For such a historic achievement, it wasn\u2019t quite the celebration the Lopez family would have had back home, in Valencia. <\/p>\n
In Spain, she said, a World Cup victory would have filled the streets with thousands of people, giant screens, flags, cars honking and celebrations stretching late into the night.<\/p>\n
\u201cHere, I don\u2019t know how to celebrate,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
After moving from Spain to Napier about 18 months ago with her husband Rafael Andres and their four children, the family found themselves celebrating one of Spain\u2019s biggest sporting moments on their own.<\/p>\n
The match kicked off at 7am on a Monday in New Zealand, but that didn\u2019t stop the household from making it a priority.<\/p>\n
Carina, who works as a midwife, had organised to have the day off while Rafael worked remotely for his Spanish company.<\/p>\n
Their children, aged 10, 14, 17 and 20, delayed school and lectures at EIT so they could all watch together at home.<\/p>\n
Although she said she wasn\u2019t usually a football fan, the World Cup felt different.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m so excited … I woke up early today to watch with the kids, and they were so happy,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey were so excited and even crying. I think it\u2019s the first time I\u2019ve seen my eldest crying.\u201d<\/p>\n
Emma, left, Eric, Noah, Carina, Christian and Rafael celebrate in the living room of their Napier home after Spain\u2019s World Cup triumph.<\/p>\n
The family spent the match video-calling and messaging relatives in Spain, reacting to every controversial decision together.<\/p>\n
Despite the victory, Carina said one thing was missing.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you are happy, you need to share with someone.\u201d<\/p>\n
She estimated there were only about 40 Spaniards living in Hawke\u2019s Bay and hoped to organise a get-together with some of them at some point this week.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the meantime, we don\u2019t know what to do. Kids are at school. Shall we wait for them to go for lunch? I don\u2019t know what to do,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere aren\u2019t many people to share the happiness of victory here. You got that feeling that you are alone.\u201d<\/p>\n
She joked she might have to settle for celebrating with Argentinian friends, although she believed their answer would be \u201cmaybe another time\u201d.<\/p>\n
Carina has not only friends from their World Cup rivals but also Argentinian brothers, so she said she wouldn\u2019t be giving anyone a hard time.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m like, sorry, but not sorry,\u201d she laughed.<\/p>\n
Rafaella Melo has more than 10 years of experience as a journalist in Brazil. She has worn many hats, from radio and TV presenter and producer to magazine editor before joining the Hawke\u2019s Bay Today team as a multimedia journalist.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For such a historic achievement, it wasn\u2019t quite the celebration the Lopez family would have had back home,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":535092,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[81095,31100,65616,13114,10542,16492,2109,71,42,78,3607,43,4062,94425,2029,65633,165,61,40,38,41,39,8982,3608,102,377],"class_list":["post-535091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-balcony","tag-champions","tag-cheer","tag-crowned","tag-cup","tag-delays","tag-family","tag-from","tag-headlines","tag-in","tag-napier","tag-news","tag-school","tag-shouted","tag-spain","tag-spanish","tag-their","tag-to","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-victory","tag-were","tag-with","tag-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/535091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=535091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/535091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/535092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=535091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=535091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=535091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}