Inter Campus Brazil: Sport as a Cultural Reflection
It was the summer of 1997, when a fresh-faced Ronaldo, well on his way to stardom, was unveiled to the press with a previously unseen Nerazzurri shirt featuring the Inter Campus logo. In those same months an adventure began in the Brazilian town of Recife and to date, it has spread across 30 different locations in the country.
While Brazilian culture has always been deeply intertwined with the game of football, Nerazzurri colours were also intertwined with the green and gold. A natural relationship filled with history and passion through which Inter Campus, over the past twenty years, has carved out an important place for itself.
In an era marked by so many South Americans thriving at the Club, the Nerazzurri social project played an even more fundamental role, appealing to the national identity so key to the dreams of all of those young people in the country. In the space of just a few months after Inter Campus arrived in Recife, it made its way to favelas in Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paolo and Pititinga, Rio Grande do Norte, welcoming thousands of young boys and girls.
The first children of Inter Campus, those who had begun as youngsters in 1997, were teenagers on the path to adulthood when their country hosted two major international competitions – the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympics; some of them already with children and families. They had grown up alongside the Nerazzurri values of sport and philosophy, hopefully inspired by the respect found in football towards teammates and opponents alike. Many are on their way to a future full of hope, just like the future their country is striving towards too, despite any social and development problems they may encounter along the way.
The opening of the most recent project centre in Camocim in 2016, thanks to the support of a partner who, like Inter Campus, believes in the educational value of football, was a way of reaffirming that their Brazil project will not stop. On the contrary, they are a growing family that takes care of the generations of tomorrow. Victories and defeats, metaphors for the highs and lows that life offers. Moments that we hope our children will face in the best way possible, thanks in part also to the years spent together, on those pitches where Inter Campus will never tire of playing.
