Luma Counseling Her Soccer Team - Essay Example

The latent spark in the style of counseling Luma to her soccer team players is sufficient to judge the strength of her inner world. She experiences the metaphor in the struggle of life in the game of soccer being played by the refugee children as if each kick to the ball indicates their determination to challenge the vicissitudes of life and the trials, and tribulations they have undergone. Luma binds them into a team brimming with the qualities of sportsmanship. War, violence, and displacement are part of the life of her team members and each one of them has a traumatic experience to reveal.
She does both soccer coaching and individual counseling for diverse emotional issues they faced. That Luma is a Clarkston “outsider” may be true from geographical or political considerations. But she succeeds in transcending the barrier of nationality, the stamp of immigrants on her personality, through the processes in which she molds the personality of her players. The “outsider” factor had no impact on her status as a coach and her team.

Addressing the boys whose attention on the game of soccer is diverted on account of an airplane show Warren St. John writes about her utterances, “YOU GUYS NEED to wake up!” a voice interrupted as the jets streaked into the distance. “Concentrate!” The voice belongs to Luma Mufleh, the thirty-one-year-old founder and volunteer coach of the Fugees.”(2) This indicates her amazing work ethic and vision. “Outsider” question may be a burning topic for political discussions, but Luma has shown through the building process of her soccer team, how to strike the balance in the diverse perspectives related to immigration, local and global politics, identity, and intergenerational issues, creativity, biculturalism, and community building. Luma has demonstrated that the complex story of Clarkston and the struggle of the Fugees soccer team is the story of America in the broader sense. She is a native of Jordan and her soccer team boys belong to families that flee to the United States from many war-torn areas across the globe her soccer saga serves as the catalyst for their coming together and is a living example of the concept of ‘the world is one family.’ She hails from an aristocratic family in Jordan. She comes to America for her studies. Giving her backgrounder information the author writes, “Luma, I would learn, had no particular background in social or human-rights work. She was just a normal woman who wanted, her way, to make the world a better place.”(6)

Luma’s position is like the proverbial, ‘between the devil and the deep sea.’ She is an American-educated woman from Jordan. She proves to be an ideal candidate to fit into the concept of the American dream, wishing to create an independent life for herself in America.

The family wounds are also later healed. The author gives the correct perspective of her creditability and he writes, “As important to the boys, their parents understood that soccer with Luma was safe, unlike the games in the parking lots of the apartment complexes”. (102)Puma’s life story takes an inquisitive individual to multiple levels about the challenges that face America. The author weaves through her character macro-level sociopolitical issues. A responsible citizen cannot opt out of the challenges of this country, represented through the life of Puma.

She has provided insight into the immigrant world and how to build the team (life) from scratch and how to move forward. On scrutinizing the entire story, I am unable to get a weak link in her personality. Read More