Summer of 2006
July – Sept.
To Whom It May Concern:
We (my wife and I) operate a storefront / chess club in a Christian /
Messianic information center located in the heart of
Dietrich,
affectionately called “Дима” by the guys, is what they refer to as being
“God sent”. Day one: Дима overwhelmingly won the respect, admiration,
trust, and affection of the people (primarily pensioners and holocaust survivor
/ chess and domino players) he came to serve.
These guys, normally suspicious of everything and everybody, evidently
saw something very special in and extraordinary about Дима to embrace him like they did.
Дима’s help with translating between English,
Russian, German, and some Yiddish was indispensable. He even picked up a few Hebrew words in the
process.
His command of these languages enabled him to formulate and teach a
Computer Science 101 type class, right on the primacies. Taking computer illiterates, he began
teaching them how to use the mouse and the keyboard. From there, using WORD he had them typing
letters, using spell check, cut and paste, etc.
The big sensation and success stories are those who, for the first
time, now have e-mail. Also the guy who had
so much problems getting use to the mouse, now loves and is able to play
on-line chess with people worldwide. And
the lady who has family in
Дима was also instrumental in:
1. Serving as my Assistant Chess Tournament Director
2. Setting up and monitoring our security surveillance system
3. Repairing broken chess clocks
4. Administering our chess library (200+ Russian, and an assortment of
English, French, German, Ukrainian, Latvian, Hebrew, and Bulgarian chess books)
Besides Дима’s people/multi-cultural skills and computer
savvy, he has a long list of other valuable attributes and assets. To list just a few: he is a hard worker,
self-starter, mechanically inclined, conscientious, responsible, trustworthy,
and plays a respectable chess game.
Mentioning “trustworthy”…I’m going to miss him opening and closing. And speaking in behalf of myself and all
those whose hearts he touched…”We will all miss him dearly!”
Yours truly,
Edwin Beckford
lura_eddie@hotmail.com