Now Is the Time for Running

by Michael Williams

  While Tom patches up Godfast’s elbow, Salie shouts above the noise of the crowd, “They’ve managed to break you as individuals. Now start playing as a team. Remember where you come from. Use one another!”

  The game restarts. We have the ball, finally, but the Russian goal area seems like the other end of the world. T-Jay slips past the first Russian defender and bounces the ball off the boards to Ernesto who, seeing me switch positions to right wing, back heels the ball to me in a smooth move that gets the crowd cheering again.

  Without thinking, I do the move Aziz taught me all those years ago at Beitbridge. It comes so naturally that it leaves the Russian striker standing still. I have a free shot at the goal and only seconds to take it, but out of the corner of my eye I see T-Jay running to my left. Without hesitation I pass the ball to him, and he drives the ball past the goalie into the back of the net.

  The crowd erupts. Their cheers drown out our on-court celebrations and the halftime horn.

  “You see, you can do it!” shouts Salie as we splash our faces with water. “Now I need two more goals exactly like that.”

  As we enter the court for the second half, the cheer we get is overwhelming. I see a new determination in T-Jay’s eyes.

  “Vladimir is not going to knock me down in this half,” he says, immediately winning the ball from the Russian defender, who makes the mistake of grabbing T-Jay’s shirt and pulling him down.

  The referee’s whistle blasts.

  Penalty.

  The Russians surround the referee, but he simply points to the spot. Ernesto throws the ball to me.

  “You’ve got the best right foot, Deo. Don’t miss,” he says.

  “No, Ernesto, I think the goalie knows my right foot too well. You take the shot. He won’t expect that.”

  Ernesto places the ball on the spot, and we hold our breath as he steps up and shoots. I hope that I’ve made the right decision.

  Goal!

  Ernesto scores and the game is 2-2.

  The next five minutes are a furious battle of defense and attack. Nobody wants to go to the lottery of a penalty shoot-out, and the Russians become more desperate with each assault on our goal. Godfast is the hero of the moment as he saves shot after shot, leaving the Russians frustrated and angry.

  I no longer hear the noise of the crowd. I have slipped away into a zone of memory and feeling. I am all I ever want to be. I am free of worry, unable to think of anything but this moment. The ball lands at my feet, inviting me to move it up into the Russian goal. In a flash of clarity it all comes back: the games I played in Gutu, Beitbridge, and Khomele village were all in preparation for this moment.

  Better make some Deo magic.

  I move past one player, bounce the ball off the boards into the air and onto my head, and then I leap off the ground and swivel my right foot to connect with the ball. The shot is perfect, and from fifteen paces away it flies straight past the goalie into the back of the net, taking everyone by surprise.

  I land hard on the cement.

  The last minute is a blur of defense and wild kicks, and then the horn blasts and the people in the stadium roar.

  It’s 3-2. South Africa has beaten the Russians. We’ve made it into the finals!

  27

  THE FINAL

  Ladies and gentlemen, will you please welcome the two teams that have made it to the Street Soccer World Cup final!”

  All around me, cheering erupts. We walk out onto the court to face the packed stands. The Brazilian team walks next to us. We line up in the middle of the court and wait for the national anthems to be played. It’s the last game of the tournament. Salie said that we could be world-beaters, and he was right.

  “I know some of you can’t believe you are here,” Salie said to us before this game. “Believe it. Now all you have to do is believe that you can be world champions. I believe you can be. But do you?”

  The Brazilian national anthem starts to play. I stand with my hand, not on my heart, but on my armband. I am excited but calm. I am bruised and battered all over, but I feel no pain. After playing twenty-two games over six days, I’ve learned a lot about how to control my emotions, how to shut out pain, how to concentrate. I scan the crowd before me, looking up at row after row of faces. In their eyes I see admiration and respect. These people, who normally would look at me with pity or contempt, see me now in a new way. The South African national anthem starts to play, and the sound of thousands of people singing fills the air.

