Sunday late afternoon we worked at one of the youth centre type places called Mig Dalor where the children were very happy to see us again. Luckily on Sunday we finish a bit earlier so we got back just in time to catch the Swansea vs Arsenal game which we watched in Zippee's house but after the result I don't want to say much more about that apart from Zippee gave us coke, beers and popcorn during the game and we both agreed that because we had been working all day and it was dark out it felt more like a Monday night game rather than a Sunday afternoon kick off.
Monday we went to a school called Eshkol, when we were shown around all the schools ont he first day we got here this was the first school we saw and is the 2nd nearest to our house so once again we walked to the school which is around a 10 minute walk. Another thing to mention is when we woke up it was warm and sunny again like on our first day. Finally a day without constat rain so we were very happy. Although when we got to the school the teachers had big jackets on telling us it was very cold, more like a summers day to us! We focused on passing drills for both boys and girls and changed it for different ages and abilities. I decided to join in at break time with a match the children were playing and ended up getting mobbed for autographs! I then managed to get back to the staff room where Denys was and we had a load of screaming children outside the door waiting for us, we also had some children asking us to sign their footballs. Afterwards we went back out to carry on with the lessons. It was quite funny during one game as we had the girls play a short match first followed by the boys but when the girls were playing 2 of the boys were sat there pretending they were playing fifa with a running commentary which I have never seen before. All the sessions went great and we outside from 8am-2pm in the sun with a clear blue sky, happy days. When we finished we had a huge crowd again wanting autographs and photos, I made a mistake of putting a smiley face on one for some reason so then everyone wanted me to draw a smiley face, rookie error. In between lessons the few spare minutes we had we stood 2 bottles of water at the top of the little concrete type stand/seating area and began to try and knock them off 1 go at a time, I was pretty happy I managed to get both of them down, oo the simple things we do between lessons to keep us amused.
The signed ball
Denys with some of the students
Penalty shoot-out
Warm up tag
Me with some students from Eshkol
A view of Eshkol school (not the best I know)
After we finished the school we walked back and decided to try the schnitzel place that everyone kept telling us about, it was excellent we got a huge baguette filled with hummus, lettuce, tomato and schnitzel for 22 Shekels (just under 3 pounds), so we sat outside and enjoyed lunch in the sun. Later on we had another friendship house called Mifratz Schlomo. This was an hour and a half session but unfortunatly when we got there they took us for a short walk to a dark school playground where we would coach but we both agreed we couldn't do it as it was very dark and we didnt think it would be safe enough to have children playing football and running around when its not very visible. So we went back and just played some games on the small grass area they had there before going to a different house 7-9 to take a session with older teenagers, then back home to bed ready for the next school the following morning.
A view on the walk back home
The Schnitzel shop where we had lunch
Tuesday we had an arabic school called El manara, this is quite a new school in Akko and the only arabic school we coach at. When we got there it was raining so there was no football, instead we went to a small room where the teacher would bring in around 8 children and we'd introduce ourselves and tell them what we are doing at the school and how long we will be there etc. Luckily after about an hour or two the rain stopped so we got outside to do our coaching session. We had 2 guys from the local university helping us Sameh and Yakov who are also arabic so they would help translate some English but we still like to use zenglish words so the children also learn some English aswell as football. We are meant to have 4 people who help us but so far we have only met 3 and dont think there is a 4th. During breaktimes we stayed out and played 2 on 2, 1 touch each including the short full pitch which is the sixe of a 5-6 aside pitch. All the children watched whilst on their breaktime and chanted ARSENAL over and over again which helped me and Denys on to victory against Sameh and Yakov. Once again the kids were great during the sessions and would listen and progress well so we got into matches at the end of each session. Its growing a trend now as we kept hearing Barcelona but do have the same amount of Arsenal fans aswell, most like Arsenal and Barcelona. At the end of school we got crowded again by loads of children asking for autographs and to sign their hands. I was also given various bits of paper with things in English about Arsenal and telling me they love me!
One of the notes
In the afternoon we had a session at Bustan Hagalil which is a boarding school for people with learning dissabilities. The boys were on a day out in Tel Aviv so we had just the girls and a couple of boys who were there today. We did some warm up games with them and passed and threw the ball around calling peoples names for an ice breaker to get to know each other. We started of with the traffic lights game and kept it simple stop and go then progressed to a game which everyone enjoyed. A stray dog decided to keep coming up and stealing our stack of cones then when we marked out an area decided it wnted the ones we had layed out! In England the wind likes to take the cones, in Israel its dogs coming out of nowhere, luckily after 5-10 minutes it got bored and decided to go off somewhere else. Most of the students spoke quite good english aswell along with other works and volunteers which include two women from America and Germany. We stayed outside till around 5:30 when it got dark then went inside to talk and play some other games. Yossi our friend from the local university was also with us and dropped us off at the Schnitzel shop on the way home before going to his teams football training which he has invited me and Denys to come along too, so when we have some time we are looking forward to going along.
The schnitzel baguette
So we have now been to each different school we will be at everyday and also all the locations we will be at in the evenings. Thank you for reading and keep following or checking back for more updates and pictures.
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