Dos encuentros

The year is coming to an end and we have put together some fun activities. Everbody should get a round of applause for their continous support and good work. Last week we brought the 5th and 6th graders from Los Caramelos to La Plaza Tomas Gomensoro to play chess with the kids from the Merendero in Maracana. Maracana were all angels, and they played very well. Los caramelos were terrors; they played, and then ran completely wild. I fear there may be some sort of hormonal imbalance or something...seriously.

In the back you will see a tall character (a familiar face by now), Brandon the Mandon hooked us up with the enormous chess pieces.

Above: Ines and Milagros play in teams. And Che, Ines deserves a medal; we had a meeting to see about working with her company a while ago to sponsor activities in the Merendero and to speed up the process she bought us 10 chess sets out of pocket on the spot! She is also taking the initiative and pressing for her company to participate in the work in the Merendero as part of a social responsibility program.

Alright, these two fotos are just to break up the monotony of serious faced, time pressured chess placed players caught in the fierce struggle for time, space, material, and position. Above: a few hams. Below: Nicolas getting Charlie Browned

This "encuentro" was put together by Roberto Osores (back right)from the Uruguayan Chess Federation. Maracana and La Teja showed up for a friendly tournament. Even though we had quite a range of playing levels we all had a great time, and we played some good chess.

Roberto and Camilo (green shirt) taught me how to run a tournament. Below could be a scene from el chavo del ocho (who is regularly scolded) !!No Chavo, ta ta ta ta!!
And this foto is great, this duel is intense.
To be honest I would give a medal to all of these guys; the Maracana boys, the other Rotary scholars, outside sponsors, Rotaract, the youth counselors, and the kids themselves. They are all going to great lengths to create opportunities and to develop potential.

The next blog may be late in coming, but it will come :)
Oh, P.S. Uruguay has a new president and vice president! Jose Mujica and Danilo Astori from Frente Amplio. Election day was pretty crazy go nutz!

Acceptance Speech, Proyecto Pan de Azucar and ?Where's Waldo?

Proyecto Pan de Azucar! We did it! The torrential downpours the week before had us worried.
I believe it was my second year at the university of Wyoming when I took a public speaking course (por fuerza). The first speech we had to make was an acceptance speach; we're about to see how I fared.First off, thanks to the Uruguayan sun, we've had our falling outs but in the end he came through for us. Thanks to all the Rotary scholars Braden, Brandon, and Jessica and Rotaract, here Mauricio, Natalia, and Fernanda. Everbody recruited, organized, and got Dirty.

Thanks to the scouts and their leader Ruben of Piriapolis that came packing all kinds of equipment. We're missing a few of the littler ones but this is before we went to the top, so don't worry. Thanks to all of the Rotarians that participated (including those that sent the Rotary scholars down, i.e. you), provided transport to and from el cerro, and gave a cookout afterward!

Thanks to la Juventud Artiguista, o sea, !Team Maracana! They mercilessly berated me for walking around taking pictures and shamed me into working as well. Thanks to the Couch Surfers, las cuales (they were all women, that's interesting) came to lend a hand. Here's where the Where's Waldo comes in; ?Can you find Yours Truly?

You'll have to look behind, through, and in all 53 bags of trash (some smaller than others) to find me. Don't spend to much time looking...I'm not in there, !te engane! :P I took the picture. So we'll play again. This time I'm in there. Ready go.

And the best for last, a very special thanks to my mom! You can find her in the picture as well. This one is a lot tougher; try finding her in the 1st picture on top of el cerro first. She came to visit and allowed me to drag her up the hill to help realizar Proyecto Pan de Azucar!

The bad news is we were only able to clean up about half of the trash on el cerro, and we threw all of it away due to the difficulties involved with recycling in the area. And faltan todavia signs that say "NO TIRAR BASURA". But it's one step towards a greater awareness of the environment.

I think I thanked just about everybody so it's time to wrap up the speech. Conclusion. Evaluation: Ah! The entire premise is off; an acceptance speech is for accepting something, and my purpose was to thank everyone, and to talk about the great work they did. I'm going to get an 'F' roja! Ah well, I never liked that class anyway.