Arsenal v. Newcastle United

Despite all the football craziness, I never made it to a football match in Istanbul. In fact, I am about 99.99% sure I have never made it to a professional football match in my life (do they even have footyball in Texas)?

We were supposed to go to the Arsenal match on Paul's birthday as a celebration. Then comes the tube strike and the game is postponed. I chalked it down as a loss and figured I probably would never get to go t a match while I was here.

Then, as Paul was browsing ESPN or some other such sport night, we realised there was a game on a weekend, this past weekend in fact.  Arsenal versus Newcastle United - we were going to be there

The stadium is very easy to get to - it's almost in the city center, just take the Picadilly line up to Zone 2. From there, we just followed the crowds to the stadium. I feel so bad for people who live on that walk up. Even though we got there 5 minutes before the start, there were still hundreds of people making their way to the stadium, not the best for entering/exiting your place of residence!

One of the many pop-up stores on the road to the stadium. The
scarves are very Harry Potter-esque to me

The fact that this was my first professional match tells you a bit about my level of soccer knowledge - basic. I couldn't tell you the exact rules for off-sides, or hand ball, so I spent a lot of the first half of the game asking Paul questions like "what was that flag for?" or "can you empty the net like in hockey?". The fact that it was a slow first half probably didn't help. It was in a tie - at 1 to 1.

The stadium - too bad they couldn't bring a little bit of the Middle East
heat from the UAE to the stadium. While it is roofed, it isn't closed,
and therefore not heated. Brrrrr

The second half though is where it got interesting. There were back and forth goals to tie up the game at 3-3. Then with about 20 minutes left, Arsenal exploded. They scored 3 goals within 5 minutes and ended up winning the game 7 to 3. It was an experience like nothing else. Throughout the whole game, people were chanting along to songs, cheering them on. Perhaps a bit like college (american) football, but more organised. For next time, I'll have to learn a few chants so I can sing along!

More Football MADNESS

So I think I may have jumped the gun in my earlier post about the football games that were winding up here.

This weekend was the final game of the season - there are no playoffs in the league here, league winner is the champion.

As it ended up, Galatasaray (#1) and Fenerbahçe (#2) were playing. There were separated by 1 point. If one team won, they won the league. If they had a tie, Galatasaray won by default because they had the most points. No extra time, no kick off. The end.

We went down to a restaurant in Bebek to watch the game with some friends. As we live on the European side, there tended to be more Galatasaray fans, but Paul is a Fenerbahçe supporter and I decided to cheer them on too because I always like an underdog win.

The madness is not because of the game itself - it wasn't fantastic play with lots of exciting goals and saves. In the end, no one even scored, although there was a player from each team ejected with a red card, and more yellow cards and "injuries" than I think I have ever seen in a football match before.

The real madness came after the game.

First off, the Fenerbahçe fans at the game REVOLTED. This confuses me too, because it is their own stadium, but they went crazy nonetheless. They threw things at Galatasaray players as they celebrated and exited the stadium, then they stormed the field and threw chairs, benches, trash cans and more at the riot police. I even saw one fan throwing the riot police shield back at the police. It seems more like a World Cup game than an end of the season playoff game.

Throughout the rest of Istanbul and Turkey, all the Galatasaray fans were celebrating. In Bebek, traffic was stopped with people yelling, waving flags, setting off flares, honking their horns. I think it may have been the biggest celebration I have ever seen.

Lessons learned? Turkey loves their football teams. Oh and make sure to only attend a game when you know your team will win!!

Football!

Paul requested me to write a blog (which he almost never does after the time I bugged him for weeks straight to write a guest post). The requested topic was our most recent weekend in Istanbul. This request was not because of anything too exciting. Really, to burst everyone's expat bubble, we (at least we as in me, Paul and our friends) do not spend every weekend at some ancient, awesome site in the city. Maybe dinner on the Bosphorous, of which you should be incredibly jealous because it is amazing as I recently described, but other than that, we live a similar life to what we lived in the States. Dinner with friends, watching a movie, cleaning house and even bowling, just in a much cooler, older, bigger city. So back to my opening statement, Paul asked me to write a post about our weekend because we a) went bowling (no biggie) and b) Paul got a turkey in Turkey (definition of a turkey is 3 strikes in a row). He had his all-time high score of 202. What what!  I won't even tell you about my meager score. Unfortunately for him, he took the camera with him on his trip today, which means the world will have to wait to see proof of this feat.

Now, on to the real highlight of the week/weekend in Istanbul.  Football. And for you Americans, football = soccer.

Istanbul has 3 sports teams in the city. Beşiktaş, Fenerbahçe and Galatasaray. This week were the some of the final matches between these teams and one more Turkish team in football. There was a big match up on Sunday. It was a bit of a nail biter because Fenerbahçe had to win to be able to play Galatasaray in the final, as Galatasaray is ahead by 1 game. Don't judge me for incorrectness on 'football' terms here - this may be a language I need to learn more of, but that's another day, another blog.

Oh. My. Goodness. People here love their football. I have heard it said that the best time to get around the city are during these matches because everyone is at home watching the game. They have banned opposing fans from the games due to things being thrown, general meanness towards fans and some agreement I have heard mentioned between the teams that seems odd to me. As much as we wanted to attend a game, tickets are hard to come by. Who has the hookup for next Saturdays game?