This is Think Tech Hawaii, Community Matters here. Ah, welcome back to Think Tech. I'm Jay Fiedel. Here we are at the one o'clock block on a given Thursday talking about Hawaii, the state of energy, but it's much more than that. Energy happens to be the contact point, the beginning of all good things with Maria Tomei. Hi, Maria. Hi there. Nice to be here. And we have Thaka Kimura. He is the president of the Hawaii First Robotics. Welcome to the show. Thanks. Great to be here. We're giving away the topic. We're going to talk about First Robotics. We're going to talk about middle schoolers, middle schoolers, thinking and building tech in Hawaii. That's the name. So you get the think and the tech and the Hawaii. Think. There you go. You thought about that. Yeah. And then it's Hawaii First Robotics Lego League. Yeah. It's a sport. Okay. And we're going to tackle this probably in more than one show, but this is the beginning. This is a big explanation. So I guess the first thing is, what's a Lego? When I was a kid, a Lego was a little plastic box. It was actually wooden. It was a wooden block and it fit together with other blocks. That's as far as I got. Yeah. That was 1957. Firework plastic. Yeah. And it still is. You can still get the plastic blocks and they stack together and you build stuff and you figure out what you're going to build and you make it happen. And so I'm an engineer and Thaka's an engineer and a lot of the folks who first get into Legos have the appreciation of building, but it's much more. It's so much more. Well, what has it become? How has it flowered out? Give us the state of the art, if you will. Well, you can see them for real at the district tournaments or at the state championship, always having 10 district tournaments in November across the state. And the kids are taking not just the blocks, but actually a lot of the gears and the linkages and programming robots with motors, Legos got robots and motors now, to actually do missions on the field and to make the topic area come alive to them by doing these missions. They fix a broken pipe, they move things around, they have the rain water and the dirty water and they have to keep them separate and, you know, they're putting water where it belongs and keeping it away from where it doesn't. It's much more than Legos. Yeah.  Okay. Yeah. So that's basically what Lego has gotten into. You can build stuff, you can do stuff, you can program a robot to move things to actually imagine that you're fixing the problems that Hawaii faces or the world faces. So, Taka, how much of what Maria said you agree with? All of it. I do want to add. The right answer is 110 percent. One thing that I want to add, these Lego sets that we have, not only can they move but there are sensors on these things too. So you can sense how far away an object is or it can sense noise, it can sense direction, color, it can sense light. Wow. It's just a whole McGillar. Yeah. So that's how you do these autonomous robots because, I mean, the robot has to kind of know where it's going and then see what's going on and then be able to do their tasks with all those motors and attachments. Yeah. Just a footnote to that. You know, that's really the incredible thing. We're talking about autonomous here for fourth graders through eighth graders. Yeah. Autonomous. Could they spell that? Autonomous. And here they are competing with autonomous cars. Autonomous drones. Autonomous robots. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. It's amazing. Well, the real neat thing too is I have young kids. And nowadays, I mean, they're talking about programming in kindergarten. So if you see the programming language for these robots, it's not what you and I might think of as a programming language, like actually typing in words and things on a screen. There are these graphic blocks on the side. Drag and drop kind of things. And drag and drop. I mean, there's like a move block and you put that there and then say, OK, a weight block and then a sensor block. And you just kind of put these instructions in a row and then you tell the robot to run this program that you've made. To them, it's just like a set of... What fun. Yeah. I mean, I want to just punctuate this by asking whether I can do it. I mean, am I over the hill?  I want to do it too. Eventually you could. My spare time. Yeah. You might have to be instructed about five minutes or so. It sounds like great fun for anybody. But especially for kids, it probably really... What does it do to them? It opens their minds. What kind of mental effect do you have when you expose a kid to robots? Well, actually, they build the robots themselves. So it's more what effect does that robot have on everything else? Yeah. The kids make great effect on their... Extending their own consciousness is what leverage. I know. It's the most incredible toy. It's exciting. It has an effect on other things. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. I want to join the tournament. I may be a little old. I'm out of the eighth grade already, but... You'd have to come in as a volunteer. Okay. Yes. So what's it like? What do I see there if I go down there? What happens? Well, it depends where you're assigned.  Ooh, that's scary. Referee. You're good. We need... Anyway. There you are. So the folks who are watching the game... I'm putting out a total of that. We're talking about Legos, right? Yeah. First Robotics. Yes. The sport of the mind. Right. The sport of the mind. Yeah. Sorry. So each of these at the robot part, now there are different parts of the event, but the robot where the robot is on the playing field and moving things around, that's two and a half minutes. And so as a referee, you'd be there and make sure everything's in place. And the students, two out of the 10 team members will be up at the table with the robot that they have built and they have programmed. And the attachments that they can put on the robot and take off the robot. Then when it says go, this robot goes off and starts doing things. And you're watching to make sure that if they have to touch the lever in order to make that thing happen, it happens. And meeting the specifications. Right. Right. Yeah. Exactly. Or if they touch... Let's say the robot crashes into something and they have to go rescue it, they actually have a touch penalty. So you set aside one of the little pieces and set aside so you can keep track of how many penalties they might have incurred. And some of them do that as a strategy. So after two and a half minutes of intense concentration, lots of cheering. Sometimes growth. Everybody's watching. Sometimes catastrophe. Sometimes just so happy that something went perfectly. So fun. So fun. Yeah.  What do the winners get? They get it all up. Well... They get a trip to some far away place, like Washington, DC. Some of the teams are selected to advance to the state championship. And so those... And then we have awards in different categories. You know, you have a robot performance award. If your robot got more points than the other teams and they have three tries. They go up and they do this match three times each team. And so the highest score of all is the one that takes up the robot performance award. And then you've got core values award and then you also have an award for the project. And we didn't talk about the project yet. No, no, we're going to talk about the project. First I have the question. Right. This is lingering in my brain. You've got to sort of flush out the cash, you know. Sensors. Sensors. It reminds me of something that UH did in the harbor. In the harbor they made an autonomous robotic small catamaran thing. It was loaded with sensors and it went everywhere and did check the water, check the bottom, check the weather, I mean it checked everything and it reported back. And it was a robot, of course, and it was, in fact, well I guess you could control it about where it went. But it's a mission of sensing things that was pretty much automated. And it opened my mind just about three, four years ago. It opened my mind to the notion that with sensors, which are always getting better, right, always getting better, you can do anything.  In this competition. Give us an example. There was one where the robot had to go and had to flip these plates around. Yeah. And depending on what color was facing, it would either have to look at it and sense like do I have to flip it around to the dark side or leave it like the way it is. And so you would have to program the robot to go look. If it had to be flipped over, you had to make a device that would actually flip this disk over, basically. And it would have to go to the next one, the next one, the next one. There were like four or five in a row. And I remember watching that thinking, the things that these kids are doing, I mean the kids don't know if it's going to be the color side or the black side facing them. So the robot has to know that. All on its own. And it did it. And then to figure out how to flip this thing over, it was pretty amazing. And these are like fourth to eighth graders. Well, that's the strength, isn't it? They can think out of the box. Yeah, the opportunity. Yeah, yeah. They're just amazing. But it also excites their ability to think. And we talk about robots doing autonomous things and sensors and all that. This is what we need now. This is going to be, I mean, it already is a world of robots. So it's totally relevant that these kids learn about robotics. Because if they give it five or 10 years, we're going to have robots doing everything. And they're right. They'll be marketable. When they hit the 12th grade, big bucks. I can't imagine how smart the engineers coming out of school are going to be when these kids go through engineering school and they hit the workforce. I mean, they've been doing this since they've been in kindergarten. So they're just going to be leaps and bounds over anything that we can do. This has changed their lives. I mean, if we had one right here right now, and we said to them, are you going to go into robotics and engineering and buildings, things like this, what would you say? Well, they're probably thinking about it. And at that age, they know that they can go into almost anything. So if they're enjoying the creative part and the engineering part, they might very well. But the other part is it's not just for the kids who want to be engineers or think they want to be engineers. Because you've got the project side and you've got this whole teamwork side. And if you have a smart person who can put stuff together and make the device do what he wants, is that enough? Or does he have to communicate? Does he have to get a team to get it? Do they have to coordinate? That's one of the things is you've got 10 kids on a team and one robot and a bunch of different missions. Sometimes, what, 15 missions or something? You've got to negotiate and you strategize. Which missions do we do first? Which one? How long do they take? How can we put them in order? And sometimes the kids have to reprogram the thing they worked so hard on. They may need to rebuild that attachment that they've fallen in love with because it's such a perfect design. But it has to work with the real world. It has to work with the other parts of the system. And so the earlier they can learn that, I think, the more flexible they become when they need to get into a real team where you have all these challenges and you have to tweak your design, you have to change your design, you have to change the whole strategy sometimes because it's just not working there. But then in the process, you're building confidence. It's all about confidence. So you know that you can try again. Failure, is it a bad thing or is it a step to learning? If you can learn from something that didn't work, you can eliminate that and come up with something better. But you might go back to that later to answer another challenge. So I think that whole mindset, the growth mindset, the integrating, the learning, and working with others and appreciating what others can bring to the project. And so the project. Okay, before we talk about the project, I want to see the graphics.  