200 Jamaican dollars [US$2.00] can get you a flag of any of the competing nations in the FIFA 2018 World Cup on the streets of Kingston. Some have flexible white plastic poles anchored by suctions that allow fans to proudly display their favorites from the roofs of their vehicles. Most will spend their short lives loosely fitted with cellophane tape to radio antennae or bonnets or simply splayed across dashboards. The delicate dance of the players looking for passage to their netted destination on pitches across Russia now has parody on Jamaica’s busiest streets, as Argentina taxis zig-zag their way in between muscular French SUVs and mid-sized German panel vans. Jamaicans are a football obsessive people and flag displays indicate just how far that devotion runs. Some of the Chinese-made flags were fluttering worn and weary by day two of the tournament.

Flag love can betray the progress of the competition. German flags have all but disappeared after being seen in profusion in the clutch of stoplight sellers as early as May. Those who live in denial still keep their Argentina flags close to hand. And then there are the wagonists, those whose football patriotism—and flags—change with the outcome of each fixture.

Wagonists and displaced nationals alike save their most demonstrative love for Brazil. Brazilian flags outnumber all the others by a considerable margin. Some motorists display up to four or more flags on their vehicles, in the spokes of motorcycle wheels and aloft their roadside cook shops. The real obsessives go even further. Shirts, wrist-bands, jerseys, wigs; you name it. Someone has fashioned something out of the Bandeira. It helps that Brazil’s colors are close to the Jamaican black, gold and green. The colors all blend naturally in the hot blue summer.

Jamaican devotion to The Golden Squad runs deep into twentieth century past. If one could date it, it would be the 24th of June 1958. On that warm night Jamaicans pricked their ears to scratchy radios to hear British commentary of a 17 year old wizard simply named Pele, deftly dribbling past the French defense and into the history books. They had to imagine what his play looked like. TV was still a few years into the future. Pele was collectively formed out of voice and emotion. His hat trick and the rush of ecstasy that poured through the speakers and into the Jamaican imagination made him from the first unworldly. Above all these black British subjects—Jamaica was still a colony then, four years away from independence— celebrated the dazzle that emitted from black feet drifting through European columns. From then Brazil became fused with Jamaica for enchanted football lovers.

Those with long memories remember well when the man himself played in Jamaica in the fall of 1975. It was his second visit to the island. Pele was then a member of the New York Cosmos and the beautiful game’s most revered ambassador. His easy smile, which always made him seem as if he was your best friend even if you had never met him, won over Jamaicans. It cleverly camouflaged his natural talent filed sharp by relentless practice. In his mid-thirties he may have been past his prime but still regarded as the greatest footballer of all time.