'round the world in one saturday

name that flag

woke up very early saturday, the 10th. quick change to a red shirt and a walk to the neighborhood pub where i was immediately taken to frankfurt, germany for world cup game 3. grabbed an ice cold pint of belgian hoegaarden. nothing like beer for breakfast. england star and world icon beckham bends a free kick to score off an own goal off the top of the head of the paraguayan team captain. england 1, paraguay nil. halftime. and i headed to the nearby white castle to grab some all-american junk fast food to complete my breakfast of champions. back to the pub. game ends with the score unchanged. though the neighborhood brits celebrate the win, they are a bit wary of the unconvincing win. i headed back home to pick up my bike. and went to the nearby russian barber. or is that barbress if it's a she? got myself a nice summertime army cut.

once that was done, headed to mccarren park where there was some puerto rican fair of sorts. some boricuan music filled the air as i grabbed myself lunch from one of the food stalls. calamari uno mas. with salsa, which i guess is their version of marinara sauce. once i finished my meal, i headed to the nearby footy field to catch a bit of the neighborhood mexican league. almost got hit by one of the players running after the ball. only casualty was my bike that got pinned down but no worries. sitting close to me on the ground was a polish father and daughter. with them 2 ecuadorian girls playing with the daughter. kinda funny seeing them get along actually especially after the ecuadorians beat the poles the day before 2-0. once i was tired of trying to translate their polish conversations to no avail, biked back home to catch the last few minutes of the sweden and trinidad match. T&T manage to draw with the swedes 0-0 and they celebrated as though they had won the world cup. was a great atmosphere to see.

took a quick nap after to recover a bit from the waking up early. a text message from a dutch friend wakes me up, keeping me posted on the human rights film fest movie plans we had. once the quick respite was over, i was on my bike again, heading to another bar nearby in the heart of williamsburg to enjoy the argentina and cote d' voire match. the ivory coast players dominated the first few minutes but the argentines proved stronger with a 2-1 win. once the day's final game was over, i rushed to the bikram yoga center for some much needed detoxifying to rid myself of the crap id been inducing. rupee, the tattoo-laden instructor of indian descent, was there with her usual friendly neighborhood yogi greeting. actually, she grew up in montreal, canada, really. had a good class. felt much energized after. energized enough to return the call of a filipino friend who happened to be in town and whom i have not met the past 4 years or so. once done leaving her a message, i grabbed myself some thai iced tea and a filling veggie green curry dinner. biked back home and grabbed a cappucino in the neighborhood italian cafe to cap off a nice day of exploring the world all in the confines of williamsburg, brooklyn.

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the flags: germany, belgium, england, paraguay, usa, russia, puerto rico, mexico, poland, ecuador, sweden, trinidad and tobago, netherlands, argentina, ivory coast, india, canada, philippines, thailand, italy, and the state of brooklyn.