Burkina Faso (Part 3)
Tuesday rolled around and it was time for program number 3 during our Burkina Faso-based run. This one started off with a friend, Alphonse, picking me up after a hearty lunch at my Auntie Alice’s compound. I enjoyed chatting with Alphonse because he was always good for a genuine belly laugh or two during a long car ride. Albeit cracking jokes in French rather than English is not an easy game, but he was always a good sport.
We were heading pretty far today, to a school of a friend about 45 minutes away. To pass the time, Alphonse and I chatted about anything and everything. He gushed about his 7 grandkids, talked passionately about soccer, and spoke proudly about his religion as a converted Muslim.
I had wanted to get him something as a token of thanks but couldn’t manage to come up with anything. During our chats, Alphonse shared that he enjoyed the occasional Coca-Cola, so I wanted to surprise him with one of those upon pickup.
“I don’t drink it very much because I’m diabetic,” he shared. Soda was out. Chocolate too. The search, much like our conversation, continued.
We drove as far as we could before Alphonse, normally a wizard on the roads and not easily-flustered, pulled off the street. Covering his tracks, he reassured me, “We’re meeting some staff members from the school here and we’ll then continue on.”
From behind us, a murdered-out Jeep Rubicon pulled out of the gas station. In the front seat, a familiar face, next to it, an unfamiliar one, but certainly not for long. Alain, a friend who quickly felt like family, stepped out of the driver’s side and approached our window, greeting Alphonse.
“Stephen, you can come with us if you’d like?” he proposed. “Say no more,” I responded, barely letting him finish his sentence. I had admired the Jeep’s exterior from afar, I wasn’t going to pass up on an opportunity to appreciate it from the inside out.
I hopped in the whip and we continued from there. I grew more and more thankful for the vehicle swap as roads became less developed and bumpier. In the passenger’s seat, a man excitedly outstretched an arm and a smile bigger than I had ever seen before. “I’m JB,” he said. “It’s a pleasure to meet you and thanks for visiting with my school today,” he continued.
JB and I loosely discussed the itinerary for the day, eventually settling on a single program with about 25 kids, with each participant receiving either a ball or a Challenger Sports tee-shirt. My family was attending, so the day was already more special than most. Obviously, my mom had seen me in my element plenty of times before, but it was the first time my father and sister had ever been able to witness and assist at a program.
I gathered two dozen excited faces in front of me and started with a quick intro.
“Bonjour tout le monde, je m’appelle Stephen,” I rolled off.
Careful to not continue without a disclaimer, I followed this with a “Je suis désolé parce que je parle français mais juste un peu.”
“Ahh,” the kids said, understandingly, whilst nodding their heads.
“I am here with my family if you guys would like to say welcome to them,” I continued in French, followed by some claps and greetings from the kids, which was nice.
We broke into groups of three for our active listening drill, and I got ready to kick things off. During the week’s first programs, I leaned heavily on my young captains because I hadn’t practiced or learned parts of the body in French, but I had studied before this Tuesday and felt comfortable enough to run the drill basically on my own – calling out the French translations for head, eyes, nose, mouth, feet, shoulders, knees, chest, and more. Halfway through, I picked a lively young little man from the field and gave him a captain’s armband.
Excitedly, he turned to his fellow classmates and pointed at the band, “Regardez! Look!” It was cool to see, my boy was so proud.
From there, we kinda just went through the usual steps of our curriculum. Skill races were next, focusing on dribbling, stepovers, and more. Excited to find some winners, I gathered the kids around in a big circle for Mains ou Tete.
I explained the rules, stopping every couple of lines when kids grew confused. Leevaid had told me that if I ever lost the kids’ attention, to simply say, “Hallo, hallo” and they would understand. I tried it once, and all the kids stopped what they were doing. “J’ecoute!” They said, orderly and with extreme attention. We ran a couple of practice rounds before a quiet teacher stepped in to help his section who couldn’t seem to get the rules right. I listened closely.
“When he says head, you use your hands.” Good start… I said to myself. “Then, when he says hands, you use your feet!” He said while mimicking a kicking motion.
The whole crowd screamed out “No!” with resounding laughter following.
“Elimine!” yelled some kids jokingly.
The program essentially runs itself at this point. With my lovely sister in the center of the circle for our second round of Mains ou Tete touching up on her 5 years of French class, I walked over to the side to share a conversation with Alain. I thanked him for what he did. For the school, for the kids, for the community, and more.
He spoke excitedly about the school, Ecole les Champions, and said how he wished we could’ve replicated the session with their school for older students, effectively named Champions Plus. Without a doubt, the schools certainly lived up to their name. Because kids deserve that, a shot at becoming champions. But beyond that, a reminder that that’s what they already are.