Might as well, it’s not like I’ll want or be able to do anything *else* tonight! Though some poor football fan is going to end up here via Google and be terribly disappointed. Not in South Africa, sorry. Also, I’ll be duplicating this on the travel blog – I don’t know if anyone actually reads both this one and that, but if so, don’t bother tonight!
They’re already congregating for the game (2 hours away still.) There’s so much noise it’s hard to parse the sounds but I swear I just heard a crowd singing along to the end of “You’ll Never Walk Alone.” WTF? Seems like an unlikely football song!
Half an hour or so ago I went down to check out what’s going on (and to get an ice cream cone. Of course I wore an orange top – I wanted to blend in! There’s music playing, though it’s not live; the beer tents are already set up and someone planned intelligently because there are sprinklers in a few places. People here aren’t used to this much heat – today is very slightly cooler than yesterday but it’s a little more humid. So sprinklers are a good idea, so they don’t have people getting heat exhaustion. It’s not terribly crowded yet, but between the people, the beer tent and the big screen you already have to walk around rather than through the square. It’s going to be packed tonight!
The vuvzelas are already going full blast. The noise level is already comparable to anything except an actual goal from any of the previous games, beginning to reach Queen’s Day levels already. (I bet it will be quieter when people are paying attention to the actual game, except of course for when something happens.
Apologies in advance for the lack of photos: between the crowds and the sprinklers, I don’t think I want to go walk around with a camera tonight. Hard to take pictures of a crowd from within it, anyway.