How many people from poor communities do you know in person or by their names? How much do you know about their everyday struggles? We often hear in the media about people or communities living on the edge of society. We discuss their situation with friends, but do we know from experience what their lives are really like? We say that we have our problems and challenges and not much time to get to know those on the other side of … town.
Our school, and especially our teacher Tomas Gulan, invests its efforts in free time activities in the community center for Roma children, who live in a poor part of town called Bambusky. We decided to invite these children to our school to play sports with our students.
At the beginning of this tournament, we started with the Slovak national anthem because though we have different skin colors, we are citizens of one country – Slovak people called to live in mutual respect and to help each other. Then the children split into their teams and played football and dodgeball. If they were tired or thirsty, they could get refreshments prepared by students of the Lutheran Grammar School. Teachers of our school were referees and tried to maintain fair play in all the matches. At the end of the tournament, all players got chocolate medals, and winners were also given prizes for their teams – a football and a volleyball.
I must admit that we made a small mistake. The next time we play sports with children from Bambusky, first we will make mixed teams and give all team members a chance to get to know each other, before they play games together. This way, they will spend some time to build up a friendship, and later they will make it stronger while playing the games.
Mgr. Ľuboš Froľo
