Love of the game speaks fluently on the basketball court
Hoops helps players from Japan feel at home in exchange visit to Niagara
A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to study abroad and become immersed in another culture continues to have a profound impact on Paul Faris nearly 40 years later.
In fall 1981, he was a Port Colborne High School student who spent his Grade 12 year in Japan as part of the Rotary Club’s exchange program.
In spring 2019, Faris, now 55 and living in Kanazawa, Japan, started a “travel experience company” along with some colleagues in his adopted second home.
And to think, it all started with basketball.
When Faris arrived in Japan, he didn’t know the first thing about the country or how he would fit in. Or if he would fit in at all. “When I first went, I didn’t speak or read or write Japanese at all — I didn’t know anything about Japan — but basketball was my language,” he recalled. “Basketball was the club I joined over there.
“Because of basketball, it was the vehicle with which I could make friends and find my foothold in the culture and in society.”
He founded the Niagara International Friendship Education Exchange (NIFEE) in 1990 to give others the opportunity to experience the rich Japanese culture while using hoops to break the ice.
“That on-the-court shared language translates to off-the-court comfort in somebody else’s home,” Faris said.
“The idea of using basketball to allow people to go to another place, to be welcome and stay in someone else’s home, is what I wanted to recreate.”
The first Canadian contingent was a senior men’s team. Except for a hiatus of six years, it’s been youth teams ever since.
Like the game plan for an inbounds pass, the format is straightforward: Japanese players and coaches spend nearly two weeks in Niagara one year, with their Niagara hosts visiting Japan the following summer.
Typically, under-18 and under-17 teams take part in the exchange. This year, 12 under-15 boys and 18 under-14 players — nine boys, nine girls — came for a visit that wraps up Sunday.
“I think the kids at this age are still young enough to really want to try to be all-inclusive, and the Canadians are still maybe not at that awkward age group,” said Elliott Etherington, head of the Canadian delegation and associate head coach of the Sudbury Five of the National Basketball League of Canada.
Etherington, a Chippawa native who spent two years as a Niagara River Lions assistant when they competed in the NBLC, said most host families have taken in two to three players since the exchange started Aug. 1.
“The reason the breakdown works like that and not one-to-one is to provide a little bit of
comfort for the Japanese when they come over,” he said.
“It allows them to really experience the Canadian side of things as a whole, and that way no one is really left out or feeling alone.”
Etherington has a coach and three players staying with him.
“Basketball is actually the No. 2 sport in Japan behind soccer,” he said. “It’s actually higher than baseball, but not a lot of people from the western part of the world realize that.”
He appreciates how a court can become common ground for youth from different cultures.
“I think what basketball offers is that it’s more of a universal language in the way the game is played,” Etherington said. “The constant moving up and down, the fact that you have to communicate universal terms when you’re out there.
“You learn how to speak to one another.”
In comparison, there is more separation between players, and their roles, in baseball.
“The pitcher is up there by himself. The batter is up there by himself,” Etherington said. “Basketball is a team sport where there is fluid action.”
After a practice the morning after arriving in Canada — “To run off the jet lag,” Etherington quipped — the 31 players and eight coaches spent the Civic Holiday weekend with their host families sightseeing and becoming immersed in the Canadian culture
“Maybe taking them to the cottage, maybe taking them to Toronto, taking them down by the Falls, all that sort of stuff,” he said.
“Really getting a sense of Canadian culture and day-to-day life.”
NIFEE boys under-15 coach Barclay Walker gained a renewed appreciation for his own backyard after opening his home to two players and two coaches from Japan.
“We’ve had some great experiences. Probably for me, my best highlight was when a couple of the boys saw Niagara Falls for the first time and the gasp that came out of their mouths,” he said. “I take Niagara Falls for granted having lived here most of my life.
“For them, it was magical. It made me have second thoughts about the area I live in.”
The Port Colborne High guidance counsellor is looking forward to visiting Japan next summer with his son Ben, 14.
The Walkers got a taste of what to expect when they were treated to a traditional Japanese breakfast featuring noodles in savoury broth one morning
“It was very different from what we have here in North America, but I found that I really enjoyed it,” he said.
“That makes me more comfortable thinking I can go to Japan, to not have those barriers to food or understanding what it is I’m going to experience.”
On Friday, the basketball aspect of the exchange took over the Niagara College Athletic Centre in Welland, where the main court was divided in half for a tournament featuring 10 games. Action wraps up Saturday with the finals.
What most surprised Kato Kota about how basketball is played in Canada is the atmosphere in practices.
“Their shooting ability is really good,” the 14-year-old Grade 8 student said through an interpreter.
One of the first things Kota wants to show his visitors next year is the non-stop way Japanese players practise.
“It’s continuous, continuous. There is no rest.”
Off the court, the great outdoors was just that to the teen from Ishikawa Prefecture, a province on the Sea of Japan on the main island of Honshu
“Everything is big compared to Japan,” he said of the wide-open spaces in Niagara.
Bernd.Franke @niagaradailies.com 905-225-1624 | @TribSportsDesk