Shakthar, the Donetsk soccer team, played Kiev Dynamo on Sunday night and I thought this would be a great opportunity for some of Laura’s English intensive people to see a different side of Ukrainian culture. These are the two best teams in Ukraine and there is a deep rivalry between them. I bought 21 tickets (at $0.60 a piece you can’t go wrong) and found a crowd to go. Due to some people backing out at the last minute, a crowd of 17 foreigners headed to town to chant “Shakthar Champion” with the locals.
We took a trolley bus into the center (8km) and then a tram to the stadium (2km). I had already gone to a game with two of them last year and they were wise to my ways… they warned the others to “stick close to Dave” because “sometimes he doesn’t look back.” Fortunately for them I’m not as serious about soccer as baseball back home; sometimes I have almost lost Laura because I “needed” to see the first pitch. Luckily we all stayed together and all got into the stadium almost on time.
The game was as intense as it was billed; it was a sellout crowd of around 30,000 mostly-rowdy fans. We sat in about the worst seats in the house (but I’m not complaining, they were worth every penny of the price) and were only one section over from the Kiev fan club. This was an interesting location, the rivalry encouraged both sets of fans to hold nothing back. They clearly demonstrated that they all had vast repertoires of rude words and gestures for to yell at and show the others when necessary (which just happened to be all the time). Many in the group recognized some of the gestures but, fortunately for them, they didn’t understand most of what was being said. Not that my vocabulary is vast in the “four-letter word” category but spending time with kids has helped it to develop some. Being the only person in the group who lives here, I was the “expert” the group turned to for answers. Fortunately for me, I only got asked if we were “safe” three times and, wisely or naïvely, I always answered “of course.”
The game ended up being a 1-1 tie and both teams put on a good show. It was pretty even but if I had to voice my opinion I would say Kiev was the better team. I hope, for my own safety, that no one from Donetsk reads this heresy.
The real adventure started after the game. It seemed that taking the large group home would take more thought than I had originally planned. We started out at the bus station where the vans leave from (usually quite regularly). Using my deductive reasoning, the fact that there were around 200+ people in front of us and we only saw one van in the 20+ minutes we waited, I estimated that we would have to wait approximately all night to get home. We walked to the trolley bus stop and waited another 20+ minutes. As far ass I could tell, no busses were running. I made some calls and found that, at 11pm on a Sunday night, my van driver friends are either busy and/or sleeping. We found a crew of taxis willing to take us home and weren’t too badly ripped off for the trip home. Fortunately there were no complainers in the group… although I probably deserved at least one or two for my poor planning. It was an adventure the group will probably remember.
Dave
