With
little suffering, my paternal grandfather passed away early the morning of the
seventh of March. He was ninety-three years old and had a long and rewarding
time here on earth. Having spent most of my life outside of Ecuador, I cannot
say I was close to the man. He had a disciplinarian streak and was often grumpy.
Fussy does not even come close to describing his attitude towards food, a shrimp
omelet and white rice his idea—at least in my mind—of a perfect meal. Yet, he
was also tender and encouraging, lovingly cupping my cheeks with his frail hand
or driving my brothers and me to pick up our favorite pizzas for dinner. One of
my fondest childhood memories is of him sitting by my bedside, patting my legs
and whispering a lengthy prayer while I tried to sleep and not think about the
scary volcanoes looming at a distance or the jets’ rumbling as they made their
final approach into Quito’s tricky airport.
As
children, my mother and father made sure we traveled to Ecuador once a year to
see our grandparents, but as my brothers and I grew older, our own commitment
to our studies, professions and families made it harder to visit regularly. I
last saw him and my grandmother in 2008 during Christmas. My Cypriot wife and I
flew in from Nicosia—our home for now—and spent ten days exchanging stories,
laughing and cherishing each other’s unfortunately short company, all the while
my better-half courageously using her rudimentary Spanish.
When
my mother called that morning about his death, I hardly blinked. My upbringing
as somewhat of a nomad who is used to city-hopping and promptly readjusting to
change in life certainly helped. I am thirty-four and the longest I’ve been in
one place is eight years and that long stint in Bogotá ended nearly a quarter
of a century ago. So often I’ve had to say goodbye to new-found friends and
family—sometimes temporarily, other times forever—that detaching from all kinds
of relationships has come too easily for me. I’m not sure whether there is any
value in this personality trait. Perhaps it’s a cover I use to avoid dealing with
grief or it simply reveals my true colors as a selfish insensitive human being.
Fact is, however, all the moving around has allowed me to handle loss in all of
its multifaceted forms.
Little
did I know that a strange kind of mourning would creep up on me later that day
in the company of nearly twenty three thousand people at GSP Stadium in
Nicosia. It was the return leg of the round of sixteen Champions League match-up
between APOEL Nicosia, arguably Cyprus’ best team, and Olympique Lyonnais, a
French behemoth, and I had a ticket to the east stand.
Minutes
before kick-off, the fogged-up sky threatened the crowd with rain. I remember
looking up at the GSP stadium’s bright lights. The lampposts drowned in the
thin clouds and a ghostly, some would say premonitory, white sheet blanketed
the night. The bleachers, however, were electric. On the south end, the
hardcore fans, most of them clad in vivid orange or yellow, jumped and sang
about how their squad took on Porto, Zenit and Shakhtar. A hooded man,
emulating Spider-Man or a typical Argentine football fanatic, clawed his way up
the tall fence separating the pitch from the supporters and held up a Greek
flag. A handful of irresponsible fans
lit four or five flares, leaving behind a trail of thick smoke and a likely
hefty fine for the club from UEFA. Throughout the stadium, cameras and iPhones
flashed to capture this historic moment for Cypriot football. Around me, men,
women and children were on their toes, giddy in anticipation for the match and
hoping their team could revert the 1-0 loss in France.
APOEL’s
Serbian coach Ivan Jovanović, who plied his trade as footballer and coach in
Greece, moved away from his preferred 4-5-1 counterattacking formation and utilized
an aggressive 4-4-2 lineup with Ailton Almeida and Esteban Solari as
out-and-out forwards. Wingers Constantinos Charalambides and Gustavo Manduca
were set up to feed balls into the area, while Nuno Morais and Helder Sousa
were parked in the middle of the pitch to destroy and distribute. Within nine
minutes, the coach’s strategic acumen paid off as Charalambides captured a
poorly-cleared ball, split a couple of defenders and slid the ball across the
box for Manduca to tap into the back of the net. 1-0 APOEL.
