I look back at the amused Americans watching us, so passionate for the World Cup. We follow our national teams with a devotion that can seem irrational from the outside. We argue, celebrate, suffer and grieve. Every victory feels like our own; every defeat leaves a wound.

Believe me, many of us have tried to care less. Yet these passions persist because they are woven into who we are. As García Márquez wrote, it is not difficult to understand why so many brilliant minds, obnubilated by the contemplation of their own cultures, have struggled to find a valid method for interpreting us. It is natural that they insist on measuring us with the same yardstick by which they measure themselves. They forget, however, that the struggles of life are magnified when you’re born south of the Rio Grande.

I often wonder what do they think when thousands of people invest so much emotion and devote so much energy to a game whose outcome changes so little in practical terms?

Some might say that we are simply passionate by nature. Others might dismiss football as entertainment for the masses. Neither explanation is entirely wrong.

Yet both miss something essential.

For us, fútbol is more than a sport. It is one of the few places where history, identity, and possibility converge.

When 11 of our best players step onto the field, they do not merely represent a nation. For 90 minutes, they become us. The size of a country’s economy no longer matters. The strength of its army, the number of Nobel Prizes, its technological advances — all become irrelevant. The prejudices and stigmas that accompany us in everyday life are checked at the tunnel entrance. On the grass, everyone begins level.

That is why fútbol resonates so deeply in Latin America. It offers something rare: a space where we are measured only by what we can create.

Pelé revealed this to the world in 1958. He showed that the joy, creativity and spontaneity born in the favelas and barrios were not signs of backwardness but expressions of genius. The jogo bonito was more than a style of play; it was a declaration of identity. It announced to the world what had always existed in our streets: la gambeta, imagination, irreverence and the happiness that somehow survives in all of us “al sur del Río Grande” despite our reality. 

Maradona — or better, Diego — carried that story further. In 1986 he became more than a footballer. To millions across Latin America, he embodied a spirit of audacity and defiance. On a football pitch England did not stand a chance. Diego showed that our desparpajo, our resourcefulness, and our magic could answer wounds that bullets and invasions never could. Those two goals were not celebrated only in Argentina. They were celebrated a llorar from Tijuana to Patagonia.

The same feeling echoed when Freddy Rincón scored against West Germany in 1990 in the dying moments of the match. At a time when Colombia was often reduced to the stereotypes of narcotrafficking and violence, that goal felt like justice. For a brief moment, an entire continent saw itself reflected not through the lens of its failures but through its talent, dignity, and resilience. Rincón’s goal made all of Latin America scream, celebrate, and weep for a result that seemed to vindicate something much larger than football.

This is why the World Cup means so much to us.

It is not escapism.

 It is remembrance.

It reminds us of who we are beneath the burdens of corruption, inequality, and history. It reminds us that joy survives adversity, that creativity survives hardship, and that dignity survives defeat. In every pass, every goal and every act of brilliance, we continue our search for identity, a search that has been just as arduous for us as it has been for any nation.

 Perhaps the greatest misunderstanding occurs when others insist on interpreting us through borrowed frameworks which only contribute to our own alienation.

Fútbol reveals something reality often obscures. For 90 minutes, we see ourselves not as others describe us, but as we understand ourselves. We remember our potential, our creativity, our stubborn joy and our passion for life despite the staggering reality into which we were born, our misfortunes and our corrupt politicians.

 Faced with all of this, our answer remains the same: vida y fútbol.

The writer is an engineer living in Cambridge and is originally from Colombia.

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