Fins connect through more than football
|While the Finnish team are used to street soccer tournaments, the Homeless World Cup spirit is new to them. Image: Travis Torres
On the concrete steps next to the athletics pitch, we meet up with Finnish players Nico, Antti, Minna and Hedu. Midway through the tournament, Minna sums up how the team are experiencing the atmosphere at the Homeless World Cup in three words: “Loving, cheering and connecting.”
While the Finnish team has had some experience of playing abroad at an earlier street soccer tournament in Dublin, the Homeless World Cup spirit is new to them. Last year, some Finnish players missed out on the tournament in Sacramento due to strict visa rules regarding criminal records. Minna was one of them. In Tampere, where Minna lives, she is part of a local team playing street soccer in summer and futsal in winter.
|"Loving, cheering and connecting" are the three words used to describe the Finnish team. Image: Anita Milas
Some of Minna’s teammates did make it to the USA tournament, and she supported them from afar. “I was watching the games live online, with my hair painted blue and white!”, she laughs. She is delighted to have made it onto this year’s squad and calls it “a silver lining” after the long wait. What was less easy to spot on the livestream but is very palpable to her here in Seoul, is the love and connection: “You can feel it when you are here. This will stay with me when I am back. I would like to bring it with me and give back.”
Football, the Fins agree, has something special to offer that few other support services provide. “If you do something together, it makes it easier to connect to people”, says Antti. “Some of my best memories as a kid were playing football. Drugs stopped that feeling. These days, football is an easy way to feel again.”
Nico has also used the power of football to help him kick a drug addiction: “Sports was the only healthy thing in my life as a kid. In rehab, we bring routine back: eat, sleep, exercise. You start to love yourself again.” Going back after the Homeless World Cup, Nico will continue to play with his local team in Helsinki. Going back to Finland after the buzz of the event can feel “cold, lonely and quiet”, he says. Training twice a week continues to be a lifeline long after the final whistle blows in Seoul.
The reason Finnish women’s team player Hedu joined the street soccer team is, in her own words: “because I always say yes to positive things”. She was involved in martial arts but had never played football. Yet, when her live started spiralling down, it was football that provided her with the kind of help that she could not find elsewhere.
Her story is an example of how homelessness can happen to anyone, if too many things go wrong at the same time. “My life was good, normal. I owned my house with my partner and four children. I had a job renting out property. A car, a dog.” Things started falling apart when a builder renovating her home caused major damage in the pipelines, flooding her entire place. While the fighting over who’s responsible went on, the place got covered in mold and became unhabitable. Heidi’s relationship also broke down and while the children and dog moved in with her ex, Heidi found herself moving from hotel to friend’s sofa and eventually her car.
|"I always say yes to positive things" says Finland's Hedu Image: Anita Milas
Struggling to kick a painkiller addiction, Hedu was refused access to rehabilitation facilities. Her only option was a private clinic which she could not afford. “I started taking these opioids for an illness, but I became addicted to them. Coming off them was very hard. The toughest six weeks of my life. I was so ill and even got admitted to hospital. But as soon as I was a little better, they would discharge me again and I had to do it alone.”
Hedu’s fellow football players, many of whom had rehab experience, helped her get through it. “They understood me and treated everyone equal. I was in a really dark place but they understood me. They brought me to a 12 step AA meeting, they were there for me and trying to help when no one else did. Finnish people are tough. We may not be so good at this street soccer, but we have this unity. The people I met through football saved my life.”
Donate to the Homeless World Cup to keep the ball rolling
Words: Danielle Batist
Images: Travis Torres / Anita Milas