After Manaus, we flew back to Rio for the last couple of weeks of the World Cup as we wanted to be there when the finals were being played in Maracanã stadium. To say Rio was mayhem is an understatement. There were so many people everywhere, it was hard to move anywhere; on the beaches, streets, public transport and the tourist attractions were an absolute headache – but I wouldn’t swap the time for anything. There was such an amazing vibe in the city that it was infectious. People laughing, drinking, partying, cheering and chanting for their team, the energy was crazy.
We spent our time during these weeks exploring and delving into the city to see and do as much as possible and try and live like a local. We has some extremely fun nights in Lapa, walking around the streets and going into the bars that looked the most happening. The samba clubs seemed to be the most popular with their easy listening music and girls doing this fast-stepped dance which looks hard, but a local girl told me you just have to pretend you are stepping on lots of cockroaches and you will have it down pat! According to a number of cariocas (residents of Rio), Lapa is home to the best club in Rio which is Rio Scenarium a huge 3 story nightclub which plays different music on each level. The cover charge and mile long line (I have never seen such a long line before) to get into the club can be very off-putting, however there is a secret to avoid both. In Brazil, the party doesn’t usually start until at least midnight, so if you go into the club for dinner around 8ish and stay for the rest of the night, you don’t pay a cover and miss out on the line!
Our favourite day time activity was to spend it on the beach where weather and water temperature were so nice it was hard to believe it was the middle of winter. Three main sports are played by the locals on the beach, two of them actually even originating on the sands of Copacabana. Footvolley, is the opposite of volleyball as you can only use your feet and head, beach paddle ball, a game between partners with wooden paddles aiming to keep a ball from touching the ground and lastly football (of course). It was relaxing to sit in the sun watching in awe at how talented some of the locals are, my favourite especially was the footvolley.
However, our main activity while we were in Rio was watching, living and breathing football. I watched more football in those four weeks than I have in the rest of my life put together and I don’t think I will be ready to watch that many again until the next World Cup! They had a FIFA Fan Fest on Copacabana beach which was an entertaining place to watch it because of the atmosphere that the crowd brought along with it. Thousands of people packed in and around the zoned off area, along with vendors selling drinks and food throughout the match for you. You could hardly move or see the screen at times as there were friendly and not so friendly jostling between the supporters of the opposing teams.
Two games that really stand out was when Brazil lost to Germany and the final. Usually when Brazil played we would go down to the Fan Fest to watch, but on this occasion we decided to watch the game in an Irish sports pub called Shenanigan’s in Ipanema, which attracts a large gringo crowd. At the start of the game the pub was completely packed with people cheering and yelling at the game but after the Germans scored four goals in seven minutes the mood in the pub completely changed. The horror and embarrassment on the face of the Brazilians, was hard to see and it was so quiet you could cut the tension with a knife. Even the few Germans that were in there had the respect not to cheer too loudly against the hosting nation. By half time the pub was only half full as all the Brazilians left. We were joined by some other spectators who had come from the Fan Fest after a local gang had gone down to the beach, firing gunshots, unsurprisingly terrorising the crowd and managing a mass robbery.
The finals, when Argentina and Germany played was of course the other stand out game for us. We decided to go back to the Fan Fest for one last celebration but stood outside of it to watch the game (there was no chance of getting in as people had bought tents the night before to camp out there)! If it had been up to the spectators, Argentina would probably have won. As the third largest supporting nation behind Brazil and the US, they had thousands of people there cheering on their team and yelling out chants, singing them over and over again. Although it would have been close because the long-standing rival between Argentina and Brazil meant that majority of the Brazilians were going for Germany even after they had been publically humiliated in their defeat by them just five days before.
It was a great game and came down to the 113th minute with Germany eventually scoring the winning goal. That’s when the Argentinian crowd lost it as well, with grown men crying and people fighting. We immediately fled the beach for our safety, narrowly missing a swarm of policemen advancing on the crowd, throwing tear gas in an attempt to control them. Xave and I were both wearing our yellow Australian jerseys which look very similar to the Brazilian jersey. As we were running away, we were advised to take them off because someone had just witness some Argentines bashing an Aussie after mistaking him for a Brazilian.
Once we were safely inside a cafe we got the chance to people watch everyone outside. Away from the beach people had started calming down but I still saw some nervous looking Germans trying to get away as quickly as possible. I felt sorry for them because they didn’t get a proper chance to celebrate on the beach because it was just too dangerous as they were so outnumbered by the Argentines. Hopefully that night they made it out to Lapa to party and celebrate properly!
Every Country 