Things that are alien to me: Talking crustaceans, soccer

This week, Jelisa Castrodale once again puts on her cranky pants and takes a look at the upcoming World Cup. Please add soccer to her growing list of Things That Europeans Enjoy But I’ll Never Understand.
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By Jelisa Castrodale
Last summer, we watched helplessly as a spaceship stalled over South Africa and countless armor-bodied aliens descended into Johannesburg, leaving one section of the city littered with empty cans of cat food and spent rifle cartridges. One hundred twelve minutes and countless political allegories later, the credits rolled on Neil Blomkamp’s ass-kickingly good District 9, and the overgrown crustaceans headed back to their home planet.
This summer, the same sun-drenched city will be invaded by something infinitely more terrifying: soccer fans. On June 11, the World Cup returns after its regularly-scheduled four year absence and — given the choice — I’d take the aliens. Despite the language barrier and the fact that they looked like pissed off dinner specials from the Rusty Pelican, at least I understood their motivations. Soccer fans, though, I just don’t get.

Admittedly, I’ve never played soccer. I wasn’t an undersized toddler in an oversize t-shirt who spent every Saturday morning standing in the grass tugging at her socks. I wasn’t an Umbro-wearing eleventh grader who shuffled down the hall in a pair of unlaced Sambas. And I definitely wasn’t an immature tourist who dropped a wad of British pounds on a Hull City jersey just because it said “Windass” on the back.
OK, yes I was.
Other than ignoring the exchange rate for a polyester-blend mistake, I’ve only pretended to give a damn about the Premier League one other time, when I briefly dated a soccer coach. During our pair of months together, I learned that a sweeper is a defenseman, that West Ham isn’t a regional pork product and that even off the field, he had no idea what to do with his hands.
Since then, I’ve kept soccer on the list of Things That Europeans Enjoy But I’ll Never Understand, wedging it somewhere between Runny Cheese and Catholicism. Despite the spectacle and the (alleged) excitement, the World Cup just doesn’t resonate with me, and I’m not the only person living between our shining seas who feels that way.
Maybe it’s because everyone already knows that the U.S. team isn’t going to win. Despite the countless number of orthodontist-sponsored kiddie leagues, YMCA-branded camps and the over-quoted statistic that soccer is America’s fastest-growing youth sport, we’re still not very good at it. In this week’s FIFA World Rankings, the United States jumped two spots (SUCK IT, SERBIA) to land at No. 14, trailing not only Brazil, Italy and England but also Croatia, Greece and Egypt. We’re essentially the Pittsburgh Pirates of international competition.
According to the footie-focused writers at Goal.com, the U.S. has a 6.5 percent chance of reaching the World Cup final. Those are only slightly better odds than they gave the team from Cameroon, a tiny African nation that until about 15 minutes ago, I always thought was a type of cookie. Cameroon is part of the problem. So are Algeria, Ghana and Uruguay, because when FIFA holds their World Cup, they actually invite, you know, the WORLD. Contrast that with MLB’s so-called World Series which doesn’t get much more foreign than Philadelphia.
Whether or not I tune in to a single minute of our tournament-opening Group C games won’t make a difference; neither will my decision to largely ignore the rest of the month’s matches. From June 11 through July 11, most of the world will be aiming their antennas toward South Africa and the Cup will dominate the headlines in countries with brightly colored money or where they spell ‘favour’ with a u. Americans largely won’t notice. Or they won’t care.
Either way, I’ll be pulling for the aliens.
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Jelisa Castrodale is a writer and comedian who has learned a lot about life by making a mess of her own. She chronicles her failures at The Typing Makes Me Sound Busy, covers music for London’s BitchBuzz and twitters while she waits at stoplights. Castrodale was featured in the book Twitter Wit and was named one of Mashable’s 10 Funniest Twitterers.
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