  I imagine I see Amai and Grandpa Longdrop in the crowd, watching and waving at me. There is a smile on my mother’s face. I remember it so well. And farther up on the stand, I see the worried face of Captain Washington. He lifts his hands up at me and applauds. One by one, the faces of the people I met on my journey return. I imagine them all looking down on this court and watching me play: Patson and his father; Aziz and Sinbaba at Beitbridge; old Benjamin and his nephew, Philani; my family in the bridge, Catarina, Rais, Angel, Gawalia and his two sons, Rasta and Tsepo; the children from Gutu—Bhuku, Shadrack, Javu, Pelo the Buster, and Lola. Standing right at the back of the stands, I see the huge figure of Mai Maria. She laughs at me, her dreadlocks swirling like snakes. Lennox is there too, clapping.

  I realize I am looking for someone else, someone more important than all of these people.

  Innocent.

  I look carefully from face to face for my brother. I want so bad to see him once more, his radio pressed close to his ear, waving at me, shouting my name. “I need some more batteries, Deo,” my brother said to me on the day that I lost him. The memory makes me smile. Innocent might not be in the crowd, but he is in my heart.

  The anthems are over. We jog into our positions. The referee holds the ball up and checks that both teams are ready.

  I call Keelan, T-Jay, Godfast, and Jacko to the center of the court. We stand close together, our shoulders touching.

  “Now is the time to show them what we are and where we come from,” I shout. “We will win this game.”

  I offer my hand. One by one they offer theirs. Our grip is strong, united in purpose.

  “Let’s play!” we shout.

  The crowd roars for the referee to throw the ball into the court. We begin the game.

  How it will end, none of us can know. It does not matter. Together, we play the game of our lives.

  Author’s Note

  A photograph of a man burning to death during the xenophobic attacks in South Africa in 2008 forced me to ask the question: If people knew who that burning man was and how he came to be in South Africa, would they have killed him? To better answer that question I decided that I had to find out more about refugees and how they came to be in my country.

  While working in the soup kitchen at the Scalabrini Centre of Cape Town (www.scalabrini.org.za) I met three remarkable young Zimbabwean men, Usher Vundhla, Fantam, and Rasta. I spent several hours interviewing them for this novel and in the process discovered that, aside from their refugee status, the one thing they had in common was that none of their fathers was alive: One was killed by the Ghuma-ghuma, one was shot by the soldiers of Mugabe, and one died from HIV/AIDS. The young men, none of them more than twenty years old, were desperate to bring their families to South Africa, but given their lack of resources and the current political climate, this remains a remote possibility. Unfortunately, Usher, Fantam, and Rasta now live on the streets of Cape Town, under highways, and wherever they can find shelter. They refuse to live in the refugee camps set up by the provincial government of the Western Cape. The stories they told me of their journey to Cape Town, while we prepared food for other refugees, inspired much of this novel.

  XENOPHOBIA

  My description of the xenophobic attacks by the residents of the Alexandra township in the novel is a pale version of what actually happened in South Africa in May 2008. I wanted to imagine what it must be like for two brothers to successfully make it to Johannesburg after a dangerous journey, only to face the hatred of the loca
l people upon arrival. Unfortunately, the burning of Innocent was not something I made up, but was based on an actual event that took place in Alexandra in 2008.

  An investigation by the Southern African Migration Project found that high levels of intolerance and hostility toward foreigners by South Africans were the main reason for the wave of xenophobic violence that took place in May 2008. More than sixty people, many of them migrants, were killed during attacks on foreigners throughout the country. More than a thousand suspects were arrested.

  The assaults on foreign communities left tens of thousands of migrants without homes following the destruction of their property. The report said the attacks were initially attributed to South Africa’s alienating apartheid past, the daily struggle for existence, and the government’s failure to redistribute to the poor the fruits of the post-apartheid economic boom.

  The study found that 76 percent of those surveyed want the country’s borders electrified, while 67 percent want all refugees kept in border camps. For half of those surveyed, enclosing outsiders wasn’t enough; they preferred a policy of deportation. The report suggests that South Africans continue to consider foreign nationals a threat to the social and economic well-being of their country. Two-thirds argued that migrants were associated with crime and used up scarce resources, while just under a half felt outsiders brought disease.

