Today was the Wallace Tournament. The Wallace Tournament is a tournament that the Ideals students (the group from the UK) put on every year. All of the Sport In Action placements can enter multiple teams to play football, basketball, netball, and volleyball. The placements include Munali (ours), Chiwama, Chipata, Fountain of Hope, and Kalingalinga. We got there around 10:30, and the tourney had just started. I headed over to the basketball court because I wanted to scout out the competition. The basketball team entered from Munali was my team, the under 15 Spartans (which has kids from 9-14). Ivy came with us today and she and Chrissy went from one sport to another helping out, watching, and taking pictures. They also spent some time at an HIV/AIDS information booth, which had been set up by the Kalingalinga Clinic. They then headed home mid-afternoon. Chrissy wanted to work more on her leadership powerpoint and workshop that we are going to present to Sport In Action before leaving. Chrissy had already downloaded a bunch of powerpoints that her leadership professor from Duke had sent her. She went through all of them and extracted the most important information to include in the presentation. The powerpoints are pretty extensive so it took her a lot of time and she still has some work to do.
When my team got there we gave them strips of the same fabric to wear around their heads. These matched all of the Munali teams, and I tied some into the ends of my braids and as a bracelet on my wrist. I can proudly say that my team went undefeated and won the championship. They played really well and were so excited to get medals, which made me happy. Some of the other Munali teams did really well too, and the Munali U-17 boys football team won the championship. I had to leave before everything ended to go downtown for the Senior Spartans’ game. I was going to help coach so I needed to be there early. Timo went with me so that I didn’t get lost. When I got there the team was changing into their uniforms outside by a car. A few of them said some things in Nyanja and then Timo suggested that we go inside because the boys were embarrassed changing while I was there – it was funny because I could see that they were hiding behind the car doors. When we got to the gym entrance I could see that you had to pay to enter. Timo explained to the men at the door that I was the Spartans coach and they looked at him as if he was crazy. They stared at me, probably thinking there’s no way this random white girl is coaching a team here. The league that the Senior Spartans play in is called the Super 8 and it’s the best league in Lusaka. I went back outside to watch the team warm up, talk strategy with Coach Robert, and look at the roster of who was playing. A few of the players I had been working with were apparently on disciplinary probation or not coming. I saw on the sheet that my name was listed as one of the coaches, pretty sweet. I wonder what the ticket-takers thought when they saw that.
The game didn’t go quite as I had hoped. We were down at half time and I realized that we needed to change our strategy of play because we were getting killed in the paint. I had seen that the other team sucked at outside shooting so I told the coach that I thought we should switch to a 2-3 zone to clog the middle and force them to shoot outside. He said I could call the shots, and so I did. In the second half we started to play much better and cut the deficit to only 5 points. Our rebounding was still severely lacking, and we weren’t being patient with the ball on offense. They fell apart and two of our key players fouled out. We ended up losing by 10. It was frustrating to watch because the team is just so much better than they showed in this game. In the locker room after the game the coach just ripped them apart. It wasn’t exactly the type of speech I would have given, because it didn’t include any constructive criticism. I gave my input to the team and also pulled a few players aside to tell them not to be too hard on themselves since it was only one game. I don’t want them to lose all their confidence. But we have a lot of work to do at practice this upcoming week.
By the time I left for home it was already completely dark. Timo walked and took the bus with me half way, and thank god he was with me. On one bus I got harassed by the bus conductor so much that I think it was the worst I’ve experienced thus far. He kept saying “sit on my lap baby” and then telling me that he wouldn’t give me the right change. He even said that he would slap me, so I responded that I would slap him right back, and that didn’t go over so well. He said “this is my bus, and I’ll throw you off if I want sweetie.” The guy asked if I was married, and since I didn’t have on my wedding ring I panicked and said that Timo was my boyfriend. Bad move, this brought on even more harassment, to which Timo just told me to ignore. He kept telling the conductor to drop it, but that didn’t work. The conductor asked if I loved my boyfriend, to which I said yes because god knows what he would have done if I had said no. The conductor then said he didn’t believe me, and that I had to kiss Timo. He said that if I didn’t kiss Timo he would fight him. I really started to panic. Timo piped up that it’s not allowed to kiss in public (which is true here) and told me not to worry about it. When we got off the bus the conductor pulled me in a hug until I struggled free and Timo and I ran across the street. Isn’t it wonderful that not a single person on the entire bus felt like defending me – I really hate that part about this culture. If that situation were to happen at home people would have been all over that asshole telling him to leave me alone. Thankfully my next bus ride was fine and I walked home the last 45 minutes because I didn’t want to deal with anymore bus nonsense. When I got back to the house at 8:30 Chrissy had already made some really delicious minestrone soup with tons of vegetables. We ate dinner and then just went to bed.
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