contact:
yama@adinet.com.uy
webpage:
www.oocities.org/yamaplos
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Outdoor/Adventure activities leader
Camp Owner/Director
Camp Counselor
Sailing Instructor
Rugby Coach
The way formal education is usually run makes classrooms not very effective in building character and values. As a career teacher I sadly got to accept that, and search for alternatives. In that quest I found some good ones especially as a scout leader and as Rugby coach.
Eventually I became convinced that an approach similar to Outward Bound, Scouting, and most summer camps is the best when the objective is character education: adventure and initiative activities run by an enthusiastic, values-oriented staff. This environment will develop a unique ‘chemistry' that helps construct self-reliance, self respect, character building and values affirmation.
More so, continuing a very long family tradition of love and respect for the outdoors and volunteer work with outdoor youth activities has provided once and again some of my best moments in regard to work that is fulfilling both for worthy results to others as it is for my personal satisfaction.
- Camp Owner/Director
CampoAventura was an attempt to introduce in Uruguay the concept and practice of a Summer Camp as I learned it in the United States.
That meant several revolutionary approaches to the usual very laid-back way camping is done in Uruguay, for example a basic concern for safe yet adventurous and challenging activities, varied and well-equipped activity areas and cabins, including canoeing, rappeling, archery, and several others usual in developed countries but almost unknown in Uruguay.
The effort and investment was continued for over a year, receiving several small groups, but never attaining economical self-sufficiency. This was due almost wholly to a lack of marketing know-how, in a country where this kind of organized camping is barely known and little valued, with constant expenses from being in the building stage and little income. Finally, with growing debt and no prospects of improving earnings, I had to abandon the effort.
- Camp Counselor
In 1981 I was to spend three months in the United States to improve my English. A most practical way to do so was to enroll as International Counselor in a Boy Scouts of America summer camp. That was in Goshen Scout Camps, National Capital Area Council, Virginia. At that moment I was not really aware of the impact that organized camping would have in my future, yet much learning happened that would be later put to use.
With a more definite purpose I enroled in 1994 in the YMCA's International Camp Counselor Program, and thus sponsored spent the summer in Camp Wewa, Florida.
As Senior Counselor my duties included first-hand responsibility for most of the camp experience of a dozen children as head of a ‘cabin' unit, where I was helped by a 16-years old Junior Counselor. I was also head of a ‘Program Area', which served about 30-40 campers each day. Other duties included planning activities with head staff, and contribute to many others geared to provide the best possible camp enjoyment for 200 campers per week.
There I was intent in learning as much as possible from the formal training given (first week and permanent on-the-job), and with frequent chats with head staff, so as to be better prepared for my then planned career as Camp Director in Uruguay.
- Sailing Instructor current
Something like forever I have loved the water and sailing, yet had but few opportunities to do it, mostly because of the cost or distance from water. Still I built several boats, mostly kayaks and an invention of mine, the kanoyak, for my camp, CampoAventura. Then a set of circumstances got me to propose a program of sailing instruction for the Bolivian Yacht Club, which eventually invited me as Sailing Instructor for the Optimist Dinghy class, teaching sailing to children and adults on that basic craft. Currently that is done as a sideline from my main job as Captain of the Port of their facilities in Lake Titicaca, Bolivia.
- Rugby Coach
As a High School teacher in Uruguay I saw that what I was doing in classes was quite useless, so I began to look for something that would help transmit some the values I believe should be transmitted, like fair play, teamwork, the sense of not giving up, of taking the hard times and turn them into great times, and so on, which obviously the Establishment didn't care much about.
I tried Rugby with students of the High School I worked in. Not much later we had built a regular practice schedule, in a city that had never before seen Rugby played. By chance I was then invited to form a team of 10 and 11 year-old children, and we went on to win the most important yearly trophy for that age range in Uruguay. Several years later I was able to see that Rugby had really made a difference in their lives, especially in their attitude towards life.
By the way, and as a serious support for its educational function, Rugby is extremely fun, both to play and to coach. If the proper outlook is built in, as a game and not as a competitive ‘sport', it will certainly contribute to a well-rounded education, as well as to keeping physically fit.
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