The Other Way: El Monumental

The Other Way strives to be an equal opportunity site. The pleas of all you River Plate supporters have been heard. There will be no slavish devotion to Boca Juniors without giving River a chance. In order to make a fair and balanced determination as to which club The Other Way will officially support during the superclasico, I went to the River home opener to compare the atmosphere and vibe.

One of the first major points of contrast as you walk to River’s stadium, El Monumental, is that instead of walking by run down buildings and burned out cars you are walking through the border of Belgrano and Nuñez, higher end residential areas with some stately single family homes, not a common site in a city with the density of BA, and, with a slight detour, through the city’s Chinatown.

The Chinese have a little bit of work to do if they want their colony here to spread Han domination to South America. There are no dragon gates or masses of people crowding the streets in search of that perfect set of ingredients for this week’s dinner menu. There are a few buildings, some with red lanterns hanging out front, and a couple of people serving food in the street. They do have something that I dearly wish Palermo possessed: a large Asian grocery store. Ah, there is nothing quite like what I refer to as, “The Wall of Smell” when you enter a proper Asian grocery store. Once you hit the wall full on, you know that somewhere nearby is a section with the most delectable selection of fish. This store did not disappoint. Fish of all sizes and shapes are available including that perfect 3ft conger eel.

Back to the action. El Monumental itself is a 70,000 person stadium built in the 1930’s that hosted the 1978 World Cup final, which was won by Argentina. The stadium is set at the entrance to a large park. As you enter the stadium grounds you are struck immediately by the constant pounding of drums and noise, which continues all match long.

The general admission area is filled with people proudly displaying their River tattoos, smoking spliffs, waving flags and, oddest of all, some of them were sitting on the second level railing in order to cheer the crowd on, sometimes with young children in their laps. It is a good thing that earthquakes are not a problem here.

The game itself was exciting. River squandered 1-0 and 2-1 leads before falling behind and ultimately pulling it out 4-3 on a late goal by local hero, Ariel “El Burrito” Ortega, who is coming back after a long struggle with alcohol. The crowd was ecstatic.

Overall, as a 49ers man instead of a Raiders man, I think River is my team. I can eat chow fun before the game, their head coach, Nestor Gorosito, has a Peter Frampton style 70's perm and the stadium is filled with political propaganda for the election of their next President. All that and a great crowd?

A couple of concluding notes. For those of you who decide to attend matches, be warned that, for some reason, you are forced to wait 30 minutes after the match before being allowed to leave. This is at least true of the general admission sections at La Bombonera and El Monumental. I can’t say if it is true for assigned seats. The best speculative reason that I have heard for this is that it gives the visiting fans time to flee the area. It is incredibly annoying.

Lastly, this was meant to be the second in the three part football trilogy, with the final report being a live account of the Brazil-Argentina World Cup qualifier in Rosario. After much time and effort tickets were purchased through a local tour company. The night before the match my buddy, Gerrard, received a phone call saying that, due to the vagaries of Argentine contracts and politics, the company’s ticket source fell through and we would have to get a refund the next morning. Gerrard was, “gutted.” I think that is British for extremely disappointed. The atmosphere in Rosario looked incredible on television. La Seleccion were whipped by Brazil 3-1.