The basketball tournament was a HUGE success and fun for all 72 participants. For the first time in it’s history, the 09hhr tournament ran smoothly and on time and most importantly, did not have any fights! Our system of making participants play in new teams, with players they’ve never met or seen before worked extremely well.
The 2 buses collected all the participants and dropped them off at Herttoniemenranan Urheiluhalli. They went straight to the lockers, changed and were directed to their designated courts. The coaches then divided them in four groups (young boys, young girls, big boys & big girls). Each group had 4 teams and they all played for their own championship. In our observation, the young groups (boys and girls) immediately started working together as a team where as the older group looked hesitant for the first game…perhaps not wanting to pass, but finding out there is no other option.
We also had a shooting competition where the coaches picked the best shooter in the team to compete. Each group had their own shooting competition, done on a knockout basis. The winning gifts were for the whole team, which made participants to cheer for their team mate in the competition.
Lessons learnt:
The staff and/or volunteers who have been in 09hhr for the past 3 years, marveled on the success of this camp and have recommended the same format for future camps. One other event that played a very important role in this event was the introduction. In the beginning of the camp, the Exective Director of 09hhr Nuran Bedretdin, the Project Manager for basketball for social change at 09hhr Pierre Jallow, and one of the parents Yama Ahmad Osman talked to the kids about the reason why we were there and stressed the importance of getting along, making new friends and not fighting each other. The messages were said in Finnish, English and Somali.
We were very happy to have reached our goal of helping young people from different backgrounds work together. We can all see the demographic change in each country in the world and we are happy to lead the way for young people to start working together peacefully.