Last night the English Department of the Universidad Latina in David held an event to honor the authors who wrote the books that students translated as a requisite for graduation. I was one of the authors. Before the event Stephany Michell Peñaloza, who translated the first half of my book Despair! The Ill-Fated Last Voyage of the Admiral of the Ocean Sea, presented me with a bound copy of her portion of the book. She received a grade of 100 for her work!
This is Stephany:
She’s as smart as she is beautiful.
I know they say “pride goeth before a fall,” but I think this is pretty damned cool!!!
I don’t know what happened with the other girl, Deyreth, who was translating the other half of the book and Stephany either didn’t know or wouldn’t say. I stayed up late into the night when I got home reading the book. While it was, of course, in Spanish, I didn’t have a problem reading it because I knew what it said, anyway. It was just neat seeing it in another language.
The event was kind of funny. While it was for the School of English I was stuck at a table with nine people who didn’t speak a word of the language and my meager Spanish was pushed to the breaking point. One of the gentlemen at the table coined a new word, I believe. David is the capitol city of the Province of Chiriqui. Chiriqui is a unique place and I truly believe if the people here had a choice they would choose to be their own independent country.
The residents of the province are referred to as “Chiricanos.” This one gentleman, whose name I don’t remember, asked me where I lived. I said, “Yo soy gringo.” (I’m a gringo.) He laughed and asked if I lived here. I said I did, in Boquerón. “Ah,” he said with a sly smile, “then you’re a ‘Chiringo’.”
I can live with that.
One More Good Adventure 
Hola Chiringo!
Just because I don’t reply, doesn’t mean I don’t follow! Very nice. Nice to be honored too.
Hi Richard:
Congratulations. Now your book is bilingual. I’m happy for this event. Also first time I hear the expression “Chirigringo”. It sound nice and very appropriate, I might add.
That’s very much how my graduation thesis looked when I graduated at ULACIT, only it was blue with golden letters. Yep, I know how proud you and Stephany Michell Peñaloza must feel. Great job.
Regards,
Omar.-
Awesome!! Congratulations to Stephany on her 100. Congratulations on your acceptance to the Chiringo community. You make our province a better place, a more interesting place, a richer place. Keep up that good work.
Not bad Richard…published writer and now an internationally published one as well….congrats!!! Keep up the steady work. Jane
I don’t know about the internationally published part. As far as I know there may not be more than three copies of the Spanish version in existence; mine, Stephany’s and one for the school. As to being a published writer, I’ve been that for a long time. My very first published By-Line was way back in 1964 in the Cape Cod Standard-Times. It was a story about an American bald eagle being sited at Arey’s pond in Orleans. For the following ten years after that I had dozens of magazine articles published on a wide variety of subjects including a couple of lurid tales in “True Police Cases.” Despair! is the only book I’ve ever written though I’ve edited two others which are on sale at Amazon.com.
What a wonderful story – and a new word to dress it up! “Chiringo” – I really like that!
Congratulations to Stephany, and kudos to you for being involved as you are. It’s great!
nice