Game Day!! Portugal vs Spain

29th June 2010

After first day not going according to plan, we decided to consult the admin of where we stay, they also provides services to book certain trips and activities. So second day we decided to stay in the city since we don't want to be late for the game ;)

We started to climb the Signal Hill (the starting point is like 10 minutes walk from where we stayed) around 10 pm. Bumped into one local guy. He was asking us where to go. Turns out he is concerned about us. We were told to keep our cameras in the bag, the actual place is safe, but getting there, the road is a bit quite. We were also told to be vigilant, do not let any strangers talk to us.

We were the first one that gets to the hill, it was windy and freezing cold, then hill overloking Cape Town city, waterfront and Green Point Stadium. The Noon Gun ceremony was initially intended to signal the sailor, such that when the gun is fired at 12 pm, sailors around Cape Town waters will reset their watch.These days, it was continued in honour of the ceremony.

with one of the navy on duty, Alistair

The other tourists arrived in taxis and vans, seems like we were the only two that climbed by foot ;p After the ceremony, we went down and make way to Bo Kapp, a supposedly Muslim area. There is one restaurant, and we decided to have lunch there. The tagline is 'Malay Cape Food' but when I looked at the menu, only one that I can identify with Malaysia, Pienang Curry (yup, spell that way). The rest is more Indian than Malay, lots of other curries, and main dish is beriyani. But the thing that ticks me the most is this. Anybody ever heard of this?

We didn't even finished lunch when the rain started pouring, and both of us did not have neither rain coat nor umbrella. After lunch, we decided to find a mosque, but most of the mosque are locked, we made way by foot to the city, and bought ourselves raincoats before heading to stadium. The day was getting colder and it was only 2.30pm. Passed by waterfront and the Japanese-Paraguay was shown on the big screen. Not many people as it was still raining.

So we made way to stadium and waited till we can get in. 3 hours before kick off, the gate is opened. There is a fan zone that consist of sponsors camps set up all over. I was like a kid in a candy store jumping from one camp to another. 1.5 hour before kick off, we went to look for our seat. We got the second tier seating despite paying the Category 1 ticket. I saw from my place that Eduardo, Portuguese goalkeeper came out for warm up.

I quickly ran down trying to get a closer look. I got a close up look on the whole team ;)

too bad that my favorite no 6 did not come close..so lelaki ini je la yang enterframe..hehehe...

It was an entertaining game despite the bummer that is only one of my favorite team will advance to q-final. I really enjoyed the live game experience. I was lucky that the ticket that I bought one year ago, is for this particular match. Where and when again I get to see Spain vs Portugal, only Allah knows.

We went back exhausted, partly due to the endless walking, which is compounded by walking in the rain, but satisfied ;)