With a 3/3 record on program days so far, it was time to continue the streak with a Sunday full of community-based work. I was wearing a new hat in the morning, one worn sometimes begrudgingly, but alas, duty called. We were having a mini jamboree in Herstelling with four different youth teams facing off against each other. Strapped for quality help, Coach Winter said he was in need of a center referee and apparently I was the highest qualified person present for the job.

I pulled a yellow referee’s top over my head and shoved a yellow and red card into my pockets. The first game of the day was a match between the home side, Winter’s Herstelling Raiders, versus familiar foes, the Soesdyke Eagles, whom we had worked with just days prior. I was excited to see some familiar faces, mainly Jerome, the coach’s son, who was unsurprisingly one of the most talented players on the team.

As the hot sun beat down on my neck and face, I reffed an absolute massacre of a game that ended 7-1 in favor of Herstelling. The lone goal for Soesdyke was scored by Jerome. Though it was a clear mismatch, I saw some quality football from Winter’s side. It was cool to see this side of him. On the sidelines working with his own team. He was definitely in his element.

Ninety minutes later, I took to the sidelines praying a new set of officials would be rolling up for the day’s second game. Luckily, I was right! “Here, Coach Stephen, rest a bit,” said Coach Winter’s wife, Natasha, handing me an ice-cold Gatorade and some fresh cassava chips.

For the second game, I was able to soak the competition in from the sidelines with my mother, patiently awaiting the rest of the day’s plans. Around 2 o’clock, we exited Herstelling’s storied footballing grounds and departed for the center of town. There, we would be meeting Guyana legend, Junior Forrester, a true staple in the community, doing his part for the development of grassroots footy. You could say him and Winter were cut from a similar cloth. After living in NYC for 20 years, he had returned back to his home country, Guyana, and his first love, football.

Basically, every Sunday, Junior runs an informal league at the Parade Grounds field. From morning until night, players U11 and up participate in his “football festival” until their legs can no longer move. There are no lights, while rented bathrooms are put up along with rented chairs and tents. The rules are simple, if you come, you will play. 

With the format of open competition, teams wait patiently for their turn to take the field. It’s an expensive venture, but for Junior, it’s worth it. Why? Because every Sunday, this is where you’ll find the kids. And whether he knows it or not, Junior’s football festivals are helping them stay away from danger and bad influences even if just for one day. From 11 AM until the sun goes down, there they are – playing friendly scrimmages against other teams… with some traveling as far as 90 minutes to get there!

Asked about why he does it, Junior’s lips curled up into a smile.

“Stephen, we don’t do it for the money, we do it for the game… and for the kids, most of all. You know if we had lights we’d be out here until 10 PM easily – even the masters (the adults) would be out here from 8 onwards, until the early morning!”

It was ever-so-clear that for Junior, this was a true labor of love. The original plan had been for myself and Coach Winter to simply visit some of the participating teams. To have a chat with them, share some wisdom, and to leave a football or two for them to practice with individually. But, I saw kids and I saw football and knew there was a bigger opportunity there.

“Coach Winter? Is there any way we can do a little mini session with some of these teams?” I asked.

I was thinking small, but luckily, Winter was not.

“Why not all of them?” he asked.

Junior was down, knowing that even though the kids wanted to play – organized training was just as, if not more, important.

Winter and I looked at the large group in front of us, down at the (lack of) resources available, and then at each other, taking a deep breath before deciding to tackle things as a coaching duo, just like we had the days prior. The task was daunting, as were the numbers: zero cones, only a handful of soccer balls, and a sea of nearly 70 young athletes to work with. But, we knew we were capable. Our work in Guyana thus far had shown us just that. Plus, good coaches always make a way.

In this case, a mesh bag of colorful training bibs would serve as our cones for the day. Fair play to them, the nearly 70 participants were really on their best behavior too. Whether it was myself or Coach Winter speaking, they gave their full attention, locked in right from the first word. Improvised training equipment in hand, we set up several grids to work on basic passing lines, demoing things through briefly before letting the kids do their thing. Then, the bib cones were deployed into cross-shaped grids to run the gamut of ball control exercises.

Once again, the kids were engaged and attentive despite their older age (in comparison to those the three days’ prior), which we greatly appreciated. It was ever-clear that these coaches were doing the most they could with the little resources they had – as all good coaches do.

“How many footballs do you have?” Coach Winter asked another coach, Johnny. “Nah Winter, don’t say footballs around me. Cuz I don’t have footballs. I have football,” Coach Johnny answered.

Ball control variations completed, we moved over to a bit of a doozy: four huge possession squares with our eight teams deployed to each one. Just like our previous iteration of the same drill, the punishment stood: 10 pushups for the team that failed to prevent the other side from reaching seven consecutive passes. Groans could be heard far and wide as teams met their marks while opponents dropped down to work out their upper bodies.

