By Daniel Cohen ’15, Staff Writer

Soccer is considered to be the most popular sport around the world. Whether it’s the World Cup or just a pickup game, soccer has a unique power to bring people together. This past summer, a group of NA students traveled to a village in Costa Rica called La Esmeralda de Turrialba for their immersion trip and witnessed soccer at its finest.

In Costa Rica, this group of NA students (Chewy Baumel ’13, Daniel Eatroff ’13, Michael Kaplan ’13, and Daniel Wilf ’13) spent eight days within the small community of La Esmeralda helping to rebuild a school and add some new amenities such as a basketball court and new soccer goals. But the greatest impact that the kids had on the lives of the people in this community was from their time spent interacting with all of the members of the community. Soccer provided an easy and effective means of doing so.  Playing soccer together bridged the gap across countries and languages.

During recess or after school, the Costa Rican kids were always kicking around a soccer ball. Even on the weekends, there was a community wide exhibition game with people of all ages, toddlers to adults, and men and women all on the field at once. The weekly Saturday soccer event illustrated a community truly coming together around the universal game of soccer.

However, this community lacked the soccer supplies and equipment that we take for granted.  They were missing soccer balls, cleats, shin guards, nets, and recently cut grass that did not rise above their knees, and much more. But none of these things stopped smiles from lighting up the field.

Chewy Baumel ’13 was so inspired by their love for soccer that he decided to bring a similar pickup style soccer game back to Newark Academy in the hopes of raising money to provide the kids of this Turrialba community with the same supplies that we get to use everyday. He started a charitable soccer tournament called “Kickin’ it for Costa Rica,” which took place during the week of November 14^th – November 18th^– at Newark Academy and was played during lunch periods. Sixteen teams participated with over 64 NA students joining in on the fun, just like in Costa Rica. The tournament was fun and exciting with over $500 raised.  All of the money raised will be used to purchase soccer supplies for the La Esmeralda community.

Final Four Friday, on November 18^th, was the day of the semi-finals followed up by the finals. The Wrightson Gym was full of fans and teachers alike watching the competitive games, two of which went into overtime, with Team Chelsea (Nick Williams, Charlie Bushnell, Ted Simpson, Ned Harwood, and Chris Benoit) coming out on top as the first ever champs in a 4-3 overtime thriller.

The next challenge that Chewy faced was deciding how to best convert the money raised into supplies for the La Esmeralda community that he had visited over the summer.  After the tournament, Chewy contacted the US Ambassador to Costa Rica, Ambassador Anne Andrew, who is helping to coordinate the delivery of the supplies. Chewy and his family will be traveling back to Costa Rica in February to deliver the supplies themselves with the help of the  Country Day School of Costa Rica. Then, they will also play an exhibition soccer game with the La Esmeralda community.

A tournament to raise money for a cause, has developed into meaning much more. Through the power of sports and soccer, the NA community has helped to give back to the world. Soccer is a powerful tool worldwide and seen by these four NA students this past summer.  It can truly provide the basis to establish meaningful relationships among people from different countries and create memories for a lifetime.