Passion

“Human passions have mysterious ways,

in children as well as grown-ups. Those

affected by them can't explain them, and

those who haven't known them have no

understanding of them at all”.                

 MICHAEL ENDE, ‘The Neverending Story’

Human passions are something that acts beyond political boundaries and cultural differences. Human passions do not make distinctions of age, social status, or school grades. Human passions do not divide us on the basis of our virtues or defects. They wrap us all together in a huge hug.

You can run after a ball with soccer cleats or with shower slippers, it does not matter! What it does matter is what you can identically read in the eyes of all the playing children and adults: passion! A passion, which reflects in the shouts and songs of the fans. An old man observes a child small like a cork dodging a kind of gorilla-man. Suddenly he springs back in the past, and turns to be a primary school student again.

The ball is made of plastic bags, pressed together with scotch-tape. The shirt got ripped in more than one point, so large to cover the knees. But it has the colors of Barcelona printed on it! The field is full of insects and thorn. Nobody seems to care...

Very less is needed: a rope and two supports… and that’s it! A high spring competition is ready! An iron ring attached to a pole… and that’s a basket field. Somebody is playing with a long skirt, somebody barefoot, somebody else while running is holding with a hand the too large trousers borrowed from the big brother.

It is music to hear them laugh. Every child has the right to a marvelous life.