The goal keeper

In Kingston on Boston's South Shore, the Jonathan Rizzo Soccer Field with its bright lights and bleachers is a fitting memorial to the young man who loved the game and played on his hometown teams. In a barren refugee camp in Rwanda, seven time zones away, there's another Jonathan Rizzo Soccer Field. There are no lights or bleachers, but there's a clear space carved out of a mountain ridge, plus equipment and uniforms for the children, many of whom don't own a pair of shoes.

The field in Kingston was built by contractors with a grant from a foundation in Jonathan's name. The field in Rwanda was built by Nick Rizzo, who picked the spot and helped clear the land as a tribute to his older brother, who was murdered in July 2001. Nick recently spent six months working in the dirt-poor country, leaving Harvard University for a clogged refugee camp.

Jonathan was 19, enjoying his summer off from college , when he offered a ride to a man posing as a stranded motorist. Gary Sampson then pulled a knife, directed the teenager to a wooded area, and stabbed him to death. Sampson, who killed two others during a weeklong rampage, was convicted on federal carjacking and murder charges and now sits on death row awaiting his execution .

At the end of the trial, Nick, who was 15 when Jonathan died, delivered a victim- impact statement in which he spoke of how he had always followed in the footsteps of his brother — onto the student council, the National Honor Society, and the student newspaper at Boston College High School.

Even in death, Jonathan would lead his brother to Rwanda. While at Harvard last year, Nick had an epiphany. Though he was a pre-med student immersed in his studies, he realized he needed to get away, far away.

"It had a lot to do with Jonathan," says Rizzo, now 21. "I always loved being in school, and then in my sophomore year I realized I wasn't loving it. I guess after Jonathan died, I sort of threw myself into school work. It was time for a break, to slow down a little bit. It was time for me to take a step back from everything that complicated my life back home."

That step was Rwanda, where the 1994 genocide by Hutu extremists against Tutsis and moderate Hutus resulted in the slaughter of 800,000 people in 100 days. It was against this backdrop that Rizzo took an unpaid internship with the American Refugee Committee. In August he was assigned to a refugee camp teeming with Tutsis who had fled Hutu terrorism in neighboring Congo .

"I think a lot of me having an interest in this is from Jonathan," says Rizzo, who borrowed money from his parents for airfare. "You learn so much from your older siblings that you just don't realize. Jonathan was into human rights, like Free Tibet, before it was trendy." Jonathan volunteered in Amnesty International and on the board of the community service program at BC High, and participated in programs for poor children.

"We have so much, and I think everyone has a responsibility to do something to help other people," Rizzo says. "For me, I don't have any money, so I can give my time." He's sitting in a cafe in Norwell shortly after returning home last month. Laptop at hand, he punches up digital photos, smiling at the ones of clowning kids, squinting at those of sick babies and ramshackle huts.

In the camp, he helped set up an HIV/AIDS program that educated, tested, and counseled people. He worked alongside refugees building a health center. The only "mzungu" in the camp and village — and the only white person many had ever seen — Rizzo lived with the Rwandan camp manager, a far cry from Dunster House in Harvard Square. A generator provided electricity two hours a day. There was no phone, no Internet . The water was a rusty color before he boiled and filtered it for drinking. He'd shower by pouring teacups of water over his head.

He ate goat every meal and slept under a mosquito net. Still, critters were everywhere: flying worms, giant spiders, bats that clung to the ceiling over his bed, mice, lizards that fell onto his head. "It was like living in the bush," says Rizzo, who quickly acknowledges it was a palace compared to the refugees' one-room mud huts.

One night, he had dinner with a priest and some neighbors in a village. They watched a movie about the genocide and then two women spoke of those they had lost in the carnage: one, a father; the other, both parents and two brothers.

"I was speechless," Rizzo wrote on his blog filed during periodic visits to Kigali, the capital. In bed that night, he thought of how openly the women had described their loss. "I thought . . . about how we can begin to reconcile what we consider pain with the pain these people have endured."

The children were a balm for Rizzo, climbing onto his shoulders, clinging to his legs. His high school French helped. "What are you guys doing today?" he'd ask.

"Nothing. There is nothing to do," was the invariable reply.

It didn't take him long to come up with a plan: He'd build a soccer field.

"I grew up playing on teams, making friends, learning about winning and failing," he says. "My parents would drive me to the field. I had uniforms and equipment. But these kids don't even have shoes, much less a place to play."

So he applied for a grant — from the Jonathan Rizzo Foundation, which his parents had established five years ago — and was awarded $5,000. Besides the field, it will pay for two coaches and, eventually, a volleyball and basketball court.