Rugby World Cup fever among ELTOs

Phanith scores a shot of the All Blacks Owen and Ben Franks

Last Thursday, our ELTO students were very excited to see the All Blacks’ victory parade. When they won against France, on Sunday 24 October 2011, we were very proud of New Zealanders and we participated in the celebration on the streets of Wellington until midnight. That night, not only local people but also foreigners were extremely delighted and excited. Even though we don’t know each other, we greeted everyone, hugged and danced together the whole night. I think a marvelous feeling of New Zealanders flew to us and because of this happiness, we were alive and joyful. That was an incredible experience for us.

On the day of All Blacks’ parade, the weather was not too fine. I really was impressed with their patriotism. Even though it was raining heavily, most New Zealanders especially children and teenagers were patiently waiting under the heavy rain and excited to see their favourite All Blacks.

We were waiting near the Parliament, their destination. When the All Blacks arrived near us, the audience shouted unanimously and some young men honored All Blacks by dancing a Maori traditional dance. How exciting it was! How unified they were!

On behalf of the entire nation of New Zealand, I enthusiastically honor the All Blacks. Congratulations on your victory!

This week I went to congratulate the All Blacks on their success near the parliament buildings. Although it was raining at the time, many people including teachers, students etc. felt excited and enjoyed it very much. Every person had been expecting for a long time on both sides of the road to wait and see the Rugby players anxiously. They came on trucks and people cheered them on. Some supporters passed on pieces of paper, rugby balls, booklets and so on, to the players for their signatures. That was a good view and created a friendlyenvironment, awesome!

For the last six weeks, the Rugby World Cup 2011 in new Zealand has been smoothly organized although there were some small problems of transport networks in Auckland city on the opening day.

There were huge numbers of people both New Zealanders and foreigners enjoying this event from the start until the final match. New Zealand people were proud to be the host of this world cup. It showed that this small isolated country is strong enough in terms of technical and economic ability to organize a very big international event.       

The New Zealand national rugby team, the All Blacks tried very hard to perform as good players for their nation and people. As seen from the first match until the last one, they always won and received very wonderful scores. In the idea of their nationalism, the people in the country provided their spiritual support and motivation for the national team via the television, radio, newspaper, and the slogan boards in the public areas in the whole country. Therefore, it showed the 100% pure of New Zealand.

Beneficially, even though there were some pessimistic ideas of the money loss by holding this event, the cash inflow was a remarkable amount for the green country’s economies. For example, the revenue from the accommodation and the transportation services that were served to the foreign visitors coming here during this matching event came into the accounts of the New Zealanders. Some local people spent their money enjoying the event but the money was circulated for only domestic transaction, so it is still belongs to New Zealand.

Everywhere in the country celebrated the victory. Hundreds of thousands of people came out to the Fanzones in all parts of the nation in the final play of the New Zealand team against the France Team. At the end of the match, New Zealand won 8-7 to France and All Black could touch the World Cup again after 24 years. In 2011, All Black became the World Rugby Champions of New Zealand’s sport history. Long Live All black!! Long Live New Zealand!!

All Black becomes a very popular king of New Zealand. Thousand times the words “ALL BLACK” are heard, written, and spoken out every day on the electronic and printing media and in the usual conversations of the people in New Zealand. In addition, the infants that are newly born in hospital also wear the All Black uniform. They can see the All Black before knowing the world. Thus, ALL BLACK is the pride of the nation.

Long Live All Black!! Long Live New Zealand!!

I became a rugby lover automatically after the game. Frankly speaking, I’m a friend of sport especially football. In my country I am just interested in soccer and I thought it was the best of sport in the world, while Rugby is new for me. But after watching the final game I became a rugby lover.

I have never been interested in rugby before coming to New Zealand and I didn’t know its playing rule. It is my golden chance to watch Rugby World Cup 2011 when I’m studying in New Zealand. I started watching the game when the All Blacks and other teams came into the quarter final of Rugby World Cup. I always cheer for All Black, because it is my favorite rugby team.

Today is big Sunday night; I’m going to cheer my rugby team in front of big screen on the waterfront with All Black cheers. It is a really exciting game between French and New Zealand (All Black). In front of the big screen, everyone cheers their own lovely team, however in front of the big screen today all most of the people cheer for All Blacks. On the game in both the first half time and second half time play it is quite balanced by both teams. Finally the last minute which everyone including me was waiting for came. So the All Blacks won by one point over the French and the All Blacks became the Champion for Rugby World Cup 2011.

Now I feel that Rugby is the most interesting sport. I know that rugby players must be fit and strong and during the game they have to try very hard and they need very good team work. So becoming the Champion of the Rugby World Cup is extremely hard. Now I have become a rugby lover, because of the All Blacks and I will always follow the next future rugby game after going back to my country.

So, we did not have class on that day and everyone seem to be happy to have more time to relax and enjoy the final rugby match on Sunday night between New Zealand (All Blacks) and France. You know during the game I was so excited because I was very scared and afraid that All Blacks were going to be a loser because the score was very close only 8 and 7.

Everyone was sitting in quiet and waiting for the time to finish, it seemed that no one breathed when France got the ball and when the referee gave the signal to end the game everyone was so cheerful and happy that the All Blacks won and are world champions.

Yesterday, when the referee blew a whistle finishing the final rugby match between New Zealand and France, all the people who live in Wellington had gone out to COURTENAY PLACE - the main street and celebrated the All Black champions. All the ELTO Vietnamese students also didn’t miss this occasion. Some of us went from the Fan zone to COURTENA PLACE. We joined together and fell in line with many New Zealanders on the street. Hand in hand, we walked and danced together. We forgot all homework and everything around us, tomorrow we could do it. Everyone sang songs and made crazy sounds to celebrate the Rugby world cup’s champion.   The street was very crowded and no car could move. It reminded me of when we won the championship for football (soccer) in SEAGAMES22. All Vietnamese people went and celebrated the champion. The temperature was the same as Wellington last night, but because our population is larger and bigger than New Zealand, we found it more animated and exciting. Every street on our country was full up people, but in Wellington it was only in the main street... . ..

We went back to the apartment at 3.30 am and had a good sleep. In my dream, I saw Vietnam become the champion of football in the next SEAGAME in Indonesia. I hope and pray for my dream.

This week made me impression of a special event that becomes high pride of New Zealanders. They are the winners of the Rugby World Cup Championship. I had a precious chance to watch this match outside and witnessed the victory’s time when they raised the gold cup over their head with pride and happiness. After that, I and my friends joined the crowd walking on streets to cheer and share our feeling to each other. All of us have been excited and happy until now and I’m sure that the feeling will be remained in the rest of my life.  

And on Sunday, I and other Lao colleagues went to visit Lao family and we also watched Rugby there. Like Carol’s opinion during our reading group, France was unpredictable. The game was very exciting. I bet everybody felt the same while watching each team working hard to get a try. All of us kept quiet to see who would win the competition. Finally the last remaining minute passed. Game was over, it was automatically obvious that All Black was the winner. I saw everyone happy as if  it was their victory. That night was a good time and no one wanted to sleep.

We were filled to bursting celebrating when the Black team beat the French one. On watching the competitive game, we shouted encouragement at the host team. This final match was of critical importance because it lifted New Zealand to have a higher status in ruby sport, which is attracting lots of audiences all over the world. New Zealand citizens from the young to the old rushed to road to celebrate their win. They stuck their face with NZ’s symbols and gathered into groups. They danced happily in long time. At that time, taxi could not move. A great cheer went up from the crowd. More different from my country, a lot of teenagers went to bars or clubs to share their victory.