World Cup 2006 Fan Fest

June 8, 2006 · Filed Under Uncategorized 


Last night we went to the opening of the Berlin World Cup Fan Fest where I bought my very first American flag that I”ll be hanging out my window when the World Cup starts tomorrow. The Fan Fest is a huge street party that will take place throughout the World Cup and can be found on the Strasse des 17. Juni, between the Siegesaule and Brandenburg Gate (a 2.5 km stretch). It has many huge screens set up to show the games and at night the area will be a giant open air disco.

Oh yeah, and I’m on Italian television! Some reporter came up and wanted a comment from me (USA and Italy are in the same group in the opening round), so I’m on TV saying “Ciao Italia!” Also, in the same group is Ghana and Czech Republic, so they were probably like, “PHEW! Finally a fan from our group!”

I only met one other American there, and unfortunately he came up to us about one second after I ran into Harald Siedentop (a friend from Schering that we used to play cards with), so I didn’t get a chance to talk to him. I hope he didn’t feel blown off, just bad timing is all.

Oh, I did experience some negative reactions. One guy walked past me and said, “Amerikaner *spitting noise*”. Then another guy said, “Ist das ein Amerikaner? Ist gar nicht klar!” (Is that an American? It’s not clear.” Rainer said the guy was just confused because I look Asian, but his tone of voice was more criticizing than confused, so I don’t know what his problem was.

Overall, it was a lot of fun and the music was really good. Should be exciting to go see the games here, and hopefully there will be more Americans around then, because standing around being patriotic and cheering “USA! USA!” just isn’t fun when you’re the only one doing it.

Behind the scenes, the staging area behind the Brandenburg Gate

One of the entrances to the Fest. We had our bags searched and were patted down.

The stage

Another pic of the stage

A random crowd shot. These guys were actually dancing comically, but it doesn’t come across at all in the photo.

The Anti-Conflict Team enjoys the musical performance. A brochure was printed out warning English fans that the Nazi salute is illegal in Germany. I didn’t know that (but I did know that it’s a crime to deny that the Holocaust happened). Learn something new everyday.

Some fans playing a little football. I don’t know what’s up with the bunny ears, but a lot of people were wearing them.

The Coca-Cola bigscreen with the Fernsehturm (TV antenna) in the background. The antenna has been painted to look like a football (in Deutsche Telekom pink, argh).

The Fest with the Siegesaule (Victory statue) in the background (Bono is standing on this statue in one of U2’s videos).

Mmmm… yummy, baby pig flesh

Simple Minds opens the night with “Don’t You Forget About Me”

The crowd grows

Pele makes an appearance

Then Nelly Furtado performs the World Cup song and her new hit Maneater

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2 Responses to “World Cup 2006 Fan Fest”

  1. ladyrebecca on March 19th, 2008 8:37 pm

    Did you still have dial up when you loaded all these pictures? I can only imagine. Must have been an all day task.

  2. Christina G on March 19th, 2008 8:53 pm

    Yep, that was a dial-up task. Didn’t managed to get DSL again (we had it in Berlin, not in Rostock or Potsdam) until we moved down to Bavaria.

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