Lusaka Sunrise - On the importance of soccer in AIDS prevention in Africa

Article on MaryBeth from Wanderlust Magazine

Read MaryBeth's Latest Dispatch from Namibia!

Background

I have been an international volunteer for the past 11 years in Bolivia, El Salvador, Bangladesh and now Namibia. I have been in Namibia for 2.5 Years. I survive on donations from my family and friends. I do not own a car, I only ride a bicycle and have not taken a single taxi since I have lived in Namibia. This keeps my costs to a minimum and I can spend 99% of donation money on the children and help support income generating projects of single women with children.

If you have read my blog, then you know that I spend every day with children and also give workshops to teachers and other grown ups on how they can make educational games out of rubbish. My book has just been published and I hope to travel all over the country helping educators find positive and creative ways to teach literacy and numeracy. The educational system here is mostly dictation and the kids get beaten if they misbehave.

The kindergartens are run by individuals who have no supplies or anything for teaching. They mostly just let the kids play in the dirt and sing an occasional song. It is pretty sad.

Goals

My goals are to help the educators provide a happy, positive educational atmosphere for the Namibian children in the worst socio-economic situations. Most are orphans, their parents have died of aids and they are "looked after" by a distant relative or neighbor. Many are abused physically, sexually and emotionally.

Therefore, my goal is also to help these children have a safe place to play, be it the soccer field, tennis court, municipal swimming pool or a local center. I run a drop-in after school program for about 150 kids who also get a big bowl of soup and bread monday to friday. Then there is the Sunday soup kitchen, too.

My goal is to make every day a tiny bit brighter for these kids, to be a friend, mother figure and role model to them and hope that they can escape the horrors of their neighborhood and home life and emerge as healthy young adults with the social skills to survive in a work force with 45% unemployment.

Those are some of my goals, and every day I rejoice in the small victories: a "please" or "thank you" or peacemaking instead of fighting.

When I am not doing that, I am running the soccer program that I wrote about in my email to Pat, which you got a cc to. If you didn't get it, let me know.

The goal of the soccer program is the same, to teach the kids responsibility and self control and respect for themselves and others. Prizes are given not to the winning teams, but to those who show up consistently and on time, and who have the least red and yellow cards. Emphasis is on fair play and respect, everything comes after that.