By Adam Kreek
Right to Play (RTP) is touring Canada with it’s first ever Canadian Awareness Campaign, visiting six of Canada’s biggest cities. The OAR Northwest Crew is joining the tour in Vancouver to lend a hand and some positive energy.
For Jordan, Greg and Rick, this will be an important education. A couple of coaches from Liberia, Keifala Kromah and Helena Massaquoi, will be with us at the events to share the educational games they teach Liberian children. Malaria tag, AIDS education and conflict resolution are all taught to these communities through play.
The third world had issues opposite to the Pacific Northwest. Obesity? Over scheduled children? That’s what we see in our small corner of the globe. Liberia has the opposite needs. These kids crave organized, educating play as much as they do the food aid that comes into their communities.
I am proud to be speaking a couple times in the next few days on behalf of Right to Play. Play and Sport for development is only a couple decades old, but it is remarkably effective. It empowers communities to organize themselves, using the universal power of sport & play.
When we go to Liberia and Venezuela later this year, we will see firsthand that sport and play transcends all barriers: language, politics, geography. And when we come back, we will have a documentary to prove it!