Fußball

As in most other parts of the world, and especially Europe, soccer (futbol, fussball, football, fotboll, etc) is by far the most popular sport.

To get part of this European experience, we went to a Hertha BSC home game here in Berlin. Hertha is the Berlin team, and brings out every type of Berliner in support for them. We were lucky enough to get tickets to the Hertha/Hamburg game, which was extremely popular since Hamburg is such a good team, and known for their rowdy fans.


[Annie and Sean on the way to the game]

After class, since the game was on a Tuesday, we all headed to Rathaus Stegliz, got dinner for the road and headed to the stadium, which lies at the north-west part of the city. Another cool fact about Hertha is that they play in the Olympia Stadion, or the Olympic Stadium that was built under Hitler's commission for the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. Since then, it has obviously been redone and was used for the final game of the last World Cup.


[The Stadium]

When we got there, there were already lots of fans coming on the train, as well as kiosks and tailgaters in the parking lot. If you imagine Germans, European cars, and tailgating mixed, you get exactly what we saw: Germans eating bratwursts and drinking beer from the trunk of their SmartCar or equally tiny vehicle waiting for a soccer game to start.

Although we were there with our Hertha Scarves and great attitudes, we were nothing in comparison to the real Berliners, who had probably been drinking since the late afternoon, had scarves tied around their waists to look like skirts and sat in the real fan section.


[Where all the crazy Hertha fans sit]


[Inside the stadium... the field is not covered so that real grass can grow, but all the fan seating is under a roof]

We had pretty good seats anyway, a little further up, but in the middle of the field so we could see all the action. Just like any US sporting event, there was overpriced drinks and food. A liter of beer was 8 Euro, about 12 dollars, including the cost of the cup, which you can return for 2 Euro if you want.


[Sal, Hans and I being spirited]

The game ended up being rather slow, ending in a 0-0 tie. But the fact that more than 40 people from our program were there made it a lot of fun to just being hanging out in a big group one last time before the end of the semester.


[Jessica, Aaron, Annie and Tim with some face paint... I tried to write Hertha on Casey's face, but lets just say problems arose when I realized i forgot about the silent h...]

I wish that I had gotten to experience the awesomeness of Hertha games before this, since they are already done with their home season. If I were ever to go to another game, I would definitely sit in the fan section. Although they are rowdy and the police are surrounding the section to make sure no fights break out, it was so much fun to see them so into the game, waving flags and singing songs.


[The pool at Olympia Stadion. When Hertha wins, apparently everyone jumps into the pool, no matter what time of year. Also well known for Leni Riefenstahl's underwater scenes of divers from the 1936 Olympics.]