Meet team Hungary’s Hadi Hazem
|"If we lose, or if we win, we stay together the whole time.” Image: Anita Milas
By Andi Phillips
Hadi Hazem’s face lights up when he talks about football, the game, the sport and specifically the camaraderie.
“We go down on the field as a team and I feel the connection with my teammates, even if we lose, or if we win, we stay together the whole time.”
As a refugee, finding community has been the most important thing to Hazem. The 19-year-old Palestinian player is a member of Team Hungary, and has called Budapest his home since 2008. Hazem’s family fled Lebanon, first by plane to Croatia and then by train to Hungary. They lived in a refugee camp in Budapest for over two years.
He’s played a lot of sports, trying everything from volleyball, martial arts, basketball. He kept trying sports as a way to make friends. He was on a football team once, but he had to quit because he said there was racism on the team.
But five years ago, as fate would have it, he came across a team playing football in Margaret Island in Budapest’s Danube River.
“I asked if I can join, I was a bit afraid to ask them, as usually that is not how things go,” he recalled. “You know a kid goes to a random field and they let you join? Especially when they are training.”
To his surprise they were very kind and welcomed him to the team, which was run by the Oltalom Sport Association (OSA). They were established in 2006 to compete in the 2007 Homeless World Cup in Copenhagen.
While a welcome member of Team Hungary, as a Palestinian residing in Hungary, he is a young man without a nationality, and no passport.
|Hadi playing for Hungary against Denmark at the Seoul 2024 Homeless World Cup. Image: Anita Milas
“On my ID card they don’t write that I’m Palestinian or any nationality they put ‘ZZZ ‘ or ‘homeless’ or ‘XXX’ and any time I want to travel anywhere it is much harder for me.”
He came to Seoul on travel documents, which can be tricky.
“I am always the first one when at the airport to see if they will stop me,” explaining the complexity of not having a Passport.
Hungarian Team manager Andras Rakos describes him as the team “wise guy” who is smart, funny, determined, and takes himself serious.
“I am really satisfied with his performance as a player and also as a young leader, he’s been trained for being a leader now for years and he has gained a lot of skills what is his position, he likes to be he likes to attack,” Rakos stated.
And here at The Homeless World Cup he feels very much at home.
“If I look around, I see people that are not 100% like me, but they can feel my situation they can understand my situation, and they have a chance to play on a national team, even if they don’t have a passport.”
He’s been given opportunities though the OSA to travel to Portugal, Netherlands, Qatar and France recently attending an event for youth aligned with the 2024 Paris Olympics.
|Image: Anita Milas
These opportunities in conjunction with his and his family’s experience motivate him to want to study and seek a role in governmental or social policy. He’s enthusiastic and has a skill set under his belt already for international relations. He speaks English, Arabic, Hungarian, German, Tunisian and trying to learn French but says with a smile, “it’s really hard.”
These events create opportunities make friends with players from all over the world as well as chances to connect with prominent figures in the global sport.
At the HWC Hadi was able to meet Honey Thaljieh, co-founder of women's football in Palestine, the first captain of the Palestinian national team, the first Arab woman to obtain a FIFA Master and work at FIFA.
His manager clearly sees determination in Hadi.
“You know he studies, he looks after himself, so I really hope that he will achieve his dreams - and he will. He will find his place in Hungary and in the world. I have no doubt that he will.”
Words: Andi Phillips
Images: Anita Milas