Bunyala World Malaria Day Football Tournament

My hometown team, Budalang’i FC, or Budo Ijax. I’m good friends with most of these guys, and was hoping to present them with our championship in the end.

I had been working on planning a Bunyala District World Malaria Day event since December, when I approached the Ministry of Health about holding the event across the river by the swamp. Naturally, with all the standing water in the swamp and low-lying areas, this is the area which suffers most from malaria. And due to it's remoteness from District headquarters, they usually don’t have the opportunity to host such an event.

At the time everyone was on board with my suggestion. But unfortunately as we began our stakeholders’ planning meetings, which began only a couple weeks ago despite my insistence, we found that we could not get a sponsor. Unlike most years, PSI and other NGOs which generally sponsor this yearly event decided only to hold one event per county.

Along with Henry Bennett, my nearest fellow Peace Corps Volunteer in Port Victoria, we worked primarily with my friend Peter Odongo of the local Burenjo CBO and Eugene Nambesa, the District Malaria Control Coordinator, to pull together a more grassroots event. Through Peace Corps, each volunteer was able to obtain a small amount of shirts, footballs, and bags, which naturally fit very nicely into holding a football tournament.

We worked to use meager resources locally to pull off our four-team Bunyala World Malaria Day Football Tournament, on Thursday. We had originally planned for it to be district-wide, with teams from all corners of Bunyala. But due to issues of flooding and expenses, we had to scale back to teams from our immediate Budalang’i area. Despite the challenges, we were able to pull together a pretty damn successful day, I would say.

Now for the pictures…

Odongo, Henry, Eugene, and I offered words of encouragement to the teams before play. We had planned the first game to start at 8AM, but in true Kenyan fashion due to tardiness, it didn’t start until 10AM, the planned start of the second game.

And in ceremonial fashion, our four-man planning committee shook hands which each of the competing players. 

We took pictures which each of the four teams competing. Here we are with Mudembi FC. (to my right is Odongo, Eugene is peeping through at the back, and I think you can pick out Henry, just a guess)

As it was World Malaria Day, I worked with my friend Charles, the doctor overseeing volunteer CHWs (Community Health Worker) in every village in the area, to mobilize the groups to perform related skits, dramas, demonstrations, and health talks during the event.

My friend Goma of Budalang’i gunning for a score in their game against Mudembi FC. Unfortunately we lost to Mudembi 0-0 on penalty kicks.

Mundere FC, who won the second match 1-0 to move onto the championship game.

Budebu FC

Eugene giving a talk about malaria during the event. Henry and I were happy that he addressed the issue of Kenyans taking malaria medication for even the slightest common cold, and how when on the medication, it is important to finish the entire dose. Improper use is causing malaria strains across the world to develop tolerance against the drugs.

To the right, the CHWs also took the opportunity when supplying players with water to demonstrate the Lifestraw system, heavily pushed in Western Kenya to filter water.

Eugene was one of several local medical officials, community volunteers, and doctors to speak to the crowd during the games. For my part, I talked about how we all know what causes Malaria, how to prevent it, yet we all don't practice what we know. It's important that we do; putting deaths aside, the opportunity and financial costs of being sick, medication, and hospital visits prevents Bunyala from accessing it's potential.

Our resources were limited, as Henry and I only could provide balls, shirts, and bags. The balls and shirts were only enough for the players, and we decided that the bags should go to the CHWs, as they were the other most important group of volunteers which made the event a success.

Unfortunately, we only had enough for maybe a quarter of the CHWs. Before we presented the CHWs with their bags, I tried to give them an emotional speech to make them feel appreciated. I thanked them for coming out, for their work in general, saying that I always love working alongside them. Volunteering to improve the health of their community is representative of the best humanity has to offer. And I apologized for not having enough materials to appreciate every one of them. But despite this, Charles, their supervisor, later told me that this was much better than previous years. The CHWs felt truly appreciated, that we were honest with them, and that they’d definitely be ready to help next year as well.

Budalang’i vs. Budebu in the third/fourth place game. We (Budalang’i) lost 0-1 to place fourth, while Budebu secured third place.

I loved the energy and enthusiasm from the players all day. Here, Mudembi FC is warming up like champs in preparation for the championship game. Its generally expected that any organized tournament in the area have payouts to the teams based on placement, but we had no such funding. In spite of this, they took the games with utmost seriousness, and generally seemed appreciative for the day and the small gifts they received.

A Mundere player strikes the ball following a stoppage during the championship against Mudembi. 

90 minutes ended scoreless. Due to time, we went directly to a tense session of penalty kicks.  

A Mudembi player scores against the Mundere goalkeeper.

Mudembi players celebrate after securing the victory.

A post-victory prayer for the winning team.

Teams listen to final speeches and the presentation of awards.

The four of us took turns congratulating the teams for their good play and offering some final parting malaria messages. I called for applause specifically for all of the participating teams and CHWs for making our grassroots day a success.

My friend Kadogo, the captain of Budalang’i, accepts the two footballs, and later 12 t-shirts, awarded to every participating team. Unfortunately three-quarters of the shirts we received were small. What PSI?!

To distinguish the teams, we prepared certificates for the first, second, and third place teams. Here, Mudembi’s captain accepts the first place certificate from Henry.