austraLasia #2314

Homeless World Cup

MANILA: 16th December 2008 -- There's no "Bah, humbug!" in the tale to follow.  and at time when thoughts go to the 'original' homeless couple in Bethlehem, Dickens couldn't tell it better than Fr Beng, of Tuloy sa Don Bosco, Manila. It is a story to warm the heart.
    The Homeless World Cup was first organised by the international organisation of street-papers headed by Mel Young. Street-papers (the UK has one called The Big Issue, are magazines which can serve as added income for street vendors. The organisers of street-papers around the world meet every year, and in 2002 decided to bring their vendors together in what they called the Homeless world Cup.
    The first of these was held in Graz, Austria, in 2003. The first street-paper in the Philippines, the Jeepney, started just four months ago. The people behind it applied for a slot in the Homeless world Cup and chose Tuloy sa Don Bosco and another street children centre to form a team of 8 players to represent the Philippines.
    The tournament is actually street soccer involving an area smaller than a basketball court, with a wall a metre high. A team puts forward four players one of whom is goalie. The goal is 4 metres wide and 1.3 metres high.  Each game is only 14 minutes.
    The Philippines team won 5 out of 13 games played. Afghanistan was the champion team. But winning was not the greatest joy.  As Fr Beng who accompanied the Tuloy team wrote, "How I wish I were a street kid! And I really meant it! It was beyond their dreams that they would go abroad, much less represent the Philippines in an international competition. Applying for the passport for one of our kids, Jeffrey, was so touching. I needed the parents' permit since he was still 17. His father had died and his mother was a scavenger. We could not locate her despite our search so we left word on the streets. She turned up 2 weeks later just to realise that it was 10 years since she last saw Jeffrey".
    The wisdom of Don Bosco in bringing poor kids together through games and sports suddenly takes on new life. In this event, street soccer is sports well beyond competition; it uses football to transform the kids and society itself. As our Salesian wrote on this occasion: "In Tuloy we choose football because kicking the ball is the greatest release of hurts which these street kids are full of".
    Needless to say the younger kids in Tuloy are now looking forward to be part of the team which goes to Milan, Italy, for the 7th Homeless world Cup in 2009, then to Argentina in 2010. It is a yearly event and the organisers say that Tuloy and their other partners are the best homeless team in the Philippines. Tuloy has been invited, by the way, to join the Youth Football Festival in South Africa during the last week of the World Cup. Now they just hope they qualify!
   
  _________________
 AustraLasia is an email service for the Salesian Family of Asia Pacific.  It also functions as an agency for ANS based in Rome.  For queries please contact admin@bosconet.aust.com . Use Bosconet-wiki to be interactive. RSS feeds - just go to Bosconet, click on austraLasia 2008 in the sidebar. You will see the RSS orange icon in your browser address bar - add it from there.  Avail yourself of the Salesian Digital Library at http://sdl.sdb.org

Title: australasia 2314
Subject and key words: EAO Provinces: FIN Tuloy sa Don Bosco
Date (year): 2008
ID: 2000-2099|2314