And then I want to see the kids with all that vitality and confidence that you're talking about. I want to feel there. So that graphic, I think the Hawaii First Robotics is an international program. I want to talk a little bit about it. So first isn't, I mean it's first and number one. What is first stands for? First stands for For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology. It was founded by Dean Kamen who... Oh, I remember him with the... Segway. The Segway guy. He came out here, he was here. Oh yeah? Yeah, I met him. Oh great. Yeah, so it was all started by him back in 1989. And so under first there are a variety of competitions or programs, I guess. There's the graphic that just came up. The lowest level would be Junior. First Lego League Junior, that's for kindergarten. Okay, so was that it? Okay, the green one. So kindergarten to fourth grade. And that's where Maria kind of alluded to, but every year there's like a challenge theme. This year it's hydrodynamic, so it's like water resources. So the Junior kids, the FLL Junior kids will make a model in the theme of that year. You know, it'll do something related to water resources. They get certain kinds of challenges in the other groups, the red and the brown there. They get other kinds of challenges. Right, so first Lego League, which is that middle one for grades fourth to eight, they'll have to do a project in the theme of that year. So this year's teams will think about ways to maybe purify water better or to store water more efficiently. Waste water. So yeah, so there'll be that. There'll be a project that they have to think about and present to judges. And then they'll also have to make an autonomous robot to do missions on a mission board in that theme. Everybody on the team have to present, because sometimes they're shy, you know. The whole team has to. The whole team has to get out there. The whole team goes together and makes a presentation to the judges. At the end of the day, nobody is shy. They might be shy, but they get over, they learn to get over that. It's part of the sport, yeah. And I gotta say, I mean, this is one of the things that really sets, to me, sets the first program apart from other robotics programs, because a lot of times the other robotics programs concentrate on robotics, but then what first does is it promotes, they have, I think called gracious professionalism, and I'll read this off, because I know I wouldn't do it justice unless I read it, but gracious professionalism is a part of the ethos of first. It is a way of doing things that encourages high quality work, emphasizes value of others, and respects individuals and their community. So in the long run, gracious professionalism is part of pursuing a meaningful life, when they can add to society and enjoy the satisfaction of knowing one's act with integrity and sensitivity. So that on graphic number three shows the three parts. You see that again, graphic number three? Yeah. Well, that's two. That's two, okay. The graphic number three is a triangle, and it shows robotics. Triangle, if we can find it. Nope. Nope, that's okay. That's okay. We'll describe it verbally. We need to be flexible. Yes, we do. Yeah. Yeah. Resilient. This is what Dr. was talking about. Yeah, so there's a series of core values that First has. So the first one is we are a team. We do work to find solutions with guidance from our coaches and mentors. We know our coaches and mentors do not have all the answers, and we learn together. We honor the spirit of friendly competition. Good sportsmanship, basically. What we discover is more important than what we win, which is a really important point for First. We share our experiences with others, and we display gracious professionalism and co-operatician in everything that we do, and we have fun. Wow. And I'll tell you one other you didn't mention. About halfway through the show, we take a break. We can do that now. All right. This is Stink Tech Hawaii, raising public awareness. Son, all the better to see you with my dear. That's so cool. What are you doing? Okay, cool. Research says reading from birth accelerates the baby's brain development. And you're doing that now? Oh, yeah, yeah. This is the starting line. Posh. Oh, dad. Read aloud 15 minutes. Every child, every parent, every day. Aloha. My name is Mark Shklav. I am the host of Think Tech Hawaii's Law Across the Sea. Law Across the Sea comes on every other Monday at 11 a.m. Please join us. I like to bring in guests that talk about all types of things that come across the sea to Hawaii, not just law, love, people, ideas, history. Please join us for Law Across the Sea. Aloha. Bingo, we're back. Yeah. And we're gonna bring some kids down. All right. That'd be great. We're gonna show them around. We're gonna show them all our technology. We're gonna show them all the electronics we can in the thought that they might be able to use that when they set up these robotics. Yeah. Okay, wanna go back to the point about the concept, the problem, the solution. This is really important. How do you set that up, Maria? Well, I think he was talking about what he loves about the program.  Your community in this topic, this year it's water. Water, right. It was energy in 2007, which is when I got involved originally. So they have all these, every year is a different topic. So this year they're looking at how does Hawaii find and transport and treat and dispose of and use water and how can we do it better? So they have to imagine themselves inventing not just a technology, but sometimes it's a law. Sometimes it's a public information campaign. It's some way to deal with whatever problem they have identified and they care about. And not only are they imagining themselves doing this, they actually sometimes are pursuing that and they're getting involved in the real issues in society that at this grade four through eighth, do we usually expect the kids to get knowledgeable about a topic, do research on how it could be better and propose a solution that's very empowering to them, very exciting to them and their teachers and their mentors. It should be. It's a big, big, big issue and lots of things are happening. And I wonder, I mean, for example, this is really important, yeah. For example, there's a guy named Don Thomas in Southwestern University, you must know him, right? He'll work in a geothermal, but he's also incidentally been working with water and he made this fabulous discovery, okay, in the saddle between Manakea and Manila. He found out the water table was much higher and there was lots more fresh water there because of the topography. This was not discovered when they did the last topographical survey in 1940 or so. He discovered it within the last year or two, okay? And we actually have much more fresh water, not only on the big island in the saddle, but on all the islands because of discoveries he has made regarding the strata of the topography, okay? So if you're talking with kids about a project involving water, they should know about this, right? They should sort of build this in. Will they know, will they care about what Don Thomas is doing?  Both. Okay, ooh. Yeah, because the teams are looking for mentors in the community that they can go talk to, check their ideas, get ideas from them. What are the issues? What are the problems? What are some solutions? And then when they come up with a solution to actually go take it to the experts and say, hey, what do you think? Yeah, that's excellent. Why would he love to talk to them? Would they love to talk to him? They would, yeah. So we can send his contact info to the coaches and say, hey guys. So this could happen. They could actually connect with cutting-edge stuff right now. It can be Skype, it can be in-person, you know, if he's interested in maybe serving as a judge for... He might be, a scientist. Yeah, we've got a tournament on the big island.  I don't know if he won. It will be great if it's gonna... Yeah, anyway. You know, San Diego just got finished spending $10 billion on desalination. Yeah. And the jury's out as to whether we need that here, but assuming we wreck our water supply and the lens, you know, the lens you guys are engineers and the lens, right? Yeah, yeah. You know, because of environmental violations of one kind or another. Then maybe those kids should learn about desalination too, about the process. Sure. The cost, the entrepreneurial aspects of the economics of it, right? So you could also factor that into the solution, the problem and the solution for them. So that's really cutting-edge current stuff. It is. Yeah. It is. Boy, fabulous. I knew he'd like this. I do. So tell us about some of the other topics that have been chosen and tell us who between the two of you, Maria and Taka, has been choosing these topics. Oh, we don't. This is an international program. Oh, some guy in Norway? No, no. No, probably in New Hampshire, I think, is where they're based. Oh, where Dean Kamen lives. He lives there, you know. That's probably why it's based there. So yeah, every year, there's a big reveal in September. And that's when they announce what the challenge of that year is gonna be. So we don't know. We don't know what it's gonna be until they announce it. Well, so it's the same everywhere. Yeah. But it's not the same for all the three groups that we saw on the chart. It'll be different for those three groups. It'll be related. Like, the junior folks will do something water-related this year as well. But not necessarily exactly the same. Well, the general topic is that but the solutions they're seeking to be different and the solutions they find, certainly will be different. So you asked what the topics have been. So I got involved in 2007, which is about halfway there. It started in 1999, but in 2007 was Power Puzzle, which is all about energy. So that's when I got started in it. I don't know what year you first. Smart moves. Oh, 2009, transportation, yep. So between 2007 and 2009 was 2008, Climate Connections, Global Climate Change. In 2010, it was about biomedical engineering, body forward. 2011 was Food Factor, Preventing Food Worn Illness. Yeah, and 2012, Senior Solutions, Assisting the Elderly. You know, what are their challenges? Oh, sure. What can we do? Yeah, that was very interesting. You're all great topics. 2013, Nature's Sherry, Natural Disasters. How do you make your cities more resilient? How do you recover from natural disasters? Talk about a topical thing now. So the kids who went through that are probably even more understanding of what some folks are facing these days. 2014, World Class, Improving the Teaching Process. Now that was very close to home for everybody involved. Hey, how can we... You all had opinions about that, yeah. Yeah, how do people learn? How do you communicate that, you know, and how do you improve that? Using technology, using different understanding of the brain, understanding of development. It was great. 2015, Trash Trek, Management of Solid Waste. You know, in that one, I remember some team actually talking about implementing solutions.  You know, it actually kind of, the whole school stopped using as much plastic through the effort of this team of 10 kids. Yeah. Animal Allies was 2016, Animal People Interactions and 2017, Hydrodynamics, Water. So, the Lego part is only one possible solution to the problem you are assigning them, am I right? Well, it's a different part. You don't necessarily have to have... Oh. Or do you? Lego and... The team has to do all three parts of it. Three parts are? Well, the robotics piece, which is the Legos. The Lego Mindstorms robot and the... You build the pieces out of Legos. Right. On this four-foot by eight-foot playing field. Okay. That's a required part. That's a required part. You really gotta be efficient. And project is one part of it. And then the core values. They actually have a teamwork exercise and whatnot. And then there's an extra bit focusing on the design of their robots and attachments and stuff. So, on the competition day, what people can see is the robots on the four-foot by eight-foot field trying the different missions and getting points. The other stuff is in small groups with professionals and other community members as the judges on the teamwork, robot design, and project. So, every team has to do all of those parts. And those are interviews. Those three parts. So, the team will go in without their coaches. Adults aren't allowed in there, except for the judges. So, just a team and like three judges and they'll have to do a presentation on either core values, how they work together as a team. Their project, like what their innovative solution is and why it should be implemented or how they designed and executed their robot. They do it all on their own. Yeah. So, what are the parameters for winning? I mean, what do you have to do to win? You have to, well, each one has a score. And so, we'll put that in a spreadsheet and you calculate the score. And the judges score it numerically. Right. They'll do it by rankings. And then certain, you know, you'll get more points for being higher up obviously. And so, they'll average the three together and the team with the best average score will win. You know, I love the notion that these are the areas of inquiry you read out. Those