The Soccer War
Authors: Ryszard Kapuscinski
Ryszard Kapuściński’s
THE SOCCER WAR
“
The Soccer War
is an example of alert, understated and unforgettable war reporting … a marvelous book.”
—
The New York Review of Books
“One of the great journalists of our time … Kapuściński’s journalistic encounters and his unexpected discoveries in the roughest parts of the world remain vivid.”
—
Los Angeles Times
“Every rare, rare once in a while … a writer comes along of such power, such extraordinary gifts, that one feels not only gladdened to partake of his work, but privileged. Ryszard Kapuściński is one of those talents, and
The Soccer War
is one of those books.”
—
Conde Nast Traveler
“A remarkable collection—part memoir, part history, part journalism … writing of rare penetration and humanity.”
—
Chicago Tribune
“A writer who combines the best of Hemingway and García Márquez … his dispatches are not just reportage but intense, lyrical writing.”
—
Milwaukee Journal
“If you wish to understand something about war, turn off your television and open this book.”
—
Buffalo News
“[Kapuściński is] a journalist of exceptional talent, vision and fearlessness.… He takes us into a vast and tumultuous landscape [and] teaches us what it feels like to be there.”
—
Miami Herald
The Soccer War
Ryszard Kapuściński was born in 1932. During four decades reporting on Asia, Latin America, and Africa, he befriended Che Guevara, Salvador Allende, and Patrice Lumumba. He witnessed twenty-seven coups and revolutions and was sentenced to death four times. His books have been translated into nineteen languages. He died in 2007.
The Emperor
Shah of Shahs
The Soccer War
Imperium
Another Day of Life
The Shadow of the Sun
F
IRST
V
INTAGE
I
NTERNATIONAL
E
DITION
, J
ANUARY
1992
Copyright
©
1986, 1990 by Ryszard Kapuściński
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in Great Britain by Granta Books, London, in 1990. First published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York, in 1991.
Various selections in this volume were originally published in the following:
Granta
: “Plan for a Book That Could Have Started Right Here” and “Lumumba” (under the title “Outline for a Book”); “Dispatches” (under the title “The Snow in Ghana”).
Harper’s
: “The Soccer War.”
The New York Review of Books
: “The Burning Roadblocks” (under the title “Fire on the Road”).
Grateful acknowledgment is made to Georges Borchardt, Inc., and Jonathan Cape Limited for permission to reprint an excerpt from
Tristes Tropiques
by Claude Lévi-Strauss, translated by John and Doreen Weightman. Copyright © 1955 by Librairie Plon. This English translation copyright © 1973 by Jonathan Cape Limited. Reprinted by permission.
Author photo © Czeslaw Czaplinski
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kapuściński, Ryszard.
[Wojna futbolowa. English]
The soccer war/Ryszard Kapuściński ; translated from the Polish by William Brand.—1st Vintage International ed.
p. cm.
Translation of: Wojna futbolowa.
eISBN: 978-0-8041-5110-8
1. Africa—Description and travel—1977– 2. Latin America—Description and travel—1951–1980. 3. Soviet Central Asia—Description and travel. 4. Revolutions—History—20th century. 5. Kapuściński, Ryszard—Journeys. I. Title.
DT12.25.K3613 1992
909.82—dc20 91-50494
v3.1
ONTENTS
HE
H
OTEL
M
ETROPOL
I am living on a raft in a side-street in the merchant district of Accra. The raft stands on pilings, two-storeys high, and is called the Hotel Metropol. In the rainy season this architectural monstrosity rots and festers with mould, and in the dry months it expands at the joints and cracks. But it does not fall apart! In the middle of the raft there is a construction that has been partitioned into eight compartments. These are our rooms. The remaining space, surrounded by a balustrade, is called the veranda. There we have a big table for meals and a few small folding tables where we drink whiskey and beer.
In the tropics, drinking is obligatory. In Europe, the first thing two people say when they meet is ‘Hello. What’s new?’ When people greet each other in the tropics, they say ‘What would you like to drink?’ They frequently drink during the daytime, but in the evening the drinking is mandatory; the drinking is premeditated. After all, it is the evening that shades into night, and it is the night that lies in wait for anyone reckless enough to have spurned alcohol.
The tropical night is a hardened ally of all the world’s makers of whiskey, cognac, liqueurs, schnapps and beers, and the person who denies them their sales is assailed by the night’s ultimate weapon: sleeplessness. Insomnia is always wearing, but in the tropics it is killing. A person punished all day by the sun, by a thirst that can’t be satisfied, maltreated and weakened, has to sleep.
He has to. And then he cannot!
It is too stuffy. Damp, sticky air fills the room. But then, it’s not air. It’s wet cotton. Inhale, and it’s like swallowing a ball of cotton dipped in warm water. It’s unbearable. It nauseates, it prostrates, it unhinges. The mosquitoes sting, the monkeys scream. Your body is sticky with sweat,
repulsive to touch. Time stands still. Sleep will not come. At six in the morning, the same invariable six in the morning all year round, the sun rises. Its rays increase the dead steam-bath closeness. You should get up. But you don’t have the strength. You don’t tie your shoes because the effort of bending over is too much. You feel worn out like an old pair of slippers. You feel used up, toothless, baggy. You are tormented by undefined longings, nostalgias, dusky pessimisms. You wait for the day to pass, for the night to pass, for all of it, damn it to hell, finally to pass.