At the end of a 500-mile road trip from San Diego to San Jose, hundreds of Jordan supporters marked the “small but mighty” nation’s World Cup debut against Austria on Tuesday with singing, chanting and tributes to King Abdullah II outside a stadium in the San Francisco Bay Area.
A convoy of vehicles draped in Jordan’s red flags stopped in Los Angeles for a break before continuing north, where members of the Bay Area’s Jordanian community gathered to welcome them.
Wearing a traditional red-and-white shemagh, student Rashed Kanawi said he was moved to tears when the team secured qualification for the North America finals a year earlier.
“I’ll be honest with you, my heart was broken when we lost to Uruguay in the 2014 qualification playoff,” he told Reuters, referring to the 5-0 aggregate defeat in late 2013.
“It’s so special. Everyone here is representing their nation in the best way they can. As you can see, everyone’s wearing the shemagh. The one I’m wearing is Bedouin.
