I am in a country of mourning. And there´s an octopus nearby whose life is in danger. If you haven´t guessed, I am in Germany on this national black Thursday.

When I arrived at work in the capital city, Berlin, this morning, I was greeted with “It´s over “ and “It´s worse than 2006“, while on the streets and on social networking sights there were hushed mumbles about the safety of Paul the octopus oracle, whose track record in predicting the outcome of Germany´s 2010 World Cup matches to date remains untarnished.

Unfortunately for Paul, earlier this week, in what was clearly a tortuous task, he accurately predicted Germany´s defeat by Spain in last night´s semi-final in Durban.

Yet, despite Paul´s forecast, yesterday Germans remained optimistic of their team´s success and many had already set their sights on meeting the Netherlands in Sunday´s final.

Last night the country´s streets, cars and citizens were painted red, yellow and black. Young, old and those in between proudly donned flags, colour-coded hats, accessories and outfits. Before the match, they snacked on a selection of World Cup themed food, including ´rainbow cakes´in the colours of the flag, doughnuts decorated with miniature soccer player icons and bread rolls baked in such a way as to resemble soccer balls. – in both shape and colour.

Last night was the culmination of the football fevver that has gripped this former host country since the tournament began a month ago.

For all of the previous German matches, thousands of people flocked to the famous fan mile or to packed open viewing areas to watch the game with fellow supporters, while restaturants were full to capacity as supporters streamed in to root for their team.

Firecrackers, vuvuzelas (yes, they have them here too!) and loud renditions of the national anthem marked Germany´s successes.

People arrived at work on the days after matches with remnants of temporary tatoos or face painted German flags, either hurriedly washed off or else partly left on as a sign of solidarity.

But now this is all over after last night´s disappointment, which signalled the end for Deutschland. I expect this Saturday´s third place playoff to be dismal in comparison to what I´ve seen so far.

So Paul was right and all that is left of the national colours today is black.