African Football Stars!!!

Today was another amazing day. We are continuing to get blown away by how receptive the Nigerian people are to our team. Last night we welcomed in 2008 in an exciting way, with Matty Burke keeping us all laughing with his incredibly wonderful songs, I think Larissa even got in there and did some rapping!!

Today was a more relaxed day, at least for a while. We decided to take the morning to sleep in, and then had lunch at a local families house. The lunch was amazing, and the boys even took some turns helping prepare it. It is so amazing how people will do everything they can to make you feel so at home here. After lunch we headed to Das where the local pastor, a wonderful man named Ishaku, set up a football against the local village. It was actually an amazing occasion, with the local leader kicking the first ball, and hundreds and hundreds of local people came out to watch. We gave the Nigerian team brand new uniforms we had brought from home, and they were very happy. It was a very surreal moment, with the whole village screaming and shouting most of the time. Something none of us will ever forget.

Tomorrow we are heading back to Das to help refurbish the well. When we are not working on the well, we are busy singing songs and playing with what seems like hundreds of kids. We have had a few stampedes when someone shows a bag of candy! It is amazing to see the joy in the children’s faces when you take time to play with them. The whole team is meeting up again soon, on Saturday we will be getting together to pour the foundation for the children’s hospital, then spend the night at a wildlife safari.
The Jos team is doing amazing, we have been hearing rumors that they have bought a goat for 15000 Naira (150$ CDN) and are planning on making some fine food out of it…..hopefully they don’t get too attached! The Abuja team is also doing great, spending time working refurbishing a school, and skateboarding around the city, something the other teams haven’t gotten to experience.
Keep checking the news for updates, hopefully a story has gotten on there, our reporter James Neely has been wonderful to have around, joining in on everything we have been doing so far. If you want to leave comments for the boys to see you can definitely do so, I think you might have to create an account, but I know the guys would love to hear from you.
Check back for more photos soon….hopefully!!!