Final Project Lionel Messi is an Argentinian soccer player that was born on June 24, 1987 in Rosario, Argentina. He came from a very humble background and he is currently 34 years old making millions of dollars. Not much is said about his spiritual life but he is Roman Catholic. When Messi was eleven years old, he was diagnosed with a rare growth hormone deficiency that is only treatable through a certain procedure that is very expensive. Thankfully, at the age of thirteen FC Barcelona at La Masia Academy recognized his talent, paid for his medical procedures, moved him and his family to Barcelona, and accepted him into their program. La Masia Academy is an elite soccer school where many famous soccer players come from and the annual tuition is five million dollars. While being in the junior team under FC Barcelona, Messi was able to score twenty-one goals in fourteen games and at the age of sixteen he had his debut. At the age of seventeen, Messi made the record as the youngest player to play in the big leagues when he joined Spain’s top soccer team, La Liga. In 2005 Messi was granted Spanish citizenship and led the team to win the European Champions League in 2006. Throughout the years Messi kept growing in his soccer career, won the European Golden Shoe Award, and eventually was named the world's greatest player in 2010. “Messi led Barcelona to La Liga and Champions League titles the following season, which helped him capture an unprecedented third consecutive world player of the year award. In March 2012 he netted his 233rd goal for Barcelona, becoming the club’s all-time leading scorer in La Liga play when only 24 years old. He finished Barcelona’s 2011–12 season… with 73 goals in all competitions, breaking Gerd Müller’s 39-year-old record for single-season goals in a major European football league. His landmark season led to his being named the 2012 world player of the year, which made Messi the first player to win the honour four times… In 2014 he set the overall Barcelona goal record when he scored his 370th goal as a member of the team. That same year he also broke the career scoring records for play in both the Champions League (with 72 goals) and La Liga (with 253 goals)” (Rollin, para. 5). Overall, Messi positively influenced the world around him and encouraged many people. Bibliography Marcotti, G. (2010). Lionel Messi. Sports Illustrated, 44–45. Rollin, J. (2022, January 31). Lionel Messi. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Lionel-Messi Kim Jong Un was born on January 8, 1984 and is the dictator of North Korea. He is the youngest son of three and the successor of the previous dictator Kim Jong Il who passed away in 2011. His education started in the International School of Berne at Gümligen, Switzerland and he later ended up studying in P’yŏngyang, North Korea at the Kim Il-Sung National War College in 2002 to 2007. When he was a young adult, he shadowed his father on military inspections and surveilled government officials. “He was listed as a candidate for the Supreme People’s Assembly in 2009, and that April he was given a post on the powerful National Defense Commission (NDC); the chairmanship of the NDC, defined in the constitution as the country’s highest office, was held by Kim Jong Il. By mid-2009 Kim Jong-Un was being referred to within the country by the title “Brilliant Comrade,” and in June it was reported that he had been named head of the State Security Department, the government agency responsible for political control and counterintelligence. In September 2010 Kim Jong-Un was given the high rank of four-star general, although he was not known to have had any prior military experience” (Murray, para. 3). Kim Jong Un is not religious and deems himself as a god. He has contributed negatively to society and even murdered his own uncle. “By 2017 North Korea had conducted a total of six nuclear tests, including at least one of a device that North Korean officials claimed was small enough to mount on an intercontinental ballistic missile” which put the USA in the range of North Korea’s missiles and led to Kim meeting Donald Trump (Murray, para. 6). In 2017, Kim Jong Un pushed for an agreement with the United States of America where they would denuclearize themselves if the U.S. army would retrieve itself from South Korea which resulted in 2018. https://youtu.be/k_3HfoYsO1A Bibliography Murray, L. (2021, December 13). Kim Jong-Un. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Kim-Jong-Eun Park, Yeonmi. (2020, November 30). Why did Kim Jong Un Kill his Uncle? [Video]. Youtube. https://youtu.be/k_3HfoYsO1A
