25 Jun, 2014 | Valeria Wilde

Social issues and Sports

Sitting in the living room of the Bolivian Express house, I am surrounded by Bolivaristas. Worried that this issue will be disproportionately contaminated by white and light blue, I feel a certain responsibility to somehow bring to life the name, the colours and the feelings that have been with me for as long as I can remember. So now that the magazine is only one day away from going to print, in the dying moments of extra time, it is left to me to defend my Tigre as we Stronguistas do best: with courage, with emotion, with passion.

To be a Tigre isn’t easy: it’s not for everyone. It is a privilege reserved for the most dogged, most valiant, for those who aren’t guided by reason but by sentiment: in a word, it is a privilege for the strongest. I, my friends, feel lucky to be striped: my blood is not blue, but yellow and black.

Thank you, daddy, for passing on the stripes to me. Thank you, Chupa Riveros, for that great warcry that still makes my hair stand on end. Thank you, Tri-Campeón, for being the only, the first. Thank you, yellow and black, for being the colours that brighten my view and warm my heart. Thank you, Curva Sur, for your unyielding support. Thank you, Pájaro Escóbar for being the most die-hard Paraguayan Stronguista ever to live. Thank you, Chumita for your loyalty and persistence. Thank you to football for your mere existence.

However, above all, I would like to say thank you to all the other Stronguistas for sharing so many victories, and more so for sharing the defeats, because it is here that we differentiate ourselves from others: when the heart refuses to go cold or stop beating, when we unite and feel more than the opponent because we cheer the best of warriors — warriors who know what it is to play with courage and die on the battlefield having given everything.

Past the midnight hour I can go to sleep happy after reliving –like a victorious final– the feelings and pride that define a Stronguista. I go to bed with a clear conscience and a happy heart in the knowledge that in this issue, BX’s 40th, I will be able to see my colours, my shirt, my team represented. With a smile and a lump in my throat, I join my team with that immortal warcry that moves mountains:

Huarikasaya Kalatakaya… Hurra Hurra!