Match 8 - Benedict Arnold & The Last of the Sub-Saharan Africans
MSC World Europa (Cruise Ship)
When we first joined the cruise, it seemed really nice. The technology worked well, everything loaded to a card that gained entry to the ship, room, and had our payment information on it. But it’s a cute gimmick when nothing else seems to be planned very well. Why can’t we eat dinner before 7:30? Why do the ship scanners break sometimes, and we all have to wait for them to reset? Why is it impossible to call room service and you have to wait for a callback (been over a half hour, and then then hung up within 10 seconds, after I didn’t make it to the phone fast enough), why can’t we eat breakfast before 9? Why are we subjective to your absurd time table, which isn’t even built around the reason why you’re docked here… if a match is scheduled at a certain time, maybe anticipate needs around that?
I understand that some larger percentage of passengers opt for the all-inclusive package, that would suggest that serving more people faster is the less economically viable thing to do. But we did not opt for that and therefore have to pay for everything, so how is it possible that we spend most of our time waiting instead of spending money as captive consumers in their closed economy? Huge pet peeve of mine, waiting to spend money through incompetence. I think I may have brought this up in an earlier post. MSC, join the list of companies I’ll never deal with again because you make it too hard to take my money, not that any cruise ships were particularly high on my list to deal with.
A docked ship does solve one of the biggest problems with any sort of boat experience. You can always disembark! However, this tournament docked ship is pretty far from things, and it becomes pretty isolated. Read, my previous experience trying to get a taxi to take me to the port… At one point Zoe pointed out this is the first cruise we’ve been on in a decade. I had to unfortunately tell her that it actually has been two decades… enjoy these that I found! Which also continues to beg the question, why are cruise photos such a big deal? They offer a lot of photo opportunities… but why? Why are people doing them? Why is everyone? Why did we?
I hope you’ve finally recovered from laughing at those pictures. I hope you caught that I was rocking a blazer with cargo pants, and flip flops… There was a chocolate La’eeb on board, which is a bit haunting, children playing soccer on the main deck, with seemingly no rules and haphazardly just drilling balls into passersby. The best compliment I can give them is that they found a good parking spot. The view from the deck of downtown Doha was actually the best we’ve seen (notice the boats in that picture have sails that are different country’s flags). And a nice hot tub soak with readily available alcohol was appreciated.
England v. Senegal
Geez, is Al Bayt far. We’re so spoiled now. Being able to go to any match on the metro line. To transfer to a shuttle bus for free just feels rude. Though I suppose this is the last time I’ll ever have to go there! Okay, so I have to bring this up… there was this guy there, and he had two phones and on one he kept pulling up pictures of women (from what I can tell they were Facebook or Instagram pictures of people he was not friends with), and taking a picture of them at the game. I’m not sure what the goal was, but I’m hoping someone has some ideas. It was really sketchy. He did this for at least a half hour…
I had swapped jerseys and we belted out “God Save the King” (which is much slower than I thought it would be, and we may have replaced some words with “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee”). It’s hard for Americans to not assume England as a team to follow. With all the Premier League watching, we’re incredibly familiar with the entire squad already, there’s no language barrier, and we have that aforementioned special US-UK relationship. Among my very first soccer jerseys were David Beckham and Wayne Rooney (though my mother will point out that the very first soccer jersey I was ever given was a Sweden kit, she says she liked the color). And so, even while the fans are not the best, I’ve got my (new) loyalties and was ready to go.
England was dominant. Senegal had a couple early sniffs of goal, but once England went ahead, they rarely looked at risk. They have a deep talented team. Definitely a tournament favorite. I appreciated the first goal a lot, with Jordan and Jude hugging it out! Maybe? Jude is coming to Liverpool soon? I like the combination. Start churning the rumor mill.
The Senegalese fans put more steps and energy in than any fans I’ve seen. I’d pay double to be in one of their sections. It seems like an absolute hoot. It’s honestly too bad, that they and the majority of teams have not been able to be better attended by their hardcore fans… The count of neutrals and really uninterested attendees has been disappointing from an experiential standpoint. But gotta respect those Senegalese supporters, they put a better show on than most fans, definitely leading the Sub-Saharan African teams I’ve seen, the Cameroonians, but I can’t speak for the Ghanaians.