“We are changing the world.”
That is the slogan adopted by PJSC Gazprom for the Russian company’s Football for Friendship (F4F) international children’s social program.
First held in London in 2013, it initially involved soccer teams from eight FIFA members — England, Bulgaria, Hungary, Germany, Greece, Russia, Serbia and Slovenia.
Photo courtesy of Hsieh An-chi
Since then, the project has been getting progressively larger year by year until, this year, an ultimate goal was set: to invite 12-year-old ambassadors and young journalists from all 211 FIFA members, fly them all to Moscow and hold a F4F World Championship ahead of the 2018 FIFA World Cup.
I first became involved on an ordinary day in April that led to a extraordinary experience for two young Taiwanese as they traveled to the Russian capital to take part in a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
TOUGH START
Photo courtesy of Hsieh An-chi
Having been set the goal of inviting a delegation and journalists from all 211 FIFA members, Ekaterina Podpalnaya, participants’ operations officer of the F4F organization committee, had been having no luck with the Chinese Taipei Football Association (CTFA), so she decided on a different approach.
She happened upon the name of Robert Iwanicki, manager of Taiwan Football Premier League side Royal Blues, likely her choice as he speaks some Russian after his schooling in Soviet-era Poland (something that proved useful in a city with almost no English signage), and called him, explaining that she needed Taiwanese representatives for the tournament in Moscow.
A few days later, Robert spoke with the CTFA, who told him they had nobody available to deal with the Gazprom program. When he offered to organize a delegation himself, a frantic week of form-filling and photography began, culminating in a visit to the Russian representative office in Taipei to get visas.
Photo courtesy of Hsieh An-chi
Taiwan’s ambassador was to be my son, 10-year-old Danny Carroll (謝又甯), while 11-year-old Sherri Chang (張馨予) was picked as Taiwan’s young journalist, both players at the Royal Blues’ Formosa Football Academy.
That was slightly problematic as the ambassadors were supposed to be 12 years old, but the F4F organization committee voted to accept Danny, to much relief, and the trip was on.
Earlier in April, 32 international teams of friendship had been formed in an open draw, each named after an endangered species as part of the project’s ecological initiative.
Photo courtesy of Hsieh An-chi
Taiwan’s ambassador had been drawn in the African Wild Dog team alongside Luca Durso of Australia, Sam Clarke of Grenada, Wadia Chery of Haiti, Alvaro Nogues Couchonnal of Paraguay and goalkeeper Andrey Ponomarenko of host nation Russia, at that point just names on a piece of paper, but now a global group of best friends.
The Taiwanese delegation of Robert, Danny, Sherri and Sherri’s mother, Shuling Tsai (蔡淑玲), flew to Moscow on June 7, while us journalists flew over on June 10.
With the kids sharing rooms at a hotel with metal detectors installed by the elevators and security guards at every entrance, Danny was paired with Haitian young journalist Djenansky Noresty (I am certain housekeeping gave up on that room after day 1), while Sherri shared with Haitian ambassador Wadia.
CAUSING A STIR
It was not long before the Taiwanese kids made their mark.
Reluctant young journalist Sherri hosted the F4F 2018: Digest Day 2 video on June 9, causing quite a stir in the Taiwanese media, especially at her determination to use “Taiwan” rather than “Chinese Taipei” in the broadcast, which is still available on the Football for Friendship channel on YouTube.
On being told of the reaction to the video back home and that she was now a “superstar,” Sherri’s reaction was, well, very Sherri-like.
“I don’t want to be a superstar, I just want to play football,” was the retort.
Despite her misgivings about being a reporter (and let’s face it we would all rather be playing the game rather than reporting on it), Sherri still picked up an award as one of the top five young journalists in Moscow.
After three days of training and getting to know his teammates, the morning of Tuesday last week was Danny’s turn to come under the spotlight as the group stages of the F4F World Championship were held at Lokomotiv Moscow’s academy stadium (see Taipei Times, “Taiwan player and side edged out in Russia,” June 14, p16.)
African Wild Dog certainly competed, but maybe were a bit unlucky, with Whale Shark scoring with the last kick of the first match, before they then let a lead slip against Blonde Capuchin in the second after not getting the rub of the green with the referee’s decisions.
A victory in the final match against Dama Gazelle was well deserved, but too little, too late as they exited after the group stage.
The evening finale, where the final was deservedly won by the Chimpanzee featuring players from Dominica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Malawi, Colombia, Benin and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, was then followed on Wednesday last week by a trip to the Moskvarium for the F4F International Children’s Forum, where the kids were excited to listen to former Real Madrid star Iker Casillas and former England defender Alex Scott.
The next day a 30-plus bus convoy headed through central Moscow, past the Kremlin, Red Square and Gorky Park, to the opening ceremony and opening match of the World Cup at the Luzhniki Stadium, a 5-0 win for the hosts against Saudi Arabia that I am sure will live long in the memory of all the kids who were there.
They did not sleep that night as they partied until a day of long goodbyes, the swapping of social media addresses and photographs as they waited at the hotel for the various buses to Moscow’s airports.
That’s when the realization struck that it was not about the “football,” which was just the glue. It was about the “friendship.”
We had seen the best of the world and the world had seen the best of Taiwan, through Danny and Sherri, and as we left Moscow, even this cynical old hack thought: “Maybe, just maybe, these kids are changing the world.”
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
It’s hard to know where to begin with Mark Tovell’s Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds. Having published a travelogue myself, as well as having contributed to several guidebooks, at first glance Tovell’s book appears to inhabit a middle ground — the kind of hard-to-sell nowheresville publishers detest. Leaf through the pages and you’ll find them suffuse with the purple prose best associated with travel literature: “When the sun is low on a warm, clear morning, and with the heat already rising, we stand at the riverside bike path leading south from Sanxia’s old cobble streets.” Hardly the stuff of your
April 22 to April 28 The true identity of the mastermind behind the Demon Gang (魔鬼黨) was undoubtedly on the minds of countless schoolchildren in late 1958. In the days leading up to the big reveal, more than 10,000 guesses were sent to Ta Hwa Publishing Co (大華文化社) for a chance to win prizes. The smash success of the comic series Great Battle Against the Demon Gang (大戰魔鬼黨) came as a surprise to author Yeh Hung-chia (葉宏甲), who had long given up on his dream after being jailed for 10 months in 1947 over political cartoons. Protagonist