Donations from Philly... and "el carrito"

Melissa and I met at 8:30 AM in Colador Cafe, a Dominican owned coffee shop, in the corner of Bedford and Dekalb Ave, Brooklyn. There we had our cafe con leche con expreso, plus a nice breakfast to start our long trip to Philly.

It was our first time in a Chinatown bus, so we were kinda lost at first. While on tour we did our usual girl-talk, enjoy the view and sleep. Melissa called her twin sister Mariela who told us the good news of yesterday's boxing fight at Madison Square Garden. Mr. Cotto (our puertorrican amazing boxer) won last night against the other guy. Yeah! I bet half of Puerto Rico is celebrating this victory on the beach, mean while our Sunday back in Philly was a rainy and gray day.

Two hours later... the bus finally arrived to Philly's Chinatown. We walk to the mall grabbed a salad in the food court, then ask for directions where they told us to get the 57 bus. With the map in our hands we realized that we were not that far from South St. so we decided to walk. It was like a 15 min. walk... it was cold, windy and rainy, but we made it to a coffee shop in from of Nocturnal Skate shop.

Fresh Chai Tea served by the owner, a very social Palestinian man.

After a great cup of coffee, another of chai tea and baklava we were warm and full of energy to picked up a bunch of donations from Nocturnal and Bainbridge Skateshop. In Nocturnal, Braxton hands up a bag full of wheels, some trucks, like 8 used boards (one of it was from Luis a friend from Puerto Rico), and 3 new decks from One Skateboards Co. At Bainbridge Caezar gave us 3 used boards, and another bag full of wheels. Yeah! Melissa and I where hands full of equipment... cool! but how are we gonna get all this back to NYC?

This is when imagination come very handy... so we built "el carrito" from a skateboard and a recycle bin that we got for free at a gallery in Bainbridge St.

OMG! We were laughing all night long of our funny-weird invention. Hahahaha!!!!

Melissa making sure to tight the handles, and placed in the luggage compartment "el carrito" in the bus.

Sofia pulling "el carrito" from the bus station and ridding it around Brooklyn.

Thanks Melissa, for helping me transport the donations from Philly to NY!
And thanks to all you guys that donated equipment to make this project possible!

this SUNDAY -next trip to Philly-

This weekend we are traveling to Philadelphia to pick up our new and used donations. We're looking forward to meet with AJ Kohn from One Skateboard Co. Our friend Caezar just told us he has some board for us at Bainbridge Skateboard Shop, and the boys from Nocturnal as well have a donation to make... so is gonna' be a busy weekend!

Then on Monday we will pick up a box up at ETNIES showroom and another box that Amy packed at KCDC, plus some used boards that the boys have been saving at the shop.

LAST CALL FOR DONATIONS IN PHILADELPHIA: Sunday, Feb/22!!!

Trip to Philly

This weekend we went on trip to Philadelphia looking for more donations of used skateboarding equipment. Philly has a great vibe... love it!

On Friday we visit Bainbridge Skateboard Shop were we talk to Ceazar who will post our poster an hopefully will help us out. Then we went looking for some mural spots for summer, but that's for our next project (top secret!).

Saturday morning we stared the day with the best cappuccino coffee at a small shop owned buy the nicest man in Philly, which is located in front of Nocturnal. OMG! I could say that's life: a good coffee shop in front of a skate shop. I guess Sofia is falling in love with Philly already (sorry for that girly moment)... ok, back to work...

In the afternoon we walk into Nocturnal, really cool shop with a huge selection of decks, shoes and clothing. Braxton, manager of Nocturnal Skateshop, was kinda busy with the locals, but we were lucky to chat a bit with him about our Skate My Patria proposal. He was great, appreciated our poster and told us to count with them for a donation before the end of the month. Yeah! It seems like we are starting to meet wonderful people that believe in our humanitarian art project in Cuba, even thou we are living in hard economic times. Also we must thanks Anabelle Rodriguez and Sebastian our tour guides around this great city.