A Sunday at the Soccer Field (*reposted from Jan. 25th, 2009)

It’s hot today. We’re watching the big girls play soccer (football). We, that is my students, their football trainer and me. Sokey tries to shield my face from the sun by holding her jacket as high above her head as she possibly can. Unfortunately, the shadow only reaches my chest, but she doesn’t let that deter her. I find four to five girls crowding together behind me in my shadow, the others share jackets that they hold over their heads. It’s very hot, the sun is strong, and they don’t like dark skin. I’ve long stopped laughing at Cambodians holding jackets above their heads (as I’ve taken on that habit as well). I even find myself closing the buttons of my shirt all the way to the top and rolling down my sleeves in the heat, just to keep the sun away. The big girls lose 0:1. (So do the small girls, later on, but they play well.) I go to watch the small boys play, and I see that once again they’re playing against a team whose players seem to be too old for this league. Some of ours are quite young, so on average the other players are a foot taller than ours. Our boys fight, but they don’t have a chance. Due to a new rule, the others aren’t allowed to lead with more than 5 goals, so after about 15 minutes they have to play without scoring. They run all the way to the goal just to show they can, and before our goalie manages to get the ball, they kick it back on their side again. I wonder if our boys will want to continue playing like this, and surprisingly I find that they seem neither insulted, angry nor ready to give up. They even manage to score one goal, and then another – after which they (and all of us watching) are almost ecstatic. The rest of the game is a series of our boys not getting the ball, fighting literally every way they can; me, their trainer and the referee not seeing it, them pulling the bigger guys to the ground and rolling around laughing on the grass together. As always, some players have shoes, others don’t. Some wear the shoes they got just until the game starts, then they throw them across the field and play in their socks (they say they can’t run in shoes). Ror, one of my really small students, is playing with just one shoe. I figure maybe he’s sharing with someone, but I never do find out who that might be.