Stay true to the dreams of thy youth

This last week, the national Swedish team traveled to Cairo to play the Egyptian national team in a friendly soccer match at the absolutely enormous Cairo Stadium (it can fit 80,000 people +). We grabbed some of our Egyptian friends to buy tickets with us, and we called everyone we knew to come as well. The turn out was interesting.



At my apartment, I live with one other American, and two Swedish guys. These guys in turn have two Swedish friends, a Norwegian friend, and another American friend. Well, news of the match went through the grapevine, and we ended up with:
12 Egyptians
5 Americans
8 Swedes
2 Norwegians
and 1 German.

Only a few years ago did Egypt start letting females into the Cairo stadium... we had 8 attractive woman with us, many of whom were blond... quite a sight in Cairo.

We arrived at the stadium as the match was about to start, and were mobbed by admiring Egyptians. "Welcome to Egypt" "What's your name?" etc etc. A random guy walked up to us and pulled out this enormous Swedish flag with "Egyptson" (an Egyptian-Swedish company) written on it. Through some wonderful Egyptian connections, he managed to get us through a locked gate and into some open chairs, where we unfurled the huge Swedish flag... in Cairo. I forgot to mention the cute Swedish girls were all wearing blue shirts and yellow scarves... let's just say they stood out a bit.

The game progressed; Sweden played terribly, Egypt played fairly well, and the match ended 2-0, Egypt! I was Egyptian for the night and celebrated with my Egyptian friends. During the match, a different friend who was watching the game from home called and said we had been on Egyptian television twice... what can I say, we're celebrities here :) It was quite a night.

I'm attending the wedding of a friend's Dad tomorrow, should have some good stories to tell.