Tag Archives: mexico

Around the world, Jogo Bonito

Mexico 2-0 France

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I should be sleeping because tomorrow I need to fly early, but there’s too much adrenaline in my system from the Mexico VS France match, so I might as well post some photos. We flew to Polokwane and back just for the game, and needless to say it was well worth it. Incredible atmosphere. Mexico played like a local team, barely any French fans could be seen. The game was great, of course. The result, even better.

Click read more to see some more pics. And stay tuned because I scheduled a very cool surprise photo to appear a few hours after this post.

Continue reading Mexico 2-0 France →

Life of Marcos

Zeide’s driver’s license

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Here’s a fun little piece of family history that was recently unearthed by my great-uncle Jacobo:

This is an undated driver’s license that belonged to my great-grandfather Marcos Sandler. He must have received it not too long after moving to Mexico. It is for driving a bogué. According to my mom, that’s the word they used for wagons back in the day. I had never heard it and my search in the all-knowing Royal Academy of the Spanish Language was fruitless. I did find  the similar words bogie and boje, which are synonyms whose definition I translate:

A set of two pairs of wheels mounted on adjacent, solid parallel axis, used in both sides of the vehicles of great length destined to circulate over lanes.

Yeah, that doesn’t make any sense in Spanish either. Perhaps an enlightened reader can help? (Eva, ask your dad).

Jogo Bonito

Mexico vs. history

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Scary post from futbol y más regarding the history of World Cups and the host nation. As you know, the opening match of the FIFA World Cup is Mexico vs. host South Africa. As the table below shows, the host nation has never lost their first match, and they have always qualified to the second round. If this holds true for the 2010 edition, this means that Mexico will not win their first game and since only two of four teams qualify, they’d be fighting for that other spot against France and Uruguay.

Year Host 1st match win? 2nd round? # won # tied # lost Group rank
1930 Uruguay Yes Yes 2 0 0 1
1934 Italy Yes Yes NA NA NA NA
1938 France Yes Yes NA NA NA NA
1950 Brazil Yes Yes 2 1 0 1
1954 Switzerland Yes Yes 2 0 1 1
1958 Sweden Yes Yes 2 1 0 1
1962 Chile Yes Yes 2 0 1 2
1966 England Draw Yes 2 1 0 1
1970 Mexico Draw Yes 2 1 0 2
1974 W. Germany Yes Yes 2 1 0 1
1978 Argentina Yes Yes 2 0 1 2
1982 Spain Yes Yes 1 1 1 2
1986 Mexico Yes Yes 2 1 0 1
1990 Italy Yes Yes 3 0 0 1
1994 U.S.A. Draw Yes 1 1 1 3
1998 France Yes Yes 3 0 0 1
2002 Korea Yes Yes 2 1 0 1
2002 Japan Yes Yes 2 1 0 1
2006 Germany Yes Yes 3 0 0 1
Jogo Bonito

World Cup groups

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fifa cupThe Final Draw is over. Here are the results:

Group A: South Africa, Mexico, Uruguay, France
Group B: Argentina, Nigeria, Korea Republic, Greece
Group C: England, USA, Algeria, Slovenia
Group D: Germany, Australia, Serbia, Ghana,
Group E: Netherlands, Denmark, Japan, Cameroon
Group F: Italy, Paraguay, New Zealand, Slovakia
Group G: Brazil, Korea DPR, Côte d’Ivoire, Portugal
Group H: Spain, Switzerland, Honduras, Chile

Yes, Mexico will be opening the World Cup. Pretty cool.