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If the Earth’s orbital period is one year, then the orbital period of a football should be four years. At the beginning of each spring, we celebrate the Spring Festival, praying for peace and prosperity in the new year, as well as favorable weather conditions ； Every four years, during the height of summer, people around the world go crazy about football thanks to the arrival of the World Cup! A feast whose beginning you can see, but whose course and outcome are hard to predict. Upon reflection, I seem to have a special connection with the World Cup. First of all, I was born in a World Cup year, and my son and daughter were born as well ； Secondly, the few World Cups I have had the opportunity to experience are like matches at different stages of life: longed for earnestly, and where things turned out well without any deliberate effort. When a ball is flying at high speed through the air, it is very difficult for an ordinary person to determine its exact landing point, unless they are an exceptionally talented player. I really hope so. Having grown up in the countryside from a young age, I only knew about football; I had never heard of the World Cup, as the people around me were more concerned with the crops on Earth at that time. I first learned that there was a cup competition in football in 1994; I was in high school at the time, and my world consisted only of books I was just starting to read – football was merely a tool used in physical education classes. Until the World Cup in the United States arrived, the children from the countryside heard many stories told by the city kids about the World Cup and football ； Though I longed for it with joy, I never got to see it in the end ； Baggio’s sorrowful figure was merely a memory added later on. In 1998, the song \"Cup of Life\" came from France to China, and then spread throughout the country; of course, university campuses were not exempt from hearing it either. It was an incredibly intense and stressful final period of exams: watching Jordan in the mornings of May, watching Zidan at midnight in June, and of course, Ronaldo as well. The classroom, a place for regaining strength ； The first three rows are filled with top students, those in the middle three rows read newspapers, and those in the last three rows are sleeping ； Teachers and students coexist peacefully, without interfering with each other. Video theater, a place to watch sports matches ； Amidst the air filled with foot odor, sweat stench, and the smell of smoke, a group of intense, fanatical, and overenergetic football fans (that term didn’t exist back then) thrived on the excitement of football, not even sparing time during halftime ； At midnight, during the intermission, someone would always shout in Zheng Pu’s accent, stretching out the words: Change the tape! After romance and action movies, exciting football continues. I watched the World Cup in its entirety that year; I really wanted Brazil to win, but they lost 0-3 in the final ； My price back then was failing 3 courses. In 2002, the Chinese football team was given a favorable draw ； When the Chinese team broke through in Asia, a few of us classmates and coworkers filled General Hua’s guesthouse with firecrackers. The finals are held in Japan and South Korea, and the matches usually start at 3 p.m., so my quitting time naturally gets earlier. Even before China’s group stage matches, some optimistic media outlets speculated that the team could win one match, draw one, and lose one to advance from the group. In fact, China proved with its own performance just how significant the difference in strength was between Brazil, Turkey, and Costa Rica. The Chinese team was eliminated after three losses; the people of the country did not judge heroes based on success or failure ； Is it a good thing for the football association, or a source of trouble? The answer came a few years later. The match needs to be watched on; we have four or five close friends, with food, wine, and football to enjoy ； Talks on zirconium and titanium are led by the people from Engineer Jia’s team. Brazilians are great, but Koreans are even greater. Soccer is very political; it’s a shame we were all so stupid and naive back then! In 2006, I was no longer able to focus on the World Cup in Germany ； Because I went to a factory called Silicon. Through cold and heat, our factory has grown from nothing. We’re eager to reach full production capacity before the World Cup ； Amidst clouds and rain, my dearly cherished son was born late, arriving in June. Very busy! But you still need to watch the ball ； When I’m at home, I watch TV with the sound off in the evening; often I fall asleep on the sofa by the second half ； During shift, we were forced to gather in the dispatch room’s large meeting space, which had no air conditioning or fans; everyone there ended up sweating like in a sauna and being bitten by mosquitoes. Fortunately, the match was exciting; what was even more remarkable was Huang Jianxiang’s passionate performance on CCTV. For 10 years, during the World Cup in South Africa, I was at home with no work to do, focusing on being with my wife as she gave birth to a strong-willed daughter. Get what you want! It was just a short distance of about 20 kilometers from Si to Yue, yet it actually took three years to cover that distance; three years have passed, and many things have changed. The former teammates are no longer around; only his wife with a big belly and their four-year-old son accompany him to watch the games, probably for the fun of it. Could it be that my daughter, still in the womb, heard too much of South African vuvuzelas, and now she’s become so talkative? Her little mouth keeps moving nonstop! In this not particularly exciting World Cup, Spain’s possession-based playing style took control of the game, and it even helped many people improve their sleep. In 2014, the World Cup returned to Brazil, a country that loves football and opposed bidding for it. Some people don’t want to waste money on this, arguing that there is still much education that needs to be provided and that many children do not have enough to eat. There were also riots. Rather than doing that, it would have been better to arrange it for us from the start ； We are good at concentrating our efforts on achieving major goals, and the national football team can take this opportunity to advance. After all, the Brazilian team had high expectations placed on it by the Brazilians; yet it was utterly defeated by Germany in the semifinals, and then beaten by the Netherlands as well. Similarly, the defending champions Spain, along with traditional powerhouses such as Italy and England, were eliminated early on, which only serves to prove that this was a fantastic World Cup. But it was also the coldest time I’ve ever experienced there. Firstly, the weather was cold; temperatures in northern England were in the low teens, and it rained all day long ； Secondly, the British newspapers had been full of hype and ambition before the match; after the new defeat, some players and coaches were in a state of despair, while the fans were depressed. Fortunately, my son is very enthusiastic; he spends his days watching games with me and has also collected many celebrity cards ； He supports Costa Rica as a team. Colombia played beautiful football and achieved excellent results. As our rivals back then, where is our Chinese team now? Written in 2014.