Playing in the Rubble of Dead Gods

I scream at orphans.

The sun is merciless on this dusty field.  My face is dripping, my t-shirt is drenched through.  There are 20 girls with me wearing hand-me-down uniforms.  About half of them have shoes on.  They seem much less impacted by the heat than I am.   They all live in the orphanage and comprise the girls' soccer team.  I'm trying to teach them to execute a basic flank run and cross to an attacking teammate.  It's not going well.  They dribble down the line tentatively, almost lackadaisical.  Why is it so hard to get recreational girls to play with OOMPH!?  The crosses are limp travesties wandering toward their targets.  "You must look UP!" I say, pointing to my eyes and demonstrating.  I figure they understand about a third of what I say.  "Eyes up.  See friend.  Give ball in front of her.  Not in back, not to side - in front.  Strong pass.  Yes?"

They nod.  They're thinking that for someone from America, he sure speaks English like an idiot.  Finally a girl streaks past me down the line, sneaks a peek to the middle, then launches a perfect barefoot cross to her teammate who in turn slots the ball past the keeper into the side netting.  Perfection.

"Yes!" I scream.  "That's the one."  I clap my hands together a single time and point at the passer.  "That's the one!"

She looks at me in horror.  She's frozen in fear.  I realize that my excitement looks like anger.  My teeth are clenched and my eyes are wide.  If you don't know the term, "that's the one," it sounds like I'm upset and yelling at you.  I smile broadly, nod vigorously and put two thumbs up.  "Very nice," I try to convey calm enthusiasm.  "Very nice."  Within a week all the kids mock my passionate positivity.  They'll score a goal in a scrimmage then pump their firsts and yell, "nice!" and make an angry face.

Little punks.
I love them so much.

Siem Reap is tucked into the northwest corner of Cambodia.  People from all over the world come here to visit Angkor Wat temple and the many magical ruins around.  These incredible structures were built in the prime of the Khmer Empire between the 9th and 13th centuries to honor their kings and gods.  That empire has crumbled, the kings and gods are long dead, having abandoned the Cambodians to centuries of poverty and victimization at the hands of invaders, colonizers and themselves.   You walk toward the temples mesmerized by their grandeur and detail, awestruck at the ability of an ancient people to conceive and execute ambition at this scope.  As you walk, a dirt-smeared six year old boy escorts you.  He has only tattered shorts and a large fan which he waves in your direction, begging for half a dollar for the service of cooling you down on your temple climb. 

 I climbed the temples three years ago, and now I've returned to volunteer for a few weeks at an orphanage.  Everyday at three I take a tuktuk to work, where I work with a football coach to go over drills and tactics and then coach the teams together - boys on Mondays and Wednesdays, girls on Tuesdays and Thursdays, combined chaos on Fridays.  Of course I have favorites.  There's one boy who is 14 although he looks 11.  He's the gayest athlete I've ever seen.  I watch him and see myself although he skips and flutters with a confidence I never had at his age.  When I first met him I didn't like him.  I thought he was mocking my high voice and mannerisms.  After an hour I realized, oh my, that's really his personality!  He's always talking and screaming and everyone around him buckles over with laughter.  They're not laughing at him.  He's actually telling jokes while he's playing the ball.  He's magic on the pitch.  He plays center back - I love him even more - and he floats along, his feet seem to barely touch the grass and dirt.  He'll dribble up to an opponent, taunt them with the ball, then maneuver past as they crack up laughing because he's of some joke he's told (see video here).  I have no idea what he's saying, but I'm laughing as well.

Yelling is not my only faux-pas.  On my first day, I was teaching the boys a basic double chop dribbling move, cut backward with the left foot and then forward with the right foot.  "Dribble and CUT back, then CUT forward.  Good.  Dribble and BOOM - go left. BOOM - go right.  Good.  Dribble and BOOM BOOM.  Nice.  Again, BOOM BOOM!  Great. "  The children are very well disciplined, but I see smiles and snickering sneaking from their usually perfectly attentive faces.  One boy finally cracks and others follow in an eruption of laughter.  Later I learn that, of course, "boom boom" is Cambodian slang for sex.

Play Heals.
It's an idea that has become an obsession for me of late.  As I was struggling with my own minor hardships in the last year, my laughter was the first thing to go.  I wasn't playing.  When people, especially kids, go through trauma, they lose their ability to play and laugh.   For children this is especially troublesome.  Playing is learning.  When kids stop playing, their growth is arrested.  The kids at this orphanage are full of play and laughter.  When I arrive each day, the kids are scattered in pockets playing games with their slippers, tag games, games with rocks and jacks and hopscotch.  I come early so I can play their games and teach them new ones; look-up/look down, sharks and minnows (which I rename crocodile and river fish for cultural relevance), the slapping game (not as violent as it sounds).

The kids who live here needed healing.  They needed help learning to play.  They needed to learn security and safety again.  I'm surprised to learn that many of the kids at the orphanage are not true orphans.  This is actually a street kids rescue and prevention program.  The Center identifies youth in dire poverty.  It takes in youth who are heading to the streets for begging, peddling goods or far, far worse.  About half of them have no parents.  The other half come from poor families whose parents couldn't feed or clothe them.  By coming to the Center, they are guaranteed food, clean water and clothing.  Khmer staff and long-term western volunteers provide a top-notch bilingual education.  The Center pays for the youth to visit their families twice a year.  The families can visit anytime, though they rarely do as they can't afford the travel expense.  Most importantly, the kids are loved here.  Love is palpable the minute you enter the gates.  There is smiling, nurturing and affection.  I saw a staff person administer an injection to a crying toddler.  Six older youth hovered around soothing the scared child.  When the shot was done, a boy scooped up the brave patient, congratulated her with an infectious smile and then pulled her into a distracting game involving rocks.  I come from a loving family, but when my brother cried, I laughed at him.  They live in single gender 'families' of six to eight kids who live in a small house with a house mom.  The mom is a staff person who lives with the kids full time.  At night, they pull out a mat and all sleep on the floor together.

I informally interview many of the kids.  One of the boys tells me that his mom lives in a village about 50 km away with this three older siblings.  He has a little sister who lives in the center as well.  He doesn't go home for the breaks.  He hasn't been home in three years.
- Don't you miss them?
- No.
- Why not?
- We adapt.

I'm confused and a little judgmental.  How can he not miss his mom and siblings?  Later it hits me.  Something very bad was going on at home.  Many of the kids were rescued from abuse or neglect.

Here he laughs, he plays, he learns, he cares and is cared for.  And he plays football with abandon.

Clearing the water buffalo from the field.