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Thursday, June 22, 2006

VAMOS ARGENTINA!

This post is pretty much for about 3 people. The people I know who actually KNOW that the soccer World Cup is currently going on and that I AM VERY passionate about it.

I have rooted for my country (Argentina) ever since I can remember. I distinctly remember celebrating with family, friends and even strangers our world cup victory in 1986, and I was only 7 years old :-).

Every world cup after that (1990, 1994,1998, 2002 and now) I have been a foreigner. A foreigner rooting for a team nobody really cares about in the place where I live. That's because for world cups '90, '94 and '98 I was living in Italy and for the last two I have been in the U.S. where not only do people not care about MY country, they mostly don't even know about the world cup!!

There's a very strange feeling you get when you are in a country that is not your own, and you are rooting for your team.
It truly transcends soccer, it goes beyond that. You root for your country, your heritage, your neighbors, your family, everything that is familiar, everything you hold dear about the place, everything you remember about it from when you were a child.

Although I have called the U.S. my home for about 7 years, Argentina IS where I am from, where I am connected to a part of me that over the years just seems to get stronger. No matter how many years I live abroad, I will always shout out "VAMOS ARGENTINA!!" for every World Cup just as I did when I was 7 years old :-).



NOTE: Yes, the 2nd team I root for is the U.S. even though soccer is SO not the sport of choice here! :-)

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