Through pain, fear and the sleepless nights, Hassan didn't give up on his dream. He knew that if he was strong enough to get this far, he's strong enough to carry on.
On a muggy September afternoon a fast and furious game of swing ball is underway in Freetown, Sierra Leone. It's the rainy season in West Africa and even though the skies are blue, the ground is soggy from the constant downpours that come this time each year.
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The clumsy squelching of his flip-flops in the mud does nothing to deter 12 year old Hassan. He and his two friends are in the zone, lunging forwards again and again, left and right, trying to smack the makeshift ball. It swings wildly on its frayed string around a long wooden branch that's skewered into the ground. Shouts and laughter ring through the air when there is a break in concentration, but for now the game is on.
Most afternoons and weekends you'll find Hassan on this little muddy hangout that looks across the ocean. If he's not here, chances are he'll be challenging his friends to a game of football. To him, Arsenal are unquestionably the best team ever and Hassan likes little more than pretending to be striker Alexis Sanchez.
When they're not playing sport, Hassan and his best mate head down to the water, fishing with an old battered net and a wooden, handmade rod. The view over the ocean is calming and the blue sky merges almost seamlessly into the water at the horizon. It's a jarring contrast with the surroundings on land. Scraps of plastic and rubbish are strewn around and old sheets, which form the walls of a nearby outside toilet, billow in the wind.
Instead of a beautiful sandy coastline, the water's edge is littered with rubbish. Old car tyres have been dug into the shore to help prevent the ground from being washed away with the tides. Under a nearby shelter made from sheets of corrugated iron, a group of young men are hunched over a table playing draughts.
This small, slum community in Freetown is called Rokupa, and it is Hassan's home. It is a place full of friendships and family and a strong sense of community. But it holds bittersweet memories for him also.
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Hassan's father died when he was five years old and he was raised by his mother. She was an immensely loving woman who showered attention on Hassan, her youngest son. She sold local health remedies and did everything she could to give Hassan all he might need.
Like every mother, Hassan's wanted nothing but the best for her child and tried to provide him with everything he wanted. "Even if she didn't have everything, she would find a way to get extra for me," he said - unless it was bad for him.
She always encouraged Hassan to pursue his dreams which included becoming a doctor one day. "My mother wanted me to go to school so I could be self-reliant," he said. "She liked it because she didn't have that opportunity." When Hassan returned home from lessons, they would often play wrestled together in their one-room home.
Hassan's had his own little corner, adorned with a 4-foot long Arsenal team poster on the wall above the mattress he slept on. Hassan's obsession with Arsenal had started young and he had few other possessions – a couple of text books for school, a rucksack, a football when he was lucky. His family was poor in financial terms, but he still did not want for much. This was the only life he knew and his mother's love was unconditional and constant.
That is, until Ebola arrived and changed everything.
