Waiting for the Game to start at Haeundae

After spending time in Korea during World Cup time, I think I've reached the conclusion that if I'm ever going to travel during World Cup time, I need to go to a country that is in it. Korea went completely mad this year and it was awesome.

I ended up watching 3 of the 4 Korean games.

For the first game I went to Haeundae Beach as they had a giant TV screen showing the game. I've heard rumours that anywhere from 50-100,000 people were there watching. It was a sea of red shirts, red devil horns, facepaint and Korean flags. We were sitting really far back, and by the first 15 minutes, everybody in front of us was standing and blocking our view. We decided to move and build a sand mound, which put us about 3 or 4 inches higher then everybody else and we had a great view of the screen. Korea ended up beat Greece 2-0, and I think the entire country was hung over the next day.


The second game we ventured out to Asiad Stadium. Its a massive stadium that was built for the Asiad Games and the World Cup when it was here in 2002. It was free to go in, and they had the game televised on their two Jumbotrons. I would honestly say the stadium (maybe 65,000 capacity) was about 98% full. People were cheering SO loudly, I would even say that they could hear us in South Africa. Unfortunately Argentina won that game, and by the end of the game, the mood was very sad.

The next game was at 3:30am so I didn't bother getting up for it. I did however wake up because of the screams and shouts that were going on outside of my window when Korea scored. It sounded like North Korea had attacked. It was very eerie.

The final game was on the 26th. The day before my Taekwondo test, so I wasn't able to go out and do anything too crazy. I ended up watching it outside on one of the giant TV's near my house. It was a lot of fun, and a bit more quiet then the other venues.

I've never really appreciated what the World Cup is or its popularity until I was in Korea.

Canada, we may be the best at hockey, but we could learn a thing or two about soccer.


Red Devils


Rain, wind and heat...we look like we've seen better days


Spot the white guy.


Inside Asiad Stadium