Nyota (a)

Nyota Ndogo (Small Stars) is the soccer team that I play on here in Arusha. They practice in a slum called Unga Limited on a field that no American would call a “field”. It is all dirt except for a trash dump in one corner, and a marsh in another. Broken glass, pieces of trash, cows and goats are frequently found across the rutted field. But the soccer team, simply sees it as open place to play the one game they love.

I am the only white person who plays on the team. Chase and Colin regularly practice with the team as well, making three white boys amongst many dark colored Tanzanians. Regardless of the color difference, my teammates are some of the friendliest people I’ve ever met. They treat me as one of them. Which means that they don’t give me extra attention just because I’m a white guy. But that’s how I like it; I hate when they over-favor wazungu (white people).

When you get to know each one of them, they change from being blank faces to intricate characters. Each one of them has a unique personality. Some of the guys are jokesters; others are quite; some are strong leaders; others are eager followers.

The team bought a small shack, which has now become the “kuku club” as I call it. The team is raising chickens (kuku) as a way to pay for club fees (transport to games/cleats/uniforms ect.).

The “kuku club”: You walk into a skinny hall about 3 feet across. There are two doors on your left: one is where the chickens are kept (which actually connects to another room that has more chickens) and the other is a small room with a couple of beds. There is always at least one person somewhere in the “kuku club” to watch and guard the chickens. They even have night shifts. The person guarding (usually a player on the team) is usually resting and listening to the radio in the room with the beds.

But now for the “club” part.

First, I have to mention that every one in the soccer community of Unga watches and reads about Premiership games, European leagues and the teams and players of European football. Everyone has a team that they are devoted to. If someone asks you what your team is, you can’t say that you don’t have a team. And you can’t say that you kind of like a certain team and you aren’t really faithful to them all the time. You have to be an avid fan of your team. Like I said, everyone has their team: some love Arsenal, others are devoted to Manchester Unt. ect. Some are more loyal to their team as others. I’ve even heard of some of my teammates who won’t eat any food for a considerable amount of time after their team looses a big game.

Their eyes are always watching the European leagues. Their actions are always according to how the European players play. If someone looks or plays like a European player, they even give him that player’s name as a nick-name. (Occasionally I’m called Crouch-my height- or Van Nisel Roi-my hair).

Their dreams (almost EVERY single one of them) is to play soccer in Europe. They curiously watch everything their heroes do, and mimic everything.

They see the players in a European soccer game run onto the field out of their locker rooms; so they figure “we’ve got to have a locker room.” And that is exactly what the “kuku club” has become.

Before every game, the whole team crams into and lines up along each side of the 3-foot-wide hall. We all get dressed for the game, and the coach gives us a little prep-talk about the game. Then we all run out onto the field in a straight line. Everything is done exactly the same as in Pro-soccer.

When we get onto the field, we start warming up. We do a bunch of really fun warm up exercises. I’m pretty sure a few of them are mimics of Pro-soccer warm up drills, but the really fun ones I’m sure are their own inventions.

It doesn’t take long to notice that Africans are very rhythmic. EVERYTHING is done to a beat. I think it is so ingrained in them that it becomes subconscious. The coach tells us to run around the field 5 times. Before we get around the field once, EVERYONE is jogging at the exact same rate: all their cleats stomping on the hard ground simultaneously. It’s so cool.

The warm up drills that they come up with…you really have to see them. We all line up and one person leads an exercise that is so complex and rhythmic that it’s basically a groovy dance move. We do that exercise for a while until someone leads another even more complex one. Everyone loves the fancy drills and children line up just to watch the team warm up. People are always saying “tupe nyingine” (give us another one). So another person leads a routine of clamping, stomping, jumping, head-bobbing, fake kicking or a variety of other favorites to a complex beat and everyone else follows along until another one is brought up.

When we are called to the center of the field by the ref, we all line up facing one sideline (one team on one side of the field, the other team on the other side of the field). The ref goes behind each player who lifts each foot for the ref to check. I don’t really know what the ref is looking for, and I don’t know if the ref does either. I know in the states, the refs look for metal studs; but here, few people have any cleats left on their shoes at all (they’re just warn down too much). I’ve never seen a ref make any objection to anyone’s cleats. I think they do it, just because they’ve seen it done over seas.

Next, the refs stand in the middle of the two teams in the very center of the field, and the center ref blows his whistle. Everyone knows what to do: we raise our hands and wave to the “crowd” (most often a group of 5-11 year olds), and then turn around and wave to “the other side of the stadium” (most often no one stands on that side of the field). But who cares, they do it in the big leagues.

These are just a couple of the things that I have noticed that they mimic. If I notice a few more, I’ll keep you posted.