The title refers to the 2010 Football World Cup, or Soccer World Cup as they would say here in the US, that is currently taking place in South Africa. And it’s not just another one, since for the first time it takes place in the African continent.
Personally I don’t pay much attention to it (I must be one of the few Argentineans that don’t watch the matches), but for most of the world it is a very big event that takes place every four years to determine the next World Champion.
Why an event like this is so important? Besides the money the football fans spend in the hosting country, it’s also a chance to advertise a nation and in this case a continent that most of the time only appears in the news when something bad happens.
Still many people don’t know where South Africa is, or for that matter any other country in Africa, like Ethiopia, Uganda, Nigeria or Angola. I know many that still place Egypt in Asia, not in Africa! 
There is an stereotype about Africans as a bunch of poor and uncivilized black people and many were against a World Cup in Africa. I remember when I was living in Argentina and the 1982 World Cup was taking place in Spain a well known artist and illustrator, Caloi, created  a character that represented the single fan of the Cameroon football team, and simply named it “el negrito de Camerun” (the little black guy from Cameroon) and made him with a bone on his head, yes, really, a bone!!
And the sad part of it is that people in Argentina found him cute and loved him.
And as if that wasn’t enough, he also developed another stereotyped character called “la mulatona” (the mulatto girl) that was a black woman with big breasts, big red lips and a very generous behind. Caloi wouldn’t get away so easily here in the US with such characters…
You may think I’m over sensitive, but I wonder what you would think if someone portraits one of your Ethiopian children in a similar way?
Stereotypes are dangerous and can lead to racism.

Anyway, maybe this time people all over the world will have the chance to know a little bit about South Africa and Africa in general and stop picturing Africans like skinny blacks with a bone on their heads.
For the 2010 FIFA World Cup, six teams from Africa qualified to participate: Algeria, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria, and the host, South Africa. Unfortunately Ethiopia didn’t qualify 
I would like to end this post with the beautiful poster that Cuban artist Edel Rodriguez created specially for the 2010 World Cup that reflects the racial struggles of South Africa:

AliciA