problems, those projects are really totally current. We could use solutions. But even if these kids don't come up with solutions right now today in November, they're oriented toward finding solutions and these problems are not gonna be resolved overnight. So, they'll be building, what do you call it, scientific citizens, engineering citizens, remember? Who will solve the problems of the future? We need them bad. Oh, yeah. So, my question is why, you named about 1,000 kids are involved. In Hawaii. In Hawaii statewide. Why isn't every single kid in every single school starting fourth grade involved in this program? A lot of it is coaching and just, it takes a lot of work. On the part of the coaches. Right, and so that's a difficulty because I know a lot of schools would love to have more kids involved but then they might have only a couple of teachers who are willing to do that. It's a lot of time for the parents too. I mean, there's a lot of practice time. How can I get to be a coach? You wanna be one? You can make your coach right now. Write my name down. Yeah, we'll do, we'll do. We're always looking for coaches. Or mentors. Now in March, you know, the Hawaii Academy of Science conducts its, what do you call it, science fair. It's a convention center and they got 700 applicants usually from the statewide to come and present their poster boards in their projects and listen and defend their projects, which is an important part of it. What's the comparison? Can I be in both? Should I be in both? A lot of kids are. I mean, a lot of those kids who do Lego League because the Lego League, the state tournament is in December. So usually you can just do that whole thing and it's done in December and then after that you can do your thing. One in the fall, one in the spring. Yep. Had my whole year occupied by science. Yeah, yeah. Okay, we're about out of time. So I'd like to ask you guys to do two separate things, okay? First, you Maria, I'd like you to address the parents of these kids and tell them what they should know and think about what they should ideate about in terms of dealing with and being involved, having the kids involved in this program. Thank you for supporting, because the parents are supporting just as much as, you know, all of those of us who are setting things up because the parents do volunteering, you know, they bring the kids and they support the coaches and they bring the snacks and everything else. And they really do contribute a lot and then we ask them to serve as volunteers. So very often you've got the judges and the referees and the folks at the events, you know, it takes like 50 people to just show up on that day to be directing the traffic and registering people and, you know, delivering things where they need to be delivered and keeping score. So they really put in a lot of time too. So thank you for supporting the programs and supporting the teachers and the coaches and your kids and contributing whatever needs to be contributed to this program. You are so enthusiastic. How do you really feel? Oh, sorry. It's terrible. Too much work. Taka. Yes. Could you address some remarks to the kids? The kids in the program and the kids who could come into the program, why is it in their interest to do so?   They make really good friends through the process. And then before they know it, they've learned something. But, you know, it's, you know, what's there not to know about playing with Legos and doing these things on the game board? I mean, it's a great experience. You get to meet all sorts of people, even from other schools. If you win, you might get to go to worlds and compete against people from all over the world and meet all sorts of different people. So it's just a great program and I can't say nothing about it. Our kids are our most important asset. We've got to build them to do this. Yep, they got to take care of us. Yeah. Thank you, Taka. Thank you, Maria. Thank you. All the way.


A good student-teacher relationship to me looks like the students want to come to class and they want my opinion, they seek my opinion, but then they also work. They're motivated, they're engaged, they want to work, they want to do better. They want the feedback, they're just excited about doing it. It could be laughing in class, laughing at me in class, which has happened.  It's sort of like, it's not really like a friend, but sort of at a different type of level, sort of more of an adult, but almost like a peer, but not quite. Not that sort of intent. Not that it's friendlies or peer. A good student-teacher relationship feels really satisfying, enjoy, it's enjoyable, it's fun. It makes me come to school every day. I think a good relationship with my students looks like, or has the strength to carry on outside the classroom. And I think that for me when I go away at the end of the day, end of the week or end of the year, and can comfortably say that those students knew they could come and see me at any time, they knew that I generally was invested and interested in them as people, not just their education. I think that's what relationships for me in the classroom means, yeah. It feels great. Well, I think for the kids it feels good as well. It's respect, it's trust, it's not only me having the ability to talk to them, but it's them wanting to come forward and talk to me when and if I need to. I think it's important that everybody, and you have that discussion first, that everybody's allowed to have an opinion. You don't have to agree with it, but if you do like positive feedback all the time, there's not to be, you know, judgmental phrases used within that. It's about, like I said, making students feel safe enough to say whatever it is that they feel. Students get stressed when you put them in seating plans and when they're taken away from their friends. So my classes, they're a bit of creatures of habit, they always sit in the same place and they tend to sit with their peers that they feel comfortable with, which, and I'm quite happy, I let them do that so that they can sit there and they can talk about issues that they may not have come across before, that they need to build their confidence about, and they can do that with somebody that they feel comfortable with. And I use little whiteboards and I'll give them a question and in class they have a question, they have time to discuss it with each other, with the people that they're sitting with or peers. And then they can, if they want to answer the question in the whole class, then they get the chance to contribute that to the whole class. And I use my talking stick because they're so enthusiastic about talking that I have a stick so that they know that they've got a, it's a wand, sparkly wand. It's fun and that they have to have the stick to talk. That's usually how we start out the topics before we get into the more heavier type writing type stuff. I think some of the techniques with the relationship building for us is fortunate with the curriculum area and those types of things. I'm actually able to give the kids a lot of choice. We quite often in design fields will give them a scenario or a problem, but they get to bring in their own context of what it is in their interests and what they drive. And I guess that opens the dialogue for conversation around who they are as people and what they want. I think they know that I respect them and respect their choices, whether they're good or not so good choices, but that there's a reason behind everything. And I think that they know that I understand that, particularly those students with really challenging backgrounds and outside of school environments. Sometimes school is their safe place. A lot of times school is their safe place. The respect that they know that I have for them and I believe that they do know that I respect them is based around them knowing that I'm not going to judge them on whatever's happening. And I usually advocate for them with some other teachers as well. I think a lot of the relationships I've developed with the students and our clientele is, I guess, for me it's a simple thing and ice breakers getting to know the students at the beginning of the season, ensuring that I'm an open book is an important aspect of that. I think a lot of our students vary in the ways that they want to be known and they want to be seen by adults and it takes a little bit sort of to pick a way at the wall to get in and get to know them. So it's a challenge and I guess relationship building for me and my students is an individual from student to student and getting to know what it is that drives them and how they're here. I think a lot of the challenges in a lot of my classes, unfortunately, they're quite small classes and we did it this morning, is we get to sit down and have conversation and we have conversation where they will table something and I'll question it. But it's a safe environment where they know whatever they respond with isn't the wrong answer. And I think that challenging aspect can be daunting for people but if the environment is set to the standard where whatever they bring forward is acceptable, it becomes a very good learning base. They're enthusiastic and there are lots of different viewpoints which is good for the subject because I want to be able to discuss and we can discuss lots of different viewpoints and they get to see different people's viewpoints just by looking at the whole class and listening to each other. But then again also they're a bit of a challenge in encouraging them to listen to everybody other but they all want to have a go and have something to say so it can be really intense which in itself is good too because you don't go out feeling like it was just a boring class. Students who have here are a lot of quite complex students and have come from an interesting background and also usually have big issues happening in their life. Quite a few of them will come to seek my opinion or just to have a chat and to talk to me about things that are happening in their life outside of the subject itself. I know because they tell me, they like coming to my class, they like legal studies and they'll be laughing and they seem to enjoy themselves and have fun but learning at the same time. So part of engagement I think is making things relevant for the students and that becomes easy if you can draw on their past experiences and the past outcomes that they've had and what hasn't worked and what has worked and what would be best for that particular unit or module that they're doing or topic of work. So what they've experienced in the past definitely has a huge impact and being able to, if you don't know what those experiences are you can't draw on them. So that's a huge part of getting to know your students and what they've done in the past, making sure you know their ability levels, their reports and their home life as much as you can as much as they want to tell you. It's never a pressure thing. I generally start with whatever you don't want to tell me, don't tell me, I'm just here to teach you. It might help, might not. So how that helps them engage and keep them motivated is if I know things about them and I know the way they learn or things that they're interested in then I can try and incorporate that into what we're doing in class. I do include their prior interests or their interests because I want to know what they're interested in and what they're good at. Particularly this topic that we're studying at the moment I actually ask them, here's a list of options, which ones do you want to do? And they get to tell me which ones are going to do. Or their interests, I use them in making the examples relevant to them so they can understand it. So I ask them, if we're talking about contracts, does anybody have a job? What you do is your job, use that as examples. Is that to make it relevant to them so they understand? We use my examples. I think the role of giving students choice, obviously in their learning is the number one thing for me is motivation. But it also instills trust that I have in them that what they bring to the table they can continue within their assessment pieces and as much as I challenge them that they can challenge me with their thoughts and what's driving. Student interests get brought into my teaching an awful lot. An example of some of the projects around the place, the skateboard rack that's sitting in the school grounds. I had a student last term that's a state representative for softball. He created a community problem around softball training and we created a training divorce and aid for him to use with his softball coaching as he endeavours to use careers. Honing in on their specific interests is a massive aspect of the growth with their kids.


