跟当地人踢足球: Football with the locals

UIBE, 21ºC, scattered showers

There is a World Cup going on right now. You can hardly miss it. Everywhere I walk on the UIBE campus, I see football shirts – France, England, Germany and South Korea to name but a few. Although China is not involved, Beijing is still buzzing with World Cup fever.

This afternoon, four of us went out to the football turf to have a knock around. However, the gate was locked. There were three Chinese students who had also come out to play football. Together, we manage to find a small opening in the fencing large enough to slip through. After some introductions in our basic Chinese, we started a small match of 当地人 locals vs 外国人 foreigners. Half an hour later, the gates to the field were open, and a steady stream of students was pouring into the stadium. We added numbers to our game, and suddenly had an 8 v 8 match.

I started to pick up on the “football-speak”. 来的 – “man on / look out”. 好的 – “nice / good”. 漂亮 – “beautiful / well-played”. Although these phrases are relatively simple, I still didn’t quite understand the phrase “pass it”. Each time a player wanted the ball, they seemed either to groan or to clap twice in quick succession. In no other country have I seen this before.

The game really livened up when an enthusiastic goalkeeper sporting a bright orange top joined in. He wore padded shorts, and brand new gloves. He barked orders at everyone as though he were a Wall Street trader, except he emanated a joy akin to that of a child who got everything she wanted from Santa last Christmas. I couldn’t understand a word he said, yet I knew when he wanted me to push wide and when he wanted me to pass it back to him. Such is the nature of the beautiful game.