Fred Bowen's "The Score" column,
May 2, 2002, Washington Post

Taking Soccer to Another Level

When Laura Desobry was a young girl, she dreamed of soccer. She dreamed of scoring goals, playing for championship teams and winning an athletic scholarship to college.

Eventually, soccer took her to a place she had never dreamed of.

Laura started playing soccer in elementary school -- first in Catholic Youth Organization leagues and later for Washington Area Girls Soccer teams. "I played on my first team in fourth grade," Laura, now 19, remembers. "We had fifth-graders and sixth-graders on our team. I was in awe of those girls."

Laura played four years of varsity soccer at Walt Whitman High School. She was even good enough to play in the Olympic Development Program.

After her senior year, Laura realized the dream of so many young players. She made it to big-time women's soccer, receiving a partial scholarship to Louisiana State University.

Then everything fell apart. Disagreements with the LSU coach and tensions among her teammates took all the fun out of the game.

So Laura left LSU. She wasn't the only one. Other girls left too. For the first time in 10 years, Laura wasn't on a soccer team.

"I needed to get away from everything," Laura says. So she got on the Internet and found the School for Sport and Life. In Peru.

Starting in January, Laura spent eight weeks as an aide in a Peruvian classroom. She also helped coach soccer in a camp for kids ages 6 to 11.

"I had always wanted to do something like this, but I was always so busy with soccer," Laura says.

In Peru, soccer became more than a game that Laura played and loved. Soccer became one of the ways that Laura learned about the country and its culture.

The camp was not anything like soccer camps in Laura's home town of Bethesda, where kids had matching uniforms and the latest equipment. "The kids in Peru had nothing," Laura says. "No money, no shoes. They played soccer in the sand barefoot."

Laura enjoyed being with kids and her Spanish got a lot better. She sometimes stayed late into the evening, playing pickup soccer games with the neighborhood kids. "I was grateful that I could relate to the kids with soccer," Laura says.

"The people in Peru had not seen many girls play soccer," Laura says. "The girls at the camp were more into dancing and volleyball."

Soccer had introduced Laura to a world very different from her own. Parts of it made her sad. Some of the kids she taught in camp spent evenings begging on the streets. One 10-year-old boy, Christian, told Laura about the gangs that roamed the streets at night. Christian even showed Laura the knife scars on his arm and ribs.

But for Laura, life in Peru was so interesting, so exciting, so different. "I didn't want to come home," she says. "Peru opened up a world for me beyond soccer. I never thought I would be interested in the Spanish language or South America."

Now Laura has a new dream. She still wants to play soccer. "I still love the game, but now it is not the only important thing in my life."

What is important now, Laura says, is to return to school, play soccer and study international relations. Laura really wants to study countries in South America. Countries such as Peru.

Meet Fred Bowen tomorrow at 10 a.m. when he discusses his book "Winner Takes All" at the Chevy Chase Library, 8005 Connecticut Ave., Chevy Chase. It's free, but call for reservations: 301-986-4313.

© 2002 The Washington Post Company