What's Ukrainian for Football?

by Helena Pielichaty

  Eve grinned. “Yep. Carry on, Nika.”

  “Thank you. Where was I?”

  “Kolya working at the bakery,” Megan quickly informed me.

  I nodded, grateful that she was listening so attentively. “Right. Kolya was working for Kordik. Now Kordik employed other sportsmen as well. Gymnasts, cyclists, boxers – in fact, people from every sport going, but it was footballers Kordik favoured most, and soon other players joined the workforce. Before long he had half the Dynamo Kiev team baking bread and cleaning the ovens! He hired players from other local teams too, such as Lokomotiv. Then something happened that excited Andriy beyond belief: Kordik persuaded the German authorities to let him get a team together. They called it FC Start and they played in red.”

  “Like us!” Eve pointed out.

  “Like us.” I smiled. “They trained at a disused ground on Kerosene Street, behind the bakery. After a while, they began playing proper matches. The authorities were happy to let this happen. They liked sport, too, remember, and the bakery team was put in a mini league with a mixture of factory and army teams. The difference was that FC Start were really good. Even though the players were unfit and injured and half-starved, they were still professional footballers. They were still skilled. That summer they beat every team they came across. Not just by one or two goals, either. In the five matches they played, they scored thirty-two goals and had only three goals against.”

  “Not bad!” Eve whistled.

  “Word got round. More and more people came to watch the matches. At last the people had something to lift their spirits. Something to cheer about. Football! But the Germans didn’t like it one bit, this rag-bag team outclassing everyone and becoming more and more popular. So they sent in their best team, Flakelf – the players were mainly pilots and aircraft crew – to put Start in their place. And guess what? Start beat them five–one!”

  “Get in!” Megan called out.

  “At work the next day, Andriy overcame all his shyness and dashed up to the goalkeeper and flung his arms round him. When Kolya patted the top of his head in response, Andriy vowed never to wash his hair again…”

  Everyone laughed, giving me a chance to shift my weight and change position. I stood up so I could face everyone. My heel didn’t throb at all now, it was so well padded. I stooped nearer my attentive team-mates and dropped my voice. I was coming to the main part of the story and I wanted to give it a proper build-up.

  “That should have been that. There were no more games to play. It was August – well beyond the end of the season. Then Flakelf’s coach demanded a rematch. The Germans were supposed to be the Master Race, superior in everything, right? No way could these dirty Ukrainians be allowed to get away with such a fluke result.

  “Posters advertising the ‘revenge’ match were put up throughout the city. It was set to take place three days later, on August the ninth, a Sunday. Andriy couldn’t wait.”

  “That’s this Sunday!” Lucy shouted out. “This Sunday is August the ninth.”

  “As in tomorrow,” Petra added.

  Goose bumps prickled my skin. How strange that the dates should be the same. It threw me for a moment and I forgot where I was.

  “Andriy couldn’t wait,” Megan prompted.

  I nodded. “That’s right. Andriy couldn’t wait. Neither, it appeared, could anybody else. That hot Sunday afternoon it seemed as if the whole of Kiev was heading for the ground. The men had a spring in their step and were talking animatedly about tactics and predictions as to who would score first. The women had dressed for the occasion, putting traditional strands of lace in their hair. The kids were noisy and boisterous, caught up in the jolly atmosphere.

  “But the nearer to the ground the crowd got, the quieter they became. As they walked down Kerosene Street they became more and more subdued. Why? The whole street was lined with German soldiers, that’s why. Armed German soldiers accompanied by their savage Alsatians.

  “It was the same inside the ground, too: the whole of the grandstand, where some of the crowd had hoped to sit, was taken up by German officers and soldiers. The Start fans had to make do with standing on the opposite side, in the glaring sun.

  “Andriy squeezed his way through to an area close to the back of one of the goals. Here he sat shoulder to shoulder with other children, on the edge of the running track that separated the pitch from the terracing. Every so often armed guards would walk by, their dogs panting and slobbering over any kids’ shoes they happened to pass.

