First Games of the Scrabble in Spanish National Championship, Spain 2010.

Some pics from Alonso:

Bogota Third Part: Scrabble Tourneys

There were also other Scrabble tourneys taking place in Bogotá those days:

The Andean Tourney: for people from Venezuela, Perú, Bolivia, Colombia and Ecuador. It had been played 2 days before the World Championship (SSWC from now on). The winner, José Luis Rodriguez from Venezuela, obtained a place at the SSWC.

Other Tourney was the called “Extra” one. This one is for all the people that would like to play it and also gives 4 places for the SSWC.

The afternoon of the day before the World Championship, took place a new Tourney: the First Nations Scrabble in Spanish Cup. It was played by teams of 5 people, but playing at the same time just 4 (so one of each group can relax a bit each match). Days before the SSWC someone of the Spanish group of representatives, asked by mail who would like to play that tourney… and Alvaro, Topo, Juan Carlos and me, as good newbies, answered so soon we would like to, plus Carlos Puente, the only one of us that already had experience in a World Championship… the point is the other countries selected their best players for playing the tourney and we 5 weren´t exactly the best ones of Spain, so… the result was obvious… we were the second last… no wonder! :(

For me the funny experience was at the last match. I usually play quick, but in this case we both had to think a lot and the game took more time, so we were one of the last couples to end… It was a hard game, I had to think a lot, so, when we finally finished it, I was really thick and tired. In this kind of tourneys the public should remind outside the room the players are… so, imagine my big surprise when I opened the door of the room, someone asked me if I had won and when I said yes a lot of people screamed quite excited! Hehehehe! No! it wasn´t exactly my group of fans! ;P The point was that my game was the last one of the Spanish team and depending on it, Colombia would be (or not) the winner of the tourney… so the ones outside were the Colombians celebrating not exactly that I had win but that it meant they had win!!! :D



The World Championship was really exciting. In my case I usually say that my perfect way to lose weight is being in Scrabble tourneys! I usually go to the bathroom before starting the match and immediately after finishing each! But it´s nice to release that even the more expert players are also nervous. But what I liked more, was that even being a quite serious championship, everybody was so friendly, it really feels like a nice big family! The champion was Benjamín Olaizola.



The championship lasted 3 and half days. Most of us stayed in the same hotel. Also the meals were arranged with the hotel, so, most of us even didn´t cruised the hotel door during those days! Basically the restaurant was just for us during those days.



But definitely my favorite part of the Championship was what happened every night AFTER the matches! Just that… it deserves it´s own post! ;)



(To be continued)

Bogota Second Part: Doing a Bit of Tourism

We arrived in Bogotá just 2 days before the World Championship, trying to have at least one day for recovering from the jet lag. The other Spanish players were arriving or the same day or the day after, some of them went few days to places like Cartagena de Indias before the Championship (smart people!) ;)

So, actually Topo and I will have just 1 morning for doing tourism due we´ll participate in a Tourney that will start the afternoon before the Championship day.

We went to the Salt Mines in Zipaquirá, in a tour, with more Scrabble people. We went in a micro bus, so it was just our group.


The visit at the mines was really nice. They even have a Cathedral and a theater there.










Going back to Bogotá, as part of the tour, we went to an emeralds factory and then we went back to the hotel, but we can go walking from there, enjoying part of the tourist area of Bogotá, but some of us had the Nations Cup that will start that afternoon.

The day after we had some free hours, so Alvaro, Topo and I went to a mall with 3 objectives: mine: to buy a pin at the Hard Rock Caffe :P (yeap, I collect them), Alvaro´s one: to taste the best Colombian coffee and to find out a toys´ store with the Scrabble travel version :D (but I´m afraid we didn´t found it).

We went by taxi and it was quite interesting to see the things that made Topo and Alvaro to be curious about. It was their first experience in a Latin American Country and things like traffic, old cars, old trucks, black smoke from cars, old and crowded, really crowded buses, the color of the houses, the way people dress; impacted them both.



The special part was about how to know where to find the best Colombian coffee… so, I asked to a shop assistant on one of the visited stores and he tell us the best place was right there at the lobby of the mall, a Juan Valdez coffee shop! I should say it was the first time I heard about Juan Valdez coffee… but was funny due right after coming back to Madrid, I found out a lot of them! :D (Really no idea if they were there before, but if that´s the case, it means I less observant of what I thought I was! :$ ).



(To be continued).