Kobe’s Blog

I flew a kite last weekend at the Montrose beach. It was so much fun. The strong winds characteristic of Chicago’s Lake Michigan pulled me along a few times. The entire experience which lasted for perhaps a little over an hour reminded me of my experiences with Kites many many years back.

I flew my first kite when I was 4. It was a windy, cloudy sunday afternoon and my uncle who now lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts had paid us a visit. Being a sunday afternoon, we were eating our usual fufu and pea nut soup. Uncle had promised us many times that he was going to make us some pretty cool kites. And he did exactly that. I tore a piece of paper from my writing book and took two broom sticks from the broom used to sweep the living room. For the tail of the kite, I got a hold of the most recent addition to our rag collection - a piece of cloth that had fallen from grace from Mom’s wardrobe. I cut the rag into 1 inch thin strands and tied them together to make a kite tail about 10 feet long. One last thign we neded was glue - to keep the broom sticks which were the frames of the kite attached to the paper. Our starchy fufu made a perfect substitute for glue.

After about an hour of creativity on the main verandah - our workshop, our kite was ready to be launched. I held the nylon thread which was a little less than 10 feet and run as fast as a 4 year old could. Within minutes the paper kite was in the air. It didn’t stay for long since with all the fufu I had eaten earlier, I didn’t have the energy to keep running.

I am finally beginning to accept that my high energy days are a thing of the past. Yesterday, I got onto the pitch at Randolf and Ogden to see if I could recreate what I used to be so good at doing. I sucked. The enthusiasm is still there. The desire to win is still there. But the energy has vanished.

Zambezi’s next soccer season starts late June and I’m wondering whether or not I have what it takes to go through another season. Spring hasn’t been easy. I pulled a hamstring during the second game of the season and that largely contributed to my inability to perform as expected in subsequent games. It just seems a little pathetic that I could go through an entire season without scoring a goal when barely a year ago, I averaged 1.2 goals a game.

I guess that’s a part of life. I’m heading towards the stage where I join the fans. Perhaps Zambezi and I would be better off if I stand by the sidelines and cheer — or boo. If I bow out this summer, at least I’ll go knowing that I had some pretty good moments. But it’s going to be tough to say goodbye. I have so much love for the game.

It was winter in the West. Back in Accra, the dry harmattan winds were in full effect. Ghana had just won the youth world cup a few months earlier in Italy. At that time, the ultimate hero you could find in town was a soccer star. Those of us who were too young, too unskilled to be heroes were smart enough to associate ourselves with the real ones. Every kid had an adopted name in addition to their given name. With a felt pen, I wrote mine on the back of a levi t-shirt my visiting uncle had bought me from Cambridge, Massachusetts. My name was Alex Opoku, the midfield maestro and captain of the Ghana youth team that won the World Cup. I was unfazed by the jealousy of my peers. I knew I played just like him, if not better. The only difference was that I was 12 and he was 17, allegedly.
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We moved to the airport residential area the latter part of 1983 during the famine. I was four. Dad woke us up the third night to tell us the news. Thiefs had ransacked our new home. Mom suspected our ‘day watchman’ but Dad, as usual, was slow to pass judgement. They took everything; the cushions, dining chairs, cooking utensils, tv, record player and many others.
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