One of the most illuminating benefits of travelling is seeing different people’s culture and ways of living. Right from my first tournament coverage with ACLSports in 2018 in Morocco, I had always looked out for the driving patterns in the countries I visit.
The United States is a country of cars! There are so many vehicles on the road at every time so, driving with full compliance to the American rules and culture has been worthy of note to me.
In January 2018, I wrote about the hornless city of Tangier in Morocco, little did I know it was a mere child’s play. I really consider it a wonder of the world that there are thousands of cars on the American road daily and nobody presses the horn!
In my American Diary 3 last week, I wrote about the lady called Ariana that drove us from Harrisburg to Hanover PA. We had an interesting conversation with her on the way to our destination. I asked her how does she and other drivers easily overtake the trucks anytime they feel like, without pressing the horn for them.
She was curious to know why she had to press the horn. So, I helped her by saying, you can’t do this in Nigeria without pressing the horn; then Ariana asked:
“Why? They don’t have side-mirrors or what?”
Myself and my friend Chibuzor Amos burst into laughter. Hear Ariana o? You dey ask if dem nor get side mirror? Chibuzor said “they will even be warning you from the side”. While some of them even have it clearly written at the back of the big vehicles that “Horn before overtaking”.
One of my hosts has already offered me a chance to drive since I have my international driver’s license with me but I’m sorry, I’m not doing that. Not in this first ever trip to the US.
Jersey culture
I rounded off my five-day visit to Pennsylvania on Monday afternoon, two days after I had covered the second game at the Lincoln Financial Field, Philadelphia. Every game has its own lessons and the second game; Croatia vs Ghana, gave me a special lesson.
There were more than 60,000 fans inside the stadium, at least 20,000 Croats and at least 15,000 Ghanaians. Outside the stadium, there were also nothing less than 5,000 Ghanaians who could not secure match tickets.
The lesson I gleaned from that occasion was in the jersey culture of Europeans (Croatians) and West Africans (Ghana).
There were no fewer than 10,000 Croatia fans donning the Number 10 jersey of Luka Modric, with Modric well inscribed at their back. There were also a few others donning names of other Croatia national team players like Kramaric, Kovacic etc.
Some Croats exiting the subway after the game
For the Ghana fans though, credit to them, a vast majority of them were on Ghana’s yellow and black jerseys. However, the difference in culture means that more than 80% have their personal names printed at the back of their jerseys. You can hardly see any jerseys with a player’s name.
Knowing that Ghana are Nigeria’s best twins, I knew that it was almost same case with Nigerians so I asked a Ghanaian (who flew in from Africa for the tournament) why he couldn’t have a Black Stars player name at his back but his own name. His response was what a Nigerian would say to such question, 😁
“You expect me to use $100 to buy a jersey and put a player’s name? If Partey wants me to wear his name, he should give me his jersey nah.”
We both laughed but knowing that such thinking is valid for Nigerians too, I took home the lesson. So I’m asking you (my reader) have you ever gone to a sports shop to buy your favourite player’s jersey or you simply buy your club’s jersey and have your name at the back?
