We went to the finals of the Tusker Cup yesterday. The Tusker Cup is held every year to determine the best team in East Africa (and two other teams from Africa are invited to round out the field). The 3-4 game involved Uganda and Ethiopia. The 1-2 game involved Cote d'Ivoire (an invite team that qualified for the World Cup this year) and the home squad, Tanzania.
The game was played at National Stadium. It seats 60,000 people and was built by the Chinese as a favour for other concessions in the country (I don't know what the concessions were but I'm sure it was an open, transparent, rule-of-law type thing that benefits everyone, right? right??). We (a group that did not include Josey) took a taxi downtown and got out across the street from the stadium. People were running and queueing, looking for tickets. There was not a ticket booth per se. We were adopted by a couple of locals and they tried to sort us out. We eventually got some VIP tickets which meant that we would have great seats and be in the shade. The average ticket was 1,000 Tsh (66 cents). We finally got some tickets that were originally 4k but we got them for 6k.
The entire time we were there, we were the only white people that I saw. We were a bit of a novelty. We arrived in time for the second half of the 3-4 game. That game ended 4-3 for Uganda and was very exciting. At that point the two women with us left and eventually returned with beer. Now, the tournament was sponsored by Tusker (a brewery) but the stadium was dry. So the girls gave 10,000 Tsh to a guy to smuggle 5 cans of beer through security. Once through security, they were approached by a police officer who saw the tail end of this transaction (ie. a man pulling cans of beer out of his pockets and socks). The beer smuggler had to end up sharing half of his 5,000 Tsh profit from the transaction with the officer. So, we had beer.
Tanzania were the underdogs but got a penalty kick in the first half for a hand ball in the box. They scored on that and managed to shut down the d'Ivoirians the rest of the way. It was great to be in the stadium (Tanzania has not won this tournament since 1994). This was my first live match and it was great. I actually would have preferred to have been a little higher so I could see the play unfold a little more easily.
That is all. I (Josey has to work) am flying to Zanzibar (the price to fly for 20 minutes is almost the same as that for a 3 hour ferry ride) for a few days today. We fly to Istanbul on Saturday, where we will spend three days before flying to Paris for eleven (!) days. Still doesn't seem like Christmas with this weather but the calendar assures me that I better get some shopping done soon.
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