Goal!
ON a recent sunny morning, more than 100 soccer fans spilled out of a Caribbean restaurant in Inglewood, singing and clapping for the tiny country of Trinidad and Tobago.
They danced, moving their hips to the deafening beat of bongos and a steel drum. One cheering fan wrapped himself in the Trinidad flag and punched the air. Another waved an enormous flag at passing motorists, who honked their appreciation.
The group was celebrating the end to Trinidad and Tobago’s first game of the 2006 World Cup. And the team hadn’t even won.
With the globe’s most popular sports competition underway, there is no shortage of pundits telling us that America doesn’t understand what it means to have World Cup fever. In other countries, the tournament stops traffic. It mysteriously leaves people too sick to work but well enough to guzzle beer. It inspires a monthlong party until the final referee’s whistle sounds.
In the United States, we can watch the games in comfort at home on cable television. But Southern California’s rich immigrant culture also gives Americans a unique chance to see what they might be missing.
To seek out the best local venues to join the World Cup party is to set off on what amounts to a World Tour -- the destinations being a collection of ethnic bars, restaurants and community centers that open their doors to friends and strangers and even an Englishman with a notepad, mesmerized by a game that links pockets of Los Angeles at other times separated by race, religion and language.
Friendly hosts
It’s 9 a.m. Friday at the Los Angeles Soccer Club, a beige wooden clubhouse set in the middle of an industrial area of North Hollywood. About 30 mostly middle-aged men and women waited for the opening game between the host nation, Germany, and Costa Rica.
The clubhouse offered a relaxed, friendly atmosphere -- an Englishman with a notepad was greeted warmly. German fans chewed on doughnuts and sipped coffee. A few slugged bottles of Pilsener. “We’re drinking on German time,” quipped one.
Founded by German expats more than 50 years ago, the Los Angeles Soccer Club has not lost its accent. The club boasts about 220 members.
Among them was Christa Schubert, a retired teacher who grew up attending soccer games with her father in Berlin before she left for the U.S. in 1974. Every time Germany scored, Schubert phoned her daughter at work.
“I get so excited that I don’t know who shot first and who shot second. I get all mixed up,” she said hurriedly. “It makes your heart race.”
Schubert recalled that her daughter celebrated her wedding reception at the clubhouse the night before Germany lost in the final of the 2002 World Cup. The club stayed open all night and the party continued into the next morning so that everyone -- bride and groom included -- could watch the game live.
As the smell of bratwurst wafted from the club’s kitchen on Friday, patrons celebrated Germany’s 4-2 victory.
Said Schubert: “Today they played like angels.”
‘A way of life’
By 5:30 a.m. Saturday, a boisterous crowd of more than 200 England fans had already packed the Cock ‘n’ Bull pub in Santa Monica for a game between England and Paraguay.
The air reeked of beer and sweat. Fans were pressed up against one another. Someone tried scratching himself and ended up scratching the guy with the notepad, whose yelp was drowned out by a loud chant of “En-gu-land.”
England’s team is full of stars, rekindling faith that this year could bring the country’s first World Cup trophy since 1966. Back home, the country’s fans have an appropriately melodramatic phrase for the intervening heartache: 40 years of hurt.
“It stops traffic. It shuts down clubs. Everything comes to a standstill,” said a Yorkshireman in an England shirt who would give his name only as Tony. “It’s football, man. It’s not just a sport. It’s a way of life.”
The pub’s Liverpool-born owner, Tony Moogan, said he has seen more and more Americans visit to watch games.
One of them, Erwin Deleon, a burly 22-year-old with a mohawk, wore a white England shirt. “The way they play, it’s like an art,” he said of the England team, which won, 1-0.
Behind him, another U.S. native, Matthew Mishory, 23, had brought his mother to root for England. “If you can’t be in the stadium,” he said, “you want to see it here.”
Caribbean flavor
If the Cock ‘n’ Bull felt like a mosh pit, the Caribbean Treehouse in Inglewood felt like a carnival.
Inside the restaurant, a DJ blasted soca music -- a mix of calypso and Indian music popular on the islands. Fans of Trinidad and Tobago brought a steel drum and bongos. Customers danced to the tune of “Trini to the Bone.”
Kenson Raymond, a regular, said the restaurant draws from thousands of Caribbean expats but also welcomes anyone looking for a good meal and a party.
“This is like family,” the native Trinidadian said. “Anyone. Anytime. Even if you’re from space, you’re welcome. It’s all one love here today.”
