It is VERY interesting to see which national teams actually know the words to their "national" anthem. Well, the Italians DEFINITELY know the words to their national anthem. Every fan was singing along. In fact, there is a section in their anthem where there are no words but they sang them ANYWAY. It was something like "bum bum bum ..." and then they had this really cool cheer at the end. I'm not sure that the author put in a cheer but it added some spice to the song. That's probably the only good thing that I have to say about the Italians today.

The match was reallyl fun to watch. The Australian team wasn't really an attacking team but their patience led to several shots on goal. Italy couldn't seem to get their stuff together enough to score a goal. No matter how many times they fell down, they just couldn't get that penalty kick .... until the end. It was complete and utter bullsh** that this match was decided by a PK. That ref was WAY out of line. There was already a game fixing scandal in the Italian league and I think it carried over here. After I saw the replay, there was no WAY that should have been a penalty kick. This Australian looked like I felt after such a terrible call.


At least we had the Aussies next to us help us feel better. It's hard not to look at guys wearing crazy p-funk hair and not laugh a little, at least on the inside.


In addition to Aussie costumes, they're songs are pretty funny too. We heard some Aussies singing "Your team is sh** but your pizza is good." I think this is a reference to the Italians.

The bus trip back to the parking lot was a little frustrating. For about the first 10 minutes, we were moving at the pace of the pedestrians because they insisted on walking in the middle of the d*** road. We made it back to the SUV and out of town with no problems though. It was kind of funny with the GPS though. For the World Cup, I'm sure that Germany put in some new roads and such. Well, it seems one of those areas was right around the parking lot at KL. According to the GPS, we were in the middle of the woods when it was apparent that we were on a paved road. At one point, we were even on a a completely different road. I'm glad the GPS lady can't curse us out or we would have had an ear-full.

Rocco and I made an agreement. I would drive half-way back to Weimar and then he would drive. Our bargain seemed to have slipped his mind. We stopped for some dinner on the way back. Rocco tried Leberkaese for the first time. He thought it was OK but really didn't care for the mustard. I'm glad he tried it. It's one of my favorites. Anyway, good ol' Knuckles got to drive back to Weimar. It was alright though it was only another 2 hours from the rest stop. We got back just in time to hear the Swiss lose to Ukraine in penalty kicks. Boy, the Swiss keeper is TERRIBLE.

Ready for a couple days downtime,

Knuckles

25 JUN - Kaiserslautern (Day 18)

Well, Rocco was unable to get Brazil tickets. That's alright though. We checked out of the hotel near the Frankfurt airport and then went to the airport.

I had read all of the books that I had brought with me. I thought if there was a place that would have books in English that it would be the airport. They had a small section but I bought a book and some magazines. I picked-up the DaVinci Code. I have recently seen it but I didn't remember some stuff. I'm curious to see how close the movie is to the book.

Once we had picked up our supplies, we went looking for an Internet connection. Since today is Sunday, there weren't going to be a lot of places open except for at the other major travel location, the main train station, so we went there. McDonald's turned out to be the place for the Internet connection. I didn't get a lot done but we did find a hotel in Kaiserslautern for the night.

This is the first hotel that has had air conditioning. It was nice to sit in a nearly cold room and just chill.

Our plan is to stay in KL for the evening, go to the Italy v Australia match and then drive back to Weimar. Our hotel in KL was very nice but not in the greatest neighborhood. I didn't feel very safe walking down the street to get some juice.

We watched the Portugal v Netherlands match in the hotel bar and had some dinner. That was a dirty match and not really that much fun to watch. I was falling asleep during the England match so I went to bed.

Tomorrow, we are off to the stadium for the Italy v Australia match. Since I don't like Italy that much, I'm rooting for Australia. They are the big underdog but it would be great if they could pull an upset.


Knuckles

24 JUN - Heidelberg (Day 17)

Well, I told you early in the blog that I wouldn't have a lot of landscape pictures if I wasn't in them. I'm going to break that rule today. Heidelberg is such a beautiful city and we had such beautiful weather; I wanted to share part of what we saw with you.

We stayed in a VERY nice hotel last night, The Hotel Ritter St. George. It took us a little while to determine that we could not drive right up to the hotel last night. We parked in the garage and made our way to the hotel. We knew it was the one we were looking for because it had a nice brass sign of St. George. You know the one that fought dragons? Our hotel is right across from the big church downtown.





Looking out of my window, it was apparent that I was in the old part of the city. The streets are so willy-nilly. I couldn't tell which bits were gardens behind peoples houses and which parts were streets.

John and Rocco and I met at breakfast. Rocco really had to do laundry so John walked up to the castle and I sat in the hotel restaurant and updated the blog. I was about 5 days behind.

