There are some trips that stay with you long after you come home.
For the second summer in a row, Como 1907 travelled to Ghana alongside Sport Creates Memories, returning to Accra with a group of twelve players from the Primavera and Under 17 squads. They went to coach young footballers, visit schools and spend time with the local community. They also went to continue something that had already begun.
Last year's visit saw ten local teams created through the Sport Creates Memories programme. This summer another ten joined them.
For anyone who knows Lake Como, their names are instantly recognisable. Nesso. Lenno. Brienno. Carate Urio. Lezzeno. Domaso.
For the children in Accra, they now mean something else entirely.
They are the names of the teams they will play for every week.
That is how football builds connections that few other things can.
The purpose of the visit was never simply to coach. As Laura Juul Hansen, founder of Sport Creates Memories, explains, the project exists to create structured clubs where young people always have somewhere safe to belong. Football is the reason they come together. Community is what keeps them coming back.
The Como players discovered that almost immediately.
"We left thinking we were going to give something," says Under 17 forward Achille Tigano. "But we came back with so much more."
It is a feeling shared across the group.
For midfielder Riccardo Cassano, the week became a lesson in perspective as much as football.
"This experience really stayed with me. We've had opportunities growing up that many children haven't had. Being able to share what football has taught me over the years was incredibly rewarding, but the biggest lesson came from them. It showed me that football really is a universal language."
Primavera captain Matteo Oliveira Papaccioli speaks about something else the trip left behind.
"It taught me never to take anything for granted. It also brought us together as a group. The Under 17 players, the Primavera and the staff shared something that will stay with us for a long time."
Away from home and away from competition, football became something simpler. A ball, a smile and an afternoon together were often enough to overcome differences in language or culture.
Camilla Veronelli, Head of Community Relations and Sustainability at Como 1907, watched the players embrace every part of the experience.
"The boys immersed themselves in everything," she says. "From visiting schools and villages to coaching on the pitch, they never held back. They experienced first hand just how powerful sport can be in bringing people together."
The story does not end there.
In the coming weeks, four children from Ghana and two local coaches will travel to Lake Como to take part in the Club's Elite Summer Camp, continuing a relationship that now grows in both directions.
Meanwhile, thousands of miles away, children pull on shirts named after villages they have never seen.
Some play for Nesso.
Some for Brienno.
Some for Lenno.
One day they may visit those places.
Until then, football has already found a way to bring them a little closer.