  “All this made Andriy nervous, but as soon as the teams came onto the pitch, his heart soared at seeing FC Start standing so proudly in the middle of the field. Their strip might have been makeshift and second-hand, their boots borrowed and worn, but they were his team and he adored them.

  “But a minute later his soaring heart almost stopped. When the Flakelf side gave the obligatory Nazi salute, Start did not. Instead they gave the forbidden Soviet greeting – Fizcultura – meaning long live sport. The crowd gasped but then burst into spontaneous applause. ‘Ha!’ Andriy heard a man behind him say. ‘Up yours, Adolf!’

  “The whistle blew. Start did not start very well! Flakelf were all over them…” I began to pace up and down restlessly. “Boy, did Flakelf cheat – but the referee ignored every nasty, deliberate foul, every dirty, shirt-tugging, elbow-digging, shin-scraping challenge they made. It was obvious whose side he was on! And it was Andriy’s favourite who was getting the worst of it. Poor Kolya.

  “The Flakelf forwards were on him every time he tried to make a save, kicking and shoving him hard. Undaunted, the determined keeper lunged for every ball that came to him. Then something dreadful happened. He dived at the feet of one of the forwards, stopping what would have been a certain goal – but the Flakelf forward, instead of checking himself, let his foot continue through the shot and kicked Kolya straight in the head. Andriy swore that the crunching sound would be heard all the way down Kerosene Street.”

  “Oh!” Megan gasped, putting her hand to her own head, as if feeling the blow.

  “Kolya was knocked out cold! He lay in his goalmouth, unmoving. Andriy couldn’t believe it! He was incensed. ‘Porushenya! Foul, referee! A dirty, dirty foul!’ he called out as Kolya was carried off the pitch by his team-mates and Goncharenko took over in goal. ‘Why are Flakelf being like this?’ Andriy asked one of the men standing behind him. ‘They weren’t so dirty last time.’

  “The man blew cigarette smoke into the air above the boy’s head. ‘Why? Look at all the Gestapo watching them in the grandstand. Would you dare to lose in front of those swine?’

  “But Andriy didn’t care about that. He wanted only to know if his hero was still alive. Oh, the relief when Kolya struggled to his feet, helped by the trainer. Pale and shaky, the keeper limped to the touchline and indicated to Goncharenko that he was ready to go back in goal. The crowd whistled and clapped in admiration.

  “The trouble was, Kolya wasn’t anywhere near ready. Before long the Germans scored, silencing the home supporters. Flakelf went in even heavier with their tackles, but the more they fouled, the more angry the crowd became. Not just the Ukrainians, either, but the soldiers from other regiments in Kiev. Hungarians and Italians and Romanians. All football-loving nations, who had come to watch football, not this … this mess.

  “The bravery of the crowd in even daring to protest seemed to encourage Start. When a decision finally went their way – for a free kick – Kuzmenko blasted it directly into the net to equalize, giving the referee no choice but to award the goal. A few minutes later Goncharenko volleyed home the second. Start, realizing that the only way their goals would be allowed was by a direct shot, netted a third before half-time.”

  “Go Start!” Petra called out.

  “You can imagine how ecstatic Andriy and the rest of the Kievans were. Going in three–one up at half-time against all odds. During the break Ukrainian songs rang round the ground and women waved their lace ribbons in unity. And guess what? There wasn’t a
thing the Germans could do about it.

  “Well, in the second half Start played as if they had been living off roast chicken and caviar for weeks, not almost starving to death! Both sides scored twice more, but it was obvious Flakelf were never going to win. They knew it. The crowd knew it. The referee knew it. He even blew his whistle five minutes before time – FC Start, against all odds, had beaten that crack German side…”

  “Yahoo!” Eve yelled, and everyone clapped.

  “Wait,” I said, holding up my hand. “This is not the end.”

