CompuServe Messages

If "balkanization" can ever be amusing, I have a favorite story… When living in Ecuador, there was constant agitation for a division of the country whereby the coastal area would become independant. This, of course, stopped when oil was discovered to the East of the Andes in significant quantities to qualify for OPEC membership. The main battlefield for this conflict was sierra zone vs. coastal zone soccer games, and the weapon of choice was the .66 liter beer bottle. When full, it could be hurled at referees or players on the field, and when empty, was a nice club for brawling in the cheap seats. I never heard of a fatality, but the injuries were a boon for the ambulance companies that conveniently parked outside of the stadiums (stadia?). Of course, there is the famous Soccer War between Honduras and El Salvador in the pre-civil war days, all over a disputed soccer game. Unfortunately, there were deaths and invasionary forces in that one.