Girl, do you want to walk? Don’t you want a ride? We are nine, but… There is always room for one more!
Around noon this Sunday, it was not exactly easy to get to the Jamor National Stadium. Among the long queues of traffic at all the entrances, full of cars, vans and buses coming mainly from the Porto region but also from Tondela, was the Observer. Stuck in a TVDE, with the car parked outside the house to escape the need to park it and speed up processes, we quickly regret the decision. But everything got simpler, and more interesting, when we went from being a lone reporter to being part of a truck full of people.
Without the traffic moving, beginning to feel some pity for a driver who had been dragged into the chaos of a Portuguese Cup final, we decided to get out of the car and walk the rest of the way. After all, the stadium was already there. Even if they over there it involved walking along the edge of the road. Backpack, a worried look at a sky that threatens rain and off we go, but the trip did not last even five minutes. On a curve, among several cars that already had their doors open to stretch their legs or smoke a cigarette in the midst of the total stoppage of traffic, was a van with nine FC Porto fans. Suddenly, we hear the phrase: “Girl, are you going to walk? Don’t you want a ride? We are nine, but… There is always room for one more!”.
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The decision took mere seconds. Backpack inside the van, the usual presentations, the obvious questions: the nine friends are from Lixa, from Felgueiras, and none of them are debutants in Jamor or in the Portuguese Cup final. For that very reason, being regulars on the trips to Lisbon every time FC Porto reaches the decisive match, they complain about the traffic and assure that the confusion has worsened since the match left the Estádio Nacional, two years ago, due to the pandemic. “It was never like that, we never caught this traffic,” guarantees José, the driver, who even threatens to go back to smoking to deal with the stress of the delay and that he is upset because nobody has remembered to take out a deck of cards to fill the dead time.
They used to go down from Felgueiras to Lisbon in the hundreds of buses that transport FC Porto fans, this year they decided to rent a nine-seater van and make a more familiar and quiet journey. The problem? The van did not match and most of the trip was done at 80 km/h. Something that does not affect the clear good humor of a team that fully believes in the victory of the Dragons against Tondela and that, more than that, he totally believes in the permanence of Sérgio Conceição in the technical command of the team. Only Rui, in the back seat, has some doubts. “It depends on a lot… If he has proposals, I don’t know if he will stay. But I hope so”, shoots, he who is in charge of distributing the beers stored in a refrigerator in the trunk to the van.
Many fans set up the lunch table on top of the cars, in the middle of the Jamor forest.
Park 1 is crowded, Park 3 too, and you have to go to Park 2, something that forces you to go around Linda-a-Velha, among more traffic queues and many fans who have already chosen to park their car . away and place the lunch table right there, at the door of the buildings and away from the Jamor forest. A scenario that pleases half of the entourage, which even advocates parking in the parking lot of a commercial area, but that the older members of the group do not like. Since age is a factor, at least in this type of family, the truck heads towards the National Stadium.
In the middle, however, José gives in: he goes to smoke a cigarette. Responsible for driving the van from Felgueiras to Lisbon and from Lisbon to Felgueiras, having committed himself to the inevitability of not drinking alcohol, he even offers 10 euros for a pack of cigarettes to one of his friends. Rui, however, offers to go to the gas station right in the back and solve the problem. and the traffic is heavy enough to go, shop, come back, and get back in the van, which continues to drive slowly with the door open.
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With the final goal approaching, music is requested. Daniel is responsible for the horn and, among the natives hits Brazilians who are in fashion, decides to ask for divine inspiration. Suddenly, on the descent that gives access to one of the Jamor car parks and between the smiles of the PSP agent who is nearby, you hear “Guiado pela Mão”, by Father José Luís Borga. The line “I follow like a sheep that found a shepherd” provokes a general laugh, due to the irony of the traffic queue, but soon the music returns from the other side of the Atlantic.
Finally, around 2 pm, the van is parked and it’s time to put the stamney together. The nine friends are joined by a tenth, Ricardo, who has been living in Lisbon for a month and a half and has been waiting for the rest of the group for about two hours. The stove is turned on, the bread with ham helps to endure the wait for fevers and scratches, the bottles of homemade vinho verde are opened and the beers are well preserved in the refrigerator. In the middle of an authentic blue and white sea, noticing the natural discrepancy between the number of fans of FC Porto and Tondela no Jamor, the first songs, the first songs, the first enthusiasm are heard.
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After lunch, which even included a dessert but where the absence of coffee was lamented, the inevitable sentence is heard: “Well, maybe we have to start packing everything up.” There is just over an hour to go before kick-off and you still need to walk to the National Stadium, go through the long entrance process and get to the stands. After all, the traffic even meant no deck was needed.
Source: Observadora