Children munched on bread made from coconut. Adults ate buljol, a traditional breakfast dish of salted cod with chopped onions and tomatoes.
The Soca Warriors -- the national team’s nickname -- are making their first appearance in the World Cup. The country of 1 million people is the smallest to ever qualify for the tournament, and the team is a vast underdog.
That didn’t dampen the spirits of its L.A. fans. About 150 squeezed into the Treehouse, their faces reflecting the diverse origins of the islanders, African, Indian, Asian and white.
“It’s just like it is in Trinidad,” Raymond explained. “We have a little bit of everything. And plenty love.”
As the team clinched a goal-less tie against heavily favored Sweden, dancing resumed. Raymond waved a giant national flag on the street outside. Another man, grinning, chanted: “Bring on England!”
Iranians united
Southern California is home to an estimated 600,000 Iranians. On Sunday morning it felt as if most had shown up to Caspian, a Persian restaurant in Irvine.
Actually, about 650 packed the upscale eatery for Iran’s game against Mexico. Grandmothers sipped hot tea and children ate a traditional breakfast dish of oatmeal-like halim.
While the stylish customers chanted “Iran, Iran,” it was obvious where the loyalties of the restaurant’s employees lay. Cesar Gonzalez, 17, wore a giant sombrero with “Mexico” on the front. His older brother Tony glanced anxiously at one of the restaurant’s two big screens showing the game as he served food.
“How many people want Mexico to win?” Tony was asked.
“Pretty much everyone in the back. The chefs. The servers,” he said. “Mexicans. Iranians. We don’t think of each other as rivals. It brings us closer, as a family.”
Southern California was a major destination for Iranians fleeing the 1979 revolution that replaced the shah with the Islamic government that remains in power. They brought with them a love for the world’s game.
“When you are little boys, you are playing in the streets with a little plastic ball,” said Jamshid Ehtesham, who left Iran more than two decades ago. “No matter what beliefs, what part of the country you are from, soccer is what unites everything.”
Make war no more
Since the early 1900s, Portuguese fishermen, dairy farmers and others have arrived in California in search of jobs, many of them from the Portuguese islands of the Azores in the Atlantic Ocean. The city of Artesia is home to an estimated 2,500 Portuguese immigrants.
Newcomers found a link to their homeland at the Artesia DES, a community center that carries the abbreviation for “Divine Holy Spirit” in Portuguese. The organization has a large events hall just off Pioneer Boulevard with its own bar, chapel and bullfighting ring. (As in Portugal, the bullfighting is bloodless.)
About 250 people gathered at the hall’s bar to watch Portugal play Angola. Glass cabinets full of soccer trophies won by the community center’s teams lined the walls. Outside, more fans ate a lunch of Portuguese-style beef -- marinated slices of meat topped with a fried egg.
Portugal’s team is formidable, but many at the Artesia club will also be cheering for their adopted homeland, said John Martins, club president and Artesia’s mayor pro tem: “It’s great to have two favorite teams: Portugal and the U.S.”
The history between Portugal and Angola brought an edge to previous soccer encounters. Angola, a former Portuguese colony, won independence in 1975 after 14 years of guerrilla warfare.
The Artesia DES counts several veterans of that campaign among its members. One of them, Jose Borges, displayed a tattoo on his left forearm that translates to “Angola: Portugal, I fight for you.” Borges, now 60, said his feelings for his former enemy have changed and he expects to root for Angola in the country’s other World Cup games: “I have no hard feelings.”
Bring zeal, kudasai
On Monday, just after dawn, eighth-grade teacher Alan Glasband sat in a Japanese restaurant in Gardena to watch Japan take on Australia.
On the advice of a Japanese friend, the Minnesota native decided to join a crowd of more than 70 young Japanese expats at Bistro Laramie. Every successful play by Japan was greeted with cheers; every miss with groans. “There’s nothing compared to the fervor of the crowd,” Glasband said. “I haven’t been this excited since the Twins were in the World Series.”
Bistro Laramie is decorated for the World Cup. On the walls are framed jerseys signed by soccer stars. A large goal net with 10 soccer balls hangs from the ceiling.
The restaurant’s owner, Yoshi Ishii, publishes a magazine aimed at an estimated 80,000 Japanese living in L.A. He has dozens of reservations for seats for future games. “It is more fun to watch the game with many people,” said Ishii, 44. “We can share the same fun.”
