Rediscovering Joy

Football is more than a just a petty form of passing time amongst the Malawians. It is a backyard business dedicated to providing a steady stream of pocket change to the older teenagers who find themselves domineering amid the eager younger ones. A small semi-level piece of earth formed with even the slightest intent of being a place to kick a ball around, has transformed itself into a dynamic and competitive show down between the few who find themselves lucky enough to play in front of their entire community. It has become the venue for daily evening entertainment. A field that lacks seating, lights, and even grass is cherished and defended by the community to the very last drop of sweat. Without football, the meaning of poverty-stricken requires redefining. With football, the tables are turned as a different kind of wealth emerges; one mutually shared for the love of the game. Onlookers of all ages become one with the match as their eyes attach to the every movement of the ball. Even the businessman, who returns home after a long day at work, stops to watch the 5:00 heroics.

Football provides the avenue to which happiness can be harvested and utilized efficiently. Observing as an alien lost in the understanding of the importance of the game but in attendance with a heavy heart, brings forth mixed emotions. For one, they thrive off of kicking a ball created by wrapping and burning plastic bags together one after another around a small stone until something of weight and size has accumulated. Secondly, the passion and obsession for the chance to score the winning goal has gone unnoticed, forgotten and over looked by many. 

Recently recognized however, the game that provides unity and stability must be shared with other societies as a remedy for deprived pleasure. When was the last time we found simple joy out of something so little? Even when we throw the flimsiest of frisbees to one another we complain about the roughness of lawn or the tree that seems to have been placed right in the way. It’s time we join the sidelines and allow the boys and girls of Malawi to teach us their ways. To educate us on their system of increased happiness, purposeful in play but tolerant in teaching as I blissfully discovered today!