Word: barring
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...even without the ring, he can still think good thoughts, even while operating on just a couple hours of sleep, with graying stubble and bloodshot eyes. "I mean, what time is it?" he asks, as he lifts saltines from the salad bar here at the Pizza Ranch and fills his mouth. "It's 9 o'clock on New Year's Day, and we have 250 people here...
Popping a bite of sea urchin into my mouth I look to the chalkboard at the far end of the sushi bar that lists the daily specials: young yellowtail tuna, mozuku seaweed, minke whale. The words for whale hang there in much the same way that a pig head stares back at you from the window of a Chinatown butcher shop...
...sports team that sponsors language study? In Catalonia, the semi-autonomous region that makes up the northeastern corner of Spain, the coalition hasn't taken anyone by surprise. Barça has been a symbol of Catalan nationalism since its founding in the late 19th century. Under the Franco dictatorship, which suppressed the Catalan language as part of its campaign to create an authoritarian centralized state, the team provided an outlet for the expression of local identity, a place where Catalan flags could be waved and Catalan cheers shouted. And now, at a time when Catalonia has achieved an unprecedented...
...true that Sunday's sold-out match at Camp Nou, like all games between the two teams, will be heavy with symbolic meaning. Barça and Real Madrid are long-time rivals, and not just because they are the two most successful teams in Spanish soccer history (and currently sit in first and second place in the standings). If Barça was a symbol of dissent to the Franco dictatorship, Real Madrid was the regime's - and the Generalísimo's - favored team. (Santiago Bernabeu, the former club president for whom the Galácticos' stadium is named...
...lose or tie, the Barça-Madrid match is perhaps not the most telling example of Catalan nationalism's strange intermingling of sports and politics. For that, look to a quieter game scheduled a week later. Although international sporting organizations such as UEFA and the IOC have long rejected Catalonia's efforts to field its own sides, the region continues to mount unofficial efforts. And on December 29th, a Catalan selection will take to the San Mamé s stadium in Bilbao for a friendly match against - who else? - Euskadi, the Basques' national soccer team...