The Friends of Colombia and Albuquerque RPCVS support Marina Orth Foundation (Colombia)

 

A note from Maureen Orth (Colombia 1964-66)

Maureen Orth

Fellow RPCVs:

We’re in the home stretch and hope you will share the pride. I am a former Colombia Peace Corps Volunteer living in Washington DC with a foundation in Medellin that provides laptops and teacher training and emphasizes technology, English and leadership in 21 schools with 8000 kids: MarinaOrthFoundation.org <http://marinaorthfoundation.org/>.  Two of our robotics teams, The Little Engineers, all girls 12-13, and Digiminds, 3 boys and 1 girl, ages 10-11, are about to have one of the most thrilling experiences of their short lives. They have won the robotics championship of Colombia sponsored by RoboRAVE and will be traveling to Albuquerque May 7 – 13 to represent Colombia and compete in the worldwide RoboRAVE competition. These kids beat some of the best public and private schools to have this chance and it is quite an accomplishment for them. They have never been in an airplane before and most have never traveled outside of Medellin.

Please click on our link below to see the video with these great kids, the real distance they have come and are about to travel. The Friends of Colombia and Albuquerque RPCVS have been loyal and supportive of the Marina Orth Foundation as has the NPCA. Now I’m reaching out to all of you because these kids would never have gotten to this point if we hadn’t all once shared the Peace Corps experience. Please help us across the finish line.

https://www.gofundme.com/RoboChampstoUS

Will you help us?
Big gracias!

Maureen Orth

3 Comments

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  • Paul Simon’s SOUND OF SILENCE is resounding in my mind this morning and reading this post from John Coyne:
    [Verse 1]
    Hello darkness, my old friend
    I’ve come to talk with you again
    Because a vision softly creeping
    Left its seeds while I was sleeping
    And the vision that was planted in my brain
    Still remains
    Within the sound of silence

    [Verse 2]
    In restless dreams I walked alone
    Narrow streets of cobblestone
    ‘Neath the halo of a street lamp
    I turned my collar to the cold and damp
    When my eyes were stabbed by
    The flash of a neon light
    That split the night
    And touched the sound of silence

    [Verse 3]
    And in the naked light I saw
    Ten thousand people, maybe more
    People talking without speaking
    People hearing without listening
    People writing songs that voices never share
    And no one dared
    Disturb the sound of silence

    [Verse 4]
    “Fools”, said I, “You do not know
    Silence like a cancer grows
    Hear my words that I might teach you
    Take my arms that I might reach you”
    But my words, like silent raindrops fell
    And echoed in the wells of silence

    [Verse 5]
    And the people bowed and prayed
    To the neon god they made
    And the sign flashed out its warning
    In the words that it was forming
    And the sign said:
    “The words of the prophets are
    Written on the subway walls
    And tenement halls
    And whispered in the sound of silence.”

    This track about the inability of people to communicate emotionally, was thought by many to be a response to the Kennedy assassination as it was written during the same time and then released three months later in 1964.

    Paul Simon originally wrote the song as an acoustic ballad for their debut, Wednesday Morning, 3 AM, but Simon & Garfunkel’s first single version died and the album was considered a commercial failure.

    Later in ‘65, while Simon was in England, Tom Wilson, producer of Bob Dylan’s “Like A Rolling Stone” asked members of Dylan’s studio band to add electric guitar and drums. Columbia released the amplified Silence, which became a hit before Simon and Garfunkel had even heard it. This second version peaked at #1 in the U.S., and charted in 7 others countries, becoming one of the most successful remixes of all-time.

    A third version of the song was released in 1982 on their internationally successful live album, The Concert in Central Park.

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