The day kicked off with much enthusiasm as 150 boys playing their hearts out and very eager to get their hands on some shiny medals, a trophy and much needed balls that we sponsored as prizes.

The pitch (or should I say sand pit) was scattered with puddles and it soon became a minor battle field. But with one goal in mind these boys skillfully maneuvered around the ‘landmines’ showing what they were made of! All kitted out according to the club they played for there was such a sense of pride, passion and great sportsmanship.

It was incredible to feel the energy and suspense building as the day proceeded and teams getting knocked off one by one. With only one minor injury and no dramatic tumbles it was clear that these boys mean business, not to mention the coaches on the side drooling over all the fresh talent coming out! There were some very tense moments towards the end as the final went to penalty shoot outs. The biggest challenge was keeping the supporters off the field, barely able to contain their excitement and hanging onto every movement of the ball. The final strike sent the ball flying past the keepers reach straight to the back of the net, and in total spontaneous celebration, the winning team ran and grabbed the trophy. Never-mind prize giving, they knew what they wanted and deserved every bit of honor that came with it! With joy you can’t contain they were singing and dancing around the field, a real african-style victory lap.

The day was an incredible success and being able to share in so much passion and energy moves me in a way I can’t explain. Know that each one of those balls is creating a huge opportunity for kids to channel their energy and develop some amazing talents, such a small gift with such a big impact. Can’t wait to do it all over again!

A special thanks to Ayanda for coordinating the day and everyone that came along to help out and support.

An article in the local Cape Argus headlines … ‘Photographer pumped up as ball campaign is booted to a new level!’

Ayanda set himself a target of raising 146 balls but has already surpassed that with the total standing at 230! His passion is to reach the underprivileged children who won’t benefit from the world cup taking place in their backyard! Now that is what I’m talking about – reaching those who in need! It all began out of his frustration of of seeing youngsters playing with balls made from plastic bags. The 146 target came about by combining the ages of his grandparents and his son to reach 144, plus two for his two brothers!

We have recently contacted Ayanda and will hopefully have more on the story in the next couple of days…

I love it when folks step out and help those in need, you never know what is going to happen and I can assure you 99% of the time others will quickly jump onboard and buy into your vision!

By giving we naturally receive!

The English team are currently training at altitude and I’m sure many others are doing the same, anything to get their red blood cells up to carry that desperately needed oxygen around the body.

While doing some research I came across this encouraging campaign: Football for HOPE

An awesome FIFA CSR initiative, Football for Hope was created as a unique and global movement that uses the power of football to achieve sustainable social development. Part of the programme is to build 20 Football for Hope centers to promote public health, education and football in disadvantaged communities across Africa. Each of the 20 centres will be run by an existing community organisation, now that is powerful!!

http://www.fifa.com/aboutfifa/worldwideprograms/footballforhope/index.html

This is what I’m talking about lives are going to be changed as a result!!

Even Sir Elton John himself is getting behind it and recently visited the opening of one of 20 Football for Hope centers, read all about it:

http://www.fifa.com/aboutfifa/worldwideprograms/news/newsid=1206452.html#sir+elton+john+visits+football+hope+centre+khayelitsha

A recent visit to Chris Campbells stadium and some further insight in the Heads Up Programme is testament to people puting themselves out there and doing their part to uplift the local community. Chris Campbell had a vision and a very BIG dream, which he unfortunately wasn’t able to see come into reality himself however through the hard work of his friends and family children’s lives are being turned around! We were fortunate enough to experience this and know that he is looking down upon this pitch with a HUGE smile.

Heads UP

The Heads Up Programme aims to offer the youth an opportunity to play 5-aside soccer combined with life skills and school support.  Also, where possible, we will take youth out of Khayelitsha on outings to soccer matches.
The programmes run twice a week and involve drug and alcohol awareness, HIV/AIDS education, career guidance, school support, self esteem development and community outreach.  The programme is run in partnership with the Homestead Projects for Street Children, which enables us to do home visits for youth in need.  This is to help address the high dropout rate in schools in Khayelitsha and to help prevent youth from ending up on street corners.

Read more about Chris’ legacy here:

http://www.chriscampbellclinic.com/africa.php

Local bars and eating houses were rammed to capacity every time a premiership game was showing! The whole Kiberia economy would double when one of the top 4 played each other. Needless to say that whenever we ask the kids what they wanted to do the immediate answer was “PLAY FOOTBALL!”

We would have to exhausted our limited resource of games available and invariably save a kick around for the final 15 min of our game sessions. Looking after kids in their environment was a pleasure – give them a ball and stand back and watch the kids, boys and girls, go absolutely wild! Making space or allowing the ball to do the work was against the rules! The balls became a honey comb with hundreds of bees all trying to get their piece of the action, all the kids would swam around the ball, all trying their best to just get a toe to it!

Most games would end in a 0 – 0 draw with penalties  determining the winner! A wall of kids would quickly form creating a tight tunnel from the goal mouth out to the excited striker eagerly ready to give it his best boot!

