The Third Wave_ A Volunteer Story - Alison Thompson [59]
Plans for the historic soccer matches, which we had decided to call Football Without Boundaries, came together when we received much-needed funding from Mr. Kiha Pimental of Hawaii via our friend Doug Kennedy. Then, a week before our big event was scheduled to take place, the Sri Lankan foreign minister was assassinated in his own home. The government declared a state of emergency and the country came to a standstill. Naturally, they blamed the Tamil Tigers for the incident. We nervously awaited news, wondering if our game would be canceled. I told Oscar not to be intimidated by the assassination. I felt strongly that if we didn’t go on with our lives and activities, the terrorists would win.
On August 22, 2005, eight months after the tsunami struck Sri Lanka, Oscar, James, and I sat on a bus with a team of excited Peraliya soccer players who were singing their lungs out. The Sri Lankan military had given us the go-ahead for the soccer tournament. I was the only female in our group. We had brought Dr. Novil along as the team doctor, and the two of us discussed emergency procedures just in case we found ourselves in the middle of a bloody massacre. An older American volunteer named Buddy had joined to help me shoot some footage of the games, as Sunil had been too sick to join us (or so he said—perhaps he felt it was too risky to come). James, the British journalist volunteer who had helped us in the early days, still flew in and out of Sri Lanka often. He came in from London specially to watch the match and donate jerseys from the Leeds United soccer team.
When we arrived at the gate of the Sri Lankan Air Force base in Galle, where we were to load the plane for Jaffna, the singing stopped. A hush fell over the bus and tensions rose as the players confronted the serious side of this expedition. The airplane ride to Jaffna was tense. When we landed at the Air Force base, Army guards with Uzi submachine guns whisked us onto a bus and drove us through deserted towns and overgrown vegetation to a small hotel for a short rest.
Our first game was against the Tamil team on Tamil territory. We rode a bus out to their stadium without any military protection, unloaded quietly, and nervously approached the arena. There we saw thousands of bicycles parked outside, as well as one United Nations peacekeeping jeep. The huge Tamil players formed a line outside the stadium to welcome us. For the first time in thirty years, the two enemies shook hands. Many of the players had had family members killed by relatives of the opposing team. They sized one another up, then the Tamils ushered us into a small changing room where the players could prepare themselves for a different sort of war.
The Sri Lankan and Tamil Tiger soccer teams shaking hands before the game
When our little homegrown soccer team walked out onto the field ready to play, there were 4,000 men standing around waiting for the game, which was now behind schedule. The Tamil mayor and the head of the Jaffna Soccer Federation made welcome speeches and placed beautiful flowers around Oscar’s neck. The referee came out onto the field and I noticed that he was one of the Tamil Tiger terrorists from the negotiations the week before. He was as strong as a bull and quite a good-looking, rugged man. I found myself blushing as we met eye to eye. I had a thing for warriors. But one point was clear: We wouldn’t be arguing with his calls.
The players did a brief warm-up and then it was game on. The Tamil players were taller and a lot older than our players, but they were all good fighting machines. The crowd watched quietly, careful not to betray which side they were rooting for just in case the secret police were nearby. Oscar ran up and down the sidelines screaming his head off like a crazy Sicilian soccer coach. James sat in a chair on the sidelines playing the English commentator. “They are too bloody good!