“Hey Stephen, stick around afterwards… the coaches wanna do a little presentation of thanks for you,” Junior whispered to me, catching me on the sidelines observing possession between two top-class sides.

The man leading that presentation was none other than Gordon Braithwaite, a legend known both locally and beyond for his footballing pedigree… once as a player, and now as a coach.

“Coach Gordon” as he was now called, played at Clemson University before lending his talents to the Guyana Senior National Team.

A former captain of Guyana, the elder statesman was really a legend around these parts, known for his inimitable rastaman style.

“Alright everybody, listen up!” I said, drawing the group to a silence. “First of all, thank you guys. Let’s get a round of applause for Coach Winter, yeah?” I said, drawing praise from the crowd circled around us.

“Guys, I’m going to give way to Coach Gordon here, he has some words for y’all,” I said, closing things out so a real legend could speak.

Everyone’s eyes were glued on the man known as Guyana’s national treasure.

“Listen up boys…” he started. “We live by the four L’s in life – the first is love. And the last three are look, listen, and learn. Because you can’t learn if you don’t look and listen.”

He went on to touch on the importance of those four requirements from earlier: discipline, energy, respect and attention. For me, respect and attention were paramount. Because sure, there were 68 kids present, but man at times, it felt like 300 easily. Maybe even 500+ when we were doing possession.

Coach Gordon’s speech continued. “I need y’all to thank this man because he came from the states just to be here. To help us. To give us some resources. And boys, when I tell you we don’t know this man at all. Yet he came here to invest in you guys and your footballing potential, and we owe him a world of thanks for that,” he said, as the boys’ hands clasped together in a round of applause.

The makeshift “guard of honor” continued as Coach Gordon retreated back to his team to make way for another speaker. Our hands came together to welcome another coach from one of the teams present, a man of many hats. A social worker, a coach, a prison worker, and a father – he had seen too many youth go down a bad path and wanted to make sure the boys cleaned themselves up so as to not see themselves making the same mistakes he’d seen all too often in his many different careers.

Although the thank yous had carried on a little bit long at this point, all the coaches drew things to a close as our players took back to the field for some long-awaited scrimmages. Coach Winter took me aside to give context to the importance of the moment that had happened just before.

“Did you see that, Stephen?” he asked. “How they just kept talking, with gratitude and pride?”

I nodded my head in agreement.

“Coach Gordon was able to just talk to the boys, no interruptions, right? Because you were there and your presence garnered their respect and for once – he was given a stage to share his wisdom (as one of Guyana’s national treasures) with his players and all others in attendance.”

Totally wiped out at this point from multiple consecutive programming days, we piled back into the van for a quick fresh-up before one last celebratory dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe located in downtown Georgetown.

As we drove back towards our home base, Coach Winter beamed with happiness. Sharing his most recent update, he told me, “I just got off a phone call with the President of the (Guyana Football) Federation and he was very, very happy with how things are going here just three weeks into the league. He saw the photos Mama Rox took from today and if you can believe it, he said he’s gonna get us a PA system for next week – to really create a big atmosphere during our Sunday match days.” I couldn’t wipe the smile off his face even if I tried to.

Preparing for our flight back to the USA the next day, and with programs finally finished, I was finally able to sit back and cherish our final moments in the country after a jam-packed, incredibly fulfilling week. Every conversation was just a little sweeter, every moment just a little more meaningful, knowing we’d be departing back for JFK in less than 24 hours.

“Stephen, I have one last question for you, what’s the exact spelling of your name? And mommy too,” he asked, myself happily passing the info along, figuring he needed it for a press release or something.

Come to find out, although press releases were sent out to the federation, the request from Winter was for a far different reason. Monday morning, just hours before our flight, I got a text from Winter. “We’re outside, Coach” it read.

The van parked out in front of our gate ready to make the hour-long trek to the airport, I started piling our now-empty luggage on top of the seats. 

“Oh wait, we have something else for you guys!” said Winter’s wife Natasha, who was seated in the backseat.

Opening a bag, she pulled out two white Herstelling Raiders-branded polos. I threw mine on immediately.

“You guys even got the sizing right!” I exclaimed.

“Of course, Coach!” Winter said, “Coach Natasha knows everything about you!”

My mom and I were chuffed, we had our matching polos and a signed Guyana jersey to add to the collection. Almost identical to our initial welcome into the country, our ride back to the airport played out with just as much warmth. Handshakes replaced by hugs, we said goodbye, as Coach Winter left with one last parting thought after our long collaboration here in his home country.

“You know Stephen, what I saw here this past week was a real, positive change. I saw some actual development,” he said, with one last smile.