{"id":422846,"date":"2026-01-21T04:19:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T04:19:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/422846\/"},"modified":"2026-01-21T04:19:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T04:19:12","slug":"fort-st-john-boy-10-funds-soccer-dreams-with-bottle-drives-spare-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/422846\/","title":{"rendered":"Fort St. John boy, 10, funds soccer dreams with bottle drives | Spare News"},"content":{"rendered":"

FORT ST. JOHN, B.C. \u2014 A local youngster has found a unique way to cover travel expenses for his sporting exploits.<\/p>\n

Just 10 years old, Josiah Ojokojo spends his winters suiting up to play in the Fort St. John Soccer Club league, and has gone so far as to set up an ongoing bottle drive independently to fund the cost of tournaments.<\/p>\n

His mother, Crystal Harrison, said he\u2019s played for about four years.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll he lives and breathes is soccer,\u201d Harrison told Energeticcity.ca<\/a>. \u201cHe goes to every practice he can. He will even try to make it when he\u2019s sick.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe makes me proud. He remembers to be a good person while he\u2019s on the field, which I think is the most important. [There is] the fun of it and getting the goal. But he definitely remember[s] to help a person out if they\u2019re down.\u201d<\/p>\n

But, soccer does come at a cost, as travelling for away tournaments can be expensive. As a single mom, making ends meet is a more important requirement than going to play in Edmonton.<\/p>\n

However, Josiah, who has run a lemonade stand alongside his sister Ja\u2019bria in the past<\/a>, dipped into his entrepreneurial spirit and has asked for bottle donations to independently pay for tournament appearances.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith fundraising, there are limits with the [soccer] association,\u201d said Harrison. \u201cWe as parents have to fund it ourselves. It was something I couldn\u2019t just do.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut, he is so passionate about it. He said, \u2018if I\u2019m going to do this, I want to travel.\u2019 I told him, \u2018you\u2019re going to have to find a way, bud,\u2019 and he said, \u2018I\u2019ll just collect bottles and cans and I\u2019ll find the way there.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019s made bottle runs before tournaments throughout the season, including for next weekend\u2019s FC Memorial Challenge event in Edmonton.<\/p>\n

The four tournaments throughout the year happen in November, January, February and April.<\/p>\n

To contribute to drives, people contact Harrison through Facebook, with Josiah and his mom picking the bottles up around Fort St. John and then heading to the FSJ Return-It bottle depot.<\/p>\n

While she describes bottle collection as \u201creal sticky work,\u201d Harrison says her son has found his way to away tournaments.<\/p>\n

Although Harrison says she occasionally has to \u201ccover a little bit\u201d of the costs, each of the drives funds Josiah\u2019s tournament fees and gas, and this past November it covered the entire trip \u2013 including the hotel and meals \u2013 with enough left over to venture to the FC Memorial Challenge starting January 22nd.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor the most part we make what we need,\u201d explained Harrison. \u201cEven if that means we get groceries in the hotel and eat sandwiches.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes, it will be just one or two bags from somebody,\u201d said Harrison. \u201cSometimes, there will be 10 bags. Then, we will put it all in clear bags and take it into FSJ Return-It.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes it is multiple trips. I feel like the bottle depot knows us very well. They see us come in and ask, \u2018how many bags you got this time?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

To contribute to Josiah\u2019s bottle drives, please contact Harrison directly through her Facebook account<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT ST. JOHN, B.C. \u2014 A local youngster has found a unique way to cover travel expenses for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":422847,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,561,32146,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-422846","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-soccer","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-soccer","11":"tag-spare-news","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=422846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422846\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/422847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}