The kids would jump around screaming willing their team mates to get it their all! I have never seen such excitement, the tension prior to the strike was awesome! Goalie would fly ball would go screaming through the air and often take out an innocent younger kids who might be drinking from the tap behind the goals!

So yes football in Kenya is on an all time HIGH! The World Cup is creating quite a stir, Ghana are the favourite African side and Brazil and England are favoured to amongst the locals!

Here’s a few of the highlights on the 2010 campaign hitting Uganda…

We managed to get some footballs out to the kids living in the IDP camps up in Gulu (northern Uganda). These kids had asbsolutely nothing and living in some of the worst conditions you can imagine. The region was heavily affected by the civil war they had and is still struggling to recover. Their faces when we turned up with brand new footballs it was really amazing. The funny thing was, was that these kids had a football team but they explained to us that they had no football, so we totally turned up at the right time!

We  hit on of the churches sites for orphaned kids and managed to get in contact with the sites football coaches and donated some footballs to them as he only had 2 footballs for over 60 kids.  So we rounded him up to 10 so he can get all the kids involved and get them doing what they love.

Seriously football over there is the kids favourite past time they love it! In Kampala we managed to stop off briefly by the slums where there was a group of kids on the side of the road sitting there doing nothing and we donated a ball to this group and it was like we had just given them some gold honestly I have never seen a reaction like this before so much so the boy that took the ball and ran off home with the ball rather than playing with it. It was like we had just given him a bar of gold.

There are so many other stories I want to share with you guys but could go on forever. I just wanted to share these with you to highlight the amazing work everyone is doing and how you have really changed some of these kids lives!

Honestly we think these gifts are small but to them it is the best present they have ever had and really lifts them up in a country that really struggles to support these kids. Keep the work going guys this is truly an awesome campaign and I feel really privileged to have been out there supporting it!

Mark

The magnificent stadium which was built from scratch was completed ahead of schedule, the one logistical challenge remains around the transport but they have some plans in place around this too; Rapid Bus Transit system – involves frequent bus service operating on a dedicated lane along main feeder channels which are supported by subsidiaries.

Everyone is building the hype and things are coming together nicely, there is still plenty to do however the Mother city is looking strong and the year everyone has been waiting for has finally arrived!

- All things are possible!
- You are the change!

Were just a couple of the lines which hit us hard! Jeremy is uplifting his local community like no one else I have ever met! A past professional footballer himself he has the biggest heart for children and challenging them to not look around them but to keep their eyes on the future and inspire them to dream and reach for the impossible!

Jeremy took us on a personal tour around some of the hardest areas of Cape Town, where kids are too scared to walk into their adjacent block incase they get caught in some horrific gang violence! The stark reality hit me when I realised that it isn’t a choice for these kids, its life! They grow up in a home with 20 other family members, aunts, uncles, grandparents you name it, all living on top of one another! The social problems that flow out of such an environment are emence!

I’m not too sure about you but by 18 I had just finished school and was dreaming of breaking free from any family boundaries, scheming of travelling the world with the prospects of later studying at university. These weren’t unrealistic dreams at all, they were almost normal. Most of my friends were thinking on similar lines, there was a buzz about what folks were going to study, which university it was going to be! These were pie in the sky dreams they were real and I’m sorry to say almost expected!

Little did I know that less than 15min drive away kids of a similar age were living totally different lives; travelling the world was definitely not an option and was probably not even thought of, going to university was hardly dreamt of let alone realised, finishing school was even common practice, by the age of 16 there were far more exciting things to do and who wants to finish school anyway! How can I possibly do any homework with 20 other folks breathing down my back, Mum or Dad being high on something and uncle being permanently drunk! The prospect of dealing in drugs brought a real escape from this chaos and desperate life!

As you can imagine not many folks come out of that environment and see something bigger and look beyond their plight! Names like Nelson and many others come to mind, well we met one of the most inspiring folks I think I have ever met….to be continued

We are waiting for the stories from them, themselves but thought I would get something up asap! Many more pics and exciting stories to follow soon….

People said that South Africa will struggle to get the stadiums ready before the event, well from our little wonder around Cape Town is looking to the part! The spectacular new stadium down on the water is going to wow crowds around the world there is no doubt!!

Football is definitely on everyones agenda, I have never experienced much like it! The logistics of getting spectators to and from this new stadium is a key challenge and has caused some stir, initial plans were to build the stadium where the people were however FIFA decided that such a stunning sight had to be used and therefore the people needed to be moved! Lets just say Cape Town isn’t used to moving 10′s of thousands of fans and exactly how it all comes together for the 2 months is going to be interesting! Rapid bus services are being set up which themselves are causing much excitement with quotes from some of the folks we have spoken to: “they got it so horribly wrong that they have already over spent their budget for the next 10yrs!”

All I can say is that the city is buzzing the scene is set and the fans can be assured that their experience here in the mother city is going to be unique! There is nothing quite like this place, smiles are wider than ever and football is going to be celebrated in true African style, Vuvuzelas are being sold by the thousand and world cup merchandise is flying off the shelves!

Bring on the event its going to be a spectecale to behold!!