Arriving in Kenya for Coaching Course Level II-Days 1 & 2
Originally posted December 30, 2019 on playbeautifulsoccer.net
Day 1: INCOMING!
The adventure from St. Louis to Kisumu can be summed up like so:
1 hr flight to Chicago
1 hr 45 min lay-over
7 hr 45 min flight to Frankfurt, Germany
1 hr 45 min lay-over
7 hr 45 min flight to Nairobi, Kenya
30 min E-Visa customs
15 min to find luggage
X marks the spot, interrogation of goods, tell the truth
Meeting Wichita, helping hand
Time is elastic
6 hr 30 min drive to Kisumu, Kenya, road construction, impaled bus, food, buckets of rain
Arrival at Jumuia Hotel around 5:15 am.
SLEEP
After only a handful over hours sleeping, the first day was a challenge of exhaustion. At 7:30 am, we went to breakfast at the hotel where we met with Davis, already well into his day. Straight from a breakfast of tea, orange juice, apple juice, two hard-boiled eggs, beans, and plantains (matoke), we went to Kosawo Primary School to start the soccer coaching education program.
Day 2: Leading the Coach
The course kicked off the day before with Davis and the coaches running a review of the Level I Coaching Course. When I arrived, for the second day of the course, I taught on leading the coach (in other words, leading yourself as a coach). For the practical in the afternoon, the coaches were responsible for providing a team with a system of play and game analysis of the other coaches’ system of play.
The coaching course was comprised of 11 coaches from the level 1 coaching course that we ran last year and one new, exceptional candidate named Kennedy from another area of Kenya that Davis had worked with previously. Amongst the 11 returning coaches, there were two Tanzanians Aivan and Tony) with the rest coming from various areas of Kisumu. Three coaches were female (Yvonne, Joyce, and Beth) and nine coaches were male (the three aforementioned as well as Clinton, Churchill, Arnold, Joseph, Byron, and John Collins). Unfortunately, due to challenges with the VISA along their long journey, Aivan and Tony had not arrived by day one of the coaching course.
