mccullochblog

Sleep, Eat, Swim, Suntan (Repeat until done)

After four quarter final matches in three cities in four days, the posse called a 'wooah' in Torres Vedras today for a hard-earned day of lazing around by the pool in the 30º heat. The temperatures down in Faro earlier this week peaked at 45º, so I´m sure you can imagine the cold beers have been going down fast and aplenty...not least of course in celebration of the big Dutch win against the Swedes on Saturday night!!

We had a great day in Porto yesterday (ahead of the Czech-Denmark quarter final), home of Port, and therefore home to a bit of Calem Port tasting. Emma and I wobbled out of Calem´s tasting rooms into the scorching sun clutching 5 bottles of vintage port between us, so I guess you could say the visit was a success!

Anyway...off to a bullfight tomorrow. Unlike the Spanish, the Portuguese seemingly try and climb onto the bull rather than kill it, so I imagine we´ll see a few torreadors being carted off to hospital.

Right, back to the pool and those beers...

England versus Portugal

Well, wouldn't you know it, we managed to secure tickets to the England versus Portugal quarter final at late notice yesterday afternoon and in doing so ensured our place at a historic - and of course tragic - night of football. At kick-off it seemed that England fans actually outnumbered Portuguese at the Stadium of Light and naturally when Michael Owen scored on 3 minutes, it began to feel like a home game for England. Needless to say, it didn't last, and the next 107 minutes of football passed at an excruciatingly slow pace as England - without the injured superkid Rooney - struggled to do anything but defend. Well, the rest (bar a brief moment of Lampard inspired hope) - meaning the penalty shoot-out - is now history....but what a great game to be at.

James Maxton (in attendance as PR man for Carlsberg) texted me after the match to say "I'm never watching an England game in the same venue as you again." James and I were together in London six years ago for the England versus Argentina (also Beckham-inspired) World Cup fiasco. James - I'm going to Germany in two years for the World Cup - let's de-synchronize match schedules before the tournament.

Off to cheer the Greeks against the French tonight!

England invades Portugal.

100,000 Englishmen and women (but mostly large, fat, noisy beer-swilling men) have descended on Portugal - and mostly Lisbon - today for England's match against the host nation. "If England lose, then these men will smash up everything", the woman in the Vodafone shop told me earlier. "What about if England win?", I ask. "Then these English men will smash up everything."...so the Portugese will be closing up shop early tonight, no matter what I suspect. Actually, most of the English are doing nothing more harmful than hanging flags off every available statue and playing football in the main squares, but I suspect the copious cases of Super Bock may change their behaviour a little bit later on this evening.

For our part, we'll be watching the match at the Parc do Nacao on the big screen with thousands of ....mostly large, fat, noisy beer-swilling men...we suspect. 10-month-old Anoushka will not be attending, the parents among you will be pleased to know.

27% of visitors to Portugal have voted Euro2004 a huge success. Those folks probably didn't have to walk across a motorway to get to the Aveiro stadium earlier this week...other than that scary event though it's been a great first week at the tournament. Obviously things perked up considerably last night when Germany exited the tournament. Nothing against the Germans (well, not TOO much) but it did mean that Holland would advance to the quarter finals where we'll see them in Faro!!! Hup Holland!!

Only other major news to report is that the ratio of dogs to humans in Torres Vedras last night seems to be similarly to the ratio of pigeons and seagulls to humans in Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds".... lots of barking in the night, as I'm sure you can appreciate. Fortunately they most disappear during the day and it seems safe to leave our compound then...

right...off to make one last attempt to get tickets for tonight's game...

Four Days of Football Fun

Four days into the trip and it's been a frenetic start. For those tracking my exact progress (Jodi and Linda!), we're now in Porto in the North of Portugal within a few hours of watching the clash of the vikings - Denmark versus Sweden!

