12 Hours Part 2

The second half of my 12 hour ride…

Cruising the silent streets of San Francisco I arrive home about 2:15 am. What to do, what to do, what to do…stay up until 7am for the US vs. Algeria World Cup game or try to get a few hours of shut eye?

I spied a blu ray disc I rented from Film Yard Video and decided to feed it to the PS3 and watch Matt Damon in Green Zone. It’s an Iraq war movie about a rank and file army captain who uncovers a faulty intel plot/conspiracy in the search of WMD’s. It’s decent entertainment, I didn’t put me to sleep. In watching the bonus features I discover the movie is directed by Paul Greengrass, a British film maker. Greengrass has only been on my radar since last week. I was not familiar with the name until I rewatched the film Bloody Sunday, the 2002 definitive movie about the massacre of Irish protesters in their hometown town of Derry, Northern Ireland, by British paratroopers in 1972. It’s the Sunday in U2’s song, Sunday Bloody Sunday. Last week, after 28 years, the British govt. absolved the protesters of any wrongdoing and condemned the British forces for the killings. Bloody Sunday is in my collection so after hearing about the ruling I wanted to watch it again. I was curious about the director because the entire film is shot like a documentary. On perusal I find out the director is Paul Greengrass. I also find out he directed two of the last three Bourne movies. I had no idea he was the director of Green Zone but after watching it I was curious who made it because the style was familiar. Well, there you go.

I was not able to stay awake but amazingly I was able to wake up in time to go watch some soccer. I resuscitated at about 6:15am, after maybe one and a half to two hours sleep. I freshened up and was out the door by 6:30am. It seems that no matter where the World Cup is held, if you live in San Francisco you will find yourself in a bar sardine packed with people guzzling beers and cheering at the top of your lungs at some ungodly hour. It is rather strange when you start your night of drinking at 2:30am. The last time I remember watching a game at a decent hour was the 1990 World Cup which was won by West Germany (yes kiddies, there used to be two Germanys) winning out over a Maradona led Argentina. It was the first time I really understood the global power of the World Cup.

That summer I was working at Pepperdine University in Malibu, taking care of 92 European high school kids as part of an ESL program. The students all came from upper middle class backgrounds from around the globe (Tahiti, Mexico, China, India) but most were European. 60 of the students were split between Italy and France which became the two rival camps in the program, the historical animosity present even in these fresh faced students. These two groups kept me busy as I was playing the role of policeman in the dorm. While most of the students were polite and followed the rules the French and Italian students were always breaking curfew and making a ruckus. The difference was when I told the Italian kids to be quiet and go to bed they would apologize and be quiet but in no time at all they’d be loud again and not really giving a damn. The French kids on the other hand, when I tried to tell them anything they just completely ignored me. They were just too good for the rules. One thing was clear, the two groups did not like each other.

The first thing the students wanted to know was where they could watch the World Cup Games. Me and the other staff at first had a “whatever” attitude about them watching the Cup, we simply had no idea how into it they were but we learned quickly. It was the main concern of every student in the program. There was not one kid who was not a huge soccer fan. They begged and pleaded us so we found a space big enough to accommodate the group with a tv in one of the student lounges. When the games were on everything stopped and they watched the games. They were as hardcore as any Superbowl fan and I was impressed. I understood they had to watch these games so I made sure to schedule activities around the games. The Italian kids were devastated when Italy lost in the semis. We had a few German students so of course they were happy when West Germany beat Argentina for the championship. Most of the students were rooting for the Deutsch since they were representing Europe so there was a lot of good energy for the game but it was nothing in comparison to watching the 3rd place game between England and Italy the day before. They Italians were crushed just a few days earlier when they lost the semis but here they were, rabid as ever, cheering on their team to victory. It was way more exciting than the finals game. They tried talking me into buying them some champagne to celebrate and they didn't take to kindly to being rebuffed. At home they drink wine, beer and champagne but I had to explain to them in the US there were age limits to who could drink. They just couldn’t get over that, especially when we had a couple of 18th birthdays where it is tradition for Italians to drink champagne. Despite that, it was a ridiculous summer, as in, ridiculously good. I’d wake up from my dorm room to bright sunshine and walk out my door treated to a close up view of the Pacific Ocean. Pepperdine is on a hill and right on the Pacific Coast Highway so no matter where you are on campus you have an unblocked view of the ocean. It was like living in paradise.

