When you talk to the president of the Hip Hop football team, Michele Michelazzo, in the end you cheer for him. Maybe you already have your "faith", but this project here, unites more souls, in the same area. Use music, belly music, street rhymes, the strength that comes from the encounter, from feelings and emotions, to create charity actions. So cheer and go to review the rules of the most popular Italian sport. In football, everyone on the pitch has a role, the values of sport here blend with the beating of rap rhymes, like a heartbeat. All this is capable of undermining preconceptions, marginalization. Include in an effective and simple way. “See this photo? - Michelazzo tells me - I particularly like it because there is a girl, a student from the school we are guests of who plays on the team against us. An absolutely natural and beautiful thing. The desire to be together overcomes any barrier. Indeed, it has already overcome it "
What is the hip hop national team
Because, as soon as a ball is recovered, we all want to organize a match, to run at breakneck speed, to sweat. Laughing, screaming and dreaming of winning. As children, running after a ball made us happy. As adults, if victories intoxicate us, just "getting involved" gives us courage. The National Hip Hop asd is a charity project born from the meeting of rap artists united by a passion for music and football. It was formed in Milan on March 21, 2017 from an idea by Emiliano Pepe and Michele Michelazzo. Intuition is to unite the world of football and rap for charitable causes linked to the territory. In recent years, the National Hip Hop has given life to many solidarity initiatives. “He tore open a canvas” as Michele Michelazzo says. He has dribbled many distances, to use a football term, he has dribbled differences, difficulties.
Here then is that a group of rap artists, the Hip Hop National, thanks to their stubbornness and desire to play football, they began to meet "people" without worrying about the hype: students, neighborhood kids, oratories. Peschiera Borromeo, the IIS and the Liceo Scientifico of Pioltello, Poasco, Calvairate… Prof Elena Ravanelli, Don Simone Riva, Don Massimo Bellotti… Meet them in person, talk to each other looking into their eyes beyond the mask, listen… Yes, above all listen. Michele Michelazzo tells us
The field of the national hip hop
The Hip Hop National team has played on the field of Masseroni Marchese 2 for 3 years over 100 matches between tournaments and the # Play2Give on Tuesdays. A special field, in the shadow of the magnificence of San Siro, the first real "home" of the National Hip Hop team: a structure set in the Monte Stella Park in Milan, which the Company has rescued from degradation with commitment. Redeveloping an area of the city. The heart is always in the center. “Of those years we remember and thank Sergio, the warehouse keeper / custodian, who endured and supported us in the days of rain, fog and scorching sun. All for the love of football, friendship and charity ", reads from the site.
From September 2020 the new home of the National Hip Hop is the Scarioni Center - avant-garde with the latest generation synthetic fields and a reception structure for the public like a real stadium - you can find it in via Tucidide 10 in Milan, in the Forlanini district .
Play2GiveAtSchool: football in schools
Initiative that of Play2GiveAtSchool, which comes alive, with the school tournament. The boys play with the national team, the national team enters the institutes and proposes a different way of experiencing solidarity. The idea is supported by the Fondazione di Comunità Milano Onlus, but above all by the enthusiasm of the dozens of young people who took to the field and did everything to participate, even if school was over.
Going from the on-line assemblies of the institute last March, due to the pandemic, to recognizing oneself in person was important. The boys were involved in two local projects to be supported, the National Hip Hop took part in the presentation of the fundraising project.
We saw kids cycling for miles to play with us or play for students below 35 degrees at the end of June, seeing how in an oratory 100 boys aged 14 to 18 for exactly two hours never set their sights on their smartphone , to see boys and girls play on the same team with the naturalness of someone who has always done so. In the end they, the guys who promoted the charity initiatives, were almost embarrassed to wear the shirt with the Play2Give wording because basically they are just like that: authentic, vital, pure. Michelazzo tells. The strength of sport, of this football so loved, capable of weaving a mythical tale, together with notes and words, thanks to hip hop, establishes a real contact, gives strength to a dynamic project, based on the strength of the encounter, of the challenge, of the game. Nothing more powerful. Fun and simple, like singing, like running, happy, behind a ball.
Photographs kindly granted by Michele Michelazzo, President and Legal Representative of the National Hip Hop Association Asd