All The Reds

6-12-2010
Day 99 of 365: World Cup. Soccer. The world's sport. It's bigger than the Super Bowl, World Series, NBA Finals, and Tiger Woods scandal combined. "All the Reds" is the slogan this year for South Korea. In 2002, when the World Cup was hosted by SK, the slogan was, "Be the Reds", followed by, "All the Reds Go Together" in 2006. Never in my life have I been interested in "the other football" until I came here. Soccer is the national sport, followed by baseball, and then, I don't know...badminton? Honestly, no matter where you're at, it's hard not to catch soccer fever right now.

On the world stage, Korea's baseball presence might not be felt so much, with their most famous player still being ancient pitcher Chan Ho Park. These days, there are 2 big Korean names in sports. The first is Yuna Kim, the Olympic gold medal figure skater (who everybody knows), and the other is the guy in the picture: Ji Sung Park. I'd never heard of him until I came to SK, but he's a national hero, famous for being less talented than many of his peers, but working hard to get to the top. This is not surprising considering that in 2009, Korea as a nation averaged the most hours worked per week of any modern country. Now, Park Ji Sung (as he's known in SK) is the captain of the underdog South Korea team who put a whooping on Greece in the first round of the World Cup. He didn't disappoint, adding the nail in Greece's coffin late in the match to seal a 2-0 victory.

Having sent most of my money home 3 weeks ago to put toward my student loans and beloved Honda Civic (I miss her), I left myself the bare minimum amount of cash to get by with. Unfortunately, I forgot that there was a monthly maintenance bill due for my apartment building, which, in the end, left me with $10 for the next 11 days until I get payed next. It felt like I was in college all over again. This meant that, instead of making a trek to Seoul to watch the game with legions of Korean soccer fanatics, I quietly watched it with ten other people in a pretty little coffee shop in Ansan. This wasn't exactly what I had in mind, but it was still a fun time and I'm glad SK got the win. I am now down to roughly $1.20 with 2 days to go, but I've got a new box of cereal and a carton of milk to help get me by. I was considering making a joke about knowing how North Korea feels now, but that would just be wrong.

After the SK vs Greece match on Saturday night, I had set my alarm for 330am so that I could catch the US team's first round match vs England. I dreamed that I woke up. Instead, I was up and at my computer around 830 the next morning to find that we tied 1-1. I think a lot of Americans were satisfied with this result since England is a superior team in most people's eyes. Naturally I'm cheering for my home country to do well, but it's been fun jumping in with everyone else and supporting my current home team also. "When in Korea...", right?