Forget museums or concerts: I’d rather get my hit of local culture here

There’s an old saying among sports fans: I went to a fight, and a game of ice hockey broke out.

That’s something to bear in mind when you attend an NHL match in the US or Canada. It’s going to be violent. This might be a game of great skill and even beauty, of blokes the size of Rocky Mountains dancing on ice like figure-skaters, but at some point those blokes will slip off their padded gloves, sling their helmets to the ice and start throwing wild punches at someone else doing the same.

Why they do that is really anyone’s guess. From up in the stands at TD Garden in Boston, or Rogers Arena in Vancouver, or the United Centre in Chicago, you will be bemused by the violence, as perplexed by the haymakers as you probably have been by everything else that’s taken place on the ice, the puck zipping faster than an eye can follow, the players splattering their opponents on Perspex barriers, the game being split into three “periods” rather than halves or quarters.

I’ve been to a lot of hockey games in North America, and all things going well, I will attend a lot more. I love this game, even though I have only the most rudimentary understanding of its intricacies.

I love the spectacle, the show that Americans and Canadians really know how to put on, the lights, the music, the Jumbotrons, the snacks, the action. Some people get their hit of culture in museums or concert halls, but I’ll take mine in a 20,000-seat hockey stadium, as gladiators on ice literally beat each other into submission.

I try to attend local sporting events wherever I am in the world. Sometimes you need to plan these things well in advance; other times it’s spontaneous. Sometimes you will know the sport, other times it will be entirely unfamiliar. But it’s all good.

I’ve seen schwingen in Switzerland, a style of traditional wrestling popular in rural communities. On a trip through Laos I watched sepak takraw, an acrobatic game that’s a mix of football and volleyball.

Baseball games in Japan are always fun, where the gentle, cricket-like rhythm of the game is juxtaposed with the choreographed rituals and cheap beer in the crowd.