LaoWai-The colourful Football
When on the 31 of May 2002 the starting whistle was blown to the World Cup 2002 the whole world was simmering which team would bring its own country in the four weeks ahead of them, the victory and the final cup. In China there was also only one subject, will China finally win against the great football nations, will China in the end even be the winner of the Cup ?
The enthusiasm in China was even bigger because China could for the very first time qualify itself for the World Cup, and could thus participate in the final progress of the tournament. On top the World Cup has taken place for the very first time in history of the FIFA in Asia. That means immediately in China´s backyard, in Japan and South Korea. With this fact people in China could directly at about the same time quiver for their country.Allthough China lost their first game against Costa Rica 0:2 the World Cup–title could still be achieved and the people were even more enthusiastic and optimistic for the games ahead of them. At this time we thought, that we these Laowai´s in Beijing could quiver with the Chinese together. Of course as long as they did not have intended to win against our own national team.
And there was still the IFFC the International Friendship Football Club from Robert Gonella with whom we supported Beijing for the Olympic Bid one year ago. And as we all chose China as our country to live there it seemed natural that we Laowai´s in Beijing supported China on the great stage of the World football.
Our idea was a bit unusual. We designed a Laowai set of stamps with the subject the World Cup 2002. We tried to circulate these stamps as an official mark. Unfortunately these stamps could not have been officially registered as an official stamp, but they have been so attractive and meaningful that they were published very often in the media , and thus they had become popular. To become the status of an official stamp is not impossible but extremely hard to obtain and needed at least 12 months. But never the less it was a very interesting project.
The first stamp showed the earth as a globe pictured with brightly coloured continents. Around the earth like little satellites are flying three tiny yellow globes on whitch in red the Chinese characters for Laowai are written. The drawn flight pass of these tiny satellites all cross between South Korea and Japan, the site of the World Cup 2002.
The second stamp presents on a green playground people of different colours who run after a colourful football and on the spectators stand we can see also people of different colour who watch the match, the idea is that the colourful football is a messenger of culture and friendship he runs between people and passes friendship.
The third stamp shows the flying colourful football on whitch the red characters for Laowai are written. The colorful football flies from the bottom left corner into the upper right corner . Behind the colourful football is a white background on which the word international friend is written by hand from people of various countries .
The design of the last stamp we used for our football logo, which we have taken for many occasions, was used and presented during tournaments and events of the IFFC (International Friendship Football Club) of Beijing ,
but it has been also the logo of our own football team with which we participated at different football tournaments. During the World Cup 2002 we also printed it on cards which showed the timetable of the schedule of the football games on the backside and on the front was the flying colourful football shown up with the slogan ”China go for it!” in Chinese characters. We distributed these cards in the public, or we put them in those places that had plenty of people interested in the games.
