THE FOLLOWING IS THEIR EMAIL TO HIM:
From: Kerstin Nicolai@onlinehome.de
To: berglund_jan@hotmail.com
cc: stefantaudte@freenet.de
Subject: Palau Dresden
Date:Tue, 4 Nov 2008 22:53:54 +0100
Dear Mr. Berglund,
We turn to you with a very special question. We are six children at the age of 10.
Last year our team took part in a special chess tournament, the so called "Partnerschulen Turnier."
Each team of this special tournament started for one foreign country. Our team started for Palau. Before the tournament we collected lots of information about Palau.
We made posters, designed a flyer and painted a huge flag. We presented all these things during the tournament.
But we were also successful in the games of chess. We won most of the games and so we qualified for the Chess Olympiad 2008 in Dresden.
During the Opening Ceremony in the Eissporthalle Freiberger Arena on 12th November you will see two of us with the flag of Palau.
We will be in Dresden for the Olympiad together with our coach Stefan Taudte from 12th November 2008 to 14th November 2008.
It would be very great for us to play a game of chess with the real team of Palau. Is it possible for you to help us with organizing a meeting on Friday 14th November 2008?
We are looking forward to hearing from you.
Best wishes,
Alexander, Katharina, Soren, Max, Florian, Alina, Tim
from Erfurt in Germany.
MR. BERGLUND RESPONDED WITH:
Dear Ms. Kerstin Nicolai, Alexander, Katharina, Soren, Max, Florian, Alina, Tim and Mr. Stefan Taudte,
We are very pleased to hear what you have accomplished for, and with, us.
Of course, we must find some way of playing chess with each other during your stay in Dresden.
We are playing our daily round in the tournament from 3pm. So, if you would want to play against all of us, it must be in the morning of one of those three days or after a round.
If you would like to play some kind of simultaneous exhibition, myself and the player not playing that round can play against all of you at the same time.
But maybe you have much better ideas yourselves? Tell me, what you would like to do?
I'm sure that our kids, in our schools in Palau, would be very curious to know of what you have done for us, and yourselves.
So, if you can give us some information on paper, we can bring that home to our schools and maybe find some kids who would like to correspond with you from time to time.
Our kids are very curious to know about life in Europe.
Maybe you can sometime meet each other in Erfurt and/or Koror?
Please tell us also the results of your performances when representing Palau and give us a small resume of what information on Palau you managed to gather.
How many of you are in the group? You write six but sign with seven names?
We are looking forward to see you in Dresden. We will stay in Ramada Hotel Dresden-Wilhelm-Franke-Str. 90
Jan Berglund
National Coach
FIDE Delegate, Palau Chess Federation
Koror, Republic of Palau
The two chess players Roberto Hernandez and Gene Pastrana are difficulties obtaining Schengen visa and their trip on Nov. 12 is still hanging in the balance.
It would be unfortunate and disappointing for these kids to miss the only 2 players from Palau in the team as the other members are one from Philippines and 2 from Sweden.
The other original four members could not make it due to financial constraints and the world economic crisis.
After talking to the Consul on Monday, November 10, Hernandez and Pastrana didn't make it in time.
Hernandez will still get his annual leave and will stay in Palau Royal Resort and resume his work on the History of Chess in Palau to be completed.
The National Chess Championship will be resumed also and plans for the 3rd Ambassador Cup might be finalized after the Chess Olympiad.
There might be some invited players to participate. Mr. Berglund will also come to Palau after his role as International Arbiter in a New Zealand tournament is finished.
Mr. Diez didn't make it also to Dresden and he is still interested to play for Palau team in the next Chess Olympiad in Seberia in 2010 and he will participate also in New Zealand and Australia, with him paying his own airfare.
THE LATEST NEWS:
Palau withdrew its men's team due to visa problems of players. The substitute for Hernandez, Pastrana or Diez was denied.
He is from British Virgin Islands.
Now it's only the women's team (girls from Sweden and Australia) that will be representing Palau if their legitimacy of joining the Palau team will be resolved.
The first opponent of Palau women team is Germany.
Tia Belau Newspaper
Pages 13 & 15
Volume 17
November 17-23, 2008
No comments:
Post a Comment