It's been a tough few days so far with every game seemingly ending in a loss for the team we're supporting. First, Holland took part - as they so often do - in the game of the tournament so far, only to lose to the Czechs 3-2....the atmosphere was incredible at the game, right down to the awesome rendition of "The Referee's a Dog's Dick" by the Dutch fans.....he WAS a dog's dick, incidentally.

The second game of our trip resulted in another disappointment. If Switzerland had managed to hang onto a 1-1 draw with the French we would have been seeing England in the quarter finals...sadly - cheered on my lifelong friend, who for some bizarre Arsenal-related reason was cheering on the French, - the Swiss eventually were trounced and we'll now see them again against the Greeks in about a week.

One highlight of the France match however was scrambling up a bank to our car after the game and me treading in dog shit. That wasn't the good bit of course. The good bit came a few moments later as I used a park sprinkler system to clean my shoes, thereby sending dog shit flying into the air and into the faces of other soccer fans taking the short cut....I didn't hang around there for long.

Otherwise, the sun is shining, we're having fun and we're cheering on the Swedish tonight! Hup Sweden!

more soon....

The Fun Begins

Have arrived safely in London and am (literally) en route to Portugal for Euro2004. By the wonders of airport Web connections, I can tell you my plane to Lisbon is on time and in 24 hours I'll be in Portugal on the way Leira to watch Holland versus the Czech Republic, dressed head-to-toe in orange, naturally. Am attempting to secure access to luxury suites at matches via my client at NTT Communications but sadly with little luck so far. Watch out for us on TV!

The Full Monty

No, not me posing naked, protected by a fireman's helmet, but my full itinerary for the next three months - or at least the abridged version. Naturally I hope to post a little missive from everywhere I go, but if this site happens to be vewy-vewy-quiet for a while, it's probably because the buddhist monks haven't installed DSL to Lhasa yet...anyway, here's the plan:

June 17-July 3: Portugal, watching football at www.euro2004.com
July 4-July 12: England and Holland, watching musicals, visiting family and my God son, Jared, for the first time (looking forward to that, Rich!)
July 12-July 16: San Francisco, removing swimming trunks and football shirts from my rucksack and replacing with thermal underwear and mosquito repellent
July 17-July 30: China, visiting Beijing, Xian, Great Wall etc...
July 31-Aug 8: Tibet, visiting Lhasa and Tibetan monasteries
Aug 9-Aug 12: Mount Everest, going no higher than Base Camp, I can assure you...
Aug 13-Aug 16: Nepal, hanging out in Kathmandu, hopefully with Tarun Deo from Text 100's Delhi office
Aug 17-Aug 24: North Vietnam, starting out in Hanoi, working my way south via Halong Bay
Aug 25-Aug 29: South Vietman, mostly in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), but then crossing into Cambodia after meeting Emma (somehow!)
Aug 30-Sep 4: Cambodia, at Phnom Penh, visiting the Killing Fields, Siem Riep and Angkor Wat
Sep 5-Sep 9: Thailand, mostly in Bangkok, learning how to play ping pong with body parts
Sep 10-Sep 13: Japan, searching for Sumo wrestlers in Tokyo
Sep 16: Go to work, ask for old job back, hope it's still available!

And there you have it....3 months....just like that.

Eng-er-lund, Eng-er-oh-shit

With a display of contempt for its international allies not seen since - ooh, a few months ago - the French today spoiled the opening weekend of the Euro2004 football tournament for all of England, some of San Francisco, and most of the rest of the World - with a depressing last minute defeat of Sven Goran Eriksson's England.

The result ensured that the McCulloch-et-al entourage will be cheering wildy for both Croatia and Switzerland to defeat France so that we may see England (instead of France) in the quarter-finals on June 25th in Lisbon.

Sadly, this turn of events seems unlikely enough for me to speculate that we may instead have to cheer on Portugal or Greece (likely runners up of Group A) against the French in the quarter final instead.

Whatever the odds, there'll be no Onion Soup or Croutons fed to baby Anoushka on our trip!!! Allez les Blancs! (et les Oranges!)