To Be Spent Very Unwisely

“Daniel on Tour” with Ukraine in Germany, 2006: a blur of friends, floors and football

This time twenty years ago I left Ukraine, never expecting to return. I’d just finished my first year of teaching English and was off to Germany for the 2006 World Cup.

As a sucker for sentimentality, let’s take a wee trip down memory lane. It’s less about football - don’t worry, loyal non-football fan readers - and more about nostalgia and footballing fond memories.

With the certain fiasco of a World Cup about to kick off, I wanted to reminisce about my one and only visit to a World Cup.

Not that I can remember much of it.

9 June 2006: I left Lviv with barely any money to my name. I had a paltry salary by Western European standards, and luckily my kind boss David, gave me €100 as a parting gift with a note attached that read “to be spent very unwisely.” He was a good chap, was David.

Otherwise, I would be relying mainly on the generosity of friends to help fund the experience.

First stop: Munich

After missing a connecting train en route (the Lviv-Munich journey was around 24 hours), I arrived late for the England-Paraguay match, deeply upsetting Gen, my friend and generous host.

We hurried to the fan zone to meet up with her friends and get the party started with some early afternoon beers.

Here’s me in my Glentoran (Northern Ireland) top, my friend on the left (she’s somewhat camera shy). We’d met the year before in Prague, where we did our CELTA together.

I stayed in Gen’s cramped flat for a few days while she worked most of the time, taking in the sights, often by bicycle, carefully rationing my beer money and watching as much football as possible (obviously).

The highlight of Munich was the biergarten where I watched Spain clobber Ukraine, playing in their first World Cup, 4-0. Wearing my Ukraine top, nursing a beer, muttering under my breath and shaking my head every time Spain scored, I was joined at my table by four Canadians, who mistook me for a Ukrainian. I played along and managed to parlay my sorrow into two free beers, though by the end of the match, I think they suspected I wasn’t really Ukrainian. My lousy accent probably gave me away.

Next stop: Hamburg, by train

The first few days were spent watching on TV, soaking up the Munich Fan Fest atmosphere. Now it was time to go to some matches.

And so began a frenetic, helter-skelter couple of weeks of driving around Germany, racing from city to city to catch the matches.

I’d be meeting up with my good pal Andrew from high school, his girlfriend Maggie (now wife), his mother Eileen (my 11th grade English teacher), and Jen, a high school classmate, along with five or six of Andrew’s friends from university. They were all a great bunch.

Andrew had applied for as many tickets as possible in the lottery and was awarded multiple tickets for around ten matches, costing him no small fortune. I’m not sure how much thought was put into logistics, but my goodness, it was going to be a mad dash to make it in time to different cities.

As luck would have it, he had tickets for a couple of Ukraine matches, and I brought along the appropriate attire. From before Ukraine v Saudi Arabia:

Ukraine thrashed the Saudis 4-0.

Here’s me in the stadium, picture taken from way on the other side - can you spot me? Look very closely:

That night in Hamburg, in the infamous Reeperbahn…

Can’t talk about. What happens in the Reeperbahn absolutely must stay in the Reeperbahn. Suffice to say that I carried out David’s orders faithfully.

Leipzig, two days later

Iran v Angola (1-1). I didn’t attend this doozy of an encounter, instead waiting it out in the fan zone.

Things on this trip quickly became fuzzy. I have no recollection of what Leipzig looks like.

Nuremberg, the next day

Ghana v USA (2-1). Another match I had to sit out, watching from the fan zone with Jen. I was coming down with something and could barely speak. For some reason, perhaps due to my West Africa ties (having lived in Nigeria two years prior), we were both rooting for Ghana. When we admitted this to Andrew after he’d returned from the match in a foul mood, he was livid and threatened to not let me go to any more matches. I quickly apologised.

Berlin, the next day

I was a congested mess with a raging sore throat, pounding headache, my voice nearly gone. It was a very early start from Nuremberg to make it in time for Ukraine v Tunisia (1-0) at the Berlin Olympiastadion. As it was, we were late. Traffic was abysmal, we had to park way too far away, and ended up sprinting to get there, arriving some 25 minutes late. The only goal of the match came late in the second half, a dubious penalty dispatched by Andriy Shevchenko.

Afterwards, to celebrate Ukraine’s progression to the knockout round, we visited the Brandenburg Gate’s fan zone and partied till the wee hours. By this stage, we were very much the worse for wear. I have no memory whatsoever of this photo being taken:

The next day, don’t know where

Some hotel room somewhere, I have no idea at this point. We all watched Argentina v Mexico (2-1, AET) on TV (apparently), thankful not to be in a car trundling off to another match.

Have I mentioned that I was mainly sleeping on hotel room floors?

One day later, ticket swapping

I’m thankful that I was able to attend three matches in all. The final match I had tickets for was a 2nd round knockout affair between England and Ecuador in Stuttgart, a match I was underwhelmed for.

Andrew had tickets for the 2nd round match that day between the Netherlands and Portugal, back in Nuremberg, but he wanted to see England.

So we swapped and I went to Nuremberg with Eileen and a friend of hers for a tempestuous, highly entertaining 1-0 victory for Portugal. I was disappointed, having a soft spot for the Dutch.

England won 1-0 in what was a tame affair. I chose wisely.

I was offered tickets for Ukraine’s 2nd round match against Switzerland in Cologne the following day, but I had plans to make my way west, and I was flat broke by this point.

That night was utter hell. It was time to say goodbye as I headed off to Brussels to see a couple of friends (where we watched more matches). Nuremberg train station was chaotically crowded, and it was a lengthy, arduous journey to Belgium after spending the night in the station, desperately seeking a free bit of space to snooze. There had been precious little sleep on this trip, and I was in rough shape.

Everything is a complete blur by now.

The postscript: Euro 2012

That may have been my only World Cup experience, but six years later, lo and behold I was (unexpectedly) back in Ukraine, this time living in Kyiv for the 2012 European Championships, co-hosted with Poland.

My parents came out to visit. Here’s my mother being fleeced for a few euros - she naively thought these kind mascots were mere ‘volunteers’.

I applied for tickets all over Ukraine (Kyiv, Lviv, Kharkiv and Donetsk), but was only able to attend one match, the quarterfinal between England and Italy, with my old man. Here I am outside the Olimpiyskiy Stadium beforehand:

It finished 0-0, Italy winning on penalties.

Did you spot me earlier?

Look, here I am, waving my Ukraine scarf:

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Thank you for the lovely, kind feedback from last week’s Nigeria post. Part two, my ordeal in prison, is coming next week. (Reliving the trauma has been harder than anticipated; bear with me)

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An oldie in case you’re interested and/or missed it the first time:

On living in Ukraine and ending up in Austria

Should You Move to Austria (via Ukraine)?

Whether you love or hate football, go ahead and click on the heart to show me how much you appreciate me enlightening your day.

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Daniel is (or was?) a long-time English as a Foreign Language teacher, author, shining wit (and lover of spoonerisms), and cynical curmudgeon. If you would like to support him (thanks!), he’s written a few books, and they’re available from your preferred retailer. Actually, that’s not entirely true: only A Classroom in Kyiv is (and in print) but the other ones are currently only available as ebooks at Amazon or directly from him below: