Glimpse - Your Stories from Abroad

The sound was deafening. As I craned my neck to see the replay on the screen, I saw my husband’s mouth move, but I couldn’t hear anything above the roar of nearly 70,000 screaming Brazilians. Cupping my hands around my mouth, I yelled, “What?!”

“I don’t think your team can win!” my Brazilian husband bellowed. I frowned. At that moment, it was probably the only frown in all of Maracanã stadium—except for the frowns worn by the 11 Americans on the field. As they set up for kick-off, having just watched their opposing team score yet another goal, all of Maracanã began to sing: “I am Brazilian… with lots of pride and lots of love.”

Standing in a sea of canary yellow jerseys, I realized they weren’t just singing about a love for their country; they were also professing a love for their country’s national sport. As my husband and I made our way to our seats before the game, I had felt more than a little intimidated, and he did nothing to dissuade my fear. “Don’t cheer too loudly,” he whispered. “Sometimes fans can get out of control.”

Over the course of the next 90 minutes, I watched fans screaming, waving, chanting, jumping, flailing, and singing without pause. Two teenage boys in front of me hopped around in blue and green afro-wigs, frantically waving Brazilian flags over their heads. Somewhere behind me, a fan blew an air horn every time a Brazilian touched the ball, which was constantly. The Brazilian team played definitive Brazilian soccer: fast, physical, and with a whole lot of flair. I finally understood why Brazilians call great soccer futebol-arte, soccer art.

When the final whistle sounded, Brazil claimed a 5-0 victory over the United States, and with it, the Pan American Games championship. But the team’s greatest accomplishment was not the win or the title—its greatest accomplishment was bringing out 70,000 fans for a match in a country that still overwhelmingly believes soccer is a man’s game. It was the the Brazilian women’s team, the Samba Queens, who won the gold medal.
 
Blown away by the Samba Queens’ extraordinary skill, I left the stadium with one nagging question: Where did these women learn to play? I knew that from the 1940s to the 1970s, the Brazilian government had actually forbidden women from participating in contact sports like soccer. This meant that the Samba Queens had become the best in the world in a single generation. But while there is a soccer field on every other street in Rio, I had yet to see a girl or woman playing on a single one. I decided to find out exactly where these budding female soccer prodigies were hiding.

After some investigation, I found a local team called, oddly enough, “Team Chicago.”  I contacted the coach and got permission to observe one of its training sessions.

I arrived at the field on a perfect fall day: The temperature was warm but the breeze coming off the ocean kept the field cool. The field was wedged between two mountains and lined on one side by palm trees. If I had grown up practicing here, I don’t think I ever would have quit playing soccer. In fact, I might have never left the field.

Coach Alex Mathias was on the sidelines in a bright yellow jersey pumping up balls. We talked as the girls took a few laps around the field to warm up. Alex told me that he started the club in 1996 at the request of a group of girls looking for opportunities to play. Now about 70 girls train at the club, and several alumni have gone on to receive college scholarships in the States or to play professionally in Europe.

Years ago, when I decided I wanted to play soccer, it was just a matter of choosing one of the dozens of clubs within minutes of my house. As I chatted with some of the girls during a break, I realized that for many of them, finding a place to play hadn’t been easy. “Some people still say a woman’s place is in the kitchen,” 17-year-old Paula Amorim told me, “but I think that’s ridiculous. Soccer is for everyone.” Paula had to overcome the prejudices of her own parents to play. “In the beginning,” she said, “no one supported me except my brother. My parents wanted me to take IT classes instead.”  But she insisted that she had no plans to give up soccer any time soon. “We play. We love to play and prejudice is not going to make us stop.” She flashed a huge smile. “There is no better sport than soccer. It doesn’t exist.”

The girls returned to the field to scrimmage, and watching them, I was flooded with a sense of nostalgia. It had been years since I'd laced up a pair of cleats but I could still remember the smell of my soccer bag. (A smell that could kill a small bird is hard to forget.) I instantly recognized the dull thud a leather-clad foot made when kicking a leather ball. I could feel the brutal sting when a hard kick smacked a bare thigh. As I stood on the sidelines, I found my leg muscles twitching every time a ball rolled near me. I was simply aching to rip a shot.

But I resisted and let the girls play. It was their turn to shine.