Some say San Francisco is paradise which I will agree with but only on sunny days when the skies are clear and blue and the arctic summer winds have subsided. Leaving my apartment to go watch soccer at 6:30am it was your typical June morning, cold, overcast, and foggy. It had the feel of one of those days where there is no time. Without the sun it looks the same all day, 7am is indistinguishable from 7pm. I stop at the corner and enter Central Tea and Coffee, my local java spot and order my usual tall dark roast. I’m almost shocked to see Michael working behind the counter. He just played the Yoshi’s gig, just hours ago I had seen him schlepping to his car with his guitars and amp in tow. Usually he doesn’t open the morning after a gig but there he was, looking like he could use eight hours of sleep. On his advice he pours a shot of espresso into my coffee. Good call since the screaming is set to begin in 30 minutes, gotta be ready. I walk the eight or so blocks to Mad Dog in the Fog sipping my brew. I walk past another pub, Danny Coyle’s, and it is jam packed so I know Mad Dog will be just the same, even more so, since it is a more popular place and has seniority. I’m meeting my friend David who has one of the coolest surnames on the planet, Cervantes. You have to be born cool to have the name Cervantes and David certainly is. He’s Brazilian American so he has that Brazilian appetite for life combined with the cultural broadness of being American and it makes him an interesting guy. He has an astute mind and an impressive vinyl collection. He never made the transition to digitized music, one of the rare people who hasn't ( I guess there is no transition if you were born after 1987). When I go to his house he's usually spinning some classic jazz from the 40's and 50's. He's married to a French gal name Pascal and she‘s into grand prix racing, especially the Le Mans. He actually has to leave the game a little after half time because he’s flying to the south of France to do some vacationing with the wife and her family. Nice life if you can get it.

As I approach Mad Dog I can see a line and two guys taking money at the door. Cover charge? Hmmm, I could watch the game at home for free or at many other places nearby. I usually watch World Cup soccer at Kezar Pub, which is always packed for sports but they never have a cover charge. As I contemplate whether I want to pay to get in I catch a whiff of the deal. $10 get’s you in but you also get two drink tickets so I decide it’s not such a bad deal after all so I give up a Hamilton and enter the fray. The energy level is high and so are the patrons. Everybody has a beer, many double fisted, which in this case a is wise choice. It was worse than a rugby scrum trying to get to the bar. Once there it only made sense to cash in both your drink tickets since you didn’t want to have to drill your way through the crowd to make good on your second. I made my way to the bar while miraculously texting David. He was finding a parking space. I let him know it was crowded beyond belief and he wasn’t too keen on paying the cover so he suggested we meet next door at Café International. I agreed to meet him there but with beer finally in hand I had my doubts I could get back to the front door. Like a salmon swimming upstream I muscled my way through the crowd and after about 10 minutes I could see the glow of foglight that was the front door and I exited the place like a fetus being jettisoned from a womb.

Café International was full of people but not body-to-body packed like Mad Dog. There were tables and chairs and a small couch in the middle which had been commandeered by a laptop wielding college student. Having only one big screen television, it made the crowd more intimate as we were all watching the same game. Mad Dog has tv’s everywhere and were showing both the US game and the England game and there were plenty of people there to root for the English. David ordered us some food and a few beers. The food was actually donuts. I used to do the donut/beer combo a lot in my LA and Mexico days but it was not something I brought with me to San Francisco, mostly because San Francisco is the bush leagues when it comes to donuts and LA is a donut paradise, at least it was when I lived there. I knew places in LA where you could get donuts right off the rack, hot and buttery, melt in your mouth donuts. Getting them hot off the racks usually meant showing up at about 3:30 or 4:00 in the morning. That just hilights a major shortcoming of San Francisco, the lack of 24 hour consumerism. In LA there was a 24 hour store for everything, usually with a drive thru attached. 24 hour places like Canter’s Deli and Tommy’s Burger were legendary. Donut shops, led by the homegrown donut chain Winchell's, were 24 hour a day places so no matter how hungry or lost you were in the wee hours of the morning in LA, you could always stop and get a donut and your bearings. Taco trucks, burgers, and donuts, it’s what you do after 2:30 in the morning in LA.

