(Source: http://rusevik.ru/sport)

Russian Old Believers compactly living in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso came to cheer for the Russian national football team, which in these moments plays the 2014 World Cup match against South Korea in the Brazilian city of Cuiaba.

The 300 km way, which they had to overcome, is not so distant on the scale of the Brazilian hinterland. On the background of a motley crowd of fans around the Pantanal stadium this group of 20 people looked as if they came down from the crowd on historical picture of Surikov: bearded men in blue blouses, women in headscarves and long red skirts. The most remarkable thing is that this is the usual festive clothing of Russian Old Believers living in Brazil, who from generation to generation cherish with special care  not only faithfulness to the old Christian rituals, but also life order established by ancestors. They speak among themselves almost solely Russian, preserving the speech melody and phrases of the old times.

Moreover, their children first begin speaking Russian and only then, later in life, learn Portuguese. Russian Old Believers appeared in the state of Mato Grosso, in the vicinity of Primavera do Leste in the 70s of the last century. But before that the fate scattered them around the world: from Siberia to Chinese Harbin, then to the United States. After that they migrated to Brazil according to the UN decision.

The families of Old Believers are engaged mainly in agriculture. But they are not locked up tight in old times. There are Old Believers, who are quite confident with the computer and can operate modern agricultural machinery. Few years ago they lifted the ban on cell phones, but useless pastime in front of the TV is not welcome, especially when it comes to entertaining shows. Old Believers show ambiguous attitude to football as well. "Actually, all of us will be on the stadium for the first time: we don’t go there, but now we have decided to make an exception. It is a question of Russia national team performance and the World Championship," the leader of the Old Believers Larion Ovchinnikov explained reporters the reason of their arrival to Pantanal stadium in Cuiaba.