A Sea of Red

Utter insanity is the only way to describe it. I have never seen any place (town, city, province, country) grind to a halt the way Korea did for the Reds opening match of the 2006 World Cup. The game began at 10pm local time, after finishing work at 8:15 I met my friend Terry and we headed out for some dinner. Walking into the market area near where I work and he lives was like walking into a sea of red, everyone had Korea jerseys on. We grabbed a quick bite and proceeded to look for a good place to watch the game. There were many screens on the streets, practically at every storefront, be we decided we'd rather sit in a pub and enjoy the match the proper way... six bars later (in a small suburb of Seoul) we were finally able to get a seat in the back of a bar called Solle. By kickoff the bar was packed, and the soju was flowing (for the Koreans, Terry and I had a light night, long tournament after all). Togo scored first and I'm pretty sure you could here the gasp from Jeju to the DMZ. The second half was a different story, Korea scored twice after a Togolese red card... the place went crazy after the tying goal, and absolutely wild after what eventually became the winning goal. At the final whistle free beers for everyone in the bar were the order of the day, and I wasn't about to complain. Terry, Mike (who joined us for the second half), and myself stuck around for a bit to finish our fried chicken and free beer and were taught one of the Korean national cheers (which we already all knew) by a very... enthusiastic (to put it politely) woman from the table next to us. It was an interesting experience to be sure. I think everyone should try to be in a soccer-mad nation for at least one World Cup, it's an event unlike any other... but what if Korea wins? I think you may be able to hear us in BC...