Confederations Cup (6/29)

The finals for the confederations cup was last night. This is the last big tournament before the world cup exactly one year from now. It has no bearing on the qualification process for the world cup, but it's a big tournament which is supposidly a good indicator of future performances next year.

The final match in the confederation cup was USA vs Brazil ("El paiz maz grande de mundu" this spanish saying when said with a mocking brazilian accent translates to "The largest country in the world"... this fact is of course not true, but try explaining that to a brazilian...)

SO finals... US vs Brazil. To get here the US pulled an incredible upset against #1 ranked Spain. Before playing the USA they were not only undefeated, they hadnt even been scored on in this tournament. We shocked the world with a 2-0 win.

Going into the final game we were looking great, 2 shots on net, 2 goals. US was leaidng Brazil 2-0 going into the half. The Brazilians were off their game. Ama had to stop watching the game at halftime and couldnt see the end; she had to do math homework. Which I assigned. That's hilarious.

Anyways 40 seconds into the 2nd half brazil turned it on, scored an incredible goal, and danced and shot with a samba flair all over the field as they scored 2 more. 2-3 final score, brazil wins again. weak.

But all this talk of brazillians reminds me of a joke...

Donald Rumsfeld rushes into the oval office and says to George ("Dubya") Bush
"Mr President, we just got the news. In our fight against terror, 2 Brazillian Soldiers were killed last night."

Clearly devastated Bush collapsed to the ground, looked up at Rumsfeld and asked
"Oh my god.... how many is a brazillion?"

(Cueue Kevin Eubanks and Smitty with the "Tonight show" punchline music)

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So this morning I'm at my midtown taxi station (every day I take one taxi here, wait till it fills, and then take another ride to my final destination.) and a loud Ghanaian man approached me. My instinct was to ignore him. But I remembered where I was and I said "hello". We talked and he proceeded to hold my hand and walk me to my taxi stop. I'm very familiar with where I needed to go, but he seemed so happy to help I just couldnt say no.

Another cultural sidenote: Husbands and wives show no PDA (Public Displays of Affection) here and literally ignore each other in public. But it's totally OK to hold hands with another dude and walk down the street....