Throughout
the first half and most of the second, APOEL created a few solid chances with
good link-up play between their four attackers. Despite their advantage in
possession, most of Lyon’s attacks focused on swinging balls into the area and
these were dealt with adroitly by Portugal’s Paulo Jorge and the rest of
APOEL’s staunch defense. As players tired and substitutions were made, APOEL
switched back to the familiar 4-5-1 line-up and lost some of its incisiveness.
In extra-time, an isolated Ailton, who
for some bizarre reason refused to shoot with his left foot, tried to single-handedly
take on three French defenders, time and again cutting right and being
dispossessed of the ball. After an exhausting two-hour stalemate, Nicosia would
bear witness to the most important penalty shootout in Cyprus’ history.
I
thought things looked bleak with Manduca, Charalambides and Solari, three of
APOEL’s usual penalty takers, watching from the sideline. After Ailton and
Morais scored APOEL’s first two strikes and Bafétimbi Gomis beat APOEL’s goalie
Dionisis Chiotis to give Lyon a 3-2 lead, Cypriot winger Nektarios Alexandrou,
who had entered the match as a substitute in extra-time and performed quite like
a perch out of water, walked confidently towards the spot. Many around me worried
the stage would prove too immense for a local player who worked his way up
APOEL’s youth ranks and into the first team. Alexandrou, though, as fresh as a
watermelon in August, rifled a left-footed strike straight down the gut of Hugo
Lloris’ goal and once again evened out the tie.
What
followed was hypnotic. Alexandre Lacazette, Lyon’s future star, struck low and
to his right but Chiotis timed his lunge perfectly and denied the French squad
the lead with a breathtaking save. Macedonian international Ivan Tričkovski
scored easily for APOEL and put the Cypriot team up for the first time in the
shootout. Then, Chiotis, inspired by the crazed cries of thousands, flung his
body left and blocked Michelle Bastos’ poorly-taken penalty. The stadium
erupted and the yellow-clad players rushed the field, piling onto the match’s
hero.
Later,
I would find out that APOEL’s goalkeeping coach had studied each of Lyon’s past
penalty-takers and told Chiotis exactly where to dive. Right then and there,
though, I hoped my grandfather had had a deft hand in that night’s victory, gifting
a bright moment in European football history from beyond his deathbed to his
oldest grandson. I don’t recall him ever playing football or even being an avid
spectator of the sport, but I will live with the belief that on that particular
night he was. The skies now clear, I looked up at the lights and my eyes welled
up for a few seconds with the fleeting thought of my grandfather saying goodbye
touching my heart. I laughed and clapped and prayed “He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named,”
who that same day had put five past a haplessly awestruck Bernd Leno in
Catalunya, wouldn’t be next.
Keep
in mind that I have some serious issues with APOEL. Too many Greek flags and no
Cypriot ones fly in their matches. A small and misguided faction of the fan
base has embraced ultra-right-wing ideologies and anti-Semitic emblems as their
own. Despite all of this, APOEL’s ballsy yet disciplined performance is a
victory for an island that has been rocked by a turbulent and violent history
and recent economic hardship. Many among APOEL’s local rivals might not feel pride
in this team’s achievements, but it’s impossible for me to see what has been
accomplished in any other light. I don’t support football teams. I follow the
sport itself—as a beautiful brushstroke, as a battlefield where many times will
defeats skill, as a cauldron of mixed emotions. I might have rarely experienced
the ninety-minute roller-coaster of a ride reserved for the typical football fan,
but I have learned to love and stand behind the place—wherever and whenever
that may be—I call home.
On
the drive back from the stadium, my wife, who’s not a football fan, woke up at
around twelve-thirty a.m. startled by the celebratory commotion out on the
streets. We live a few blocks from APOEL fan’s headquarters and the honking,
football chants and loud hoorays had taken over the night. She sent me a text message
wondering whether APOEL had somehow miraculously gone through to the next round.
Knowing all too well he probably had nothing to do with the victory, I selfishly
replied “Yep. Penalties. A gift from my grandfather to Cyprus.” I guess we all
grieve in our own little ways.
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