We saw these guys walking down the street. I didn't know there were a lot of Jehovah's Witnesses in Germany but we found some. Of course, we figured these characters had to walk the baby before they could go knocking on doors. The German Witnesses must not have to wear black ties. Looks like they can wear a little more daring ties.


Once we met-up again, we decided to drive up to the castle. It turns out that you can't drive up to the castle on the weekends. It makes sense. This city is a HUGE tourist attraction.


The old city of Heidelberg sits on the Rhine and is overlooked by this really cool old castle. Here are a couple pictures of the castle overlooking downtown.



We decided just to drive around the old city and then along the Rhine. Here is a picture of a typicaly street in the old city that is leading down to the river.


There is a very cool looking bridge crossing from Heidelberg near the old town.


We had a very nice drive down the Rhine. The sun was shining, the trees are green and the setting was wonderful. Here is a picture of the houses across the river from the oldtown.


Here is a very nice picture of the river as we crossed to the other side.


It was pretty cool looking at the old town from the other side of the river. I assumed that there would be a road running along the river but there really wasn't. We drove through this kind of "private" area. The main road through went UP the hill and then DOWN the hill and I mean DOWN the hill. It was kind of scary coming back down.



John has an early flight tomorrow, 07:30 to Spain, so we drove back to Frankfurt after touring Heidelberg. We checked into our hotel near the airport and then went downtown to watch the Germany v Sweden match. We ended up at this little corner bar watching the game with about 40 other people. They can really cram them in when they want to do so. We watched the second match, Argentino v Mexico, at the hotel bar.

The hotel where we are staying seems to be more like a stop-over for business travellers. From 04:30 - 23:00, there are buses to the airport every half hour. There always seems to be a line at reception, Japanese, American, other, whatever. It turns out that the hotel is right next to the entrance to the American base too.

Rocco might have a lead on some Brazil v Ghana tickets so we might be staying in the area. Keep your fingers crossed!

Starting to drag,

Knuckles

Day 15

Today is a make-or-brake (yeah, brake, not break) match for the USA. In order to make it to the next round, we have to win and hope that Italy beats the Czech Republic. It's going to be a tough match for the US because Ghana was the African champions last year and probably have the strongest squad of all African teams.

After waking up IN A CASTLE, we drove into Frankfurt to pick up Imran, then we were on our way to Nuremberg. The ride was pretty uneventful, at least for me, becuase I think I slept most of the way. This is our sixth day on the road, and the travel and excitement at all of the games is finally starting to catch up with me...I would say I'm getting too old for this, but that's not true...I think that it's just that I'm just not used to this. I'm sure with some practice, I could do this for a living...and become a trucker! Alright, not really, but sleeping in a different hotel every night has not been that ideal for my sleep pattern, and when I don't get a good night's sleep I tend to be a bit cranky and irritable, so I just keep my mouth closed.

We finally made it to Nuremberg, and found some parking. We arrived about 3 hours before kickoff, and Imran thought we were going to go straight to the stadium...oh no, we have to "get ready"! This requires the precise application of FACE PAINT! Unfortunately, I left the blue face paint at the apartment before we left, thinking that we had plenty in the bag from the US-Czech game. So Knuckles and I applied the red and white that we had...and someone told me that I looked like I supported Poland with half-and-half/red-and-white. Not wanting to be mistaken for a Polish supporter, Knuckles went in search of the elusive blue face paint. We struck gold about 2 cars down, and the lady was kind enough to apply the blue to my forehead in exchange for some q-tips (so she could apply it to her family as well). The end result:












See the wavy streaks on the side of Knucles' head (huh, huh, huh...knucklehead!!!), yeah, they made for quite an interesting tan line! Speaking of tan lines, check out the guy with his hand in the air...















they said it was from (american) football practice, but it looks almost like it was painted on. The funny thing about these guys was not so much the adult diapers, but the red, white and blue that they "painted" themselves with was actually permanent marker. Reminds me of the old college days and the first to pass out at a party...but I have a very bad feeling they weren't that drunk when they did the painting. It dawned on me that: who was the drunk guy to think that wearing adult diapers to the match was a "good idea"...and how drunk was the other guy(s) sitting there that had to agree was a "good idea"...and how drunk were they to wake up the next day and STILL THINK IT WAS A GOOD IDEA. We chatted with them before and during the walk to the stadium, and they explained that US Soccer is in its infancy...and we asked what would happen if the diapers didn't last the whole day, and whether they had someone bring some clothes for them, and they said...well, it might be the birthday of US soccer around the world, so don't be surprised if you see a birthday suit. Well, I knew right then that I hoped that they were sitting in a different section!

