Author Archives: PPI CY H

by | August 3, 2012 · 3:14 pm

PPI-Cyprus Summer Camp Features NBA and WNBA Guests

The PPI CY Summer Camp participants with staff and guests

This past week PeacePlayers-Cyprus held its annual Summer Camp.  The camp hosted 64 Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot youth for 6 days and 5 nights at the Rodon Hotel in the Mountain Village of Agros.  In attendance at the camp were the Brooklyn Nets Assistant Coach and former NBA player Doug Overton and former WNBA player Shaunzinski Gortman.  If the final day was any indicator as to how the camp went, then all involved would say it was a huge success.  As the seconds ticked down and the buses pulled up, hugs and goodbyes began to fill the reception area of the Rodon hotel.  Doug and Shaunzinski frantically signed shirts and scribbled autographs on the programs and scrap paper that campers pushed their way.

Coach Doug Overton speaks to the PPI-CY participants

The week was filled with basketball and learning.  Campers woke up in the early hours and started their day with some morning activities before breakfast.  Activities ran through the week, including pool time, a disco night, a survival game obstacle course, and a film workshop.  But at the core of the camp was basketball and classroom time.  On the court, campers were run through drills and given time to compete in games.  In the classrooms, they learned about leadership and the importance of volunteering from Fellow Ashley Johnson and head of the PPI-CY board Akis Christofides, the Anatomy of Peace from Coordinator Athanasios Souflias, Managing Director Marina Vasilara, and Board member Tarik Tekman, and other life skills and issues of personal development.  Both Doug and Shaunzinski spoke to the campers as well, touching on the importance of believing in oneself and having the confidence to succeed.

The campers had the chance to play and compete

It was apparent to anyone observing our campers that the bicommunal efforts of PeacePlayers Cyprus are having an impact on our participants.  The children from both sides of the island were interacting to the point that you could not tell we were running a bicommunal event.  As they played on and off the court together the participants seamlessly weaved in and out of their assigned teams and groups leaving no one isolated or alone, regardless of where they were from on the island.  One night, as Doug asked the question “what is one thing you have learned so far from camp?” a participant stated that he had learned the language of the campers from the other of the island.

The camp is a great chance for our participants to be exposed to prolonged interaction with kids that they usually do not get to interact with on a daily basis.  To be able to spend 6 days and 5 nights together allows them to get to know PeacePlayers Cyprus, its staff, its guests, and most importantly its participants better.

Thanks to the Brooklyn Nets and the Embassy of the United States Nicosia Cyprus  for making this event possible!

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by | July 20, 2012 · 2:47 pm

Direction for PeacePlayers-Cyprus in the Year to Come

What will PPI-CY’s new direction hold for its participants?

This week PeacePlayers-Cyprus sat down with board member Akis Christofides and discussed the direction that the program will take in the near future.  The following is what was discussed.

PeacePlayers-Cyprus has a retreat planned this upcoming fall that will involve all of the board members and local staff.  Specific ideas and programs will be discussed with the common goal of refining the PPI-CY mission even further.  PPI-CY hopes to harvest a bigger degree of cooperation between the international sites, the Middle East, South Africa, and Northern Ireland; this includes collaboration between fellows, board members, and local staff.  Akis recalled the PeacePlayers “Anatomy of Peace” training in Hawaii by Professor Chad Ford and how it gave a sense of unity and communalism to the organization.  The chance to further collaborate with other PPI sites is a goal that PPI-CY is working to achieve; for example the proximity of Cyprus to the Middle East site makes it so that travel between the two programs is only a short plane ride away.  Imagine the collaboration that could happen over just one weekend!

The idea of using the “Anatomy of Peace” in more settings as a reconciliatory tool is another item on the agenda.  To be able to use the curriculum to further the PPI message in schools, for sports teams, and even with corporations and businesses in Cyprus is something that Akis and the rest of the PPI-CY family feel is important.  While PeacePlayers is an organization that uses sport as a tool for social change  the “Anatomy of Peace” is something that can permeate all layers of a local society and thereby have a positive impact on our kids in both direct and indirect ways.

