The Continuing

February 14, 2007
10:37:57 PM

This morning we left early for a new facility in the north west of Tucson. Today, being valentines day had an immense innate capacity to suck right off the bat for my being far far away from my fiance back in Newfoundland. We did a secret valentine exchange; Armando was my valentine and he got me a pink fuzzy pig pezz dispenser. To compound this, today is my host mom and dadÕs wedding anniversary. I serenaded them with some fiddle music before I showed them the slideshow of Newfoundland pictures I had promised. Being from Mexico, they were quite intrigued with the geography. Anyhow, in the morning after our meeting we hopped on our tour bus and headed out to different schools. I went to Van Horne Elementary School where I read books to two classes of 4th graders. After reading the kids could ask us about our home countries and UWP. Some of the questions were quite interesting such as: ÒDo you ever see the sunlight in Canada?Ó In one of the classes, a girl had a violin and we had a few extra minutes at the end of our 45 minute session. I asked her if I could play some for the class; she said yes. They were amazed by the style of the Newfoundland music and asked for 2 encores which took them into their recess time. They said I should replace their music teacher because my Òmusic was so much betterÓ.

Leaving the school behind we jumped back on the bus and headed to the El Rio Clinic (one of out beneficiaries in Tucson who received funds from out show ticket sales) where we had a bagged lunch and got to talk to some of the doctors there. They are federally funded and have a budget of about 6 billion dollars a year.

After leaving the Clinic, we went to the Town Hall where we met with the Mayor and talked about everything from issues of immigration to what he felt were qualities of a good leader (Vision, Passion, Action Plan, and decision making for the good of the people) His background is actually as an engineer and he had no prior political experience before becoming mayor.

We headed back to the Northwest Community center in the afternoon for various community impact workshops. I participated in a drumming workshop which is part of an after school program for kids. We played different percussion instruments, experimented with different rhythms, and did some dancing too. It could have used more cow bell though.

As well, we had in the founder of UWP, Mr. Blanton Belk who founded UWP in 1965. I never got to shake his hand but he was a great speaker, telling of the times he spent with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. And his famous "I have a Dream" speech. Also present was one of the Caldwell brothers who was responsible for most of the music that was performed in the early years.
As the afternoon closed to evening we started setting up for the pot luck supper being held in the community center. The food was great when I did eventually get some.

I Miss my Girl. ;(

Prep at the Elementary School