Kimberley Katch-up

Happy Halloween everybody!!! It is a little bit “spooky” how time seems to disappear when your living next to the biggest man-made hole in the world. I will do my best to recover some of my latest happenings here in the city that sparkles:

This month started off with a bang. Probably the biggest event I have been apart of since my time in Kimberley: The Castrol Holiday Skills Camp!!! We got a big chunk of change from this wonderful oil company (Castrol) to host camps all over South Africa for their schools’ “spring break”. There were camps in Cape Town, Johannesburg, Port Elizabeth and don’t forget good ol KIM! We had two camps in Kim; 100+ kids at each camp and 10 smooth SKILLZ coaches to help lead them through the SKILLZ curriculum. I was in charge of running one of these camps with my good buddy Thuso Jones: The camp was held at St. Peters school in Galeshewe (the Kim Township). The days consisted of 2 Skillz lessons and lots of soccer in between the lessons. The soccer games were played with “fifa fair play rules”. The kids would come up with a couple fun rules before the games (i.e. both teams must celebrate when one team scores; if someone falls down someone from the other team must help him/her up). It was pretty amazing to see both boys and girls playing soccer together and trying to keep good sportsmanship in mind. More than anything the games were about fair play, showing respect and having a boat load of fun. I really think the kids hit all of these standards. At the end of the fourth day, the participants had officially finished all the SKILLZ lessons and were ready for the Friday graduation festivity.

Friday was an awesomely special day: In the morning, we created a World Cup style soccer tournament, 10 teams competing for the title of SKILLZ Champion. The games were certainly much more heated than before with this illustrious title on the line but to the kid’s credit they tried hard to maintain some degree of sportsmanship. We also hired a local DJ to come blast some sick South African vibes throughout the day; it is always incredible to see these kids dance. When they start to groove you can’t help from smiling and wanting to shake a leg with them. I will never be able to move like the African can, but I always get a bunch of laughs when I bust out some of my white-boy steps. After lunch, a partner organization of ours called “New Start” came to the camp to do some sex education (how to use a condom, where you can go for help in your community, and some science of HIV/AIDS). They also provided volunteer counseling and testing (VCT) for the kids that were over 14 (you have to be over 14 in order to be test in South Africa). We encouraged the kids in our camp who were old enough to get tested and know their status. We had a little over 20 kids in camp volunteer to be tested.  I was super proud of all the kids who got tested; it takes a ton of courage for anyone to find out their status here, let alone 14 & 15 year old kids. I found out later that one kid in our camp did test positive for HIV. I didn’t really know how to react; it is obviously a horribly sad situation that somebody that young is infected. I’ve spent the last few months learning the stats and hearing so many sad, sad stories but when it finally happened that I knew someone with HIV I was simply stunned. The crazy thing is you can’t do much after this. I can check up with New Start on weather or not the kid has begun treatment but other than that there is really nothing I can do. It feels like a helpless situation and some very unfortunate kids have to face this exact struggle (probably on their own) for the rest their lives. As much as this all sucks, you have to think that each kid we reach with this curriculum has a better chance on avoiding the disease. All depends on how you want to look at it.   

After the New Start lessons we had the Championship game and Graduation ceremony. I haven’t refereed a lot in my soccer days but I was asked by some of the kids and coaches to be an honorary ref for the finale. It was an intense match; all the kids of the camp gathered around the pitch and picked a side to support. One of teams in the final had just one boy and a bunch of very tough girls. Although I made some unpopular decisions for both sides the focus remained on the game: A 3-1 thriller that brought the whole camp to life.

There was nothing but smiles, laughs and made up cheers from the week as the kids were finally called up to receive their SKILLZ certificates of graduation!!! One by one, the teams proudly sported their new Castrol hats and sweet SKILLZ certificates for a team picture. It was nearly impossible to get them to leave after the ceremony. They had made bonds with their coaches, friends from new schools and hopefully picked up some really important life-skillz along the way. I too even struggled to lock up St. Peters School that day. It was so amazing to finally have some real connections with the kids here, to feel that I had a part in them learning something that could eventually save their lives. It was a week filled with precious moments I had hoped I would experience when deciding to come here….

Kim Dribble-a-thon 2009

A couple weeks ago I was contacted by my former employer, The Greenwich Country Day School, about an all-school fundraising event called the “GCDS Walk-a-thon.” This walk-a-thon is an event that raises money for two NGOs every fall—one domestic and one international. Students, faculty and staff spend an entire day walking laps around the school campus and earn donations per miles completed. This year the GCDS community selected Teach for America and GrassrootSoccer as the organizations to support. The event was a great success, raising over $5,000 for GRS, and in a notable departure from the traditional GCDS walk-a-thon, participants embraced the GRS vision and dribbled the majority of their miles.

Somewhere over 6,000 miles away, on a different continent, in the opposite hemisphere, on a seemingly sunny October afternoon, me and a small group of fellow GRS interns embarked upon a similar expedition. This adventure unfolded in the sparkling city of Kimberley, South Africa. The four interns, me, Kristin Fladseth, Anna Barrett, and Lindsay Rotherham, were outfitted with only our strong wills and two Nike soccer balls. Our goal: to dribble approximately 15 km from our home, throughout the heavily trafficked roads and lively neighborhoods of Galeshewe, the nearby township, and finally looping back to return home.

Excitement was in the air with a fast approaching storm in the distance and many kilometers to be traveled. We started strong on some of the quieter and well-maintained streets of the city. As they neared the township limits, however, the atmosphere changed, and we were greeted by honking cars and enthusiastic bystanders. Interest mounted as we, clad in bright yellow GrassrootSoccer t-shirts, dribbled toward a local park and called out to people in the native Setswana. Slowly but surely kids emerged from their homes to join in the football festivities, including participants from the most recent Skillz Holiday Programmes.

A left hand turn took us onto the busiest road of Galeshewe, where we were ambushed by horde of intrigued and ecstatic kids. It took only a few passes and dribbles amongst the group of twenty plus children before they were totally hooked to us strange yellow-shirt foreigners. Together, we continued on down the road into the heart of Galeshewe, laughing, dribbling, dancing and generally loving this bizarre experience. When we reached the round-about in town center, storm clouds had fully formed and rain began to fall upon this unlikely group. Grabbing as many of the small boys and girls into our arms as we could we headed for shelter into a local school. After several minutes of soccer drills underneath an overhang, lightning moved us once again, this time into a classroom. Amazingly, there were still a few biscuits available to give the brave soccer soldiers who ran barefoot through the rain and muck to this location. The lightning provided an opportunity for some familiar American games. Heads up, seven up was a big hit as the kids struggled to guess which Intern had selected them. Eventually the sky’s cleared and the group began their long journey back home. A joyous yet sad goodbye was said to the young, shivering troopers as the wet, deflated soccer balls rolled on their proverbial path through Galeshewe Park and back onto the wide, soggy road home!