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thedrifter
02-05-06, 07:14 AM
Sox fan gives orphans a league of their own
By Thomas Caywood
Sunday, February 5, 2006

Red Sox Nation doesn’t quite stretch to the East African country Djibouti, but a big-hearted Bay State Marine stationed there has the destitute boys of a local orphanage swinging for the fences like David Ortiz and throwing leather like Trot Nixon.

“They love it,” said 1st Sgt. Glenn Golba, a die-hard Sox fan who grew up in Springfield. “They run up from everywhere when we go out to the orphanage. You pull up and there’s nobody around, then all of the sudden there’s 40 or 50 kids coming out of the woodwork.”

Red Sox pitchers and catchers aren’t due to report for spring training for two weeks yet, but Golba’s eager players have been practicing for a few weeks already. Golba, 42, concedes his ragtag band of orphans - some of whom play in flimsy sandals or bare feet - still need work.

“We’re just practicing at this point. Eventually, we’ll break them down into teams,” he said in a telephone interview. “It’s totally different for them to pick up a bat or a glove and try to catch the ball and not be fearful of it.”

The tiny Muslim nation on the Horn of Africa borders Somalia and Ethiopia. Golba, who has a 13-year-old daughter back home in Florida, is stationed at Camp Lemonier in Djibouti City as part of an anti-terrorism task force.

Golba and his fellow Marines of Headquarters and Service Company, 4th Amphibious Assault Battalion, took up a collection and raised more than $1,000 to restore the Djibouti City orphanage’s ragged basketball court and soccer pitch and buy balls and nets.

“Of all the places I’ve been, this is by the far the most poverty-stricken country,” the veteran Marine said.

Half of Djibouti’s citizens live below the poverty line, and the average life expectancy is just 43 years, according to U.S. government reports.

“It’s sad to see anybody being raised this way, not knowing where their next meal is coming from,” Golba said. “If you go right outside the front gates, there’s people living in grass huts.”

Golba’s troops guard the camp and its airfield and patrol the surrounding area, but the free time he and other Marines spend teaching the orphans to bat and field could prove every bit as important to battling terrorism.

“Hopefully in the years to come they’ll know Americans as good people,” he said. “Maybe they’ll help keep terrorists out of their country some day.”