Day 3 – Raa-fa ... Raa-fa

So, the day had finally arrived. All that fretting over tickets, planning and faffing was over and today the sole focus was Rafa ... and tennissss of course. :cough:

Larky Lark Rafan was up and about and had found us a nice place just around the corner where we could have breakfast that didn’t include a gluten filled brick and lashings of olive oil ... Spanish olive oil (of course), so that was our first port of call for the day. Then it was just the small task of negotiating the small, windy, narrow streets which were “off piste” from the main thoroughfares in order to make our way to one of the main avenues, as it looked like getting to the bullring was pretty straightforward from there.

We got lost “off piste” ... quelle surprise ... but got there in the end.

Now Cordoba’s bullring from the outside was not very attractive, as we’d just seen the one in Seville (and I’ve seen the one in Madrid) and as a piece of architecture, those two were streets ahead. However on thinking about it, when you’ve seen one bullring, they all start to get a bit samey. Hehe ;) But there were several sponsors tents around and Rafan was hastily collecting every single newspaper and freebie that they were handing out. :scrapbook: There was a nice stall selling tennis memorabilia such as signed pictures and signed tennis balls, and Rafan quite had her eye on a picture that spelled out R-A-F-A as a cut out with a picture of him behind each letter. The stall-holder quickly saw that glint in Rafan’s eye (and she gave him her phone number, but more of that on the story of the appropriate day :whistle: ), and we just got chatting to “Javier” as I’ll call him, cos I’ve forgotten his name, and he seemed rather bemused that English women would come out to Spain to support Rafa and the Spanish Davis Cup team. Dunno why ... it seems like the most natural thing in the world to us. Anyhow, Rafan said she’d think about the R-A-F-A picture and we decided to go and take our seats.

Now any public event is organised chaos in southern Europe, if you ask me, and we knew we had to enter via a Tendido, but we didn’t really know what a Tendido was, nor the number of the Tendido we needed, because funny old thing, our tickets failed to even include the word “Tendido”. So after a bit of aimless wandering around, we joined what the Spanish call a “queue” and before long ... we were IN !! Now although we’d paid Category 2 prices, our tickets were in Category 4 and you can guess what that meant ... yep, climbing hunnnnnnnnnnndreds of steps. :pant: :pant: :pant: ... but then what would a Rafateers on Tour trip be without walking bleedin’ miles and climbing bloody steps. Someone however – mentioning no names but blonde pigtails and pink ribbons might give it away – seemed to have remembered all of her gambolling ways from Monte Carlo and once again skipped up there like a mountain goat. (She smelt Rafa ...).

Now I’ve been to the footie several times at the San Siro in Milan, Italy, and coming from the Theatre of Dreams like I do with its beautifully moulded and crafted plastic red seats, it was always rather a shock to find that the “seats” in this so-called famed football stadium were nothing other than slabs on concrete with a plastic mould stuck in them upon which you placed your culo (bum). So after climbing Mount Cordoba, in the heat, and panting like Feli was pushing his shorts up right in front of me ... it was something of an even greater shock to see that our “seat” was nothing other than a number painted on a concrete slab. I kid you not, and it wasn’t even and polished concrete at that!! Lumps and bloody bumps all over the place ... good job there’s plenty of padding on the rear end, that’s all I can say. But we’d made it, we were there. Sitting amongst the riff raff and joining in with all their Mexican waves and singing and chanting, and even though they were supposed to be the nose-bleed seats, the view of the court was perfect and even better, we were under cover of a roof and the sun shined on everyone else but us. Perfecto!

So let’s move on to the event. On court were a number of flag bearers, all holding flags of the nations taking part in the Davis Cup and tucked away in the corner was a rather large band. Ball boys and girls were also forming orderly queues on court. Then the Master of Ceremonies started up and making their entrance from the Toreadors’ gate came the teams, lead out by France, as they negotiated their way around the side of the bullring. The French team were announced individually first and they walked on to polite applause and then formed a line at the far side of the court. Tigger was playing the first match of course, so he was already prepared in his kit, and was bouncing and jumping up and down by the side of bullring, waiting for the Spanish team to be announced. And then they were ... with him entering the court first.

Oh readers! The cheers and applause that that boy got was absolutely superb, FAB! I’ve never heard anything like it, and it just proves how loved and popular he is in his home country. It brought a quiet little tear to this old fangirl’s eye, I can tell you. Then little Daveed was announced, followed by Fer, then by Feli and finally, Albert Costa. The Spanish team formed a line next to the French team and then we had the national anthems. Respectful quiet was maintained during France’s, and then it was the turn of the Spanish. Now its funny, cos the Spanish national anthem doesn’t have any words, but the crowd la-la-laaa’d their way through it and waved their flags. Just a bit about the Spanish crowd. I thought it was brilliant that the vast majority of them all turned up in their national colours of red and gold. There were big flags and small flags, banners, hooters, the lot. They really added so much to the atmosphere and we felt brilliant to be part of it. But an over-riding memory for me was that, well, we might have mentioned one or two times that it was hot, and from our position , all you could see around the bullring were fans being wafted ... and this fluttering movement in the crowd was really a spectacle to see.