  I gathered myself for the final part, the part that was still new and raw to me and the main reason that Uncle had called these men heroes. “What Andriy didn’t know, and only found out later, was that at half-time, an SS officer had come to the Start changing room and warned them to lose the match … or else.”

  “But they didn’t – they played even better,” Megan said, her eyes wide and anxious.

  I held my head high. “Exactly. They ignored the warning. No way would they throw the match… They were too proud, too brave to do such a thing.

  “A week later the Gestapo arrived at the bakery. They marched into Kordik’s office, pushing him aside, and began to call out names over the tannoy. One by one, every single member of the Start team was arrested and marched away. One of them, Korotkikh, was shot the next day; the rest were sent to Siretz, a prison camp.”

  “Oh no,” Lucy cried out.

  I concentrated on the floor, my voice trembling. “The following February Kolya, Klimenko and Kuzmenko were shot too…” Someone gasped, but I didn’t look up. I just continued, speaking quickly to get it over with. “Andriy heard it was meant to be random – that they just happened to be picked from a long line of prisoners in retaliation for something that had occurred outside the camp – but as the man who broke the news said, ‘Strange that it just happened to be those three who were ‘randomly’ selected, huh?’”

  “So they were shot just for playing football well? That’s mad,” said Eve heatedly.

  “Just for being Ukrainian and playing football well,” I said. “And everything was mad in those days.”

  “Is that it? Is that the end?” Megan asked, her voice almost a whisper.

  “That’s it.”

  “I wish you hadn’t told us that last part,” Petra said. “It’s too sad. I’d have preferred a happy ending, like that story from the First World War – you know, the one about how on Christmas Day the German and English soldiers stopped fighting and had a friendly football match.”

  “Sorry.” I shrugged. “But that’s what happened. I think Goncharenko and one or two others escaped, if that helps.”

  “Not really,” Petra mumbled, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.

  I turned to Jenny-Jane. I had not looked at her since the beginning of my story. Surely she wouldn’t mind being Ukraine in the tournament now? “I hope you can see what I meant about this match being more important than any World Cup,” I said. I waited for her response.

  “Maybe,” she eventually replied.

  I blinked. “Maybe?”

  “Well, it doesn’t make me want to do what you said.”

  “Excuse me?”

  She shrugged her shoulders. “You said it would make me wish I’d come from your country. No way! It sounds well bad. People starving and being shot. Who wants to live somewhere like that?”

  For a moment I simply stared at her in bewilderment, then I, too, shrugged my shoulders. What else could I do? I would never convince this girl of anything. There was a cabbage where her heart should be. I was tempted to walk off, intending never to speak to her again, but instead I held out my hand. Resentment was pointless with someone like this. “Come on,” I said; “let’s get some grub.”

  She looked up suspiciously, hesitated, then put her hand in mine. “All right,” she mumbled.

  11

  Somehow we ended up walking to the restaurant together. At first, neither of us spoke. I did not mind. I had told my story. It was up to everyone who heard it to do what they wanted with it. I would keep my thoughts carefully folded away, close inside.

  It was Jenny-Jane who broke the silence, and what she said surprised me so much that I stopped in my tracks.

  “What?” I asked her.

  “I said I’m sorry.”

  “You are? Why?”

  “For sounding a bit … um … uncaring about your story. I wasn’t dissing it. I thought it was interesting and that … in fact, it’s the best football story I’ve ever heard.”

  “Thank you.”

  “It just didn’t make me want to be Ukrainian. I like being English. England’s the best country in the world.”

  I sighed. She had missed the point. “I wasn’t really asking you to be Ukrainian. I just wanted you to see that your country isn’t the only one that ever won an important game.”

  “Maybe,” she said and kicked a pebble into the gully between the path and the grass.

  “But even if you can’t see that, please, will you play properly tomorrow? For our team? Even though we are not England?”

  “I always play properly.” She scowled.

  I couldn’t let such a fib go. “No you don’t. You didn’t try at all today and you know it. You let your team down just because you don’t like me.”

  She seemed genuinely astounded. “Eh?”

