Football in GreenPoland

I live in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, one of NYC's great Polish outposts, so of course I had to go watch Poland/Ecuador with the natives. The first place I went was the Polish Sports Club on Nassau, right off of McCarren Park. I've walked past the place about a million times, never went in. It's a nice place. Sadly, I don't have a camera at the moment, so I can't show it to you. But the ratio of Polish people to hipster photographers was about 2 to 1 during the game, so if you want to see a picture of the place, go to any other site you can think of, and they'll probably have something up. There were a lot of "Polska" scarves on the walls and everyone in the place was drinking an ice-cold Tyskie, For this non-drinker, I must say, them shits were looking mighty good.

The atmosphere was tense until Ecuador's goal in the 24th minute, at which point it turned to sad and resigned. One stout Polish dude with a combover and sweatstains on his workshirt kept making loud dramatic soliloquies to the room as he stood beside his seated ladyfriend. I interpreted them as something along the lines of, "the anemic play of our side grieves my leonine heart," etc. The hottest girl in the place was the room's only Ecuadorian. She sat at the side of the bar in her Ecuador jersey with her (I think) Polish boyfriend. She actually looked a lot like this Ecaudor babe up there, although she was wearing clothes. People were decidedly less friendly to her after Ecuador's goal and she got very quiet.

At halftime I decided I had to try a little harder, and moved on to my neighborhood, the true Greenpoland, the neck of Greenpoint across McGuinness. I went to The Fireplace, a joint that does indeed have a fireplace, right down the block from me on Norman. I have on occasion had a pork loin with sauerkraut at The Fireplace and it is far from the worst thing I've ever eaten for nine bucks.

It was crowded at The Fireplace. Not a female in sight except for the bartendress and a waitress who wore a red cowboy hat that said "Polska." The smell of Polish man-sweat was dense. No photographers appeared until late in the match, when an aggressive dude came in with a press badge and a big lens on his camera. He strutted around snapping everyone with an overall air of seriousness and great importance. At one point, he announced to a table of gamewatchers that he needed Poland to score so he could take a picture of everyone celebrating. They didn't seem to know what to make of that.

He actually took a picture of me, I noticed, so maybe somewhere out there in Medialand I'm representing the local color of Greenpoint watching football. If so, I'm a terrible fraud.

Here are my impressions/highlights of the afternoon:
-Carlos Tenorio, who scored Ecuador's first goal, is a lethal motherfucker. Within two minutes of the first half it was clear that he would eventually score.
-Poland plays an uninspired, workmanlike brand of soccer and will be lucky to advance. They're sound at midfield, but they're at least one, possibly two, creative, beautiful players short of a credible attack. Give them a Tenorio, for instance, and they're a different team.
-I have lived in the Greenpoint/Williamsburg area since 1993 and I still don't know a single word of Polish. I don't even know how to say "yes" or "thank you." It's much to my discredit as a human. The only thing I know how to say is the kind of kielbasa I like, and that's only because it rhymes with "vagina."
-With Poland down 2-0 in the 80th minute, one of the Polish man-slabs in the Fireplace started chanting, "U.S.A, U.S.A..." His mates threw shit at him.
-Another funny moment - the television shows the name of an Ecuadorian, "Guagua," and this fat Polish guy with a terrible look - ponytail, peach polo, clogs (yes, clogs) - looks at his friends and says, with an eyebrow raised, "Gwa. Gwa." They all fucking died. I have to say, it was pretty funny.
-On the whole, the Polish soccer faithful seem resigned to their fate. Their team is pretty wack, and they know it. They don't seem too heartbroken.