Suba Lakers Dominating

The past few weeks has been full of sports from the school level reaching up to the Provencial level (6 levels). The Lakers have been excelling throughout on their various teams and showing people around the area that girls can play football like boys. For many of their games, there are more fans watching them play than the boys team. They have won every game (around 23 in total) including the regional championship this past Thursday and Friday. They won the finals by a score of 2-0 with goals by Caren Akeyo and Alice Okoth. The team representing Mbita District was made up of 12 girls from the Suba Lakers Football Club and coached by myself. We are leaving today for Bondo where we will compete in the Provencial Championships. Ten of the players are from the Suba Lakers Club.

Shining Stars

The CGA girls football players continued their winning ways today. Even though their games were shortened drastically by the referee because of time, they managed to earn two clean victories. Eleven CGA girls were representing the Mbita base at the Zonal tournament. In the first match Sharon Akinyi scored a classic goal when she got past the last defender and used her speed to race towards the goal and deliver a powerful shot. In the 2nd match the team dominated the action with our goalkeeper never even getting a chance to touch the ball. Sharon netted the 2nd goal after a beautiful cross by winger Belinda Awuor that she controlled perfectly and directed it in the goal. The fans gathered around the field at Kirindo Primary thoroughly enjoyed watching the style of play the girls displayed with deft passing and great teamwork.

It marks the end of a successful two week run with 10 straight victories at different levels and in different tournaments. Seven of the CGA girls were selected to move on to the Divisional level on Monday. It has been fun coaching this bunch of girls, as we move on to the different levels we compete against other members from the Suba Lakers Football Club. After defeating them, we join them with our group for the next level.

CGA players also have been very successful in netball, boys and girls volleyball and boys football, in addition to girls football.

Copa Coca Cola Champs

The Suba Lakers played in the Copa Coca Cola Tournament this weekend in Homa Bay. It was an under-17 year old tournament. The club took 17 of its primary school players to compete against mostly secondary school teams who had entered the tournament. In the first match, the Lakers thrashed Pedo 7 to 1 which helped us to advance to the semifinals in the knockout tournament. In the semfinals we managed two goals against Ogande Girls Secondary School.

On Sunday we prepared to face two former CGA students and their powerful Asumbi Girls Secondary School team. They have reached the Provencial Finals the past two years in the Nyanza Secondary School Championships and had all of their players returning from last year. Our young primary school girls fought valiantly, but wore down as the 2nd half dragged on. The defense stayed strong though and goalkeeper Adah Sharon made some great saves to preserve a 0-0 draw. To decide the winner the match went to penalty kicks.

We missed our 2nd kick and were down 2-1 with most of the girls losing hope. Asumbi had easily made their first two kicks, before Adah blocked the next two. When their fifth kick sailed wide of the goal our team erupted with joy and attacked our goalkeeper in a dogpile. Adah was then carried around the field in triumphant victory.

My high spirits were brought down quickly about 15 seconds after the celebration when I realized that my cell phone was gone. Some bystander had taken advantage of the mayhem to steal my phone from me. So we won the tournament, but I lost my nice phone and all my contacts.

Our team will be advancing to the next stage of the Copa Coca Cola Tournament in Kisii town in April.

A Great Day

I am not sure if it was such a good day because I am feeling healthy again or if God just blessed me with one of those days to encourage my heart. I led our staff's morning devotions and God just spoke through me as I taught on Ezra and the spiritual rebuilding of the Israelites when returning from 70 years of Exile in Babylon- reading, practicing and teaching the Israelites the word of God.

Then I went back to the clinic for my 2nd injection of antibiotic (a really cool tingling through the veins up my arm). After that I went to the bank and was successful in running some errands.

After that, back to school and teaching my 8th grade Math class and 7th grade Bible class. In Math the students were following right along on a difficult topic (area of combined shapes, borders, etc.) and were very jovial and lively. The 7th grade Bible class was more active than ever raising their hands, answering questions and asking questions. We had a great lesson about King David's heart and how he was quick to repent of his mistake with Bathsheba once he was confronted by Nathan. We talked about how he fasted and prayed for his child not to die, but after his death how David got dressed, ate and went to worship and praise God. We conrasted this to King Saul and how he was so quick to lie, deny, make excuses and blame others when Samuel confonted him about following God's instructions to totally destroy the Amalekites. They were able to discover for themselves the difference in a "man after God's own heart" and others. Not the fact that David was perfect, but that he was quick to repent and turn back to God.

After the lessons we took our 4th-8th graders to Mbita town to play a friendly match vs. another primary school at Onundo Stadium (not a stadium like you would picture one, more like a soccer field with a fence around it).

Our girls walloped their opponent 3-0 (should have been 10-0) and the boys played their best match so far and held a strong team to a draw. By the time it was over, the sky was getting dark and the rains were coming. I was able to pile about 25 students who live far from town in my vehicle and get them all home just a few minutes before the rain storm hit.

At home I had a nice fish fillet and potatos dinner waiting for me and my friend.

Thank you God. I needed that!

Becoming More African

I had some stomach discomfort and back pain this past week, along with some general achiness. I thought it was just that I slept in a bad way or hurt myself playing football. After a few days of dealing with it I went in to the clinic. They found malaria, amoebas and parasites and bacteria in me. I didn't expect those things because in the past when I would get them I would have extreme vomitting and a healthy dose of "the runs." Dr. Sawa looked at me and said, "I guess you are becoming more African. The longer you stay in Kenya the stronger your immunities get and the better you are able to deal with these 'small things' like malaria, amoebas and parasites." I wasn't sure if that was good news or bad news.

Thankfully I got a couple of antibiotic injections and some medicine that quickly started working within 24 hours. Now I feel like a brand new man!