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 News from Around Banderas Bay | May 2008 
How to Create a Playground in Four Days
 Peter Gray - PVNN
| | The Navy League of Puerto Vallarta got close to achieving a miracle this week... the creation of a children's playground in San Vicente de los Angeles from start to finish in four working days! (Dale P. Hansen) | | |
You know the old saying "The impossible we do at once - miracles take a little longer"? The Navy League of Puerto Vallarta got close to achieving a miracle this week. The creation of a children's playground in a rural village from start to finish in four working days!
| | The Puerto Vallarta Navy League council has it's regular monthly meetings at 11 am on the first Tuesday of the month at the Marriott Casa Magna Resort in Marina Vallarta. Visitors are welcome. For more information, visit VallartaNavyLeague.org. |
While this was a combined Toys for Tots project, most of the heavy-lifting was accomplished by Navy-Leaguers. Here's how it was done.
Once the Navy League team, led by Fred Piontkowski, received the O.K. to go ahead with the project, they accepted the challenge of having the playground inaugurated on el Dia del Niño.
Pulling that off was a triumph typical of the determination and optimism that tends to be a characteristic of the local Navy League.
The village of San Vicente de los Angeles is an agricultural community some 5 kilometers east of Mezcales in the State of Nayarit. This community is home to around 1000 children. The only amenity for them has been a soccer field for the older kids. It was time to give the smaller children their own place in the village.
The site selected for the playground lies within a stand of tall mango trees which will provide shade for the smaller children through the summer. It is close by an area earmarked for a new church, bordered by fields of albahaca and platanos.
When the village heard of the installation plan, their Padre held a special mass on the site, while appreciative mothers and grandmothers turned out to pledge their support.
For three days - Friday, Saturday and Monday, nine workers provided by the Municipality prepared the site under the direction of Roberto Zamorano. This required building 12 by 18 meter construction walls, which were then filled with a 12 inch cushion of sand.
On Tuesday morning, April 29th, a truck arrived from Guadalajara, carrying the playground equipment. The community turned out to welcome the crew with tortillas and jugos. Then a willing team got to work getting the various playground items unloaded, unpacked, unwrapped, assembled and installed. Alongside Fred Piontkoski, fellow Navy-Leaguer John Moore was on hand to give some expert assistance when part of the equipment needed some on the spot modifications.
Wednesday April 30th - The Day of the Children - at 2 pm Nayarit time, the San Vicente playground was dedicated. It was a wonderful, happy celebration for the whole village.
The neighborhood women provided jugos and frutas for the visitors. There were speeches of welcome and thanks from the Presidente Municipal of Bahia Banderas, Dr. Jaime Alonso Cuevas Tello, Kelly Trainor, USA Consular Office, Jeff Miltenberger, President Navy League and representatives of the local mothers. Josefina Naya represented the Marriott Hotel, which is one of the strongest pillars supporting all Toys for Tots endeavors.
Finally, when the grown-ups were done talking, the children were invited to swing, slide, seesaw and climb the monkey-walk to their hearts content. To say they were ecstatic would be an understatement.
Among the other participants from the Navy League were Warren Johnson, Bill Clark, Judy Sorrell, Dale and Marion Hansen, Jim and Mary DeVaney, Dorothy and Fred Piontkowski. And from Obras Publicas, Ing. Felipe Burgueno.
For more photos and additional coverage of the new playground in San Vicente de los Angeles, click HERE. |
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