Orlando Day 5

Today we went to see a MLS game between Orlando City and DC united (As in Washington DC). this got off to a bit of a shaky sart as we thought the game was on Saturday night- When we were in a bar earlier in the day the owner asked us what w were doing whilst i Orlando and we said "Tomorrow we're going to se the MLS" and he was like "Don't you mean tonight?"
ARghh
Then another customer in the bar was like "Be careful the area round the stadium is al Ghetto".

Ray dropped us off at the stadium (The Citrus bowl) and it was crazy- Traffic everywhere and soooooo many police and closed roads etc. I the end we just jumped out whilst she was stuck in traffic and walked towards the stadium. we got there for about 4pm and it was mad- cooler parties and people with BBQ in ther rucks, and DJs and bouncy castles and a live band al the way from New orleans. I eve got to sit on a police motorbike. Ad burnt my leg. on the exhaust. Despite all Jay's warnings.
 we mooched around outside until 6pm- we only went in really in search of some shade.

The game kicked off at 7 so we watched the players warm up- Some were old UK premer/ league 1 players, some had played in lower league UK football, there were some international players all finishing off their careers before they retire. There were also lots of america players.
MLS is weird:
1) It's mixed seating
2) everyone is super polite because it's a family sport- you can boo the opposition, but that is about it. the guy beihind us was shouting at the players and was like "You're being Lazy!" the standrd UK chant for a bad player is "You're shit, and you know you are" to the tune of "Go west" by the pet shop boys.
3) you can drink beer in the stadium but it's $11 per can
4) Everyoe wears team colours! We both wore black Tshirts hoping to be innocuous but DC play in black. oops.
5) Everyone stands and sings the national anthem.

The football was interesting, it was a fu experience but it's very slow and not very skillful. you can see what will happen looonnggg before it happens- not like watching premier league football.

We had booked a taxi for just before the end of the match, so we went outside to wait for it- and it didn't show up! Fuck you Diamond Cabs Orlando! A really lovely steward let us borrow his phone to call them ad they wouldn't pick up. We walked dow the road a bit incase there were any taxis and eventually asked a police officer- who could not have been more helpful- He rand us a new taxi from his phone ad told us to it would be about 15 minutes and would pick us up from the carpark of Church chicken.
Church chicken was very interesting. Traff had had a few beers so was yammering on quite loudly. I was trying to get him to shut up because we were clearly not local. During this exchange we ran into a crackhead and his missus. the guy just pointed at Traff ad was like "Man, I love your hair" whilst he was talking we could see that he had all metal teeth, so Traff's response was "Man, I love your teeth!" Thankfully the bloke and his missus thought this was funny as we were stood in a bush.
They asked us what we were doing in the chicken shop- adn I was starting to as myself the same question- We said we were waiting for a cab from the game and were getting some chicken. He said he'd like some chicken. We said we'd get him some. It seemed like the best solution.

We went into the shop and everyone stared at us. then some enormous bcak bloke wearing dungarees and with o front teeth was like "You need to eat more fried chicken if you both want to be big and strong- it's the best kind of diet- Don't end up like me though" And rubbed his belly.
We agreed it was an excellent kind of diet. he though we were australian and we explained we were from the UK and had just bee to the football- so they asked about that and who won.. Everyone was really nice and friendly.

Then the "Guy with teeth" came and knocked on the chicken shop door ad was like "Your taxi's here!" so we gave him some money to get some chicken and got in the cab.
The driver looked rather nervous but cheered up when he realised we were just foreign. I think the guy with the teeth had bee trying to chat with the taxi driver.

The drive home was uneentful, It turned out the driver was from California and had moved to Orlando because it was not so hot. he gave us a bit of a tour and talked about his day.
All good.

we got back but 10pm and went for a drink in the hotel bar with John- Ray was already in her PJs. After our exciting evening I felt that rum was in order.