A multi-story residential building and a tower house in Hamas and other media outlets in Gaza City collapsed after Israel warned the occupants in advance to evacuate. Another structure was heavily damaged in the airstrikes. The building is located in the busy shopping area of Ghazan. Other airstrikes hit was Israel's military set where rocket launch sites, Hamas offices and homes of Hamas leaders. Hostilities between Palestinian militants and Israeli army intensified in the third day of fighting.


think tech, raising public awareness about technology, energy, diversity, and globalism. This show is center stage. I'm your guest host Tony Pasculli, filling in for Donna Blanchard, who's on the mainland again. Donna Blanchard is the proud managing director of Kumakua Theater, which is right down the block. We're broadcasting live from Pioneer Plaza in the heart of downtown Chinatown. We're going to be talking today with Jeannie Barroga. She is a playwright and author, and she is in particular the author of the new play, Buffalo'd, at Kumakua Theater opening. When is that opening, Jeannie? Thursday, tomorrow. Opening tomorrow. That's exciting. Are you ready? Yes. Okay, great. And this is not the first time you've had this play produced. Is that right? It's been done somewhere else? This is considered the Hawaiian premiere. It was the world premiere in 2012 at San Jose Stage in California. So I understand the play is about buffalo soldiers in the Philippines, and that's really all I know.  Is that right?  What would you tell me? I would tell you that the buffalo soldiers were first formed in the Civil War. They were invited to fight for the North against the South for their own freedom, and proved to be such good fighters they went on to fight in the Indian Wars and in the Caribbean and Spanish American War and the Philippines and even a little further to the Boxer Rebellion. So the buffalo soldiers have quite a history since that time. And what makes them buffalo soldiers? Two schools of thought. One is that when they fought in the Indian Wars, there were 38 recorded Indian Wars that they fought in, and the Indians were so impressed with their fighting ability, they named them after their favorite animal, Katanka, which is buffalo. And the other school of thought is their woolly hair resembled the buffalo. So I go with the first. Okay. Great. So how is this production shaping up compared to, I don't want to put you on the spot and make you choose a favorite, but obviously this is going to be a very Kumakoho. It's going to be a very different sort of production than your production on the mainland, I imagine. So what are some of the differences that you've encountered along the way? CAST. But the difference is that it really is a new play. After it closed in 2012, I rewrote it two months later. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. Great. Because then I just figured there are things I could still tweak. And as a writer, if you're going to grow and really look at your own work critically, it's like, okay, if I can fix that, I will. And if I get another production, it'll be ready. So I set myself up that way in the anticipation that I'm going to make it the best possible product I can. Okay. Great. Any other differences? I imagine that Kumu, I don't know this, but I imagine Kumu is a smaller, more intimate than you, than your previous venue. Yeah. Well, actually, it's almost about the same seat. Oh, really? Okay. But San Jose Stage was an equity house. So that's the biggest difference. So now you're working with much more passionate people. Passionate people who are doubling, tripling, quadrupling roles, which are amazing that they can get that much done in the amount of time that they were given. So, yeah. How involved are you as the playwright with the production? Are you kind of hands-on? Does the director allow you into the room? The director, Ribb, has been very, very good about allowing me into the room. But we had been in conversation by telephone for at least a couple months before I came out. And that established the groundwork for our working relationship. So once I came into town, which was earlier in January, I started sitting in on some of the rehearsals and we would have our talks afterwards. And then I'd go away for a couple of days and come back and see what else had been done and comment on that. And as it got closer to opening, which is tomorrow, the amount of involvement just sort of lessened and lessened. And now it's on them there. It'd be wonderful to see what they'll show me and everybody on opening night tomorrow. Any surprises for you in this production? Surprises. Anything just like, oh, that's an interpretation that hadn't occurred to me before. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I kind of hesitate to tell them about it because it's so wonderful. It's a monologue. No spoilers. It's a monologue that turned into something very, very creative and theatrical. It was a whole different view of how to even handle that compared to San Jose Stages Urgent. So I really was pleased with it, yeah. That's one of the things I love about live theater is that it's, you know, it's unique and it's ephemeral. You can't really see the same play twice. Even if you in the same play, right? Same play. Well, you said even the play script is different. Yeah. But just coming to it with a new cast and a new director and a new venue just changes everything. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And coming into town and also having a different script. So by the time it shows tomorrow, I would say it's another, maybe another 5% change since they first got the script. How long have you been in town to support the production? I arrived January 5th. Is this your first trip to Hawaii? Oh, excuse me. I lost my thing. Is this your first trip to Hawaii? No, I've been here about a dozen times. Oh, great. Okay. So is there something about this play that you think is particularly relevant to Hawaii? I think in general, it's a viewpoint of where the US really became an imperialist country and how that affected not only the Philippines, but pretty much all the islands across the Pacific, between the US and China. And that to me really was a point I wanted to make a bigger emphasis over with this production, because the takeover preceded the Philippines at least by six years. So there was already that school of thought about, you know, they're coming this way and they're starting to take over this and own that and beware of it. And it kind of gave a heads up to the American public, too, about what are you doing? This is not even a little over 30 years since the Civil War. Why can't you take care of things at home? And why do we need to go over there and take over countries and essentially use people who we have no connection with or we don't know about and yet we're trying to change their culture. So across the board, yeah, anything that was along that path, any island, any territory, but particularly Hawaii. And I did adapt that in my PowerPoint presentation that I was giving at the local colleges, Windward, Leeward, UH Manoa. So I wanted to make sure that that was something the local audiences would be able to identify with. That's great. And so and then just to be clear, that's that is supporting material that you did for the colleges. That's sort of a lecture. That's the history. That's the background. But the play itself is is not a history lesson. It's a dramatization. It's still a very human story. Very theatrical. And there's the Screma arts, martial arts that the actors had to learn and also be able to morph it really into dances because that's what happened in that war they were not allowed to congregate. So they would have their their meetings and their dances and disguise the moves. So yeah, I just really think it was something that would add to the theatricality of it. There is an original song by the playwright. There's other songs of the period. So I see it as a full theatrical experience. Great. I had another question for you and it slipped my mind when we were talking about that. So what? Oh, this is it. What was it that brought this play to Kuma? Was that you? Was that Kuma? Did you submit it as part of the playwriting contest or something else? Or when it was in production in San Jose, I really thought, you know what, this would be nice to see the theaters that I'd worked with before it would be interesting. Again, I always resummit to the theaters I've worked with before and Kuma Kuma. You did a talk story at Komu in 1995. That's a while ago. Yeah. So I had been in touch with Harry. And I was kind of sending him draft after draft after draft till fine. I said, this is it. This is the one I would really be nice to be able to even have a reading of, you know, just kind of get my foot in the door again. And in summer of 2016, he finally contacted me and he said, we're just didn't do it. And I was like, yes. And then and so you brought this play to Kuma, but I'm sure because you're connected with what is it, the Asian Asian American theater company that's in San Francisco? That's in San Francisco. Yeah. So you must have done other other plays that the tie into the Hawaii experience in some way, the Asian community in some way. Why why this play at this time? Why this play at this time? At the time when I was influenced and inspired to write it, we were in a state of being aware of the Gulf Gulf War soldiers having a very, very, very hard time over there. They don't talk about the desertion rates really, but it was something that was becoming more and more of an issue. And so when I came across a story about the Buffalo soldiers, I figured, okay, there's something that probably could connect people today, modern audiences with what already had happened back then. It's the repeat of history that shouldn't have to happen. That's that's kind of one of the issues I was making a point about. So yeah, it's always my plays are always meant to to connect something going on currently. And without hitting people over the head, it's just like, look at this story, you know, re look at history as you've been taught or not taught and just just be aware that there are other ways of thinking about that parallel residences. Sure. Okay. Do you so you've done you've written a lot of plays, 60 plays, according to your that I tell people about it's really more than that. But I want to have some some trunk plays. I'm sure trunk plays a lot of trunk plays. So are there are there themes in your plays you keep coming back to? Yeah, pretty much. Identity was a large one for a long time. Connection, which is I see as Buffalo's main theme, really. And again, it's because of all the disparate cultures and peoples that are in America today. I write about an American landscape. I want to see on stage, the friends and the people I see on the street that I rub shoulders with. So it needs for me to be that specific, let's say. So even though people say, Oh, you write just Filipino plays, not necessarily. I really write to show that there are Filipinos in this fabric that we call the American society. Yeah, and then there's others. The people you meet on the street is going to depend on what street you live on, for sure. So definitely something I experienced moving to Hawaii. Speaking of, Cece, you've been out here for how long? A couple weeks? I don't know. It's almost about three weeks. Three weeks? Okay. I've had a chance to do anything fun in the islands besides you've been changed at the theater all the whole time. Yes. You're out here with your your husband, Sony, who is who is watching the show right now. He arrived a couple days ago. So I had time to kind of just bop around the island and find some little snorkeling areas. And I got in touch with an old friend of mine, who is the daughter of a band member who was in my dad's band. So I wanted to connect that way as well, just because the history of my own family is something very new for me. In the last year, I finally found a lot of things on ancestry. And I direct the PowerPoint lecture about two other people who may have that same type of dilemma. Like, where did I come from? How did I end up here? You know, just to say, we're going to take a break. Second, we will be back after about a minute break with Jeannie Baroga. Playwrights her play Buffalo is opening at Kumakahu. Aloha, I'm Kauai Lucas, host of Hawaii is my mainland here on think to Hawaii every Friday at 3pm. We address issues and importance for those of us who live here on the most isolated landmass on the planet. Please come join me Fridays at 3pm. Mahalo. Aloha and how only Maka Hiki Ho, which is happy new year and I hope it's a happy and prosperous new year for you. I'm kidding Akina with the grassroots Institute. Every week we partner with think to Hawaii and produce a program called a Hanukako. Let's work together. We bring together movers and shakers who are making a difference here in Hawaii, making a better Hawaii for everyone. If you're interested in improving the economy, the government and society, join us every week on Mondays at 2 o'clock PM for a Hanukako on the think tech Hawaii broadcast network. Until you see me then. Aloha. Welcome back to think tech Hawaii. This is center stage. This is again Tony Piscoli guest hosting for Donna Blanchard, who's still in the mainland, and we are talking to Jeannie Baroga playwright, author, director, actor, backstage helper in theater. You wear all the hats. What are what are some of the more unusual hats you have worn in the more unusual? Hmm, let's see. That's hard to say. They're probably early in the career when I was thrown into the booth to work not only the sound and the music cues and what was the other one? It was it was it was like three different things at once. And of course, I had contracted to just do sound and while you're up there in that small booth, instead of us getting another person in there, but that's not as unusual really. No, no, that's that's not unusual at all. It happens all the time. Right, right. Probably the one thing was when I was the associate artistic director of Asian American Theater, and actors came in from all over for Philip Katanda's play. And they said, Well, would you would you drive them around? All right. Well, okay, these are Asian American actors that had very specific needs, let's say, and they wanted to go to a very specific restaurant. And so we're driving around or driving around. And I'm thinking, like, we got to get back to the theater. This is just a break. No, no, you have to eat this place. It's really, really wonderful. So that was kind of unusual there. But also being called upon to drive around a very, very well known actually, Hollywood, who they had her up in a bed and breakfast, which was really nice, except she didn't know anybody to for the very, very short weekend run. And so they said, Would you take her around?  