Inside the stadium, we found our seats in the corner section with all of the American fans. It was interesting because our section was blocked off from adjacent fan sections by a glass partition and looking up into the upper deck, we could only see the people standing in the firts row. This made coordinating any chants especially difficult. At one time, I heard 5 different US chants...doesn't really help much if everyone is saying a different thing. Even when we were "coordinated" on a common chant, it sounded more like a round with the "USA" portion seconds apart in each of the section of fans. Oh well, we still yelled, screamed, cheered, drummed to support our boys on the field. I really liked this banner, but it was taken down shortly after we took this picture, probably by those in charge of FIFA as being a "politically insensitive" statement...one that challended the ref's decision in the previous match (which saw Pablo, a US player, get a red card, meaning he was suspsended for this game against Ghana):













Frankly, I was a bit disappointed in a group of US supporters that continually chanted "nobody likes us, and we don't care." I thought that on a stage like this where the fans of every country have been friendly and looking to make friends that you wouild think of something so classless to chant. Classless, that's all I can say, and I hate to admit that they were part of our supporter's section. Barring that, the support for our team was tremendous. During the national anthem at the US-Czech game, I got goosebumps to hear so many people singing so loudly, but was completely taken aback at the sheer amount of noise we made this time singing our national anthem before the game! Amazing. It was worth the money for the plane/apartment/hotel/tickets to the game just to be part of, and witness, such a display for our national anthem. LOVED IT! It doesn't matter how bad of a singer anyone is, when they are combined with THOUSANDS of others in unison to sing praise to our country, I can't help but think that even the bad voices turn into a sweet, sweet sound in the end.

The game itself was a bit disappointing because we lost...on a call by the ref that should never have been made. Granted, our players could've played through it, and our fans were definately doing all we could to lend vocal support, but it just wasn't to be. The US team crashed out of the World Cup with a wimper. That has made me pretty grumpy, so it will probably take a couple of days to recover from what I expected to be another highlight of my trip - witnessing our boys advance to the second round. We left Nuremberg to head back to Frankfurt to pick up my friend John (the son of a partner at my former law firm) at the airport. He is flying in from Spain to watch the Spain-Saudi Arabia match tomorrow. After picking him up, we dropped Imran off at his apartment and headed back to the castle for another night.

Cheers,
Rocco

Day 14

THE BIG DAY! I've been waiting for this day for many months now...we headed off to Frankfurt to watch the Netherlands vs. Argentina. This game was in VERY high demand for a long time. To me, it is a matchup between the snotty European powerhouse ("South America...where is that") and the gritty S. American powerhouse ("there are leauges outside of S. America?"). Both teams have been performing very well lately, and it is a rematch of the 1974 World Cup final match (or somewhere around there). It is very rare that two teams who have previously met in a finals match have gone on to play each other again. This is the third match in the group stage, and both teams have already guaranteed passage to the knock-out round, and the lineups reflected that a bit. Both teams left some of their superstars on the bench to either avoid yellow card accumulation (which would make them ineligible for the next match) or injury.

We drove down pretty early because I had an extra ticket that I had bought expecting a friend of mine to fly over for todays game as well as the US-Ghana game tomorrow, but he couldn't make it due to work stuff. We stood outside the gates hoping to find someone to purchase the ticket, and we were there for only about 15 minutes until a young guy came up and asked for how much we were sellling the ticket. After brief negotiations (yeah, the lawyer in me really put the negotiation skills to the test...alright, not really because I'm not much of a negotiator), he agreed on the price. I could tell he was a fan and not a scalper, so I was a bit more lenient on the price because I figured he was there to enjoy the match as much as we were, and that's what the world cup is all about. Again, the motto is "a time to make freinds", and that's what we had done. After we agreed on the price, he told me that "I am so happy right now I want to hug you"...but there were no hugs to be had; all of us got to keep our "guy cards" that day! I could tell he was very excited to see the match, so I offered him our extra ticket for the next day's US match and told him we'd even give him a ride to and fro' (no, not 'fro - different words).

As it turns out, he majored in actuarial science (which I still don't know what that is, but it has to do with lots of numbers) and he's from South Africa. He was in Frankfurt for about 4 days, staying at a friend's apartment. He had tickets to another game that day in Munich, but couldn't figure out how to get there in time for the match so he came over to the stadium hoping to score a ticket.

We then proceeded past security...wow, I sure love the pat-downs, but I keep getting denied the women's line (that has a woman security guard doing the pat-downs). Well, I guess that's probably for the best so that my boo doesn't get too upset with me! The Poland game had the tightest security/pat-downs because the Polish are notorious for bringing in...let's just say "banned materials." This was the second-most rigorous pat-down that I've had, and I'm pretty sure it's because Argentinians have the same type of notoriety. I needed to use the WC, and as I walked down the stairs, it became apparent that not ALL "banned substances" had been confiscated at the turnstiles...and it was also obvious that the Netherlands was one of the participating teams just from the smells coming from the bathroom...

