Five Hundred Bucks

9-26-2011

Last week I had the privilege of doing something great when some players on my football team, the Seoul Warriors (last blog: Working on a Dream), decided to hold a fundraiser for the Pearl S. Buck foundation. It's mission is to support and enrich the lives of orphaned and underprivileged bi-racial children in South Korea. As a foreigner-based team in a Korean football league, it's difficult to gain favor in the eyes of the competition, especially when you're already the best team in the league (we'll prove it this season). As guests in this country and in this league, we have to continuously earn our keep and fight for every inch of respect, both on and off the field. Even then, we've been shown that we will never get a fair shake, even from the refs. Nobody in Korea wants to see us win except for us. For that reason, we have to do what we can to give back to the community, and in doing so build good will and favor among the locals. So we decided to hold this event to not only give some exposure to Pearl S. Buck, but to build a better image and get American football on the map in Korea as well.

The event was called Race to the Top. The idea was that every available player on the team would ask their friends, family and coworkers to sponsor us as we ran up Namsan Mountain to Namsan Tower, the highest point in Seoul. We started the fundraiser about 3 weeks ago, and did the run last Wednesday, Sept. 21st. It was a cool night and a challenging ascent, but we were all in it together. There were news journalists and photographers at the top, as well as a representative from the Pearl S. Buck foundation waiting to greet us. It was a great night and a good little bit of exercise as well.

As for my part in the fundraiser, I sat on my hands for almost 2 weeks because I didn't know how to approach this thing. Since I don't live in Seoul, it was hard to raise money for our team since most folks in my area will probably never even come to a game, and the few people I'd mentioned it to didn't give me much confidence. I was frustrated, and the kids were lined up to get a big fat zero from me because of it. However, on the last morning before I had to submit my pledges, I decided to go for broke. I changed up my approach and decided to send personal facebook messages to the small handful of people I knew in Korea, putting the emphasis completely on the charity while still mentioning my team as the hosts of the event. I honestly wasn't expecting anything, but I wanted to at least say I'd tried. What happened after that left me in awe. It was slow at first, but one by one people started to respond to my messages. $10 here, $20 there. I was over $100 in a couple of hours. Then, two amazing friends of mine, Ary and Cheng, were inspired enough to ask their friends on my behalf if they would participate. $300 was raised between the two of them, and by the next morning when I had to submit my pledges, I had $500 total! I was ecstatic. If I'd gotten my act together sooner, I know I could have raised a lot more money, but it's much better than the goose egg I had the day before. It was exciting to see so many people willing to contribute, and all of the folks who participated were happy to do so as well.

Of all the people I sent messages to (roughly 30 or so), more than half of them responded. Of the ones who responded, 100% donated money to the charity. That's the part that touched me the most. True friends are ones that care about what you care about. I found out how many real friends I had that day in Korea, and it was a marvel to behold. I'll never forget it, guys. As for the rest of the team, we raised close to $2000 altogether. It could have been much more, but it turns out that military personnel can't participate in fundraisers, which left about ten of us to raise money. However, many of the soldiers still did the run, so we had a nice turnout.

We presented the check to Pearl S. Buck on Sunday at our season opening game against the league champion Daegu Phoenix on our home field at Yongsan Military Base in Seoul. We had around 300 fans in attendance, and even the Korea Herald was present to cover the event. I'm sure the publicity and exposure they received will be worth much more than what we were able to contribute. Oh, and by the way, we beat Daegu 31-7. I couldn't think of a better way to start the season.

Working On A Dream

9-24-2011

It's 8:12 pm on Saturday night. I got home from practice in Seoul a few hours ago. For dinner I re-toasted the other half of a flatbread tuna sandwich that also accompanied 1 1/2 cookies that I ordered from Subway earlier in the day. I will end the night studying my defensive playbook and eventually fall asleep watching Any Given Sunday. Compared to most other foreigners in Korea, this will be a relatively quiet night, but I need my rest. Tomorrow is a big day. Tomorrow I play football.

My team is the Seoul Warriors, and we play in the Korean American Football Association (KAFA). We are mostly Americans and Canadians, but the other teams in the league are primarily Korean. Although soccer and baseball are the two major sports in Korea, the KAFA is slowly growing to include 6 club teams, as well as 36 university teams. The Warriors were formed in 2010, and though it's our sport that we've been playing our whole lives, we didn't win the championship that first year. Having joined the following off-season in February, it was a pleasant surprise to me to find out that the Korean teams didn't roll over. They can actually play. So we've been preparing since March to get that title, and hopefully all the hard work will pay off starting tomorrow.

Most folks don't even know that American football exists in Korea, but we're trying to change that. Through word of mouth, fund raisers and public events, we've been slowly building our expat fan base. It's fun to win, but it's even better when you have folks cheering you on! Since our club consists mostly of English teachers and US soldiers, we have two big networks of people in Korea draw from. Tomorrow we expect to have several hundred friends and family members in the stands, including some colonels and generals. As the season progresses, we hope that number will grow.

As for the caliber of players on our team, many of the guys have played college and semi-pro ball, not to mention all the soldiers who are also in tremendous shape. That left a normal guy like me a little intimidated at first. I've put in a lot of work to get stronger, faster and quicker, but in the end you either know how to play football or you don't. My natural positions are Wide Receiver and Defensive Back/Safety. I am focusing primarily on the defensive side of the ball this season, and if practice is any indication, I'm expecting to see time at DB and S, but I may even play some Outside Linebacker on passing downs. We have a lot of skilled players on both sides of the ball, so we will be rotating in and out regularly to keep everyone fresh. For me, it doesn't matter what I play, as long as I'm on the field.

So my dream begins tomorrow. After highschool I thought it was finished. No hitting or breaking tackles. Just pulling flags and two-hand touch. It's a privilege that I took for granted when I was young, and I won't make that mistake again. I am so excited right now that I'm probably not going to be able to sleep tonight. Tomorrow I play football again.