Hi everyone, how have you been?!

It's been so long, I know, I've missed ya!

First of all I want to congratulate my dear friends for getting married, for becoming a mom of a pretty Jesse and for being ready to become a mum!! Love you girls and I'm so happy for you!

Some of you might remember, I was organizing a small marathon (you can read my previous mail, it was on july and I was asking for help finding a name for it?), it was in memory of a good schoolfriend of mine who was murdered on November 3rd, 2008, Diego Schmidt-Hebbel. Trial will be in March 2010 (hopefully) and those who did it will pay for it. At least that is what we all hope.

The marathon was a HUGE success, it meant tons of work, tons of hours on the phone, sending mails, meeting with possible sponsors, lots of stress, discussions with friend and was exhausting (you can’t even begin to imagine). I never thought it would involve that much work, time and energy but it was all worth it:

Deja tu huella – corrida por la amistad 2009 (Leave your mark – marathon for friendship 2009) gathered over 3.000 people, runners and no-runners, to run for friendship, love, coexistence and my friend Diego, to remember we’re lucky to be alive, an together. It was the first in it’s kind and since it was celebrating friendship you could run as a couple, with your lover/friend/family/partner…. Whoever you choose, doesn’t matter if male/female, young/kid/old, fitness, if you’ve ran before… whoever you choosed to share the experience with you could do it. Couples shared the same number and had to cross the finish line holding hands so it counted. It rocked! People were wo happy and excited, people who had never ran in their lives (and some people were over 50 or even 60 years old!) walked, jogged or ran (or a little of each) for 7,5 kms. in the center of Santiago de Chile. It was a touristic tour also, people from Perú, Bolivia and Brasil read about the race on our Facebook group and decided to come and be a part of it! Can you believe it? It was an amazing experience and BY FAR the best thing I have EVER done in my entire life.

To feel the energy, support and happiness of everyone who was there was so overwhelming that I couldn’t stop crying when I heard the horn and the running began… everybody knew why we were there and showed us support… I can even express the joy I felt (and also my 3 friends and boyfriend who organized this with me). Diego’s family was so happy and proud, the memory of Diego was flying up in the sky with all this expressions of love and friendship from family, friends and people we had never met…

We got amazing Media coverage (thanks to my contacts in advertising, hehehehe), we appeared on EVERY channel on TV, got newspaper coverage, front page of the bigger newspaper in Chile, radio interviews, thousands of comments on our facebook group… you can take a look at a TINY bit of it all on our website [link] you can go to the Gallery and see the photos!

Here are some photos and links so you can see what we accomplished, hehehehe!!

[link] about to start
[link] Diego’s parents almost on the finish line
[link] part of the crowd beside the start/finish line, just outside our National Museum of fine Arts
[link] There’s us (I’m the one on the left) thanking everybody for coming and telling that we expect to seem them again next hear on Deja tu huella 2010!

When I have some time I’ll try and upload the videos of us on the TV news! I was even on CNN Chile!

I learned a lot and got more convinced that my future lies in producing events more than working in advertising (although I do like it, still! ). I wanna be a wedding planner in the future, I think I’m gonna be great at it. Just give a couple years and you’ll see

Can't believe this year is ending already, I've had this job for over a year now, our dear and caring Amy past away, became a group, Mauro and I had our 3 year anniversary , Steph is becoming a mom... wow! Can't wait to see what next year brings. I'll be flying to Germany for a best friend's wedding So exciting!

Hope you have a nice Christmas and new years eve with your beloved ones, I wish you all much happiness and good challenges for 2010.
Love you all,
Heidi

Hey guys,
I know I've been absent here on dA lately and that is because I've had tons of things going on lately, lots of work and one personal challenge that has consumed a lot of my time and thoughts and it has come to a point where I could use some help.

In case of you don't remember, a good friend of mine and class mate from school was brutally murdered on November 08. The worst part is that this wasn't an accident and he died defending the life of his girlfriend and her family. Trial should be in October/November 09 and although it was all over the media, we want to raise conscience so that in spite of all the media fuss people don't forget what really happened, a good and inocent 25 year old man, just starting life, died leaving his girlfriend, family and friends devastated.
[link]

Diego Schmidt-Hebbel was full of life and happyness, he treated everyone with respect, offering friendship and enjoying life every day. He had a sweet girlfriend for over 4 years, had graduated as an economist and had started his first job 3 or 4 months before he past away.

He wanted us to join the 10k Nike run last year, but he didn't live to run it, so we all did in his name!!

We made our own t-shirts and it was a wonderful experience. People cheered us up when we were trying to get to the end of it, I'd never ran in my life, so you can imagine how hard it was! Here in Chile everybody knows Diego's case, and most people (not everyone of course) agrees that both people who did this should pay for what they did (they are both in jail waiting for the trial btw), so they encouraged us to keep going!

It was amazing, here you can see us at the end! [link] and I bet he was laughing his ass off watching us from wherever he is now.

To sum it up, we're all dealing with his death and trying to enjoy our lives, friendships and what each has, everyday.

So, with his family and a couple friends, we decided to organize our own Run, 8k, this year!

When? October 25th, 9 am.
Where? here in Santiago
People estimates? 2000-2500!
Sponsors so far? 0.

This requires a LOT of work and time and we don't always have it (I work from 9 to 19 monday to friday, and my 2 friends too) so you can imagine, we need all the help we can get so this 8k is a success!

What do we need to get sponsors?
First, a name for the race.
Second, a logo!

We've had several meetings and conversations (the organizing team and his family) but we still haven't come up with a good name for this race (although it's not really important who wins it, the main thing is you get to the end, everyone is a winner )

So... can you help us find a name and hopefully a logo?
With this run, we want to conmemorate our friend Diego, but also celebrate life , gather all kinds of people for one purpose, being thankful to be here and having each other! We don't want it to be "the Diego S-H race" or simething like that, we wanna have it's own fun, catchy name, full of energy and related to friendship, coexistence, acceptance and happiness, not taking life and friends for granted!

Without a name and logo it will be impossible for us to get sponsors, so this first step is vital and we haven't found the right name yet! Can you help me/us?

With the money left from paying the production of the race, we are thinking about donating it to a childcare foundation so that children without parents/home/education can also have a bright future ahead and stop discrimination.

If you wanna help me/us by proposing names or even creating our logo me, my friends, and Diego's family and girlfrind would be FOREVER thankful. If you need more "pointers" in order to think of a name, just let me know! We won't earn money by doing this and we don't have money either so this can be you "pro bonus" case of this week, hehehe maybe it's a lot to ask but I though there are so many people here that are talented in this kind of things and maybe some of them would be willing to help us, it's a good cause don't you think?

I created a group on facebook to support this cause, you can join, it's "Corrida x Diego" (Running for Diego), it's in Spanish, or add me or note me here on dA, send me an email to wendolina@gmail.com for any suggestions of support.

You might have the best idea we're looking for!

THANK YOU, from the bottom of our hearts.
Love,
Heidi

ps.: now you know what I've been up to!

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