Z/Web

The 2006 FIFA World Cup soccer tournament starts tomorrow! I am SO excited. I am feeling a little alienated. Here in the States I feel like a foreigner. No one seems to understand or care about the significance of the World Cup. “It’s like the Olympics times ten!” I cry, but I just get blank looks and bewildered shrugs. For most, it’s an event about a sport they don’t pay attention to, but for me the World Cup has nothing to do with sport: it’s all about history, human achievement, artistry, spectacle, and hundreds of cultures uniting for a full month of peace. It’s about celebrating life, your nation, and enjoying healthy competition.

I don’t hold out that much hope that U.S. will do as good as 2002 — we’re in an ridiculously tough group with Italy, Czech Republic, and Ghana, all great teams we’ve never beaten — but cheering on your nation is not the only reason to watch the World Cup. I watch every game, all 64, and I don’t care who’s playing, some unknown African nation like Angola or a powerhouse like host Germany. I know how important just getting to the finals is for a country like Angola, and what it will mean for their nation if they accomplish anything — a goal, a draw, a win. The World Cup is the most amazing event in the world, period. It’s every four years, like Olympics, but instead of watering down the event with hundreds of medals and sports, it’s just one medal, one champion out of 32 finalists out of 200 teams that took over two years just to qualify. The World Cup is a microcosm of human history in a nutshell, to playfully mix metaphors. It’s 30 days of glory, passion, agony, and triumph. There’s nothing else like it in the world.