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Africa Outreach USA Brings Opportunity to Zimbabwe Youth Through Basketball, Other Sports

By Doug Williams, ESPN, 07/31/17, 11:30AM PDT

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As A Boy In Zimbabwe, Gus Chikamba Had Very Little. He Made Do.

As a boy in Zimbabwe, Gus Chikamba had very little. He made do.

"I remember we could not afford a soccer ball, so we used to make soccer balls out of plastic, out of trash," he said. "I think I first saw a basketball at the age of 14 when I went to boarding school."

Basketball was his ticket to opportunity. He played in high school and college in Zimbabwe and believes it kept him focused and too busy to get into trouble, unlike some of his friends.

"They did other things, and they fell through the cracks of life," he said.

Today, Chikamba, 47, lives in Indianapolis, a world away from where he grew up. Yet he has never forgotten how far he has come from kicking makeshift balls on dusty fields.