A friend of a friend had put them in touch with Di Stéfano. And despite his fame, he had not only agreed to meet with them, but he had come bearing gifts: some yerba maté, the bitter herbal drink that Argentines like for some reason, and — most important — a couple of tickets for a game the next day.

That is why Ernesto and Alberto were in Bogotá, after all. They were both soccer fans, and they had taken a break from their work in Leticia, near the Peruvian border, to make the hourslong journey to the capital so they could watch the most exciting team in the most exciting league in the world. They were here to see the pirates play.

It is only with hindsight, and the knowledge of who was sitting with him at that table, that it is possible to see just how extraordinary a scene — painted vividly in Ian Hawkey’s biography of Di Stéfano — this is.

One of those two doctors would witness such rampant inequality on the journey around South America, and in Colombia in particular, that he became convinced of the need for social change and, eventually, violent revolution. A few years later, the world would know Ernesto, the 24-year-old cadging a ticket off one of his country’s finest players, as Che Guevara.

Inside the Embajadores that day, though, he was just a kid, a doctor, a fan. If anyone at that table was a rebel, it was Di Stéfano.

Source: New York Times

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