Tuesday, November 29, 2005

The Life Emanuel

Welcome to Tuesday, November 29 #1! Little known fact outside of the ship: one of the first things I did getting on the ship was join the Salsa team, and in honor of our big performance tonight, I wanted to write a quick word about Emanuel Pleitez, who just happens to also be our main salsa instructor.

Remember that name - he's one of those people I just know we'll be reading about someday. Emanuel grew up in a poor neighborhood in Southern California, got himself into Stanford, and now on SAS comes up with some ingenious methods of financing his trips that he couldn't go to otherwise. Whenever we arrive in port, Emanuel works for the taxi drivers in exchange for rides, spending hours fraternizing with them right off the ship and serving as their salesman. Language doesn't seem to be an issue - he came back from Myanmar with a surprisingly extensive Burmese vocabulary - and often has some of the best stories from his trips to places money can't take you.

Janet Eastman wrote a short blurb on Emanuel for the LA times. The guy impresses me tremendously, on and off the ship, so I mention his name here as a favor. I think you'll hear his name again. So if someday you pick up a newspaper and see the picture of a guy who looks like a football-playing John Tuturo, remember that you heard of him here first.

(I just noticed our one-headlight incident in Mauritus also got a mention.)

1 comment:

Mandy said...

Rico,
thank you for this very sweet card.
We can't wait to see you soon either!!! Yeah...
We really miss those lats! ;-)

xo