Mfks World Cup diary

[MFKS]

For Militia
Proudly sponsored by Tooheys New FOR THE LOVE OF KALE

Got up Friday 23rd June 2014 at 05:20am.

Quick shower and try and sort my shit out in the dark so as not to disturb my room mate.

Grab the gear and head to reception. My taxi is waiting 40 mins later and I am at the bus depot. Head in and redeem my ticket from my email print out. Grab something to eat and wait for an hour and jump on board.

Remember ****ing little of the trip. The bus depot is right at the bridge that leads off the island. I was asleep before we made the bridge. Got a good 3.5 hours in and by the time I awoke we were approaching the city limits of Curitiba.

Had picked up a ticket for the Honduras V Ecuador affair. Was one of the first I got and I only went for it as at the time I had no tickets and demand was low and it seemed a wise idea to pick up whatever tickets you could at that stage to see as many games as you could.

Got into the bus depot in Curitiba at just before Midday. Am heading back to Curitiba but am pretty occupied with matches when I am there so am taking the time to see the sights. Headed down to the Estacio Shopping as I knew I could get the city tourist bus there from my visit Monday.

Whilst waiting spotted some bloke dealing drugs openly on the street. Bit of an eye opener as you don’t really see that back home out in the open like this. Made sure to ignore and not stare as you don’t know what they are carrying likely to do.

Was relieved the bus rocked up and jumped on. The thing was packed with Ecuadorians in town for the game. R$25 for the tour. Jump on board and got on and off at a few interesting places. The trip round took about 3 hours non stop. By the time I got off it was 5pm and time to head to the game.

Made the couple of kilometre walk and got there 90 mins before kick off. Headed in and took a tour of the stadium.

Headed to my seat and found an Aussie sitting in front of us. Had a good chat.

As the teams come out to warm up noticed the world’s biggest ****wit Ben Williams was the ref. This was the first time I had laid eyes on the **** since the night he sent the Griff off at his triumphant return to Newy.

As the prick warmed up right in front of us I went down the front to get close and gave him the finger called him every name under the sun and made sure he got the message.

As I was wearing the E&C Jets top and mentioned Griff enough he would have got the point when he eyeballed me I knew he noticed.

Game kicked off. Some impressive forwards for Ecuador but after Zura probably not the type for the Jets

Honduras nicked the lead which set the game up well. Ecuador equalised soon after and good old Ben Williams developed a new legion of haters by disallowing a Honduras goal on HT.

Second half seen Ecuador take the lead with about 25 to go. They then parked the bus and didn’t play. Honduras took control without looking like equalising.

Ben Williams then denied the Ecuadorian striker a hatty for a hand ball of dubious nature and he had another legion of haters.

Game finished at 2-1 Ecuador. Headed out at 9pm having to race to the airport for my flight in 2hours 15mins. Being I was leaving a game and airport was a distance away it was cutting it fine

Made it back to the shopping centre quickly. Jumped the bus quickly and was at the airport at 9:45pm with 1.5 hours to spare.

Check in on the automatic machines and some type of issue. Head to the counter and some type of issue. Nothing was said to me as the supervisor was called. Turns out the flight had been cancelled months ago.

Airline tried telling me they contacted all the passengers months ago. Advised that I had heard nothing. I then pulled my phone out and showed them emails they had sent in the last few weeks and 3 days ago saying we were good to go.

Bloke then looked up my reservation on the internet and it was still showing up as good to go.

Just then a pile of people rocked up who had the same story as me. Cluster**** up of epic proportions for the airline.
Situation was resolved with 2 offers.

Offer 1 flight tomorrow morning
Offer 2 taxi at airlines expense to Florianopolis

Not wanting to spend the night in the airport took the taxi option.

Were gonna drop me at the airport or bus station but pushed it and got them to drop me at hotel which was another 45 mins away saving me paying for and finding another taxi in Florianopolis in the early hours

They filled out a voucher and instructed me to hand it to a taxi outside.

Headed out and gave it to the cabbie. Blokes looked at me like the look you would get if you dropped your pants and took a dump on the floor of Westfield Kotara in Centre Court when the kiddies were lining up to see Santa

Not believing me we headed back to the terminal to see Azul the airline. After speaking with them he got the word it was real and we loaded up the cab

Introductions were made he was named Jimmy. Went to the local servo and filled up.

Jimmy called the boss and let him know what was going on. We hit the road and got 5km up the road. 1.5 hours later we had done about 3km after traffic jam. Found out the reason. A little hatchback was under the wheels of a semi. Ouch.

No one in the car by the time we passed but unlikely the passengers in the hatch will be healthy or alive.

Once past it Jimmy cracked up the speed. We were doing 140-160km on a road similar to the dreaded Swansea bends. The vehicle was rattling and pushing limits that NASA’s Apollo program would have not passed.

Was tempted to get some sleep but was afraid to close the eyes as it may have been the last thing I ever seen. Watching as we took each bend at high speed seemed like it took the edge of not watching.

After about 30 mins outside of Curitiba started getting paranoid. There was very little to stop Jimmy dropping me off on the highway in the dark in the middle of nowhere and telling the airline he took me to Florianopolis. Could have robbed us taking my luggage anything. Outside the car was literally bushland and a place Ivan Milat would have been scared to go.

After about 2.5 hours we stopped at a roadhouse on the highway. Quick piss and back in the taxi. Far too many odd characters hanging about at 2am

Finally made the hotel at 3:20am after a 4.5hour taxi ride.

Left Jimmy with a $R 100 tip. As he drove me to my hotel he had saved me more than that in cab fare from airport anyway
Also advised him to fleece the airline for heaps via Google translate

Sat up to 4am absolutely perplexed it had been a bizarre day with a 4.5hr 350km taxi ride