http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/sep/05/aztecs-nat-berhe-newyork-giants-first-eritrean-nfl/?#article-copy
Berhe proud to represent Eritrea in NFL
Former San Diego State Aztec and current New York Giants safety Nat Berhe
is the first Eritrean-American player in the NFL
By Stefanie Loh4 P.M.SEPT. 5, 2014
The initial Tweet was really more of a question than a statement.
Minutes after the New York Giants drafted Nat Berhe in the fifth round of
May’s NFL draft, the Aztecs safety tweeted, “First Eritrean in the NFL?”
“It was a question that had to be asked because I was kind of curious
myself,” Berhe said. “We’d started looking around and realized that I was
the only Eritrean in the NFL.”
“Then everybody found out about it and that’s when it started blowing up,”
said Tam Berhe, Nat’s older brother.
San Diegan distance runner Meb Keflezighi, an Olympic silver medalist and
the defending Boston Marathon champion, is probably the most prominent
celebrity Eritrean athlete in the U.S. Another Eritrean-American, Thomas
Kelati, played basketball at Washington State and was in training camp with
the Los Angeles Lakers in 2009, but he never played a game in the NBA and
now plays professionally in Spain.
But Nat Berhe is the first Eritrean-American who’s managed to break into
the professional ranks of America’s most popular sport.
Growing up in Colton, Calif., Nat and his brother, Tam, were always aware
of their Eritrean heritage. Their mother, Judy, is African-American, while
their father, Berhe Asfaha, emigrated to the U.S. from Eritrea in 1970.
During the boys’ formative years, the family owned a gas station in Colton,
and Asfaha routinely worked 17-hour days, leaving Tam and Nat to spend most
of their time with their mother.
As a result, the boys don’t speak their father’s native language – Tigrinya
– and while they sometimes listened to Eritrean music, ate Eritrean food
and went to parties in the Eritrean community with their father, they were
never heavily immersed in Eritrean culture.
So Nat was a little surprised by the attention he has gotten from the
Eritrean community since his initial inquiring tweet back in May.
To date, his original Tweet has been re-tweeted 308 times. Congratulations
poured in via social media as Eritrean-Americans heralded the success of
one of their own in a sport that has never really been associated with East
Africa.
The New York media soon got wind of the story, and one week after the
draft, the New York Post ran a story on Nat being the first Eritrean in the
NFL.
The only problem?
Nat was quoted in the story saying he was “the first Ethiopian player in
the NFL” and that he looked at it “all the same, Ethiopia, Eritrea, it’s
all the same, just different name.”
Eritrea and Ethiopia are East African countries that share a border and
have similar cultures and people, so that statement wouldn’t mean much to
the average American unfamiliar with African geography and politics.
But melding the two together is akin to calling New Mexico and Mexico the
same country. Though formerly part of Ethiopia, Eritrea won its
independence from Ethiopia in 1991, after decades of war.
Nat took to Twitter to say he had been misquoted in the story and to
clarify that he had identified himself as Eritrean, but had simply wanted
to convey that the support he’d gotten from the Ethiopian and Eritean
communities was the same.
Yet the damage had been done. Eritreans and Ethiopians caught on
immediately and ripped into Nat on social media.
“A lot of people were upset,” Nat said this week, in a phone interview from
New York. “I got a lot of comments like, ‘He doesn’t know where he comes
from.’ I had to sit back because I was getting upset.”
The unfortunate episode marked the rookie’s first lesson on how to handle
the media barrage that comes with playing in one of the NFL’s biggest
markets.
“You have to be careful about what you say,” Nat said, in reference to the
New York media. “A lot of things are taken and twisted a little bit.”
Learning curve
On and off the field, Nat has learned a lot in his first three months with
the Giants.
Football-wise, he’s had to familiarize himself with a new playbook and the
Giants’ defensive system. His tackling ability and hard-hitting style of
play won him kudos from the Giants’ coaches by the end of New York’s first
preseason game, when Safeties coach David Merritt christened Nat “The
Missile,” and the nickname has stuck.
Nat’s rapid progress, and an unfortunate injury suffered by Giants safety
Cooper Taylor, means the rookie will go into Sunday’s season opener in
Detroit as New York’s second string strong safety, and he’s also on all the
Giants’ special teams.
“I have some really good guys, seasoned vets, ahead of me and it looks like
special teams is where I’ll make my money this year,” Nat said. “I really
want to lead the team in tackles on special teams, and at this point, be a
solid backup to whoever, and just stay ready.”
Despite the misunderstanding that stemmed from the New York Post’s story,
Nat said he’s gotten a steady stream of support from the Eritrean and
Ethiopian communities over the last few months, and the attention has
intensified ever since he made the Giants’ 53-man roster last weekend.
Eritreans from all over the world have suddenly become Giants fans. Nat has
had parents – Eritrean and Ethiopian – reach out and thank him for being an
inspiration to their sons, and a girl recently tweeted at him to say that
her mother can’t wait to attend the Giants game in Washington D.C. so she
can give him a giant Eritrean flag.
“I get a lot of people reaching out, especially on Instagram and Twitter. A
lot of Eritreans and Ethiopians. They say, ‘Thank you for being an
inspiration,’” Berhe said. “To me, I’m just playing football, but to them
it’s a big deal.”
He hasn’t attracted the same volume of media scrutiny that Michael Sam and
Johnny Manziel have had to deal with, but as the incident with the New York
Post showed, Nat has also had to learn to handle the responsibilities that
come with being a trailblazer.
"Habesha"
As congratulations from strangers poured in the day he was drafted, Nat
tweeted: “Shout out to my Habesha people, much love and respect. Will make
you proud. Thank you for the support.”
The term “habesha” has generally been used to refer to anyone of Eritrean
or Ethiopian origin, but it means different things to different people
depending on their self-identification, and the word is fraught with
political implications linked to the contentious history between Ethiopia
and Eritrea.
Twitter wars have erupted over Nat’s ethnicity, and whether he’s “habesha”
to Eritreans or Ethiopians, but despite the firestorm the New York Post
article created, Eritreans and Ethiopians alike have continued to hail Nat
as one of their own.
According to Nat’s cousin, Lia Amanios, first generation Eritrean-Americans
like Nat and herself have come to use “habesha” as a familial term.
“Informally, for the youth, that’s how we use it,” said Amanios, 25. “For
(native) Eritreans and Ethiopians, it’s not as inclusive. But from our
point of view, growing up out here, we’ve learned it as an inclusive term.
If you see somebody who’s Eritrean, you get excited because you’re like,
‘Hey, you’re like me.’”
As far as Nat is concerned, he is “habesha.” The safety has embraced his
role as the NFL’s Eritrean-American ambassador and is eager to learn more
about his culture and contribute to the Eritrean community.
“Later on down the road in my career, I want to start to become more
involved in that community and give back to those who are less fortunate,”
Nat said.
Nat has never been to Eritrea, but wants to visit in the near future. In
the meantime, he hopes that his presence in the NFL will popularize the
sport among Eritrean-Americans and raise the profile of his people in the
United States.
That, Amanios said, is why Eritrean-Americans are so thrilled about Nat
making it in the NFL. He’s a walking advertisement for a young country that
has only existed in its present form since 1991 – coincidentally, the year
Nat was born.
“He’s kind of a pioneer for the Eritrean-Americans because it’s a country
that, when we were growing up, nobody had ever heard of,” Amanios said.
“We’re starting to make a name for ourselves and represent our background
and culture. Anytime there’s an Eritrean anything, like an athlete or a
musician, it’s a big deal.”
Received on Fri Sep 05 2014 - 21:00:29 EDT