Conflicted viewing

As most of the world knows, FIFA's World Cup started on Friday.

Aside from a 1994 World Cup t-shirt I received as a gift, I recall that when I first remember hearing about the World Cup in 2002.  I was in Newfoundland at the time and was relatively upset to hear people who otherwise seemed to have no interest in soccer/football acting as though this was an event they cared about.  I couldn't understand how something that I basically hadn't ever heard of could be used as an excuse to cancel classes at university or motivate departments to book lecture halls for mass viewings.  Just about everything associated with the World Cup seemed implausible and upsetting.

In 2006 just as the next World Cup was getting underway my parents began hosting a Brazilian grad student for the summer.  Not surprisingly, she was interested in watching the World Cup - or at least those games in which Brazil was playing.

My recollection is that my parents didn't have cable or maybe they didn't have a functional TV - in any event, it was decided that World Cup viewing would happen at the house in which I was staying at the time (and that just happens to be adjacent to my parents' house).  As I didn't have all that much furniture we were able to arrange everything in the living room to maximize our comfort while watching Brazil's games.

Of course, it didn't take all that long for Neil and I to enjoy watching the games and start rooting for Brazil.

Somehow in this midst of this increasingly intense World Cup experience a English friend without cable called out of the blue and asked if he could bring his Canadian-born kids over to watch England play for the first time.  Within a matter of minutes they were in place for the game.

We were then drawn into the World Cup experience in a way I could never have expected even a week or two before.  All of a sudden I began to see why even people who otherwise aren't particularly soccer fans might enjoy following the event.

By the time 2010 rolled around I was living with Neil and Rebecca in Halifax and most of the games were easily streamable.  Instead of studying for then still-unscheduled comps (in my defense, I likely didn't even have a reading list by the time the event started) along with Neil (and sometimes Rebecca and Jeannette) I watched many more games than was likely healthy.  I was fully hooked on the experience and even more convinced that of all of the non-annual international sporting events it was the best.

It's so clearly the best because it happens only once every four years.  Or to put it differently, not so frequently that its appearance isn't noteworthy or that you're still burned out from all of the soccer you watched last time around.  On top of that, and very much in contrast to the Olympics (Summer or Winter), by including only one sport it is almost possible for an dedicated individual to watch every game.  And even if you don't watch every game there are few enough games that it is quite easy to keep up with the developments occurring in those games you don't watch.  Of course it's also nice that even though soccer is played world-wide only a limited number of the best teams qualify for each World Cup.  And even better is that when you live in a place like Canada that isn't likely to qualify this means that you (and also the networks covering the event) can focus on good games rather than distracting national allegiances.

Of course as enjoyable as the World Cup is as casual viewer, it's not entirely without its issues.  Last Week Tonight with John Oliver did a great job of introducing a variety of these significant issues in a recent episode.



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So, eight years after Neil and I first began watching World Cup coverage Neil opted out because of dissatisfaction with the organization behind the event.  I, on the other hand, am also disappointed with the organizing body - but obviously not to the extent that I have decided to skip the event.  Instead, Jeannette have taken advantage of several cancellations this weekend to watch as much of the coverage as possible.