Resilience ReDefined : Recovering & Restructuring Life’s Challenges

2004. I was sitting in the park looking at the football field. I was in 6^th Grade and didn’t know how to approach older boys playing. What I saw before me was the most beautiful game I had ever seen. Players running around the field, each moving from one position to the next, trying to outthink and outplay their opponent. It was more than a game; it was art. After what felt like an eternity, I approached the group and asked them if I could play. Some of the boys told me I’d hurt myself playing with them. I felt sad and rejected, until one of the boys came up to me and said, ” “come on, you’ll play on my team”. They called him KK, but what struck me was what he was wearing. He had a crimson coloured jersey, the sign of a cannon on the crest and a name emblazoned in gold at the back, “HENRY”. That one game was magical and I think, for the first time in my life, I fell in love. With the game, with the club, with every little aspect of football and Arsenal.

My father was in the navy, so we kept moving around the country every two years or so. In 2006, we moved to Delhi, a city I would grow to see as my home. Through constant moves, came changes; schools changed, friends came and left, languages and cultures changed, football was the one constant. Every time we moved, I tried to find people who wanted to play. If there was no one around, I tried to build my own team. 2008, we moved to Chanakyapuri. There, I found my football family. We called ourselves SPMA, and playing with them meant the world to me.

On the football field, with my friends, the world was different. There were no problems, there was no pain or sadness. Life was simple, put the ball in the net. Back then I decided, I wanted to do this for the rest of my life. I wanted to become a professional footballer.

Over the years, I have been playing with my teams, trying to become a better player and a better person. Playing with SPMA and my college team led me all across the city. Winning was great, but it wasn’t the most important thing. We helped each other get better and in turn made the team stronger with what we brought to the team. It was wonderful, but one thing was missing… a chance to prove myself to the professional teams in the city, and eventually, the greatest team in the world….Arsenal FC. Trying to get into the world of professional football as someone with no connections turned out to be an uphill battle. Try as I might, there was always someone who could help me, but just out of reach. At age 21, after completing my bachelors, I decided to try my luck abroad. I moved to Germany.

Arriving in Germany, I looked around for an opportunity to prove myself in training. I joined a club and found my way into the starting XI of SF Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf in Berlin.  Although there were quite a few obstacles, I did not give up hope. Somewhere deep down, I truly believe that I will do something great. A foreign country, a foreign culture and a language that I did not understand…yet, football remained the same. I spent the first year in Berlin, playing for Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf and spending every other moment trying to connect with coaches, agents and professional players. Eventually, I moved to Chemnitz, pursuing my masters. There I joined TSV Ifa Chemnitz and soon became their top striker. The teams changed, but my goal never did. In 2008, I briefly moved to Hamburg and got into contact with a lower division professional team. They were impressed with me in training and talks started on me joining the team in the January transfer window.

In June that year, however, tragedy struck. While playing in the league, a wayward tackle from a defender snapped two bones in my leg. As I lay there on the field, waiting for the paramedics, I didn’t feel any pain. I felt numb. The only sensation of pain came, not from my leg, but from my heart. It truly felt like I was broken. My operation and recovery took place shortly after, in mid June. I remember that the World Cup was on at the time, and it hurt seeing other people on the field, honoured in representing their country on the greatest stage of all. The doctors weren’t very positive about my chances of playing either. The chief surgeon mentioned that I may never walk without a limp, much less run. People around me told me to give up on my dream and move on to something else. I know they meant well, but how do I convince my heart to just let go of the one thing that always brings me joy? I decided then, that even if it were to put me through the worst pain of my life, I would recover. I would run again, I would play again. Over the next few months, I managed to gradually gain back the strength in my leg. By March the next year, I was back on the field, scoring goals and giving hell to every team that played against us. Things were changing for the better, and the dream was within reach of becoming my reality.

COVID changed everything. Two years lost to the worst pandemic my generation has seen. Two years is a very long time in the world of football. Contacts walk away, teams change, people who could help you suddenly find themselves out of favour. It felt like I was back where I had started. I’ve been playing in the Chemnitz Kreisliga since 2016 with TSV Ifa Chemnitz. We had a restructure in 2020, and had to start again from one division down, where we swiftly regained our spot by winning promotion. 2023.

It has been 19 years since that day at the park. I am older, and have a lot more scars. People have come and gone, the world has always been changing. The only constant is my dream. I will not falter or fall. I will persevere, I will play professionally someday.  

Anubhav Rai