ITF JUNIOR WORLD CHAMPS

<4 December 2002>

"..There are at least 34 countries here, Canada has 40 members in their team. HUGE!"

Team is good and in high spirits. There have been some hussle and bussle but all seems to be flowing nicly now.

North Korea is not here. Mr McLellan, Master Bos, Master McCallum and Master Quan are all here.

Will be in touch soon.

(Ed - nb) There are plenty of Puerto Rico maps out there, but maps of Ponce are very hard to find.
Thanks to Mr Llauger Castillo of Ponce for locating this one for us, in between his duties at the tournament venue.

Now we just need the team to tell us where their hotel is on here.

<3 December 2002>

Hi again,

Mr Gato Gato arrived this morning at the motel, he was wearing an NZ team shirt that we gave him.

Weigh in's!!!!!

All they team are now weighed in ready to go, Rose, Jess, Kyle, Mark & Dan T were pushed to the limit this morning to make their weights.... Rose especially, she weighed in twice, after some quick work from the coaches,and the encouragement of the team, she made it :-) we all can breath a sigh of relief.

We don't have much in the way of Internet access here, I have had to sweet talk the staff.... so families awaiting emails don't fret we haven't forgotten you (Sandi G)

<3 December 2002>

Hi all, Today we visited the Venue, there are 4 rings, and heaps of seating. The boards are wood and the board holder is an all in one job.... Power on one side, specialty on the other. The hall has 34 country flags hanging. We have met Canada, USA, Aussie, Great Britain, and Argentina.

Weigh in this afternoon and so far looking good. The hotel and hospitality are great, and of course the food is awesome. We had a bit of a wait yesterday, but none of us really cared the team spent most of their time in the pool and games room. Last night they had a good work out in the gym, they got quite a crowd outside the gym door.

The kids are well and feeling extremely excited, looking forward to the competition commencing. There are a lot of lovely young girls here but the boys are containing themselves well. The girls are far to focused to worry about the boys!!!!

We have arrived in Ponce, it is even hotter hear, they local's say they have never seen rain.

The team are now gearing up, reality is setting in now that they are seeing other countries. It is drawing closer nearly 2 days away.... the coaches are looking forward to their meeting tomorrow to find out who & where people are on the draw.

Thanks to everyone sending messages to our team members they are appreciating it so keep them coming.

We arrived in San Juan around 8.30pm last night. Our transport representatives were waiting for us at the baggage carousel and so was Mr Gato Gato the tournament organiser. He took us around town and showed us where to buy a quick late night dinner and bottled water to take back to the hotel.

Our time clocks are all out a little so it was hard getting off to sleep last night.

We had an enjoyable day out at Fort Morro which is perched on a cliff overlooking the Carribean (the walls of the fort are 20 foot thick) The kids had an enjoyable training session down by the beach which is only a two minute walk from our hotel.

Mr Gato Gato rang Mr McQuillan while we were out and asked him to ring him back urgently, but it was only to check we were all okay and had an enjoyable day

We enjoyed looking for a bank on a sat in San Juan, lets say the police gave us the wrong directions and when we finally found it, they didn't cash American Express travellers cheques, so then we had to rustle up 3 taxi vans to get to Old San Juan.... There is only one speed in San Juan "FAST" two taxi's made it to the destination, the others managed to find us after walking a mile to find the bank where we all littered the streets..... Mr Galpin managed to leave a huge tip for the taxi driver... his digital camera, it was almost like a mission impossible quest for Mr Francis who disappeared in another taxi and returned with camera in hand..... Mark thought he also lost his passport in the taxi only to find it waiting for him in his room.

The highlight of the day was the visit to the old fort. It was there that Jessica and I (Greg) re-enacted a battle royal with water bottles. This quickly spread to several team members joining in with one common target......ME!!!!

The team trained late this afternoon in an open grass area by the sea (photo's attached)

We are in San Juan, man is it hot, Yesterday's high was 38 degrees. We ventured
out last night when we arrived and everyone was tooting at us and waving. A real experience for the team, they think they are famous :-) they have already been asked to do the Haka but they are reserving it till they have had a practice.

And if anyone out there has a copy of my Black Belt results I would really love to see them

No Steve and I aren't talking to Andrew. (just kidding) Although we are sure he had a wonderful trip sitting in business class.

A big Thank you from the team to all the supporters who turned up at the airport to see us off. And a special big thank you to Trisha Ingles our brilliant travel agent who travelled all the way from Wellington just to say goodbye and good luck to the team.

We had a good flight as far as Los Angeles although we were an hour late with take off. Most of the kids were impressed with the new small TV screens on the back of the seats in front of them and a wide choice of movies to watch.

We have had our first training session outside the Holiday Inn hotel in LA and finished off with a pool training.

We are all really tired so are having a Thanksgiving dinner in the hotel tonight (Yes its thanksgiving day) and then off to bed at 7pm ready for our early start tomorrow morning.

Well, an interesting trip.
After leaving all the supporters at the Airport, there were a few tears from some of the team and a little bit of anticipation.
Once we got to the gate I was called to the desk. When I got there they upgraded to business class... it was about that time that Steve and Debbie stopped talking to me.
Well, the trip was, well it was long. Rose slept for most of it, Sam watched movies and Steve and Debbie... well they weren't talking to me.
Arrived in LA, got through a lot of security checks.... Fun... Finally here, I have headed off with my friend Rob (who lives here) to do email etc and find something to eat. Catching up with the team at the Holiday Inn soon.

The New Zealand Junior Team departed Auckland Airport for
Puerto Rico to attend the 6th ITF Junior World Champs.

Photo shows the team and supporters just prior to departing Auckland airport - minus a few held up with check-in security.