Esteban Castillo García, a 37-year-old Guatemalan, he will finally fulfill his dream: being present at a soccer world cup, in this case Qatar 2022, which will begin on November 20 and end on December 18.
With the caption that reads like this: “28 years of dreaming it, 1 year to prepare it, 2 weeks to live it”, left for Qatar this Wednesday. A flag of his country that he says he is proud of accompanies him, but also the joy of making the “child in him” happy.
Esteban’s decision to go to the World Cup was made a year ago. “At that time, I didn’t even have plane tickets.I had not even applied for tickets, but yes, at that moment I said, “let’s try it and see what happens,” the fan told via Skype to the Voice of America.
“It’s definitely a dream come true”, he emphasizes.
This Guatemalan remembers that from the age of 9 he began to love soccer and He comments that the first tournament he consciously watched was the 1994 World Cup in the United States.. Then her parents gave him a book with the history of the World Cups that aroused his curiosity even more.
“Before the World Cup arrived on some date, I had already read about all the World Cups that had happened before. That was starting to get me excited as a nine-year-old at the time and, When I watched the recent World Cup, I enjoyed it from start to finish.. I remember very specific matches from that World Cup ”, he adds.
His lucidity is so great that he mentions that Brazil went to penalties in the 94 final and became champion.
“They are moments that were recorded in my mind. After that World Cup, that expectation remained and waiting every four years for it to arrive, each time a little more informed because I really like the history of the World Cups. I investigated more, I got more involved and now, after so many (World Cups) seen from afar, from the outside, this opportunity has arrived”.
This fan says he has high expectations to know.”how does it feel to be in a stadium with so many people” and adds that in Guatemala in the largest stadium that has been is one that can fit about 25 thousand people.
The Guatemalan comments that although his country’s team did not qualify, he says that “We still enjoy football as a spectacle and sport“and the World Cup represents for him”the maximum of the tournaments that exist”.
“As a soccer fan, as someone who likes soccer, everything excites him. I even said it before. When I had the dream of going to the World Cup, I said, “I just want to go to a game and any team. I don’t care if it’s a big team or a small one.” The important thing is to enjoy that party, that event that is the most important of all in the world of football”.
He saved with his co-workers
This man who works as an architect in his country, began to save money to fulfill his dream and also tells that the co-workers of a company where he was working before, carried out activities called “culchubales”, which is an amount of money that office colleagues gather monthly to raffle among themselves.
The dynamic changed for co-workers and one month it was up to one person to receive the money saved, another month to another and so on.
“That helped me save because, being in a group, one can pay, so I joined two of those groups and that’s how we were saving. With that discipline of saving, because sometimes it’s hard for many of us to save, but when you’re involved in a group like this, it’s more practical, there’s more group pressure to do it”.
Little by little, Esteban was paying the costs of the trip to Qatar. First the flights and lodging too.
To attend, he also made maneuvers to lower costs. Most of his tickets are category three, “the cheapest and I got, perhaps not games in such demand, because those are the first to run out”.
In Qatar he hopes to be two weeks. Since Sunday, which is just the day the World Cup begins until December 4.
In the same way, it will take the opportunity to upload content about soccer in a Facebook page where The goal of making a daily publication with data, with stories, with statistics was set. of everything I was learning and reading, and publishing day by day.
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