The last week has really been about one of my most favourite activites...being a football hooligan! :P Now dont worry I didn't stab anyone or get arrested. All I did was taking in the amazing atmosphere in the various stadiums of Istanbul, where football seems unimportant when you look at the action happening on the terraces. Here football is life; The club is everything. Holding the flare in my hand (as can be seen above), walking towards the ground with thousands of fans, shouting and singing louder than anything I've ever heard I thought "this is it. This is life!".
There are few things in life that feel so special and amazing as going to a game of football with your friends, especially if your friends are crazy Ultras in the Balkan regions. What I wittnessed was amazing but I think it was only a warm up to what is expecting me in Belgrade this April, when it is once again time to get out the flares (and knifes :P) and march together, singing, drinking and simply put, going mental :)