Anyhow ... the tennis. Well, you know the score by now and I’m not going to take you through it point by point. But ... and here comes another quiet, teary fangirl moment ... when Rafa stood to serve, and the crowd (helped by the trumpet from the band in the stands) all started up with, “Raa-fa, Raa-fa, Raa-fa, Raa-fa, Raa-fa” ... oh I swear, it was marvellous. It was Rafan’s point that even though we’ve been lucky enough to see him live before, and even though he’s loved in our own country ... never does he ever have the full support of the crowd. There’s always some joker in there willing him to lose, simply because he’s Rafa. There’s always a large part of the crowd loudly cheering on the underdog, there’s always some portion of the crowd in their RF caps and thinking Rafa is the tennis anti-Christ. But on that afternoon, the crowd was all his ... all Rafa’s. And I loved it, and I loved the support he was given. Most of us at some point have gone on about his participation in the Davis Cup, or wish he would skip Barcelona ... but with me now having this experience, I can understand why it means so much to him to play in Spain, to play for Spain. And long may it continue.

And the other brilliant bit was that he was playing so well. Its as if he’d never been off clay ... hell, it was as if he had started to actually play on clay in 2011. Gone was that troubled, tired, un-confident individual that we witnessed this Spring ... Rafa on clay was playing like ... Rafa on clay! And even though we were in Monte Carlo, never during that tournament did he play as well as he did on Friday. The variety and length of his shots, the Rafagrunts when he wound up that big forehand ... all of it was there, loved it! He annihilated Richard Gasquet and was superb throughout ... bravo Rafa!

So after safely and superbly giving Spain the lead, next on court was David Ferrer against Gilles “chicken legs” Simon. Another look at Simon ... boy are we lucky to endlessly keep catching his matches. Now I’ve read in other places that people feel a bit sorry for little Daveed, that Rafa being Rafa is the one that gets all the attention and all the adulation. Well, yes he does ... but don’t think for one minute that the Spanish crowd don’t appreciate Daveed and all that he does for the Spanish team. He was cheered every bit as loudly as Rafa and the support was absolutely out there for him. He too, played a fine match and won in straight sets. So Spain were 2-0 up after the first day. Easy!! And Rafan and I had learnt several new things. Well ... we’d learnt how to clap in the flamenco style when trying to encourage the players. And we’d learnt all of the Spanish football chants such as Ole! Ole! Ole! ... A lluego, ole! ... and our particular favourite ... Yo soy, espanol, espanol, espanol. Did I mention that concrete slabs aside, we liked sitting with the riff raff?

But of course not only was there hotness out on the court, there was hotness on the bench too, with FeliFer sat watching and Marc! goofing around. During Rafa’s match, Fer sat there in his cap and shades, and stuck a wet towel over his head and over his legs. I found it hard to take my eyes off Feli, cos never does a man wear his flip flops so well *thud*. And he kept making several moves towards the boxes behind him who most probably were hosting the players’ families and friends. And at one point, he leant over to this little girl who threw her arms around his neck and planted a smacker on his cheek whilst he did the same to her. Then he hugged and kissed a little boy ... child envy is a very serious crime, I can tell you. Feli also made himself useful by dishing out the water. Hehe. After Rafa’s match, he came to join the rest of the team and can barely sit still for a minute. He’s up and down clapping, he was at one point sitting next to Toni and was in lengthy discussion and gesticulating with his hands various shots at the end of points. I’ll tell you something though ... that team looks like they all get on and have a riot. What I wouldn’t give for just half an hour of being a part of it. And getting a snog from Feli ...

Anyhow after the tennis, we made the trek back home. Away from the main avenues, we always entered the Old Town by the gate at the original city walls and with the map in our hand, we successfully negotiated going “off piste” without a single mistake for the very first time as we made it back to our hotel. After a little rest and recovery, we went out that night to join the VB girls for dinner ... and I even treated my face by wearing a little eyeliner and mascara and even the lips got a dose of lipstick. I had two huge gins that night that cost me 15 euros! FIFTEEN bloody euros, can you believe it? But joy of all joys, we met the girls for dinner in one of the squares, Plaza Tendillas, and the menu catered for our delicate English palettes. I had an exotic cheese pizza and Rafan had seafood paella. Delicious! Dinner that evening, 8/10 but unlike the other night, I’m not including any score for the scandalously expensive gin. Harumph!! Two of the VB girls indulged in the local delicacy of bulls’ tail and spuds. It looked like the Devil’s peasant food. Hehe.

So at midnight we tromped back to our hotel after a very successful day. Me to try and stay level in the bed that I had broken, and Rafan to carefully arrange the towel on the floor so that she could roll out of bed in the morning.

Watching Rafa play tennis on clay ... 11/10. VAMOS!!