Fine, you know. So I took her around to Chinatown in San Francisco. And boom, everyone recognized her. So I'm thinking, Oh, good, she gets to see people, they get to see her in town like that. So it was really, it was unusual because because I knew it was important for her to be seen, you know, and she was so appreciative after that, because she knew that she wasn't going to be able to make her own way around. And in the short time, she was there. Oh, that's nice. It's always great to have a host. I mean, yeah, just really introduces you, not just shows you the places, but connects you to the people in the place. That's a wonderful thing. So yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, and that just taught me a lot too about about sometimes when you think someone is big, there's a humility that they know that is part of that persona as well in order to have a fan base that will love them really, you know, so she was very gracious. I just, I was, it was lovely to spend time with her. We were talking before the show about how when you when you get involved in theater, you end up doing basically all the jobs. And then you settle you're mostly a player right now. Is that your favorite job?  Well, that's the one I put on my tax return. So yeah, it's the one that brings in the majority of the money. So I'm saying is that the one you enjoy the most? Oh, yeah. Okay, that's great. That's always nice. I mean, it's helpful to get the income coming in. But you also love it. Yeah. So I mean, because of course, there were times early on where I didn't get that that kind of income. This is like all love and to the point where you're holding down four other jobs, you're paying to be in theater. And and it's it over time, it changes. And it's so so gradual, you don't really notice it because you still love it. Yeah. So you're also a director. How is that? How is that different from play writing? Oh, way, way different. It's different hats. I keep calling it different hats. When I would talk to my cast about the play that I wrote. And they'll say, you know, I don't quite get this point blah, blah, blah, blah. I said, let me run that by the playwright and I'll get back to you. So I just have to be very, very specific when I'm the director and when I'm the playwright, you know, so you have directed your own work? Yes. Okay. But I have directed other people's work to which is it's easier because then you you do have that distance to look at their their work and be the geometric for that as well as the director. It's easier. I guess it is easier to direct other people's work. But then on the other hand, how do you feel you're comfortable at this point, you must be you have to be you're comfortable having other people direct your work. There's a there's always that that sort of risk you take when you hand this is your baby and you hand to someone else and you say, here, please be gentle with this. And they just go, I have an idea for this. I see it as a as a Busby Berkeley musical. Like, no, no, it's not. Yeah, is that every horror story along those lines? That's pretty drastic. I think the probably one of the worst case scenarios was where I really did have to say no, this is probably not the play for you, you know, and I just pulled it. And that's a big chance because, of course, especially if money has already been exchanged.  Okay, you know, but that's very rare. You know, when you work with a director, like I'm working with Reb right now, and he says, I have ideas. I said, okay, run it by me. And you can still tell you're in sync, because the ideas, the presentation is going to change no matter what happens. But as long as it doesn't change the story and and and the lines, you know, but particularly the thrust of what the plays intent is, what the scenes intent is. To me, I'm probably a lot more flexible than some people because having gone through that route, I know when it works, you know, by a description, it's like, that sounds good. Let's try it. But if it doesn't, you know, we just say, you know, well, it's really gratifying to hear that you and Reb had been in so much contact beforehand. He's really open to, you know, having you in the room and working with you and a lot of directors are not like that. They really just want to, you know, it's like, Hey, your line, your job, your job is right. And I don't know. I mean, that's not to me the meaning of collaboration. And that's not the meaning of theater, because here I am in my little room alone and I'm typing and I know it so well, we give it to people. And there are things that are going to be explained. But as a playwright, it's like, if I have to explain that much, it's in the writing. That's something I have to change, you know. So that that's the difference to me. If if there's something we collaborate on, and we come to that same point, it's like, OK, good, we're on the same page, but we're just not working on a writer's level. It means I have to go back to the table, you know. And playwriting is sort of, as you were saying before, it's kind of a more fluid art form than some. I mean, I have friends who are novelists and you put a novel out there and that's it. You don't get a second second bite of the apple, you know, what you printed is what's there forever. And you you've mentioned that you got you immediately went back to Buffalo. Oh, I've lost my earpiece again. You immediately went back to Buffalo and and made changes. And is it something that you do often do? Or is this a special special play for you? Pretty much. Yeah, no, I don't think there was a play that's ever been produced the first time that I didn't touch again. Probably one. And that was a one act, but that was because I just worked. It worked. It worked until I finally got to the point where that's it. That's it. That's the one I want. But I still look at some older plays and I could tweak that. But it's not that important to like have a workshop about it. It's just like when it goes into production. I talked to the director. I said, can you look at this one area for me or just see how it works in your first reading? And that's that's enough feedback right there. Do you ever find yourself in the rehearsal process changing the play? Like this one? I'm not. No, I'm suggesting this one. No, no, no, no, but because I have. Oh, did you? Oh yeah. Okay. Wow. Yeah. So tell us about that. Well, okay. There were places in there that again, because it was a new script, I hadn't seen before. And seen the actors work a scene. Maybe there were too many words. I was like, okay, let's just see if we can we can infer that with the action instead. Because maybe the action is going to be stronger than these wordy, wordy, wordy words. And so we we did changes along that that line. The monologue I was telling you about before. That was another case in point. Talking it over about what what what is the final moment in at the end of the play? What do you want to really leave the audience with? And so that took that took a bit of talking through because it's like, well, we could do this, we could do that. And because I have it in my script already, it's like I already know I've got to change it because something already is going on that's better. So again, this this is after years and years of having dealt with many directors and and and learning when that that collaboration is just going to blossom or it's just going to, you know, lay flat. And this didn't happen here. You know, that's great. So yeah, that's another challenging thing about about play writing is that you like as you say sometimes you find that the action is so clear. The actors are so expressive that you can you can get by with less language and you can cut it away. You can strip it away in the rehearsal process. But unless that language is there in the first place, the actors, the director, may not necessarily know what the intention was to be able to play it. So as someone who goes back and forth between playwriting and directing, do you have a strategy for coping with that? Pretty much on a case-by-case basis. Sometimes it could be it could be the acting, you know. Being the writer, I'm always willing to believe that if I can fix it first, you know, there's only only a latitude that an actor or a person creating something can go because it's so concise. It's like, okay, I get it. I know what the point is, you know, and that means my writing worked. So that's why I test myself. You know, it's like if any actor can can read the scene and it still plays, I've done my job, you know, because that's what's going to happen. It's going to be in the mouths of very, very many different types of actors at different experience levels. And you've got to be as clear as you are as a writer to make sure that it will play no matter what. That's great. And then you said you're also an actor, so you have some experience with that too. You know what it is to take a script and find a way to make it work for yourself and deliver that language. So is that something you find valuable? I mean, having those different hats, is that being a director and an actor, does that assist you in writing plays? Yes and no. Okay, I was in a play two years ago and it turned out that playwright was one of my playwriting students. And she liked how I read as we were developing her play. She said, would you audition for this role? And I went, oh, no, I can do that. And so I finally went out for auditions and the director called me and he says, we want to offer you this role. And I went, okay, this will help her, I'm sure, you know. But being in the process, it's not even a but. When we're in the process, I could see already that the changes I had suggested to her while we're developing it, still hadn't been touched. And I said, this is the place and the time to kind of re-look at that. And at one point she was just really adamant, no, no, you have to be on stage for this. And I said, but it's not her moment. It's not that actor's. It's not that character's moment, you know. And as it turned out, right up until the very end it was, okay, yeah, yeah, we'll have to rethink that. But for now, let's just keep it. So it's that kind of concession that I kind of always have to kick myself. It's like, I shouldn't say anything. I'm an actor, you know. But they're asking me, if you ask me, I will tell you. If you ask me, I will tell you. And then she's a student too. I mean, sometimes you have to learn this stuff the hard way by trying it and getting it wrong and figuring out. Yeah. Well, she was a very, she's actually a very, very good writer. She's been around and published as a poet. But this was her first play. So that was something that was, that came into play too, because I knew she loved that story. And it worked for the most part. But it was just again, theatrically, whose moment is it when you're having these characters represent something. Right. So again, your play, Buffaloed, opens tomorrow night at Kumakahua Theatre. And you're excited about that. Yes. And this has been Jeanie Baroga. I'm Tony Pisculli, filling in for Donna Blanchard on center stage, Think Tech, Hawaii. Thank you so much.


