Non-Football Facts About Pele (iii)
In 1994, he married Assiria Seixas Lemos. They met in 1985 in New York. Pele liked her and admired her from the start though; she was married at that time to her first husband and with a daughter. Simultaneously, Pele was going out with a doctor from Rio called Lucene, but he realized he couldn’t stop thinking about Assiria. Towards the end of 1980’s her marriage broke down, and they started to see each other more often. When Assiria and Pele decided to get married, they did it twice. A service was held in Las Vegas and then another one at the Episcopal Anglican Church in Recife, Brazil. A little over two years after they got married, Pele reversed the vasectomy (a medical operation to remove part of each of the tubes in a man’s body that carry sperm, after which he is not able to make a woman pregnant) he had. Assiria became pregnant and delivered a set of twins, Joshua and Celeste- the girl received the name as a tribute to Pele’s mother.
As of 2006, Pele had seven children from four different women. This shouldn’t be considered outlandish considering his global fame and wealth but could appear paradoxical in light of the fact that he is a teetotaler (a person who does not drink alcohol) as well as a non-smoker. Many regard dinking alcohols and smoking as off –shoot of womanizing.
If you have thoroughly read the preceding, you will observe that Pele’s on the pitch performances has been largely avoided but the golden rule of this story will have to be broken because some of the events happened in Nigeria.
In early 1969, he went on a playing tour of Africa with the only club side he starred for in Brazil in his entire professional football career, Santos FC. Precisely, on January 26 1969 at Onikan Stadium Lagos which was then known as King George V Stadium, he featured in a friendly game against a Nigerian FA selected side. The match ended two goals apiece with Pele scoring a brace for Santos FC on Nigerian soil. It might interest those who are history conscious that the match took place during the Nigerian Civil war and a 48 hour ceasefire was declared by the two belligerent parties (Nigeria and Biafra) in the war just to see Pele play. According to Pele there was a huge military presence on the streets and were well protected by the army and police.
In the early 1970’s, Pele enrolled for a degree course in Physical Education at the University of Santos which lasted for three (3) years and following the tradition as a freshman he had his hair cut, something that became known as the Pele cut
He was again in Nigeria in 1976 as a facilitator in a Youth programme and almost causing a diplomatic incident when he was caught up in the abortive coup d etat that led to the gruesome murder of General Murtala Mohammed on Friday February 13 1976. The airports were closed and a curfew imposed. He was unable to leave his hotel for six days and when normalcy was restored he was advised by the Brazilian ambassador to wear an aviator’s uniform as a disguise when leaving Nigeria.
On another occasion when he was in Nigeria, a fan offered him his daughter in marriage. Pele was flabbergasted but had to turn down the offer. The same offer had also been extended to him by a fan in Greece who brought his daughter to Pele’s hotel room.
A fan of Pele in Yugoslavia turned his house to Pele’s museum.
Since 1956, Pele has been subject of books, articles, films, documentaries and more. He has featured in so many adverts and endorsed many products as well but he has rules: no alcohol, tobacco or religion. Beer and cigarette companies are constantly trying to get him to change his mind and he has been offered insane amounts of money but he always refuses. One whiskey company wanted to put his face on their bottles. Cigarette companies have tried all sorts of imaginative ruses. Pele was invited to meet a board of tobacco executives. They asked if he wanted to take part in an advert for their company in which Pele would make it clear that smoking is bad for consumers. In a dummy commercial produced by the company to convince him, Pele appeared running around and saying that he was healthy because he looked after his diet, that he was an athlete and that he didn’t smoke or drink. He was then surrounded by lots of children and he told them: ‘Look here, none of you should smoke. Smoking is not good for you; it’s not good for sports people. But, if one day I decided to take up the habit-then I would smoke these cigarettes. The concept of the tobacco company was that even though smoking is bad, their brand was the least bad. The company asked Pele to name any price but he rejected. However, he accepted to endorse Viagra, an aphrodisiac produced by Pfizer.
Pele’s interests also include music. He has composed songs that have been performed by Brazilian musical legends like Elis Regina, Jair Rodrigues, Sergio Mendes and Wilson Simonal. One of the things he hopes to do in future is release a CD of all the songs he has composed. He has appeared in films with the following titles; O Rei Pele (1962), Isto e Pele (1975) and Escape to Victory (1981) which starred Michael Caine and Sylvester Stallone.
On 27 September 1977, the United Nations gave him a certificate declaring him ‘A Citizen of the World’. In 1998, he was awarded an honorary knighthood by Queen Elizabeth II, at the Buckingham Palace. Pele had first met her in 1968 at the Maracana Stadium, Brazil.
Throughout Pele’s career he has been privileged to meet so many eminent personalities from all walks of life, from Presidents of many countries to Popes of the Catholic Church. He has met every American President from Richard Nixon onwards and he even turned down Bill Clinton’s invitation. When he met Ronald Reagan, Reagan introduced himself by saying, ‘Good to meet you. I ‘m the President of the United States; you don’t have to tell me who you are- I know you’re Pele, everybody knows. As well as Presidents of countries in six (6) continents, he has met all sorts of film stars and famous athletes and the person he was most impressed with is Nelson Mandela who he refers to as a true icon.
Pele has bought the cemetery which will serve as his final resting home when death come calling. It is a tower block- a tall multi-storey building with graves on each of the floors. Pele bought an entire floor for his family. Already, his father, aunt and grandmother are buried there. The cemetery is located in Santos, a municipality in Sao Paulo State, Brazil.
SOURCE: Pele: The Autobiography, 2006
