Insanity

So I arrived in Madrid without much fanfare and promptly fell asleep. When I awoke Sunday morning (ok, so it was early afternoon), I was greeted by old friends who were ready to hit the beat again. We found some tapas and sangria, but really were in search of the PARTY that was happening as Spain prepared to play Germany in the Euro Cup finals. I've always wanted to be a part of one of these street parties, but had no idea what I was in for.

We wandered down to Plaza de Colon (above) but there wasn't much going on yet -- just a ton of people 2 hours before the game. So we wandered a bit more -- people watching as scores and scores of people made their way to a public viewing area somewhere in the city. Everyone was wearing red and gold (team colors) and most were draped in the Spanish flag. There were rather inebriated men painting the flag on anyone or anything that would let them, and lots of beer. Lots and lots of beer. Oh, and did I mention the horse that was being paraded around?

When the game finally started, I found myself smack dab in the middle of Colon with my friends...and about 60,000 others. People were crawling on top of anything they could. People were cheering before anything had began! We stuck around until Spain scored -- at which time a mosh pit began behind us and as a space cleared we realized it was for a firecracker that had just been lit. The guys grabbed me right in time, but one of them got nailed in the back of leg with a piece of firecracker. We feared for our safety so we decided to finish watching the game in a civilized pub.

But when Spain won, we had to see what would happen...
Insanity. Absolute craziness. Kids. Adults. Shouting, yelling...screaming. Flags. Horns. Noise. Till the wee hours. We stood on the main thoroughfare for about 30 minutes, but I'm sure it followed us home...for a few hours. Spain knows how to celebrate!