Welcome to Toffy TV, we have just watched the press conference Marcel Brands and Markoog Silver, a Finch Farnbass, they look good, let's just start with that, they looked good, it was a complete 180 from seeing Steve Walsh in his old Silver Shadow high-techs. He strikes me as a mannydwy, Silver Shadow high-techs, jogging bottoms from BHS, and obviously Silver Day, looking smart as well, no big sound. So, what were your initial thoughts on just what they had to say? Yeah, very positive, I think they looked apart, which is good, and said a lot of things that we'd hoped they'd say, but said it with conviction I thought. I think the thing with brands, I think, the difference with like Walsh and Cooman, and with Demons, there seems to be a clear chain of command almost, that Marcel Brands is the man who is in control of this, and Markoog Silver is very much the head coach. I think he was the other way round with Walsh and Cooman, but I don't think they didn't appear to have much of a relationship, or certainly that's what we're led to believe, and I always felt Cooman felt himself he was bigger than everybody probably at the club. So, it's good that there's that air of authority about brands, and obviously now he's doing it, and Silver was very positive as well, so it's good. I thought what was good was the fact that the press conferences just in general, the fact that they were brought out together and introduced together rather than brands brought out last week and then Silver brought out. I think that showed straight away that there was a presentation of how it was going to be. Do things in tandem, but Marcel led the press conference as well, which I thought was quite interesting. Also, that was quite interesting that there was no senior figure out of it as well, there was no Bill Kenner. It was more Marcel passing it over to Silver, Marcel led it and is our new manager. Straight away like you've just said showing that air of authority, but also the fact that like you've just said Cooman came in, and then Steve Walsh came in a couple of months later, and then it was almost like you never seen them together, like they were all Steve Walsh was out doing something, and with his days it felt like he'd been presented as a team. Presented as a team, but you know, almost like Silver was presented by brands, so I thought that was very interesting. I know, because someone told me that brands have already, you know, and we've seen the video on Friday of them going round with David Underworth. I've been told that he went round and spoke to a lot of different people at the club as well on Friday and introduced themselves to a lot of different people. Something Steve Walsh didn't do for quite a while at the club, so I think that's straight away, that's brilliant, he's getting stuck into the job. And that came across, so I thought that came across that. It was like, listen, you know, we've got to get into this straight away and get ourselves going. And he does have said that he spoke to each other previously and met up and got things discussed as well, so it seems like straight away they're getting into the job. Yeah, I think the big thing that you've got to take into consideration is that Marko Silver's wanted this job from late October, and he's been out of a job since January, you know, obviously far, I'm not sure he wanted them in October as well. So apparently he's turned down four or five, six jobs in that time, so he's wanted this job, this is a job that he's looked at and thought, you know what, this is a big club and money and things like that. So he'll have been doing his assessment anyway, watching games, because it's a natural thing, you keep your eye on something that you're interested in. And Marcel Brandr has been approached two years ago, and obviously he's gone, this story bro, January I think, that I've been looking at him again. So he's had time to assess it as well. So the fact that they've met a few weeks ago and gone through stuff, they both will have come to that meeting prepared. This is, I've seen what we need to do with Bloody Glare and what, how would it work and everything else. I think the thing with Cumin was Cumin almost needed to be convinced to come here from Southampton. And like you said, then he brought Walsh in almost, he wanted Monty, that's someone he wanted brands, that's someone he couldn't get rid of them. And Walsh was kind of the shiny thing, that lester had just won the league, but it wasn't really, he created a role for them. So that's why that was, that seemed to be fractured, where there's this one, like you say, you know, brands, it's taking that, that path of, I'm in charge of football said, there's your head, there's our new head coach, and that's there. And it's good, and it's good that they are getting straight into it, because they realise that, you know, this is a big project as they've said, but it needs tackling immediately. So I talked about time and said it's very short with the World Cup, second of July they said the players will be back, so it's less than a month, so the players are back in pre-season. So, is that really the last year? Back a day, I think. And then last year we had Europa League, so straight back at it, obviously we don't know as yet about the pre-season. We go on through Austria to the training camp. But there's no, nothing on games as such, apart from the Valencia game. So I don't know whether that's, whether they add something, whether they add something in place, because otherwise kept on telling us it was all done, whether they add something in place and they've ripped that up now because, and these two basically want to get into it, I don't know. But they said, you know, as you mentioned, their time is ticking with the World Cup. So the brand said, is it, you know, we got in the job on Friday and this phone was ringing straight away from agent about players coming in and players going out.  So it's his job straight away to get rid of those players. You know, that is, I mean, he's talking about who does what, that is one of his jobs straight away is to get on the phone and start doing deals and start moving some of those players. I'm sure they will have already identified who do you want to keep. And I'm sure they'll have different gradients and they never really got into Player Pacific. San Joe's name was mentioned because the reporter mentioned it. But I mean, Rooney's name came up from what was said. It did feel like Wayne Rooney would be leaving the club. But you know, brands basically said he's got an opportunity to leave the club and it did feel like it was like it's up to Wayne. We, you know, almost like saying we're happy with them to leave. It's up to Wayne. Yeah. Oh, and there was a Freudian slick from Mark O'Shores as well. Did he say Atalanta or Atalanta? Atalanta. But he said the deal was already done when I arrived. He did, yeah. The deal was in place. Well, it is in place. It is in place. It is in place. It's up to Wayne, isn't it? Wayne wants to play football. That's what we're led to believe. He wants to play football. He's not going to be guaranteed to play at Everton. So, you know, and I've done a lot of, and we'll do this on a different video, but I've done a lot of soul searching. No. Like Disha, John or Mark O'Shores and I've watched lots of clips of our teams playing that. And everyone knows I love Wayne Nune. And I still think Mark O'Shores could get a tune out of him, but the way Silver's teams are set up in general, it's a big ask for Wayne to play in the high-pressing and things. So, yeah, I mean, what I find really interesting was though, and I liked it, what Bran said, if he goes, we want him to come back here. Because I think that knowledge and that experience and that will to win, we need that in our club. OK, if Wayne's not going to be part of the team and he's going to go and have another experience, fine, but he comes back here. Because that's a Dutch way. But also, though, that's what Liverpool did with Gerard and he integrated them into the under-19. And they've got a future plan for him, and I was going to Ranges, but they've got a plan for him. So, that almost feels like that's a sweetness for him. Do you know what I mean? That to me sounds again like we want you to go, but the relationship is very...  And if you want to stay, you can, but this is probably best for that. That's probably how you've failed at the questions room. I think the thing is, as well, when we're looking at this and people go on about money and go, you know, money to spend, I don't think the spending is an issue. No. The spending isn't an issue. The wage bill is an issue because whether people like it or not, there's a wage cap almost doubled, isn't it? Exactly. The wage bill has gone through the roof, but it's got to fit in with the percentage of your money. So, it doesn't matter even if it's coming off. But sat there going, I'll take these silver briefcases. It doesn't matter if you can show that your income's increased.  Getting him off the wage bill frees up. I suppose another decision for Wayne is, is if Wayne wants to play more than one more season, he's not going to get that evidence. If he wants to play more than one more, he's going to have to move anyway. So, it does seem inevitable now that Wayne Rooney will probably leave the call. It looks that way. It looks that way. But that's not necessarily their decision. That's his decision now. So, we'll wait and see. Silver was, he was asked for, you know, expectations. He didn't want to be drawn into the Wofford stuff, obviously. Obviously, there's a lot of ongoing stuff with that compensation stuff. So, we probably can't say too much. But he was asked about going back for players. Again, he just didn't want to, he was scared around the question. But expectations was interesting on where he, you know, what can you achieve and what do you think he is expected of you. And I thought the way he answered that was really good because, you know, when he's been, I played against him and he said the atmospheres were good. And he said, you know, the more, he always said the more, it was almost like the more fans make noise about stuff, the more the bigger the club is. And I think that's what he was basically relating to was fans probably moan more or ask more questions because they expect more because they think of it in a big club. So, he was, you know, he's taken that on board from the start and I thought that was a really good way of getting that across. Yeah, and it's an important thing to understand. It's something I don't think Sam Allardyce understood at all. Do you know?  