Of course, at the core of the PeacePlayers-Cyprus agenda are the kids.  An item on the agenda moving forward will be how to ensure that when kids become too old to be in the PeacePlayers program we are still able to help them and engage in a relationship where there are mutual social benefits.  PPI-CY will work in the near future to look at ideas such as community projects and continue to expand our Leadership Development Program so that our strongest advocates, the participants, can continue to associate with PPI. Our kids can also become our coaches; just look at PPI-ME coaches David and Khaled.  The transition between a participant’s graduation from being a PeacePlayer participant to becoming a full-fledged coach is a key period of growth that programs and initiatives, such as the LDP, can take advantage.  In other words PPI CY can help its children at all stages of their life and will strive to do so in the upcoming year.

Finally, another important item on the agenda is the relationship that PeacePlayer-Cyprus has with the parents of its participants.  PPI-CY will work to strengthen the relationship between the parents, children, and organization.   To be able to bring parents further into the PPI equation would not only give them a glimpse into the PeacePlayers way and its benefits but also add what Akis refers to as “the spice to the soup” of helping our kids.

While most actions and immediate thoughts are being poured into preparation for PPI CY’s big summer camp, the retreat is an important issue that sits on the horizon with promise and intrigue.

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by | July 13, 2012 · 2:13 pm

A Preview of the PeacePlayers Cyprus Summer Basketball Camp

Last year’s camp was a great success.

PeacePlayers Cyprus will host its annual summer camp starting on July 27th and ending on August 1st.  The camp will see 64 children of Greek Cypriot, Turkish Cypriot, and other backgrounds between the ages of 12 and 16 work, play, and learn together for five nights in the village of Agros.   Last year PPI-CY successfully ran the camp and the days were indeed packed with fun (the participants had the chance to take part in a treasure hunt), hard work (plenty of basketball drills and games), and a host of PeacePlayers activities (time in the classroom learning about the Arbinger Institute’s The Anatomy of Peace).

This year the camp has a host of activities planned, including a set of “survivor games”, the opportunity for the children to make their own videos, and the viewing of the 2012 London Olympics opening ceremony.  As expected from a PeacePlayers event, the camp will help the children create relationships and forge friendships with each other through learning life skills as well as everyday practice and activity.

An exciting highlight of this year’s camp will be the attendance of two professional basketball stars.  NBA Brooklyn Nets coach and former NBA basketball player Doug Overton and former WNBA player Shaunzinski Gortman will attend the length of the camp as mentors, coaches, and guests.  PPI-CY is very excited to have guests from the US whose expertise in all aspects of the game of basketball, including their abilities to not only play but to teach, is something that PPI CY and all of its participants will greatly benefit from.  Doug will host a coaches seminar on July 28th for members of the Cypriot basketball community.

PPI CY Managing Director Marina Vasilara said “This is the first year we have managed to get an NBA coach and a WNBA player and for the kids it will be a lifetime experience.  For the coaches it will be an exciting learning process, watching them.  For me, the camp last year set high goals and was very successful and I hope that this year the camp will exceed expectations by even more.”

Please tune in  during the coming weeks to hear how the camp will go.

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by | June 22, 2012 · 2:06 pm

PeacePlayers Cyprus work with The Ministry of Education and the Nautical Organization of Ammohostos

PeacePlayers coaches and staff worked with the Ministry of Education as they watched over a variety of sports and activities.

This past week PeacePlayers Cyprus worked in cooperation with the Ministry of Education in Cyprus in the city of Limassol to help run a day filled with water sports and fun with the Nautical Organization of Ammohostos. The event hosted 140 5th and 6th grade school children from the 4th and 18th schools of Agios Antonios.  Starting in the Fall of 2012 the Ministry of Education will begin a relationship with PeacePlayers and sponsor practices in Limassol twice a week for the children in order to allow PPI coaches to provide structure and basketball training to the schools.

The children of the 4th and 18th schools of Agios Antonios take to the high seas!

