Lieutenant Colonel Vishwanath Channamallappa Gundagi from India, wanting to give children a couple of hours of happiness a day, bought and handed over 100 footballs to boys and girls in Western Equatoria State.
Football is known as the beautiful game, but in some of its most avid fans, it also brings out equally beautiful acts of human generosity at its very best.
Lieutenant Colonel Vishwanath Channamallappa Gundagi, who until recently served with the United Nations Mission in South Sudan, is an outstanding example of what the potent mix of passion and compassion, coupled with initiative and generosity, can lead to.
Just ask hundreds of football-loving boys and girls in the towns of Mundri, Maridi and Tambura, all located in conflict-affected areas of Western Equatoria State. They were the beneficiaries as Lieutenant Colonel Gundagi dug deep into his owns pocket, spent his money on 100 footballs and gave them to jubilant young players.
In his own poignant words:
“On one of my many long-distance patrols, I met Christopher. He was a small lad, about 8 years old, staying at the camp for internally displaced persons adjacent to our UNMISS Temporary Operating Base in violence-plagued Tambura. He lost his parents during the 2021 conflict. His clothes were torn, his slippers old and battered. He was being taken care of by his uncle and grandparents.
When I asked him what he would like as a Christmas gift, there was no hesitation, no wasting of time as he said: “A football!” When I asked around among the other children at the camp, several others gave me the same answer: a football. Like Christopher, they had just lost everything: their homes, families and their community.
They may have been young, but they were aware of their losses and that they cannot be replaced, and yet they knew that they could, and would need to, rescue some sort of joy in their lives. Playing football has that magic power, of triggering immense joy in the here and now, and I can personally relate to that.
When I was studying in a boarding school in India, my classmates and I always looked forward to our soccer matches in the evening. All that we yearned for was to get out on that field and run like crazy behind the ball. We would play for at least two hours, and time flew by. That ball could not feed us, it couldn’t bring back our parents, and it didn’t stop the relentless bullying of senior students, but for two hours we were free, happy and living the moment.
These vivid memories of bliss make me inclined to believe that sport may bring a similar or even greater joy to kids who have to endure life in a conflict-ridden, violent place like Tambura. This realization made me and my former classmates decide to give these traumatized children exactly that: a happy, worry-free zone for a couple of hours a day.
We embarked on a mission: to distribute 100 footballs to vulnerable children in Western Equatoria State. We imagined that a single football could entertain 20-25 kids at a time, so my humble initiative would be able to bring joy and smiles on the faces of some 2,500 children.
Now, I have watched them play, and believe me when I say that the number may be even bigger. To me, contributing to a couple of thousand children picking up a football instead of a gun is an achievement to be proud of. We have given them something that most conflict-affected children have not.
Footballs, at least if they are to be of a minimum level of quality and durability, don’t come cheap, but what I have been privileged to watch with my own eyes is priceless. The sight of that sparkle in their eyes when they received their balls, their laughter, unbridled joy, eagerness to run, to strategize, and to get, among so many defeats in their young lives, one win, one scored goal and a moment of intense pleasure, it was worth the effort. I truly believe it was a victory for all of us.”