That's what you need to do. And you almost have to... Rybeto had it to a certain extent, but you've almost got to look past when people try and put obstacles in the way. Sam Allardyce tried to put obstacles there. David Moyes is good at job as he done. Put some obstacles there as well because it was about reflecting on them. Yeah. Rybeto broke a couple of them down but didn't really, wasn't able to back it up a little bit. Yeah. With the shouldn't be. And to be fair to Rybeto Martin, as he said this towards the end of the season, I think with the Newcastle game, we were on live and he was in the studio and he said everything should be challenging for Cubs. They should be at least attempting to win the league. Now it's a laugh, people are laughing, laugh and go win the league. But you've got to have that ambition. You haven't got that ambition if you go, my ambition is to finish sixth. Well, why isn't your ambition to finish first if it's sixth, fine. I also think that, I think what happens as well is, the club has a whole set ambitions out because they're more realistic because they're coming from a business point of view or whatever. And a lot of managers, a lot of the good managers will almost test the club on that and say, well, I'm good. Just because you want to finish there we're given so much money to finish there. It doesn't mean we can't do better than that. And I don't think any manager of the last few years has been prepared to do that and almost said, well, just because he wants to finish there, I want to finish. I want to, do you know what I mean? I think I've done it for a while, I've put their own obstacles in their own way and managers have been happy to hide behind those obstacles. Ronald Cooman did the same. So I'm not saying Mark or Silver would do that, but I'm just saying it's nice if a manager came out and said, you know what, forget it. We're not putting our obstacles in our own way. We're going to just try and do what we can. I mean, David Moy has done a brilliant job. I love him. Yeah, he got things wrong. I was critical of him at times. I didn't know probably all the way.  Which is fine because really that's what everyone should strive to do. You should strive to do. Just because you've got all the money in the world you still should strive to do better. Man City realistically should have done much better than they've done if you look at the resources they've had. This year they were outstanding, but in general they should have been doing that for years. But it's competition. Football anything can happen, hence why teams like Swansea were bottoming the league beat Liverpool when Liverpool were absolutely flying. It's a game of football. You should never go into games beating. And I think some of the managers we've had have put that across. Not really expected to get anything to me. And I don't think you play like that. I think you have to play with. We can beat these. We've had that last season. We had that with acceptable defeats. So a manager has to turn around to the person and say no did I know acceptable? No I'm the manager. As an owner do you want acceptable defeats? That's fine. And if that's what buys me time to get on with my job then that's fine. But as a manager I don't have expected because that just filters down all the way. It goes into the players who go well this game doesn't matter and then suddenly that it's the fans. And then if you want it it's the fans. We've all done it. We've all done it. We've gone away and gone. Last year when we went to Amfield they were scoring 5s and 6s every game it seemed. We went 7-0 the game before us. And you go there going we're terrible because we were. We looked like we can't keep clean sheets and now we've had a couple but it seemed a struggle. And you start thinking right well you know if we get out of here with 2 or 3-0 that's not the way. 2 or what? But that's what I'm saying though. It filters down once it hits the fans once it hits the fans then it's done because once fans and you know we sit here guilty as anyone once it hits the fans then there's no coming back from that because once fans start accepting that. I'm not saying listen you can get beaten any football match. It's where it's honked every now and then. One thing of football is you will be beaten. It's as simple as that. You will be beaten. It manifests itself and the reaction after it. The reaction is a big one. To answer your question I know I took us off in a different route but to answer your question I thought he did handle the expectation thing quite well. He's ambitious. One of the things he said was he was asked a question on video kind of and they were quite proven questions actually. A good question. Coming from Evertonians and Evertonians. He asked them out longevity because he said you haven't been anyway for any length of time. A season is the most or a couple of seasons. After Estherill. He had Estherill for 12 years. He basically asked them he was like well this is a project he said it's not even a one two three it's a four five. So be interested in that. I mean that's got to I suppose I like that where you're thinking in terms of like well I'm here as long as as long as you back me on me. As long as I'm back then I'm here and hopefully that's the case. We'll have to wait and see on that because you bring a manager in who's got a record of moving on from places then don't be surprised if he moves on from the place. But you hope that doesn't happen. You hope it's a case of this is the place I want to be. I finally found somewhere I've got someone with me who's going to help me do the job and if I'm back this could be really really good because that's coming off the back of a weekend where Pocitino's been getting oh it's Real Madrid, Real Madrid. No, I'm happy. I'm doing my job and you just hope there's a little bit of that in it. Yeah I mean manager's move on in football that's the way it is and there'll be whether we like it or not there's almost like a food chain in football. Hence why you want to delete what for them to come to evidence because evidence are bigger. You know and this is what some fans don't get when you talk about club size and you know your west hands your lesters they would try to think they're bigger than evidence and all that because they've had that one season where it worked out for them. Evidence are big club so if he comes in and does really well and Real Madrid come knocking he's going to go if that's what he wants.  But you know it's easy to look at him and go he doesn't stay anywhere very long. I think he had three years as esterel manager after being a player for nine. He went to sport in Lisbon and won the cup finished third and they shocked him because they wanted Porto's manager to try to win Porto. He then went to Greece and absolutely bleached their league broke the record winning 17 straight games from the start of the season to the European record and he left there because he wanted it he just wanted it and there was other stuff going on in the Olympiacus and he could see it coming so he got himself out of there he'd replaced the Porto guy at me. Yeah, yeah. And then obviously he went to Holland and they were dead and very dull.  Yeah. They had 13 players you know and he wielding deals and he got them to within the last couple of games of the season and he got beat around by Sunderland because Pickford had a Weldy and that kind of set them down but he done really well there and then he went to Wafford and was like this is alright but within reading a lot of stuff about him and Wafford and within a few weeks of that they'd gone back on stuff they'd said and they sold a player on him that he said he wanted to keep and bought a player and he didn't know anything about and said you've got a player and he was like nah and then he went out in the media and was asked a question and he was quite he's a little bit merino like and he's quite straightforward so they said were you happy with the transfer window and he said no because we didn't do that and then there was a little bit of they weren't happy that he doubted them he wasn't happy because they didn't give them the thing so that's the test for him then everything come along but we mustn't ignore that before everything come along they were brilliant they were absolutely brilliant go and watch Chelsea Wafford highlight it ends 4-2 it should have been about 6-1 to Wafford it's just ritualising missing out on goals left like and so on but I don't worry about stuff like that too much I'm not it doesn't worry me what's gone on before or such you know what I mean it's just the case of what happens now if he's found a destination where he thinks you know what these are a big club the fans have backed him they get a big and I can build something here with that money I'm quite sure his final destination is never in football club he's gone on that's my dream job he might look at it might be Barcelona it might be Real Madrid it might be Ben Thffy who knows but he wants to prove himself in England and that was said earlier on in his career even when he was in sport in Lisbon he'd done an interview and said I want to go to the Premier League it's the biggest so if he comes in here and goes I'll be back then he builds everything in the right direction and we have a bit of we need a bit of stability I'd love to be I'd love to be sitting here in a few years time worried about Real Madrid all that I remember doing an interview with someone when we got cumin and it was like managers leave one way or another they either leave for a bigger club or they get sacked so it's whatever happens I remember when we used to fear that man is would go to Barcelona and then we were fearing that cumin would go to Barcelona both managers got sacked so I wouldn't even I'm not even asked about that one time you just made a really good point about Pasatino everyone was going these Real Madrid managers his dance going he's the man he's just come out and gone on the map and then they put a store and we weren't really considering them anyway but you know managers as well I mean do the thing about it if Madrid went to Liverpool for a club do the thing about it as well just on the same subject is that at some point in his life he's going to want to put roots down you know just imagine like from his Mrs's point of view or his kids point of view I don't even know if he's married and I don't even know if he's got kids and I'm just saying that but moving school to school to school to school and all those kind of things at some point you just go can we just live somewhere for a few years while the kids get the education or whatever do you know what I mean just those simple things you want to just put down some roots at some point hopefully that's evident but obviously just there's a caveat that he's got to do the business here yeah of course this is all we're just going off what he said which is really positive and I think we feel all we all feel a little bit happier after what's gone on the previous season so I'm just that I mean I'm happy that that this is the map seems like it's been the map for a while do you know what I mean it doesn't seem like in the last few weeks it just seems like everything's clarified and gone well no you know that fella was never that one was never been we've gone after the fella that we've always been interested in and there's been no every day in the papers it's well it was like a little bit like well but there's nothing really a couple weeks ago it was like it's silver and everyone knew it was going to be silver and then and it just felt like it's been silver for a while it makes you laugh it makes me know someone and our tether was interviewing you like so that's good so that for me is a really important thing they mentioned as well the player decisions massive brands and he said well that's something we need to get he said there's no point in me buying a player that he doesn't like so I thought that was good as well I thought without going into it too much I thought that the