  “You don’t like me because I am foreign. And don’t deny it because it’s as plain as a pancake.”

  “I do like you,” she mumbled.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I do. You’re all right … you don’t whinge or faff about like some I could mention.”

  “Thank you … I think.”

  “But you’ve got to admit your lot always seem to get everything.”

  “My lot?”

  “Foreigners. Immigrants. Asylum seekers. Whatever.”

  “What do you mean we get ‘everything’?”

  She glanced across at me. “Everything! Like you. You got the free place, for a start, and then you even got your own country in the draw…”

  “The free place? To take part in the tournament?”

  “Exactly. My dad said that was typical of foreigners, coming over here and getting everything for nothing. He says people like you are bleeding the country dry.”

  “How kind of him,” I muttered. Tato and Mama were often being told this by people they worked with, too, even though they both did jobs nobody else seemed to want. It was most hurtful.

  I took a deep breath. “Look, I did not ask for the free place. Hannah asked me to come. She said we were one player short and nobody else could go. I told her we did not have spare money for things like this, but she told me that was not a problem; there was a free place nobody else wanted.”

  “Oh.”

  “Did you want it?”

  Jenny-Jane looked insulted. “Me? No way. We’ve got loads of money, we have.”

  That surprised me. Jenny-Jane never gave the appearance of having lots of money – not that it mattered to me whether she did or didn’t. “So tell that to your father,” I continued, trying to keep my voice level. “Tell him I never asked for anything. And tell him that both my parents work hard and pay taxes. We do not claim a penny from the state. Or steal your council houses.”

  “OK, keep your hair on. I was only saying.”

  But I did not want to keep my hair on. I wanted her to know everything so she could tell her prejudiced family. “We only came to England to look after my uncle.”

  “Oh.”

  “My uncle – who, by the way, is the Andriy in the story I just told you.”

  My revelation made a bigger impact than I had expected. Jenny-Jane stopped dead. “What? The old boy in the window when we picked you up – he’s Andriy?”

  “Yes.”

  “For real?”

  “For real.”

  Her mouth opened and closed again, then she shook her head as we resumed our walk. “That’s amazing,
” she said finally.

  I smiled. I couldn’t have agreed more. My uncle was amazing and I was very, very proud of him.

  “He’s the reason we’re here,” I explained. “He is old now and he needs someone to look after him. When he wrote to my grandma asking if she knew of anyone who might want to come to England for a while, to help him, we agreed. Mama taught English at college, so she thought it would be good experience, and Tato agreed because he thought it would be an adventure. But the adventure isn’t always an exciting one, I can tell you.”

  Jenny-Jane bowed her head. “No, I guess not.”

  “When Uncle passes away we shall probably return to Lviv.”

  Jenny-Jane looked startled. “That’s a shame.”

  “Is it? I thought you’d be happy with fewer foreigners around. You and your dad.”

  She cleared her throat noisily. “My dad does get things wrong sometimes.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And so do I.”

  My heart leapt then. I knew that such an admission was progress for someone like Jenny-Jane. “So you will play properly tomorrow? For our team?”

  She scowled at me. “I told you already; I always play properly.”

  I scowled back. Why was she still denying it? “Not today you didn’t,” I persisted.

  She shoved her hands deep into her pockets. “I couldn’t,” she mumbled.

  “Couldn’t?”

  “I’ve got these stupid boots that are miles too big. Every time I try to run I slob out of them and nearly break my neck.”

  “Are you serious? Because of your boots? Not because we were Ukraine?”

  “What are you? Deaf or something?”

  “But why didn’t you say anything?”

  “I thought I could sort it out. After the first matches I stuffed some paper towels in the toes, but that just made it worse – they were too big and felt weird. Then when Hannah had a go at me before we played America…”

  “You felt victimized?”

  “Exactly! First we don’t get England, then my boots start giving me grief, then the coach starts giving me grief. No wonder I got a cob on!”

  I laughed then. I couldn’t help it. I laughed so much.