The Real Madrid Club in Madrid, Spain!

Almost the whole world is enjoying a football bash now with the beginning of the 20th FIFA (The Federation Internationale de Football Association) World Cup! I am not a very big fan of football, but I enjoy the celebratory mood of the people from all over the world. Some people support Brazil, some like Argentina or some choose their own specific countries. Lot of advertisements in all types of media, increase sales of the idiot box (I mean television) and many forms of lotteries arranged by companies - all are a (commercial) part of this game. I feel a bit nostalgic with the World Cup. I remember, decades ago (I was in standard three or four in school), around the time of the World Cup, I used to buy Big Bubble (chewing gum) to collect players' photographs which used to come with it. I also remember that, only our family used to have one Black & White TV (with the big shutter door) in our neighborhood. At night, many of our neighbors used to come to our house to watch the World Cup on our television. Little did I know about football at that time, but I used to enjoy the excitement on other's eyes and their celebrating spree. I too shouted "Gooooooaaaaal" with them. It was fun! Years passed by but my feeling is still the same. Now I reside in Lausanne, Switzerland, which is not far away from the FIFA headquarters in Zurich, Switzerland.

So for all football lovers (and also who don't love) out there, a small gift from me. Here I am going to present my travel experience to The Santiago Bernabeu Football stadium (home ground of Real Madrid club), which is the most successful and perhaps the richest club in the world, when I visited Spain. Real Madrid C.F (Club de Football) is known all over the world because it always had big name players (Beckham, Zidane, Ronaldo to name a few) in its squad, thus capable of presenting free flowing and entertaining football. I know Spain is out of the World Cup this time, but when we visited they were still the world champions!

  The Santiago Bernabeu Football Stadium is Real Madrid's home ground.  










The Trophy room inside the Real Madrid Club is spectacular. It was amazing to see all the golden balls and boots won by the Real Madrid players. While I can't even kick a football hard (ouch my knees, it hurts) but I was happy to pose in front of the trophy gallery. 




























Whatever be the field (Engineering, Medicine, Painting, Literature, Football or Cricket), it needs courage, determination, passion and winning spirit to become successful. 

"Your love makes me strong, Your      hate makes me unstoppable" 
               
                  By Cristiano Ronaldo








Inside the trophy room, we saw two statues. One is of Santiago Bernabeu Yeste, one of the most prominent men behind the success of Real Madrid Club and the other statue is of Alfredo Di Stefano, the Argentine-Spanish footballer, who is regarded as one of the greatest players of all time. 

Even a non-football fan like me got caught up in the atmosphere inside the museum. The interactive player's gallery is indeed wonderful.  It was amazing to watch all the cups won for the European Champions League title by Real Madrid club (9 in total).



















































Writing about this memorable tour in just one blog post seems a tough task. So I will write about the Santiago Bernabeu stadium more in my next post, where you can read about and see pictures of the player's dressing room and their dugout, VIP gallery, player's tunnel and the club's press room. 

So have you ever done a stadium tour? If yes, how different was it from this? Was it a football or cricket or tennis stadium or of some other game?

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