The 4th and 18thschools of Agios Anotnios are part of the Zones of Educational Priority (ZEP).  The ZEP are programs established by The Ministry of Education and Culture in order to “promote tolerance and dialogue in order to eliminate stereotypes through education.”  According to The Ministry of Education and Culture in Cyprus the ZEP serves to “promote tolerance and dialogue” and was established “in order to eliminate stereotypes through education.” Many schools in the ZEP host children who have grown up in difficult environments and have faced economic and social adversity.  A relationship between PeacePlayers, the Ministry of Education in Cyprus, and the children of the schools of Agios Antonios is a step towards helping to alleviate the hardships and bring about social change.

Children of the 4th and 18th Agios Antonios schools hard at work on the water.

The day was filled with activities on the beach and in the water.  The children were given opportunities to learn to sail, row, kayak, play football, volleyball, and water polo.  School teachers from the schools assisted the PPI staff to make the day a series of smooth transitions as assigned teams of kids moved from one sport station to the next.  The children covered in sand and soaked in water ran back and forth from sailboat to canoe and from volleyball court to soccer field.  Though the day did not see PeacePlayer’s bread and butter, the poetic sport of basketball, with the help of the Ministry of Education is became obvious that any sports were beneficial and fun for those participating.  As one looked up and down the seemingly endless stretch of sand and blue water our group of kids were some of the few people who had sails, oars, and kayaks.  A wonderful opportunity, the day proved to be a unique experience that is just a first step towards fostering a positive relationship with the schools of Agios Antonios.

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by | June 15, 2012 · 2:21 pm

New Fellow Ashley Johnson Arrives in Cyprus

Ashley hard at work in the PeacePlayers Cyprus office.

New fellow Ashley Johnson arrived this past Friday at the Larnaca Airport in the early hours of the morning just before the Cypriot sun decided to rise over the mountains and pave the way for a new fellow to start work.  Tired from a long journey all the way from Colorado, Ashley brings with her a large amount of professional level experience, including a two year position in the Peace Corps in the West African country of Cameroon, where she worked as a Small Enterprise Development Volunteer. Ashley graduated from Colorado College with a degree in Economics and Business, where she also the captain of the varsity basketball team.  Members of the PPI office are excited to have someone who not only is an expert in basketball but also in the field of international development.

Ashley’s days as a member of the Peace Corps in Cameroon.

The breadth of members of the global business of humanitarian aid and international development vary in skill set and identity.  Many members are doctors, engineers, or development specialists. While skills and identities tend to be vast in variety in aid and development, it is apparent that someone with such experience as Ashley and her impressive work in the field is extremely valuable to any organization.  The skills learned in her past experience will undoubtedly go a long way for PeacePlayers Cyprus.

Ashley’s first practice was in Lapta, one of the furthest sites from our office.  After a lengthy drive on a road squeezed between what looked like an endless stretch of cool blue Mediterranean water and a line of sloping green and grey mountains, Ashley arrived at her first mission “in the field.”  She made her way into the small gym and took a brief tour of the surrounding camp grounds: where the water was, where the baskets were, and what the characteristics of the tight indoor court entailed. Soon after, the Lapta children began to pour in from the path leading back to the highway. A full practice heralded a big group of girls led by our coach in Lapta, Zalihe.  After smiles and introductions Ashley was tasked with a dribbling station.  She handled it with expertise and ease even despite the burdensome jetlag and language barriers.  At one point, during a technical shooting drill that commanded everyone’s attention, the PPI staff forgot that Ashley had just arrived and that the possibility that she would need help communicating or simply staying awake loomed heavy on the other side of the dark wood parquet floor.  But the possibility proved absent; Ashley was commanding the attention of the girls, doling out orders, running a relay race that had everyone dribbling and giggling all by herself, only hours after having first set foot on the island.

PeacePlayers Cyprus is excited to have Ashley as a fellow for the next two years and looks forward to her contributions.

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by | June 8, 2012 · 3:36 pm

PPI-CY at The Nareg School’s Fun Day

The students of The Nareg School warming up for their practice.

This past week Fellow Henry Louis and Coordinator Athanasios Souflias volunteered at The Nareg School in Nicosia during the school’s annual Fun Day.  The Nareg School is an Armenian school that teaches Cypriots of Armenian descent and other Diasporan Armenian children living in Cyprus.  The school is located on Armenias Street and has branches in Limmasol and Larnaca as well.  Situated near the Armenian Prelature of Cyprus and the Saint Asdvadzadzin Church, the school sits in a centralized location for Armenians in Cyprus. Armenia is a small mountainous country located in the Caucus Region with a population of approximately 3 million people.  It borders Turkey, Georgia, Iran, and Azerbaijan.  Armenians form a very large Diaspora outside of Armenia and are spread out across the world, a sizeable number of which  live in Cyprus.