  The report concludes: “The tragic events of May 2008 should act as a major wake-up call to all South Africans. They cannot rest on their laurels. All past and future perpetrators of xenophobic violence should be vigorously prosecuted. What is urgently required is action, not only to ensure that the disgrace is not repeated, but so that South Africans can hold up their heads as they prepare to host a distinctly uneasy world in the 2010 World Cup Soccer final.”

  Unfortunately, the murderers of “the burning man,” as he is now known in South Africa, remain free, and there is very little likelihood of them ever being brought to justice.

  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenophobia_in_South_Africa)

  THE HOMELESS WORLD CUP

  The Homeless World Cup is a life-changing international soccer tournament. From Argentina to Australia, South Africa to Portugal, Cameroon to Brazil, Germany to England, homeless people take a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to represent their country and change their lives forever. Seventy-seven percent of players go on to find a home, to come off drugs and alcohol, to get into schools, to find jobs, to get training, and to repair relationships with friends and family. This is the future we hope for Deo.

  Following the huge success of the first few Homeless World Cup tournaments, the games are now recognized as an annual event on the global sporting calendar.

  (www.homelessworldcup.org)

  GLOSSARY

  amai Shona word for “mother”

  cassava Large thick root; tastes like a potato when cooked

  Chipangano Youth brigade of Zimbabwean political party

  dhoti Wraparound linen cloth worn by men

  Ghuma-ghuma Criminal gang that preys on refugees

  Jozi Slang word for city of Johannesburg

  kak Slang Afrikaans word used to mean “nonsense”

  kraal Circular African homestead

  kwerekwere Derogatory term for foreigner; word is imitation of how different African languages sound to the local ear

  madala Old man, elder

  MDC Movement for Democratic Change, an opposing Zimbabwean political party

  pungwe Mandatory rally held for propaganda purposes

  sadza Mush made from meal produced by grinding corn

  shambok Animal-hide whip used to herd cattle

  spaza Small general or convenience store in South African townships

  wena Slang African word for “man” or “guy”

  Zed Abbreviation for ZANU PF, Zimbabwean political party

  Acknowledgments

  I am deeply grateful to all those people who made this book possible:

  To the three young men I met at Scalabrini—Usher Vundhla, Fantam, and Rasta—thank you for telling me your story; Amy Kaplan for her insight and “no editing” approach to criticism; Ellen-Anne and Emma, my two lovely daughters, for their patience with Dad’s constant refrain, “I’ve got to work tonight, girls”; and my dearest wife, Ettie, for her editing skill and wonderful, loving support.

  Contents

  FRONT COVER IMAGE

  WELCOME

  DEDICATION

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  PART 1: LEAVING MASVINGO

  1: GOOOAAAL IN GUTU

  2: GRANDPA LONGDROP TALKS TO COMMANDER JESUS

  3: BEATING INNOCENT

  4: OPERATION WHO DID YOU VOTE FOR

  5: BLOOD FOR DRUMS

  6: CAPTAIN WASHINGTON IN BIKITA

  7: THE GREEN BOMBAS

  8: TRUCKING

  9: PATSON’S GAME

  10: FINDING MAI MARIA

  11: CROCODILES IN THE LIMPOPO

  12: GHUMA-GHUMA

  13: THE PARK

  PART 2: HOW WE CAME TO A PLACE CALLED JOZI

  14: FLYING TOMATO FARM

  15: PHILANI’S DEAL

  16: JOZI

  17: ALEXANDRA TOWNSHIP

  18: LIFE IN A BRIDGE

  19: NIGHT AT THE CHURCH

  20: BURNT GARBAGE

  PART 3: UNDER A TABLE MOUNTAIN

  21: COMING DOWN

  22: STREET SOCCER

  23: PAINFUL PRACTICE

  24: THE LAST DRILL

  25: A MIDNIGHT RUN

  26: MATCH WEEK

  27: THE FINAL

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  GLOSSARY

  COPYRIGHT

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2009 by Michael Williams

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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  The Little, Brown name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

  First eBook Edition: July 2011

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  ISBN: 978-0-316-13478-1