Last Sunday, after we had visited four different churches we went back to the hotell and quickly slipped out of our suits, ties and cuff links and put on old jeans and sleeveless t-shirts... We had been given VIP tickets to a soccer game, Emmanuel and I. Dar es Salaam has a super modern stadion that seats 65,000 people! It was packed out! Wow! Atmosphere like crazy! The final game for Eastern Central Africa Soccer Tournament... Teams from Ethiopia, Sudan, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania among others had played and now two teams from Tanzania had reached the finals! We watched Yanga meet Simba and it was the craziest folk-feast I've attended in my life! So fun! The supporters fought in the bleechers and sent up flares and the police had to intervene about once every 10 minutes or so :).
The Yanga players celebrating...When Yanga, in the extension of the game, won 1-0, their fans took of their shirts and danced in wild happiness, waving their t-shirts over head and blowing in horns for about an hour... When it was time for the prize to be ditributed to the winning team and a mobile platform was wheeled into the stadion, the power went. There was no national anthem and people blamed Simba's supporters for sabotage and fought with everyone and everything... I loved it when they brought in an ambulance to temporary light up the platform with the head lights from the car... The trophy was given to Yanga and medals to all the players - everything in the light from the car while screaming in megaphones!
Sooo wonderful! Love Africa! What an experience!
See ya!