The day was filled with running practices for the young Armenian children, ages 6 to 12.  The kids flowed from Fun Day station to station wearing their color-coded team hats, sometimes too big for their heads and sometimes too small.  When told to do certain drills the kids ripped their hats off and dove into the drill without worry.  When the work was done, Henry and Athanasios had worked with well over 120 kids, as they all scrambled back and forth from their art classes, their dancing lessons, their cooking sessions, and other fun-filled activities; however, each time a new mass of kids came down to the sun-soaked concrete of the basketball court they were excited and focused, filled with an eagerness to learn the game and were never drained from their other activities.  Though many of the children were younger than the typical PPI-CY participants, they were adept at their dribbling and defense stations, where they displayed their trilingual speaking skills, in Armenian, Greek, and English.  The Nareg staff assisted throughout the day and was excited to have their students learning fundamental basketball skills.  While practicing under the white walls of the school sitting on a hill above the court, a sense of community could be felt, that an Armenian culture was really appreciated in Nicosia.

PeacePlayers Cyprus plans to start a team this upcoming fall at the Nareg School. The team would further expand PeacePlayer’s identity as an organization that focuses on multiculturalism, and would be the first Armenian team in PeacePlayers history!  This July some of the PeacePlayers Cyprus staff will also make an effort to teach basketball at the Nareg Summer Camp. To engage more of Cyprus’ youth in sport with a social conscience and to expand into new cultural territories is an exciting prospect for PeacePlayers Cyprus.

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by | June 1, 2012 · 2:26 pm

A Sustainable Structure in Cyprus: PPI Fellow Adam Hirsch’s Departure in Context

It is always difficult to say goodbye to PPI fellows. Serving two year in PPI’s program sites, they become well known within the communities we work with.

Fellow Adam Hirsch finished his 2-year commitment as a fellow this past week for PeacePlayers – Cyprus.  Of Adam, our Managing Director Marina Vasilara says “PPI-CY is grateful to Adam for being a great coach, art teacher, blogger, communication innovator, and supporter of peace in every way.  We shall miss him every day.”  Adam was here for about two and a half years and his impact was something that I could see in all aspects of the job. At first I was referred to as “the new Adam.”

I remember the first few practices I went to, the kids would stare up at me curisouly. I would point to the middle of my chest and say simply: “new Adam.” They would smile and nod, as if I was a little cooler simply by association. After a while I began to refer to myself as “the new Adam” everywhere I went. I would meet coaches for the first time and explain who I was putting my identity in the context of old fellows, whose names continue to pop up in conversations. Adam’s work on monitroing and evaluation projects, his astuteness as an artist who not only could produce amazing murals in record time but lend to them a social impact as well, and his obvious passion for the work he was doing were all aspects of his personality that were assets PeacePlayer’s came to appreciate and benefit from.

Although it was difficult to say goodbye to Adam,the staff and the knowledge in Cyprus remains.

Now that Adam is no longer working for PeacePlayers the question “what now”  pops into mind. Adam was a excellent trainer, but there are still parts of his tenure that are lost; the differences between a new fellow and an experienced fellow manifest in understanding of society, organizational structure, and a number of other positives that only come with time. Such “brain drain” caused by attrition in international development organizations can often be a large problem.

A pertinent issue in international development organizations is sustainability and the retention of workers and knowledge. For example, organizations in the public health field that operate in developing and third world countries face a common problem of worker turnover and attrition, where, for various reasons, community health workers leave their posts and move on to other jobs.  Groups are often left where they started: in need of workers and a system of sustainable recruitment and retention.

PeacePlayer’s reaction to a similar problem of attrition is an impressive one.

The local partnerships set up between the office in DC and the local staff in each of our four locations neutralize the threats of volunteer departure.

