Douglas graduate spending a semester in Spain

Gardnerville resident Melinda Matus reports that her daughter Alyssa will be spending the next six months in Europe as part of the semester abroad program at the University of Nevada, Reno.

Alyssa is a 2006 graduate of Douglas High School studying nursing at UNR, though she's been accepted to the University of Arizona, Tucson, and will go there when she returns.

Alyssa has been in San Sebastian, Spain, for the past two weeks. San Sebastian is located on the northern coast of the Basque country, not far from the French border.

She left for Spain on Jan. 8 just before her 20th birthday and was bussed to San Sebastian after undergoing orientation in Madrid.

Melinda said Alyssa is living in a home with a Spanish family, eating their cuisine and living their lifestyle.

"Her goal for this period in her life is to be immersed in the Spanish language and come home fluent," Melinda said.

Going to Spain was a big decision for the 20-year-old. She was offered the Hispanic National Merit Scholarship and an invitation to attend the University of Arizona, Tucson. While she was waiting to hear if she'd been accepted to the Arizona nursing program, she requested a semester leave so she could use her Millennium Scholarship through UNR to go to Spain.

Alyssa is reporting her experiences on her travel blog at http://web.mac.com/amatus/iWeb/Alyssa%27s%20Site/Home.html

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I was standing at the bottom of the stairs in the Judicial and Law Enforcement Center on Monday morning when the crowd let out from the East Fork Justice Court hearing on Rocket. More than two dozen people came down the stairs after the hearing.

The story of the ill-fated Rocket is an emotional one and I've received a couple of letters that presume Rocket's owner Sabrina Lohr's guilt in the matter. I'm going to hold those until we get a resolution in the case, which may be a little while. This isn't a political campaign, it's a legal case.

In the meantime, News Editor Sheila Gardner found a couple of Rocket signs someone left in the ladies room across from the courtroom upstairs.

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Longtime Gardnerville resident Vic Bergstrom dropped by Wednesday with a couple of items from newspapers past, including a You Said It from the early 1980s. Vic was on the Gardnerville Town Board from 1978 to 1985 and was chairman of the board in 1983.

"I was running the pack station out of Coleville for six months out of the year and I didn't know what was going on in town," the 76-year-old said. "The vice chairman had to keep track of everything. I tried to resign, but they wouldn't let me."

Vic found two clippings among his mother's things. They are a1980s R-C You Said It! man on the street photo from the early 1980s and a letter he wrote from Zephyr Cove to the Oakland Tribune that appeared Dec. 5, 1965, defending Lake Tahoe as a place to live.

n Kurt Hildebrand is editor of The Record-Courier. Reach him at khildebrand@recordcourier.com or 782-5121.