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This year's recipient of the annual Cosmopolitan Club Service Award is Julio Urbina. Julio has been a member of the club and very active participant since he first came to Cosmo as a new graduate student in Electrical Engineering in the summer 1993. I remember Julio's first year at Cosmo very well. He began as a quiet, timid young man, a bit shocked at all the differences between life in his home country of Peru and life in the USA. As we say in Puerto Rico, he was a bit like "una cucaracha en un baile de gallinas" (a cockroach in a dance for chickens), trying to keep up with everything but not at all sure about what to do next. Everything was new—the language, the room where he lived, and even having to shop for groceries and cook for himself. He was fascinated by everything, loved to ask questions, and learned a lot quickly, including the fact that he shouldn't freeze fresh potatoes to keep them longer and then leave the unwashed potatoes to defrost on the top rack of the refrigerator! When it came to volunteering for activities, Julio jumped in immediately with lots of enthusiasm and energy. I can still picture his laughing face after he helped all afternoon with serving at the international student reception in the park and then ran with Delphine to empty garbage cans. As the years progressed, Julio continued to volunteer to help with receptions, coffee hours, dinners, and dances. He was especially good at the latter and was known for his ability to get people interested in dancing salsa. Julio did more than this, however. He cared a lot about people and reached out to help all he could. When another Cosmo resident from Hong Kong was having trouble finding time to prepare for his comps, Julio organized a team of connivers to help remove distractions. I don't think Ben ever fully realized what happened and how much all of us cared about him. Characteristics of caring about others and willingness to learn and work hard soon helped Julio become Cosmo's house manager, a job which he performed for many years with outstanding ability and dedication. Now Julio is graduating and leaving the university. We will miss him very much. He takes part of Cosmo with him, quite a large part in fact, since this January he happily married Kazumi from Japan, whom he met at Cosmo the first year he was here. |