Kids celebrating their victory

After my first office week my German Volunteer colleagues (Marlen and Micheal) and I got the chance to support Stefan and our Life Skills Trainer Siphelele with our Tournament for the Emthethweni Primary School in one of the biggest Townships close to Durban, called Umlazi. It was the first time for us visiting a township and we were shocked about the dimensions. According to Wikipedia Umlazi is home for more than 500.000 people who live in very poor conditions. Moreover I was surprised by the warmth and the joy of the children. After each goal the kids started singing and dancing. I will never forget the moment when I stood in a crowd of kids and all were singing the South African anthem and different Zulu songs. For me, it’s hard to imagine that German kids of this age would react as they did.

On Wednesday we ran the tournament only for Grades five and six. More than 200 children joined the fun and each of them was extremely motivated and ambitious to win the World Cup! We counted the children and split them into 32 teams, but that is not as easy as you think! For this amount of young kids you have to be well organized and you need a good connection to kids. But because of that I was very fascinated with Siphelele’s relaxed and sensitive way while working with the kids. At the end of the tournament Greece was the lucky winner and able to take the World Cup home. On this day North Korea received the silver medal and team Algeria was chosen for the Fair Play trophy.

The first problem we had to deal with on the next morning was the weather. As so often in recent days it was raining so that the principal called the tournament for the children of seventh grade off. But after  a weather check and an assessment of the field we convinced the principal to run the tournament. Wise decision, it stayed dry! Team USA beat Nigeria and team Serbia was able to take the Fair Play trophy home. All in all we ran two successful tournaments in Umlazi. I enjoyed the time with the kids and I think the children had also a great time. Afterwards I can say that the tournament in Umlazi was a great experience and I am very grateful that WhizzKids United gave me the opportunity to gain these unforgettable experiences!