On our way to our seats, we passed a couple of reporters doing their bit, and as we passed, I turned around and it was JP Delacamera (sp?) and John Harkes (formerly a DC United player). They were doing the pre-game for ESPN, but I found it pretty funny that of all the people that have surrouned every single television camera just for a chance to get on TV for only a second...but NO ONE was crowding the two Americans! John Harkes looked pretty funny because he had some indoor soccer kicks with a dark suit...obviously an American. Once they did their bit, I turned around and acknowledges Harkes, and he looked a bit surprised that SOMEONE, ANYONE recognized him.

As we got to our seats, I was pleasantly surprised that our seats were located on the aisle, 6 rows behind the goal...I thought these would be excellent seats, but the goal camera on the boom kept blocking the view downfield, so they weren't as good as tickets that were a bit higher up. However, the seats were still great because we could see exactly what a player on the field would see! We had the Argentinian supporters to our right, and the entire rest of the stadium was ORANJE (Netherlands fans). It didn't matter how many Oranje supporters there were, because the Argentinians came to sing, dance, party, and just plain make noise! They had a group of about 10 drums that were beating the entire game, and they had songs and chants that everybody in the section sang along with. On occasion, when the Oranje supporters got tired of listening to the Argentinians, they would start a "Holland...Holland...Holland" chant, which easily downed out the Argentinians, but it was always short-lived, and the Argentinians came back with even more support. The excitement and electricity in the air was amazing. Everyone was abuzz, and it was very festive...if only the game on the field was remotely as exciting as it was in the stands, it would've been a game to celebrate for years to come. As it turns out, the game was rather ho-hum with not very much excitement. Neither team wanted to do much in the way of scoring, and the other team was just fine with that.

After the match, we took Imran (whom Knuckles and I affectionately refer to as "our stray" as we found him near the side of the road, literally, and we took him whereever we went for a couple of days) to his apartment, then went back to our castle-hotel for the night...that's right, we booked a room in a castle! Not like the castle that you probably think of with the high walls and towers, but more of the castle in the middle of the forest where travelers stop on their long journey. It was a very nice place, and they had some very old photos of how the castle used to look. I was really glad that the castle provided a relatively soft bed...FINALLY! Hit the hay early knowing that tomorrow is going to be a VERY long and tiresome day; lots of travel, and watching the US try to advance to the second round.

Here is a pictoral representation of the day:











(as you can see, my mohawk is starting to get pretty long and looking like a toupe like Knucles')














(the sea of Oranje)















(the drum section...with a slow exposure)


Cheers,
Rocco

23 JUN - The OK Corral (Day 16)

After a disappointing game in Frankfurt, we are off to Kaiserslautern again today. The last time we were downtown among all the fans but we didn't attend the game. Today, we were in the stadium for Spain v Saudi Arabia. Spain is always fun to watch, just like the Argentinians. I wasn't disappointed either. In the first half, for Spain, it was a shooting match. They seemed to possess the ball the whole time and they definitely made it exciting by shooting so much. Spain topped Saudi Arabia though 2 - 1.

Unfortunately, there was no parking near the stadium. We had about a 10 min bus ride from the parking lot to the stadium. I wasn't sure how FIFA was planning on moving thousands of people from the parking lot to the stadium in time for the game. Somehow they did though.


We got to the stadium about 2.5 hours before the match. It's cool to see a stadium decorated like this one is with letters in the seats.


In case you were wondering, it is OK for a man to wear make-up at a sporting event. He just can't apply the make-up himself.


I'm not sure what this guy was doing at the Spain v Suadi Arabia match. Perhaps there is some Scotland-Spain alliance that the rest of the world doesn't know about. His daughter was wearing a kilt too.


I really liked this guy's hat. I'm a big fan of creative hats and this was a good impromptu hat. I'm glad he didn't use helium since it might have torn his head off and that would have been rather unpleasant. I usually don't have an appetite for at least 2 hours after I've seen someone's head torn off.


As I looked around the stadium, I noticed for the first time that there are hardly any women in attendance. A World Cup match is not the place to look for Mrs. Right. I'm not even sure I know why I shower before I go. At least my tooth paste is holding out. I have only 2 little sample tubes with me and, when those run-out, I probably won't brush my teeth until I return.

After the match, John and Rocco and I made our way to Heidelberg. Rocco very generously offered to pay for a hotel in downtown Heidelberg. This place was AWESOME! It was right in the middle of the city. It was this cool, really old hotel and the wait staff were very friendly. These are picture from my room. Heidelberg is a very popular tourist city with its castle on the hill and beautiful downtown.



I posed with this guy since he was guarding the stairwell to my room. I had a lot of important stuff in my room, my iPod, my chewing gum and my toothbrush.


Secure in Heidelberg,

Knuckles