In 2010, for the first time since it’s inception, the FIFA World Cup was hosted on African soil. South Africa 2010 was Africa’s first opportunity to host—and hopefully win—the world’s greatest football trophy.
You remember, don’t you? You cried too, didn’t you? Such painful memories. Suarez. Hmmm. We’ll get to that.
Anyhoo, sometime at the beginning of our stay in Aggrey House, Smizzle lined up all the form 1’s and made us answer the same question one after another; “What work do your parents do?”
According to him, it was to get an idea of how some parents could provide expertise with various development projects around the house. I never bought that. I always figured it was a genius strategy to rank parents according to the S.I. unit of “wallet-weight”.
One discovery Smizzle made that day was Kwabena, whose dad was a sports journalist. Before the world cup started, he offered to have a DSTV satellite installed in the house. Makes sense, right? Sports journalist… Super Sports. Mind you, it was 2010; DSTV was still the reserve of dadaba people, so Smizzle was excited. We were too.
Two weeks before the World Cup began, a technician came around and hooked us up. We returned to the house after lunch to the wonderful realization that we had joined the ranks of the dadaba-by-DSTV order. The crystal-clear feed from “Super Sports 3” was proof that our level had changed. There was only one problem…
The Remote
Riddle riddle. what do you call a TV without a remote controller? An annoyance.
Organic chemistry was hard, but eventually, I figured it out. One thing I never figured out was how Smizzle justified keeping both the decoder and remote controller for our new DSTV in his house.
If you wanted to change the channel, you had to go to his house, knock on his door, and say, “Sir, good afternoon. Please, we would like to watch Cartoon Network.” Seeing as you cannot imagine saying those words to your housemaster or housemistress, you can safely assume that 99% of the time we watched what Smizzle wanted to watch.
I told you organic chemistry made more sense.
Essentially, Kwabena’s dad had unwittingly upgraded Smizzle’s TV experience, and he was “allowing” us to watch his DSTV with him. Brilliant! Super-villain level brilliance! But let’s get back to the World Cup.
Vuvuzelas, Jabulanis and Shakira
The World Cup excitement was tangible. South Africa brought their A-game… the country, not their football team—their team sucked.
The “Jabulani”, their custom football design, became an international sensation. Vuvuzela horns also sold across the continent like hotcakes. The World Cup music that year was far better than any other year I can remember.
Shakira and her ‘unlying’ hips dropped “Waka Waka” (AKA “Zamenamena”) which became the ring tone on my yam phone for a while. Coca-Cola got in on the lyrical action too with “Waving Flag“, which was so moving it felt like a spiritual anthem.
What a time to be alive!
Ghana’s Black Stars were doing quite well on the pitch too, all things considered. For our second appearance in the World Cup, I must confess, we were pulling our weight.
In other schools, especially the boys’ schools, I’m pretty sure prep was forgotten for the entirety of the World Cup season. Not in Motown.
Most likely, the heads of administration would have wanted to keep us at prep in the evenings, but there were two obvious problems; the teachers, who would have to supervise, also wanted to watch, and if the students were overly provoked, the crazy ones could incite a riot. So as the games progressed, we started out with no prep on the days when Ghana had a match and quickly switched to a house prep system.
House prep meant we were supposed to spend the prep time studying, but let’s be real; who studies during the World Cup? It was football galore, and the random shouts of “GOOOAAALL!!!” and sounds of vuvuzelas in the evenings confirmed that everybody had taken a football break. In the words of King Solomon, “There is a time for everything.” It was time for football.
In fact, the football fever was so strong that the Motown German club flew some of its members to South Africa for the World Cup. On one of the days, they got to eat breakfast with the German national team. Maaaaad!
If ever I cared about speaking German, it was then. To clear all doubts, my German has remained like my Ewe: useless. It definitely doesn’t match a surname like Ametewee-Nutakor.
(If only I had an Akan surname, like “Agyapon” or something. 
)
Ghana Vs. Uruguay
Our boys, the Black Stars, were doing really well. The group stages had been a little shaky, but we had made it through.
We met with the USA and kicked the butts of Obama’s boys. We were in the quarter-finals; the farthest any African nation had ever come in the world cup.
Standing between us and making history by entering the semi-finals was Uruguay.
We were going to make it. We knew it. Our boys were on fire. Nothing was going to stop us.
That evening, supper was served early in the dining hall so we could finish in time for the start of the match.
Food? What is food when your national team is about to make history? Forget the food. We were shii-ing jama and making noise—boys and girls alike. The prefects gave up on trying to maintain order and rang the bell for the end of dining.
We returned to our houses, and for the next hour we were giddy with excitement. Noise be what?
Super Sports was clear like something. Herh!
Finally, finally, finally, they began to play our national anthem. I’ve never been more patriotic in my life. We put our hands on our chests and sang with vim and vigour.
The support of every African was behind us. Every African power, physical and spiritual, from pastors to juju-men, was behind us. We sang with pride, “
–And help us to resist oppressors’ rule, with all our will and might forevermoooooooooore!!“ Then we let out a blood-curdling yell and resounding applause for nobody in particular.
A few minutes later, the match kicked off! #Sigh
At this point, I’d like to borrow the narration of the story from my friend, Joojo’s WhatsApp status, which he shared on the 10th anniversary of that match. You see, I knew I wasn’t the only one who still had this memory fresh in my mind. Heck, I’ll throw in a video. Try not to cry.
Game Over
It’s been over ten years but I still remember the heartbreak.
Herh! Suarez!
Herh Baby Jet!
Heeeeeerh!!!
Hard guys were crying. Like, real, actual tears.
After all our previous games we would run from girls’ house to girls’ house to shii jama and dance in the streets till teachers came and chased us away. But not that evening. That evening we were beaten, sad, angry, demoralized. It would prove to be the end of my status as a football fan. There was only so much my heart could take.
The next day there was no entertainment. The remaining matches were supposed to be our entertainment, but they were just a horrible reminder of our defeat. I think the whole school just slept.
Sunday came swiftly, and the chaplain on duty tried to cheer us up. He tried to explain to us that we were still winners in spite of everything. He must have been very desperate to see us smile because he quoted D.J. Khaled… in a sermon!
He said, “Frieeeendsss, I like that song you guys sing at entertainment. [* dramatic pause *] ‘Win, win, win, no matter what!'”
There was silence for a full five seconds as we tried to process what we had heard, then the whole chapel erupted in laughter as we realised that the Reverend Father was trying to sing “All I Do Is Win”.
I saw Akua later that day. She cheered me up a little. Only a little.
The real joy was that it was a visiting Sunday, and my mom brought the ultimate comforter: jollof rice. There was still some meaning to life after all.
Later that evening, Ronny, the B-Dorm senior, arrived from South Africa with the rest of the German club ambassadors. Apparently, it was more painful for them seeing the loss with their naked eyes. Also, exams would start the following week, and they were not about to risk their grades dropping to watch another country win the World Cup.
That evening, the B-Dorm seniors had a blast. Ronny was showing them pictures from South Africa on his little digital camera when M.O.B. had a brilliant idea. Why not go back to South Africa right there in B-Dorm?
And go they did. That’s how our World Cup story ended. Right there in B-Dorm, some of the seniors, M.O.B., Armani, Kɛjɛ, Wuloo and a few others, grabbed Aaron’s winter coats (July is winter in the southern hemisphere) and took pictures pretending to be in South Africa. Of course, they took some with Ronny. That way, mixing their pictures with his actual South Africa album, they managed to convince a few girls on Facebook that they had been to see the World Cup.
You call it deception, they called it a silver lining. 