So I totally don't care about the World Cup

Not that I'm a huge football fan, but I'm always up for the World Cup. A touch of orange here, a crate of beer there... An occasional fan indeed, but a good one. Sports connect, and football even more so. The whole country buzzes and surges with every goal. But now? Now I wonder why the teachers at the daycare I walk by have flags painted on their cheeks. And is my neighbor celebrating her birthday because her house is completely decorated with orange balloons?

In short, I feel zero about it. And it's not because of our team and certainly not because of Louis van Gaal, whom I find a delightful colorful person. It's two things.

1. The season
For me, the World Cup belongs to the summer. Buzzing balconies, stands in gardens, boats in canals, that sort of thing. I'm now in a Michael Bublé mood with blankets and candles. Turned inward and not in the mass-hopping mood.

2. Qatar
You might think that the World Cup is just in Qatar and that you have to deal with it, but I can't do that. I felt the same way when I was once in a fantastic resort in Turkey and I couldn't even get on Wikipedia. The idea that someone else decided what I could or couldn't read took all the shine off the vacation. Or in Dubai, where I saw the movie Bohemian Rhapsody and where the scene in which Freddy Mercury tells his girlfriend that he is gay was cut from the film. I found that out when I watched the movie again in the Netherlands. I had the same experience in Singapore. There, the famous orgasm scene from When Harry Met Sally was cut. And when a movie was made about Bugis Street (a street where many transvestites and gays met), actors were hired to play those characters because they didn't want to know anything about ‘real’ gays and transvestites. By the way, I've never met as many fun lesbians and gays as in Singapore, so thank goodness the regime couldn't ban this. But the feeling that hundreds of people have died to realize this World Cup just freezes me. You feel that everyone who is there is playing with the handbrake and cheering. Everyone would have preferred it not to be this way.

And that makes it a sadness for me that even the best goalkeeper Noppert or the most beautiful goal from Frenkie de Jong can't change...