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The Fugees
By
Published: Jan 01, 2007
Category:
Beyond Classification
Maybe it was the anticipation of the Colts-Patriots playoff game. Maybe it was that no song lyric was on permanent repeat in my head. Whatever the cause, the questions that legendary Colts quarterback Johnny Unitas used to ask his teammates in the huddle — “Do you need anything? How can I help? What can I do?” — haunted me last weekend.
Those words were like a koan; I grappled with them. What supreme self-confidence! What loving concern for his teammates! What great leadership!
And, of course, the obvious comparison: How do I measure up?
So when I read Warren St. John’s article on the front page of the New York Times — Refugees Find Hostility and Hope on Soccer Field — you might say I was primed to do something useful.
St. John wrote about the Fugees, a soccer club in Clarkston, Georgia. Every kid who plays on the Fugees is an immigrant, mostly from Africa. Many have survived the unthinkable: soldiers murdering a father in his living room, soldiers forcing a boy to kill his best friend. Now, thanks to the efforts of Luma Mufleh, their founder and volunteer coach, they have a common activity that builds pride, character and, not least, roots in the new community.
There’s just one problem.
Clarkston (12 miles from Atlanta, population: 7,200) is not universally thrilled that, in just a few years, immigrants from Somalia make up half the population. The Fugees — the name comes from their refugee status, not from the hip-hop band — are thus a flashpoint for hostility, even racism.
Consider: “There will be nothing but baseball and football down there [on municipal parks and playing fields] as long as I am mayor,” says Lee Swaney. “Those fields weren’t made for soccer.”
Consider: The Fugees were not only forced to practice on dry, rutted fields, they went without goals until two weeks before the end of their season — the administrator at the Y.M.C.A. was slow to put in the order.
Consider: Last fall, Mayor Swaney arranged for the Fugees to use a town field for six months. The day after Christmas, he rescinded that promise. (Reminded of his pledge by the Times reporter, he reversed that decision.)
It is easy to get agitated and reduce the Fugees/Clarkston story to a blanket denunciation of old-fashioned racism. And it is very tempting to define the issue in simple terms: Powerful people who should know better went out of their way to brutalize kids who have already been horribly brutalized.
Not so fast.
There is definitely a heroine in this story — Luma Mufleh, the 31-year-old Jordanian and Smith graduate who founded the Fugees in 2004. What seemed like a small gesture has turned into a large commitment. In addition to coaching the team, she has become a second mother to many of its players. And the cleaning service she launched has been a blessing to many of their mothers, who now earn considerably more than the minimum wage.
But there is no heartless villain here. Immigration experts thought that refugees could find jobs in Atlanta and cheap housing in a county that had lots of empty apartments, and so, in just five years — from 1996 to 2001 — 19,000 refugees washed into DeKalb County. The experts did not anticipate that the newcomers would transform small-town life. And they could not know that 9/11 was coming, and, with it, newfound resentment of Muslims.
To the Mayor’s credit, he forced the chief of police to retire after repeated complaints that cops were harassing immigrants. And the new chief, who is black, then cracked down on recalcitrant police.
For all that, if the Clarkston web site expresses real attitudes, it is wildly out-of-date: “Still distinctively southern in character, life in Clarkston recalls a simpler time where one may still experience the treasured memories of those who enjoy the serenity of little towns and villages in America.” Locals call their town "Ellis Island South." And so the Fugees — a heartwarming story about the best of America — have been treated shabbily, to Clarkston’s shame.
Luma Mufleh is no fool. When Warren St. John decided to spend the fall following her team, she filed for non-profit status and built a web site that tells you all about the team and makes it easy for you to donate. I imagine many will. And that, in short order, we’ll see Luma and her players on “Today” or “Oprah.”
I imagine something else as well. I imagine that half the people now reading this donate just $10 to the Fugees — I imagine that we make this our cause-of-the-moment, that we adopt this program. Given the size of this community and its historic generosity and the great hearts of the readers who write me, I imagine that is possible. I imagine that we help Clarkston erase its shame. I imagine a happy ending, even glory.
One personal favor. If you click on the Fugees web site and donate, would you just shoot me an e-mail at HeadButlerNYC@AOL.com and tell me that you gave. I don’t need to know the amount, just that you participated. I ask only because the Fugees can’t track donations, and I think we’d all like to know.
“Do you need anything? How can I help? What can I do?”
I’m glad those questions wracked me all weekend. I could help, I did do something. And I feel better now.
— Jesse Kornbluth, for HeadButler.com
To read "Refugees Find Hostility and Hope on Soccer Field," click here.
To go to the Fugees web site, click here.