While volunteers come and go, the staff and the knowledge remain. The local staff, including managing directors, coordinators, and coaches, form a group of workers that localize PeacePlayers. Sometimes I sit in my office and stare in amazement as our coaches, coordinators, and managers rattle off impressive lists of twinning locations, practice times, player’s names, and PPI know-how.

This retention of knowledge can also be seen by anyone who observes a PeacePlayers activity.  For example, at our end of the year tournament I was tasked with various duties to make sure the Greek-Cypriot and Turksih-Cypriot participants followed the rules and played the PPI way.  I had a team of local staff helping me with every question I had.  My head was on a swivel and each spin simply made me more and more confused, but each time my head stopped moving someone with a PPI shirt was there to answer my questions.

In conclusion, fellows as important and helpful as Adam Hirsch can be tough to wave goodbye to, but the structure that PPI has set up  retains the local skills and knowledge of the PPI-way.

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by | May 18, 2012 · 2:02 pm

Taster Session in Geri

Taster sessions help PPI reach out to new communities and children.

This week PeacePlayers held a taster session for 6th graders at an elementary school in Geri, a section of Nicosia far from the city proper.  The idea behind a taster session is to see whether or not a school and PeacePlayers would be a good fit for one another.  If a taster session goes well and the children have fun, the next step is to build a relationship at the school and eventually start a regular team. The story below is written by PPI-CY’s newest fellow, Henry, as he experienced his very first taster session:

I sat on the far side of Gunnar shaking my leg up and down.  I slowly wrenched my neck to one side and then slowly to the other.  Two loud cracks and Thanasis looked at me. “You need a chiropractor,” he said. “Yeah,” I replied behind a half smile.  What I really needed was for the next taster to go well, my first.  The kids were in class and we were waiting to be summoned again.  Gunnar strung his whistle from his neck and handed it to me, dangling it in front of my face for a second.

“You got this one,” he said quietly.  He got up for water and slapped my shoulder as he crossed behind me.  I wiggled in my chair, spun the whistle around my middle and pointer fingers a few times and played through everything that could go wrong.  A few Greek-Cypriot women teachers, walked in and out of the room offering us coffee and tea.  The bell rang loud and the halls began to rumble and voices sounded from the deep.  Kids began to appear from every hall and door, in their school uniforms of black pants and white shirts.

The 5th graders were up. We moved our way to the court outside.  The sun painted the hill, the school sat on a bright yellow wash and the valley below was spotted with bits of shades from clouds above. Thanasis, Gunnar, and I began to set up the balls and cones in the proper order as the kids, who just heard of this strange group named PeacePlayers, took center court.  The kids lined up as their teacher, Marios, calmly and slowly directed orders for the kids to pay attention.  They were shuffling left and right, stepping over the line, spinning in place, bubbling almost. They squinted at the three of us in front of the sunlight.  Thanasis introduced us in Greek, and towards the end of his speech he pointed his arm at me.  My number had been called.

For most of these kids it was apparent that basketball was new to them.  Their dribbles were unique, their shots were without precedent. No kid was driving down Griva Digena and getting the same visual education from a TV screen on how to shoot like Kobe Bryant or pass like Ricky Rubio that we take for granted in the US. I started with an explanation of our PeacePlayers clap, something I saw for the first time just an hour before.

“Basketball,” I said, and a couple of kids clapped out of unison.  30 stood in front of me.  I frowned and repeated:“Basketball!” Two claps echoed against the playground walls and distant school buildings.  For the next two years these kids will be responsible for clapping twice after every time one of us said the word basketball.

We continued to warm up. I shouted out orders at the kids and they giggled and laughed at the pitch of my voice.  They ran, stepped, kicked, skipped, and dove their way across the singed cement for the next 40 minutes.  They smiled, screamed, laughed, complained, succeeded, and failed. And it was good.

At the end we brought the kids into the center of the court.  They were disoriented but giddy.  They spewed out a thousand words a second at each other, pointed at us with their growing fingers, damp with salty sweat, reasoned amongst themselves why we looked and acted the way we did as every child does about something so new and unusual, and reached conclusions mysterious to me and satisfying to themselves, ending in smiles on each face. The taster was finished and it was apparent that these kids enjoyed the little flavor they had of basketball.

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