They had been outside the hotel since 4 in the morning.
I know because I could hear them at 4 in the morning, and at half 5, and at 7, and when I finally gave up on the ceiling and pulled the curtain back at half 8 they were still there and there were 3 times as many of them.
Boom. Boom. Boom-boom-boom.
["WAAALSH! WAAALSH!"]
One drum. One man with one drum, bare arms, a green flag knotted round his neck like a cape, and he had been beating that thing for 5 hours and he had another 2 days in him.
Below him, filling the road, a crowd that had decided that the way to spend the Friday before a World Cup final was standing on a pavement in Moscow looking up at a window in case a man came near it.
A woman at the front had a baby against her shoulder in a green shirt about 8 sizes too big for it. There was a lad up on his father's back with a sign, and the sign said something in Arabic on one side and, on the other, in English, in marker pen, WALSH IS OUR SON.