Australia won, 3-1, an outcome met with polite applause from the disappointed crowd.
The joy of dancing
Brazil’s opening game, against Croatia, brought a crowd ready to party at Zabumba, a Brazilian restaurant and nightclub near the L.A. neighborhood of Palms.
At times, soccer seemed secondary. A samba band and the chants of “ole, ole, ole” drowned out the television’s commentary of the game. Some fans danced through the entire 90 minutes. At halftime, seven shapely women climbed up onto the restaurant’s long bar and danced for the singing crowd.
“Welcome to Brazil!” Ana Edwards, a Brazilian native and one of the dancers, shouted at an Englishman with a notepad. “This is a little taste of Brazil. We feel that we are part of them there. Our hearts are with them.”
During the game, a Croatian man wearing his national team shirt walked into the restaurant, hands aloft. The Brazilian crowd cheered. A woman wearing a Brazil soccer jersey and a sunhat covered in Brazilian flags walked up and hugged him.
“I showed him we’re happy people, even family. We eat and drink in peace, no fighting,” said Aurea Silva, 50, a caterer who left Brazil 13 years ago.
On the restaurant’s front patio sat Ross Clarke, who was visiting from England.
“The music, the atmosphere,” he said, “they’re the only people who know how to enjoy football.”
Meanwhile, here...
World Cup fever had taken a grip in pockets of the Southland, but were traditional U.S. sports bars on board?
At Barney’s Beanery in Santa Monica, there was at least one man for whom the flame burns brightly -- manager Jeff Doherty is a self-proclaimed “soccer freak” who said he carried the U.S. flag at the opening ceremony of the 1994 World Cup.
For the U.S. match against the Czech Republic, the bar offered its usual selection of 40 beers on tap and a large breakfast menu. All 102 televisions were tuned to the game. Sadly, the screens badly outnumbered the fans watching -- about 50.
Tyler Gonzalez, a 22-year-old sports medicine researcher, said many of his friends felt apathetic.
“People aren’t willing to take that time off to watch the team lose,” he said.
Still, the bar offered those who showed up a good place to connect. On a chair, Gonzalez had hung a large American flag. Together, fans mocked the television commentary and groaned at each goal in the U.S.’ 3-0 loss.
“I just sat down, shook hands and it’s off to the races,” he said. “You’ve got a solid group here that you can root with. That’s all you need.”
*
Times photographer Gina Ferazzi contributed to this report.
*
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)
See the world
---
Germany
Los Angeles Soccer Club, 11466 Chandler Blvd., North Hollywood. (818) 763-5873. Relaxed atmosphere, full bar with German beer and various food. Showing most World Cup games. Call ahead.
***
England
Cock ‘n’ Bull pub, 2947 Lincoln Blvd., Santa Monica. (310) 399-9696. Boisterous atmosphere, full bar and English pub menu. Showing all World Cup games with British television commentary.
***
Trinidad and Tobago
Caribbean Treehouse, 1226 Centinela Ave., Inglewood. (310) 330-1170. Carnival atmosphere, children welcome, traditional islands cuisine. Showing all Trinidad and Tobago games. Also showing other World Cup games from 11 a.m. Will open earlier for games upon request.
***
Iran
Caspian Restaurant, 14100 Culver Drive, Irvine. (949) 651-8454. Upscale but passionate crowd, traditional breakfast and sandwiches. Showing all Iran games. Also showing other World Cup games from 9 a.m.
***
Portugal
Artesia DES Portuguese Hall, 11903 E. Ashworth St., Artesia. (562) 865-4693. Family-friendly atmosphere, full bar and specialty food. Showing all Portugal games. Also showing other World Cup games from 7 a.m.
***
Japan
Bistro Laramie, 18202 S. Western Ave., Gardena. (310) 532-6555. Hip Japanese crowd, beer and soft drinks and sandwiches. Showing all Japan games. Also showing other World Cup games from 9 a.m.
***
United States
Barney’s Beanery, 1351 Third Street Promenade, Santa Monica. (310) 656-5777. Trendy soccer enthusiasts, full bar with 40 draft beers on tap and 102 television screens. Showing all World Cup games.
***
Brazil
Zabumba nightclub and restaurant, 10717 Venice Blvd., Los Angeles. (310) 841-6525. Child-friendly, festive atmosphere, full bar and specialty food. Showing all Brazil games. Also showing other World Cup games from 9 a.m. Arrive early for Brazil games.
