Match 1
South Africa 1 - 1 Mexico
Johannesburg - JSC
Location watched: Heathrow International
A television situated in the middle of a concourse in Heathrow was where we settled to watch the first half of the first match of the 2010 World Cup. After arriving in London, we had taken time to eat lunch, figure out where our departure gate was located, and then found this small sanctuary where football fans from all over the world gathered under similar travelling circumstances. There were many other places we would have preferred to watch the match, but this was going to do just fine!
Mexico immediately took the play directly to the host’s end. Chance after chance left the visitors wanting, however. Towards the end of the half, the Bafana Bafana settled in and produced a few chances of their own. The half-time whistle found the opponents knotted at nil.
There was no time to bask in the glow of the Cup’s first half-time, however. We had already pushed our luck by staying to watch the entire half. Our plane was departing from a gate approximately 10 minutes away, and they had already started boarding. Despite, or perhaps because of, the large number of people waiting to board, we easily took our seats before take-off.
This flight, at roughly 1 hour and 45 minutes would be our shortest leg of the trip. It would get us to Madrid in plenty of time to see the 2nd match of the Cup.
Match 2
Uruguay 0 - 0 France
Cape Town
Location watched: Periodic internet updates at Madrid International Airport
For some reason, the World Cup just isn’t important to Spanish travelers. We searched the area of our arrival, and every subsequent concourse on the way to our terminal, which was the final concourse in the entire airport looking for a TV that was showing the match. We saw a total of 2 TVs: one at a McDonalds, showing McDonalds commercials on a loop; and the other in a waiting area that alternated between news that took place yesterday, and LG commercials. There was a lot of excitement as the South African people celebrated the day prior to the start of the tournament, but no actual Cup action. It would take an internet hook-up at 17.5 Euros before we would verify the score of the earlier game and track the ending to this one.
This next portion of the trip will be very taxing. We have a 10 hour flight, followed by a mad scramble to get to the first match we will be attending. This particular flight leaves at 1:30am from Madrid. We are already running on fumes after leaving the Twin Cities at 7:40pm last night. Hopefully we can get a bit of rest on this next leg.
