I realised it's been two years I've gone without any new entry. Heavily influenced by the current situation related to the coronavirus, we hadn't been traveling much these last two years. Apart from that, though, we had moved two countries which brought in even more chaos into our lives. But hey, new exciting adventures! New travel destinations! In short, we left Brussels in 2020 to move back to Zagreb, and had decided to leave Zagreb and move to Belgrade for professional reasons in 2021.
To start the new year, my husband convinced me that we all should go watch the Croatia-Serbia match at the European Handball Competition. When we learned that the very match was being held in Szeged, in Hungary -just two hour drive away from Belgrade- we decided to give it a go. Now, if you've been following our journey, it's not the first time we take the kids to big sport events. We took them to Zagreb indoors tennis matches, to EuroBasket when Croatia was hosting, and to UEFA Euro in Paris when France was hosting. We had also brought them to rock music festival in Slovenia. Generally they were fine, but they were much smaller then, therefore mostly asleep during the matches or carried in a carrier. But now, finally, at the age of 5 and almost 8, both of them are really into the match and able to follow the game flow.
In the end, Croatia beat Serbia and won the match 23:20. It was a great match, enjoyable to watch. Now, if you're a sport fan yourself but hadn't had the courage to take your little ones to a sport event, these are our little tips that might help planning your next sport adventure:
Buy the tickets online, and choose a neutral zone
You don't want to stand in line in front of the ticket box just to find out later that there's no more tickets, so get them beforehand and print at home. Generally when you're buying tickets, you can choose a seat in each of the playing team's fan zone, or in a neutral zone. Unless you're a really big fan and want to be in your team's fan tribunes, I'd suggest to get seats in the neutral zone. We did cheer for Croatia, of course, but getting seats in the fan area might have been too loud and overwhelming for the kids. Most country fans would have drums and trumpets, and might be cheering loudly constantly. We decided it would be less stressful to be in a neutral zone, which turned out very well.
Let the kids get acquainted with the basic rules of the sport
Both of our children are gymnasts, so they don't play any group sports. We let them watch several handball matches before going to watch it live, just so that they're familiar with the basic rules. Later in the arena, our younger one was more into the reindeer mascot of the competition that anything else, but our 7-year-old followed the game very seriously, half explaining to herself every time a player gets 2-minute suspension or gets a penalty shoot. Be ready to get a lot of questions. Most of the time I was just answering questions that our 7-year-old had during the game.
Arrive early, prepare water and snacks, get comfortable
Most stadiums or arena won't let you in with any kind of bottles, so we didn't bring the water bottles with us. You'd need to arrive early, find your seats, and head to the bar to get glasses of water for the kids (and beers for yourselves). We arrived a bit late, so my husband had to stand in line for over half an hour to get us our drinks. We used the half-time break to stretch our legs. We bought seats closest to the aisle so we can get out easily, and walked around admiring the new Arena during the break.
Talk about fair play, tolerance and the unpredictable result of every match
Yes, we came to cheer Croatia, and yes, we wore the Croatian jerseys and all that. But prior to the event, we had to have a lot of talks about how everyone can cheer for different team and for their own country; and although it's okay to support different teams, everyone has to respect the end result without personally insulting the other team. Things happen on the court. Players might start a fight, fans throw things to the court. The kids need to be told that these are all not part of a fair play and are unacceptable behaviour.
Combine the match with something interesting nearby
We don't normally just go to a match and go home. We usually combine the whole experience with some activities that the kids would love, so they can get a positive experience in general. On the day of the match, we arrived early in Szeged, and decided to spend the lovely sunny day in Szeged zoo which was really great. The day after the match, after a good night sleep, we spent the morning in this amazing waterpark called Szeged Aquapolis with its indoor pools and endless water slides. Overall, we made the whole weekend a nice weekend getaway for the whole family!