David and I are settled near the back of the International enjoying the game. England scored earlier in their game so the US had to score or be sent packing. For most of the game we had been treated to several “almost” scores. Soccer is the only sport where almost scoring is as exciting as scoring. Soccer goals develop so when a score seems imminent the anticipation of the crowd hits a crescendo that either erupts for a score or collapses mightily for a missed shot, the closer the miss the more dramatic the collapse. That is why 1-0 and 0-0 games can be terribly exciting. There have been three or four times when it looked for sure the US would score, so sure you already had your hand in the high five position, only to be let down by an errant or high kick. David had to bail about a half hour before the game was to be over and it wasn’t looking good for the US when he departed. It was 0-0 and neither Algeria or the US seemed like it would score as the game wore down. Algeria started playing for the tie as they kept most of their players back on defense. The US was getting more desperate because time was running out. Regulation time was over and now we were into Injury Time. Only a few minutes remained. For some unknown reason Algeria decided to attack and got a decent header shot but it was smothered by the American goalie. This gave an opportunity for the US to attack and the goalie quickly released the ball to teammates streaking down the sideline. A few quick forward passes later a US player was taking a good shot on goal which was deflected by the goalie, rebounded by a US player, and again deflected by the goalie but this time he had taken himself way out of position. For an eternity the ball spun around as frantic players tried to react and off screen out of nowhere comes Donovan to boot the ball into the goal, a clean shot the goalie had no chance to make a play on. The place erupted. It was fantastic. Most of the people in the place were thinking the WC for the states was soon to be over but in an instant everyone was reborn. People were jumping up and down, high fiving, hootin and hollerin, and hugging the nearest stranger. Pints were hoisted in honor of the goal and the win. It is a great feeling, it feels good to make the 6:00am wake up call and the breakfast beers seem worth the effort. I was feeling a bit delirious from the goal and the beers and I was loving every minute of it. When people combust spontaneously in a good way it’s like everybody gets high off of it. It’s the natural high, that’s why people love it world over, even us late-to-the-world-party Americans, who are finally catching on.

I headed back over to Mad Dog, I still had one drink ticket to dispense. The place was a mess but now path to the bar was clear. There were still a lot of people but they had spread out to the sidewalk in front and the patio in back. I saw a quite a few people with that happy stagger, them that enjoyed the game immensely but maybe had two beers too many. There is an afterglow in the place that can still be felt despite all the spilled beer on the floor. I drank my beer and watched the replays of the game on the dozen or so screens around the bar. On one tv there was a Wimbledon match being shown and I remember the score being 26-27. I thought that was odd because that was a ridiculously high score ofr a tennis match, and they were still playing! We were so into the soccer victory myself and the other people in the bar didn’t pay much attention to that score. Later on in the evening I found out the match would set a record for the longest tennis match of all time. It was so long they had to postpone it and finish it the next day. I stayed at Mad Dog talking to inebriated strangers about soccer and the chances of the US advancing to the quarterfinals. After a few more pints I decide it was time to head home. I wondered what we are all going to do for the rest of the day since we already shot our wad. It’s only 10:00 in the morning. There is still practically an entire day waiting to be lived. All I can think about at this time is getting out of the chilly fog and getting wrapped up in some blankets for deep sleep and dreaming.

As I lay me down to sleep I see that it is 11:00am. 12 hours ago I was starting one adventure and now I am ending another. It was a good 12 hours, all the fun and adventure made it seem like a vacation. 12 hours...you can change your life in 12 hours.