After the yesterday's - rather sad - contribution We have to look ahead to Antakya, which was destroyed by the earthquake, and want to see the beautiful things again. We want to be happy. And that's what we're doing now.
In Tunisia, we saw children playing football with crumpled PET bottles on littered pitches. We would have loved to give them a real ball, but we couldn't find one. It wasn't until days later in Tunis that we passed sports shops.
On a whim, we write to the only person in our family chat who has a real interest in (and knowledge of) football. Our son-in-law could be at the source. "Do you have any old footballs for us? Maybe some used ones from previous advertising campaigns?"
"I'll have a look, but I'm sure it'll work," comes back by return of post (do you still say "by return of post" on WhatsApp?). A few days later, we learn that 25 balls are waiting for us. Sending them to Tunisia no longer works, we're already on our way back. But we took the balls with us when we left again in the autumn.
25 balls are pretty big when they're inflated. So we let the air out, fold them into half-shells, get a pump and everything fits perfectly into our Felix.
In the Czech Republic, we give the first ball to a little rascal in our car park. Yes, the Czech Republic isn't exactly a poor country, but those beaming children's eyes are just a dream. As we say in Switzerland, they shake like professionals. The mum, rocking another baby in her arms, is even moved to tears. Wow, now I'm getting emotional too.
Here in Turkey, it is easier for us to bring joy to the children. People live outside here and we see a lot more children. We find a rather shy boy at an archaeological site. He hardly dares to look at us directly. A smile? Not a chance. Until Gerd takes out a ball and accidentally lets it roll into the nearby river, which thankfully has no water in it. Suddenly the boy looks up, just stares at the ball, and when Gerd takes it out of the river and simply hands it to the boy - without words, and without any knowledge of Turkish? - it is as if he is not being handed a ball, but the World Cup trophy itself.
But instead of playing with it, he carefully wipes the dust off the ball, places it first on the chair, then on the table and holds it tightly. And beams. As he leaves, he laughs and waves, and we sincerely hope that the ball will one day be put to its proper use. That it will be played.
In Harran, near the Syrian border south of Şanlıurfa, things look very different. School is out and the empty car park of the only tourist attraction is full of boys and girls. Our Felix is all alone, we take a guided tour and then have tea together. And learn that the children somehow all belong to the same family. 8 to 10 children are quite normal here. Okay, so we take out a ball and give it to the children. But we didn't expect the argument to start now. Everyone wants the ball and the first tears start to fall. My heart is bleeding, I'd love to hand over all the balls now, but Gerd says, what do they all want with one ball? You play football together, not individually. He's right. And yet ...
We still have a few balls left. We are looking forward to the joy we can bring. And we are also looking forward to ourselves a little, just as we feel this joy.
And last but not least, we would like to thank our son-in-law and his colleagues from Adidas, who gave us the balls (which were of course not used, but brand new) as a gift.
PS: It doesn't always feel quite right for us to simply take photos of the children without being asked. We still need to find a good and better way of dealing with this.
Merci for "travelling with us
We are thinking about taking another break from travelling in the summer and visiting our families in Germany and Switzerland. One of the ideas is to organise a Lecture about our long journey to the Persian Gulf to prepare. If you would like to, what would interest you the most? We will also tell stories here that don't find a place here on the blog. We're thinking of the Bern and Berlin area - simply because we have family there. But other places are also conceivable. Feel free to write to us.
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