Bangladesh make it to their 1st Homeless world cup - one year later
|Image: Anita Milas
Fifteen months ago the Bangladeshi team, competing under the Sports for Hope and Independence (SHI) banner, were just about to pack their bags ahead of their first ever appearance at the Homeless World Cup in Sacramento 2023. However, at the last moment, the wheels of bureaucracy ground to a halt leaving the players unable to travel to participate.
Fast forward to this week and the team flew – this time in the opposite direction – to join their fellow street soccer squads in Korea.
However, as Head of Sports for Development SHI, Pappu Modak explains, this journey wasn’t without its challenges.
“In our country it takes at least one year to get an appointment to discuss a visa – and we started two years ago – and we eventually received the visas five hours after the deadline for this year’s World Cup draw!” he says ruefully.
This meant that although the teams were welcome in Seoul, they would be unable to take part in the competition, instead playing friendlies.
“There are things we can control – things on the pitch – but these bigger things are out of our hands,” he adds.
While trying to bring mainly the same team that would have competed last year in California, Pappu adds that much consideration was given to ensuring all religions, abilities and disabilities were represented, to maintain the diversity of the team. That’s one of the principles of SHI, as founder/CEO Sharmin Farhana Choudhury takes up the story.
“We started our work almost ten years ago and became a registered organisation five years ago,” she explains. However, SHI would never have taken flight, had Sharmin actually secured her wings.
“I originally wanted to become a pilot,” she laughs, “then I studied law, then worked in the British High Commission, before I joined the family business.
“I did work in a rehabilitation centre for the disabled, and that’s where I met Pappu. There were certain issues with the centre, so I had a thought – all people, from seven to 70, have a right to play sport, so why not start something myself, which is more transparent?”
Pappu, also working in the rehabilitation centre based in Dhaka, was thinking along similar lines. “It was helping a limited number of people, as it was geared towards people with disabilities,” he adds, “so I spoke with them about what we could do for all the people, to give everyone the opportunity to play and grow.”
Bangladesh is one of the most densely populated countries in the world - at 171.2 million it’s 8th in the world - with around 15 million of its people currently internally displaced in the country, due to climate change-related disasters like flooding. The nation also hosts almost a million Rohingya refugees who have fled persecution in Myanmar. Over five million workers in the country’s garment industry - the lowest paid in this industry anywhere in the world - risk their safety on a daily basis, and around 4000 city slums are home to nearly 3.5 million.
So SHI certainly didn’t have to look far for their challenges when starting their journey on 17 March 2016. They use sport as a tool for child and youth development, girls’ empowerment and life skills development for those with disabilities.
Sharmin is grateful for the backing she received from her family - “We have a motto, every religion, every ability, will be supported.” she continues, and in due course they expanded from just soccer into amputee football, wheelchair basketball and para athletics.
|Image: Anita Milas
“In our country nothing is easy, we’re fighting every day to help the people we want to support,” she continues. “For example, when I started to form a girls’ rugby team – what a problem! I had to go to the village chairman, the schoolteachers... I was told the girls would not play in shorts, that playing sport is not for them because in a few years they will be married and having children.
“Parents think maybe no one will marry them. If they go to school and finish their studies, they will get a job. But what will happen if they become a sportsperson?
“But the thing I noticed is that the girls want to play. I saw them crying when they weren’t allowed to come on the field.”
That upset was matched by the emotions last year when team Bangladesh were unable to travel to their first tournament.
“When I knew we couldn’t go, I started crying too,” Sharmin admits. “These players are like my children – I'm a single woman – and they look at me as a mother. And I could do nothing because it was out of my hands.”
So when, on the Thursday evening, two days before the tournament kicked off, Bangladesh knew they had secured their visas, Sharmin had no hesitation in paying around three times over the odds to then purchase the plane tickets to allow the team to travel.
“I had promised that this time, if we got the visas, we are prepared to play, we will go. I couldn’t say no to this journey.
“I’m still a little in disbelief that we’re actually here, though. I think I will wake up tomorrow morning and imagine I’m still in my bed in my own country – this is like a dream!”
What has also been like a dream, is the team’s performance on the pitch since they arrived, albeit a little late, so far beating every team they have played, with panache.
“Even after the first game I could see they were more confident,” says Sharmin. “I also prepared them that if you lose a game, you don’t quit – the big teams like Brazil and Argentina, they also lose games – so just forget about it and plan for the next game.”
Ah, Brazil and Argentina – no coincidence that Sharmin chose to mention these legendary nations.
|Image: Anita Milas
Without a national team to follow in soccer World Cups the Bangladeshi population has channelled their fervour into supporting either Brazil or Argentina over the last decades, thanks to the exploits of one Diego Maradona in 1986 in Mexico in his country’s victory over England in the tournament, and the rags to riches backstory of the mighty Pele.
In fact, so popular are the sky blue and whites - La Albicelestes - that it’s said 70% of Bangladeshis support Argentina on the football field. Last year that passion led to Argentina reopening its embassy in Dhaka, 45 years after it closed, and the South American country reciprocating the support for its national football team by backing the Bangladesh cricket team.
But while it’s Argentina that Pappu supports, Sharmin is solidly in the Brazil camp.
“I’m a Brazil supporter, so the team jersey for our side’s first match was exactly like the Brazil strip,” she laughs. “We dedicate our beginnings in Homeless World Cup to the legend Pele because he was from a very poor family and went on to find greatness. For me, it’s Pele – God of football.”
So, with both South American sides also participating in Seoul – and the Bangladesh team almost equally split in their support – there was nothing for it but to organise a mega teams’ tug of war in the middle of the practice pitches, much to the delight of all involved and everyone spectating.
Who won? It was a tactical draw!
Words: Isobel Irvine
Images: Anita Milas