More than 4,200 rangatahi are impacted by cancer in Aotearoa every year. Some are going through diagnosis and treatment themselves. Others are watching a parent, brother or sister go through it. Either way, cancer reshapes a young person’s world almost overnight.
School stops. Sport stops. Time with mates gets replaced by hospital appointments and waiting rooms. Gaming can be one of the ways young people stay connected through all of that. A planned gaming evening with friends is a chance to socialise, switch off from everything else for a while, and just be themselves.
They’re part of our community. They always have been. This campaign is for them.
This December, the E Blacks, New Zealand’s national esports team, fly to Los Angeles for the Global Esports Games, run by the Global Esports Federation. Like every national team, we’ll carry our flag. Unlike every national team, we also chose to build one from the messages of Aotearoa, and we’re asking you to help make it.
The flag is built from 4,200 pixels, one for every rangatahi impacted by cancer each year. Each block holds 10 pixels and can be claimed by a supporter and filled with a message, typed or drawn, then printed onto the flag before it leaves the country.
When it’s full, the flag will be a physical record that Aotearoa stood behind every one of those 4,200 rangatahi. The E Blacks won’t walk out in Los Angeles alone. They’ll carry your words, and the strength of Aotearoa, with them.
Every dollar donated goes to Canteen Aotearoa. Canteen supports rangatahi through every stage of cancer, whether it’s their own diagnosis or a family member’s. Their crews are there through treatment, recovery and grief, providing counselling, peer support and a community of young people who genuinely understand what each other is going through.
That work runs on donations, which means every block on the flag does two jobs at once: it carries a message of support, and it funds the people delivering that support on the ground.
Go to donate.eblacks.nz, claim one or more blocks with a donation, and write your message for rangatahi facing cancer. Type it or draw it, whatever feels right.
The flag closes on 1 November.