distinction was made quite early on they didn't go into what their jobs were obviously but I thought that distinction was made quite early on even when he just said I was in on Friday I was on the phone all day to agents I thought yeah that's your job he doesn't have to deal with that you do and that's your job that's not in the past that would have been Bill or Elston no that's your job and you're like no no and I think that was quite good and I thought straight away with the player decisions but this is something we do together I thought that was good straight away as well and again there's no one you know we were still saying probably in March just a few months ago who bought the players was it Walsh was it Allardyce was it Cuman with the earlier players or was it Walsh now just today day one they've gone we do it together and I'm talking to agents he's got a sort of squad out and we'll make any decisions on the players together so no one can go brands bought him we know that the management team have bought him and they both agreed it that's better because then there's no them stories aren't there to write them do you know what I mean I thought it was very positive and I just like the I like the feel of brands so far be fairy I think straight away it just feels like he's the man in control like coming on Friday going round you know I don't Steve Walsh I don't know what he did I still don't know whether he had an offer since Finch Farm and whether he was the main man I just feel straight brands you know there's pictures of him going round Liverpool city centre on Saturday you know trying to get a feel for the place that he's living 20 minutes away from Finch Farm yesterday he's at Amfield and he's watching the game and I thought a little thing on that as well is at our time and I like this he didn't he just sat in his seat he didn't go down and get a bit of the buffy or go and have a little he just sat in his seat on his phone all through our time and I thought that was really interesting like because other people would have been like you know five minutes four and a half times getting tucked into the no he just sat there on his phone the entire time and I thought you've come here for the 40 you've come here for the 40 and even if it was just not to do with everything even it was just well hang on there's an international game and at a stadium in the city I live in I like that I like the fact that he just seemed to focus on the 40 so I thought that was really interesting so straight away I get the feeling that he's going to be someone who's going to be really into everything into everything at the club and not someone you just see skating round the outside because that's what Walsh felt like yes you know he's seen him when he went to Italian but he always felt like he was just skating round like he whereas this fellow just looks like I'm actually in control and straight away I think that's really good I think that the thing the experience of how he's done stuff is massive for us he's done it he's done the job you know what I mean you can't buy that experience well if we just bought it you can't buy it and pass it on but we bought the person who's got the experience we haven't bought the experience have we so he knows what he's looking for he knows he's got to be made some self in the club there's lots that need to change in having a football club on that side of it and he's very very proactive and that's what you want you want someone who goes and determined if I was the owner of having a football club I want someone that's going to come in and go I'm going to give you everything to make this club join that elite so to speak I can do it given time it's going to be very very best to try and get us there and we're going to get into everything there's no barriers because we can break them down wherever barriers there are we might have to be clever it might take a few years we might have to build but I can get us there I don't want someone coming in going they're established they're all rich it's established clubs it's going to be difficult this because what's the point football is about dreaming football is about going those are probably the best the best example you can use because everyone else I know Tottenham has spent money but everyone else has spent a lot of money Tottenham have done it well in the deal and they've done it the right way they've had a wage structure they haven't broke hence they've lost players like people like that but they've gone on and just they're doing it their own way and by doing it their own way they're now becoming established in the champions league no one would have said years ago a few years ago there was us in them but also the stadium situation that was very much like our one where it was like they're never going to get that build they're never going to get that build for whatever reason stadiums nearly done they're getting really big sponsors involved now they've got a big lucrative deal with Nike it all follow if you've got a good football team and you're putting yourself in a position where you are in the champions league then the big sponsors will come and you'll be able to pay for the Nike shiny stadium and all those things and I think that's what it took space a while to find that formula they messed about but once they got the manager in he pulled it all together and the other fellas doing the stuff behind the scenes and it's the same at Liverpool as well the managers brought them all together but there's a fella in the background doing all that stuff everything spins off if you get it right on the pitch if you start playing nice football and winning games everyone's exciting comes back when everyone's exciting comes back the club's unified when the club's unified you're excited to get in the ground to spend money in the shop to buy and to turn over increases people are... you're excited to put on a match day the last few months we can all go and we're home and you go to a match and get in the seat literally as Zeg has started or as they were ready to kick off 10-5 game finishes you're on your way home because there's no you know what we were like we'd come in and be like there's just no belief that we're on a kind of journey we just seem to be just bobbing till the end of the season I think what we want now is we want these two men to build something start building something that helps us build that community again pull everyone in the right direction because I think for too long it's been like it's far people are just I don't believe in this and I don't believe in that I don't believe in the manager I don't believe in Walsha, I don't believe in the system I don't believe in the players it's about just going wherever it was they'll come it's just about going like that bringing everybody together I think you can still have your difference of opinions but I just think if everybody's just going in the right direction that creates a bigger thing so that you can still have so that when you when the game's finished what you're not saying is we've had far too much of this is well it's his fault no it's not and there's been far too much of that about recently and for a long time it's not the manager's fault it's not his fault it's the director of football's fault let's hone it all in so it's like at the end of the game you can go we need a new whatever we need a new writeback so it's about the people on the pitch put all the things in place so that you can go well ultimately it's about getting a new sentiment at the end of the day we're going to lose games and there's going to be bumps in the road on this we have to back everybody we have to look at it and go right we've got a new chief executive we've got a new director of finance we've got someone on the stadium farads pulling everything in together and this is the director of football he's wanted for two years this is the manager he's wanted since last october get like you said a unified ever with fans joined up with the team we're a better side the other shower but what they do really well cos clubs pulled it together is they're all on the same journey they might not all agree with everything you don't expect to agree with everybody but in general you're all going in the same direction and I think now that things are being pulled out like else don'ts gone bills haven't less influenced walsh has gone now it's like this is almost like everything it's a clean slate measure it from now let's all move forward let's back them 100% or as much as you can and see where it goes ultimately it might fail it might do but you know what if you don't you know you miss it 100% of the shot you don't take things like that you might as well back it get on board and everyone you know I remember going so many away games seeing an everton fan and you were like and you were all together now there's like people arguing games even the home game we all want the same thing we all want to see our team win that's all we want and we need to get that feeling of we're all in this together let's see where it takes us who knows where it can take us let's be positive and move forward let us know your thoughts in the comments Marcel Brands, Marco Silva's first press conference together they're both in the jobs it starts now that is all your thoughts, we'll see you later


TFNN, Deadline News Update. Good afternoon everybody, I'm Tommy O'Brien, coming to you live from TFNN Headquarters in St. Petersburg, Florida, one PM Eastern time on Thursday, three hours left to go on the trading day and we got markets hanging right near record territory. Dow Jones up 160 points, that's more than half a percent, trading at 29,189, S&Ps up 18 points, a similar just shy of 6 tenths percent in the positive, trading at 33.07, that's within about a point of all time highs, NASDAQ up 60 points, about two thirds of a percent in the green, trading 93.17 and the Russell leading the way with strength, Russell 2000 up 20 points at 17.02, that's approaching 1.2 percent positive for the day. We'll start things off, let's jump over to the VIX, Volatility Index, 12.21, as you would expect, very muted action, very low volatility priced into a market that makes continual highs on a daily basis it seems at least to start off 2020, reach actually 11.78 early today in that VIX. Let's take a look at the charts, we'll start it off with the Dow, you can see the acceleration overnight, we get a pop at about 3.30 in the morning, we reach a high at 10.30 this morning of 29,172, all the markets just hanging right where we are at near all time highs since basically the market opened, I mean you're talking about a Dow, from 9.30 a.m. we've basically traded from 29,120 up to a high of 29,000 around 160, you're talking about 40 Dow points maybe in a range, very small trading range today. NASDAQ 100, a little bit wider trading range, we make it to a high of 91.19, we trade down to an intraday low of 9,077, right in the middle of that range at 9,095, S&Ps, 3.30 a.m. we trade up to 3,307 but check it out, since about 8.30 this morning we were at 3,305, you're talking about almost two S&P points from call it basically 3,304 to 3,307, a 3 point S&P trading range so far for today. Crude oil, not quite the case, quite a trading range in crude, check out the acceleration from 7.30 a.m. we trade from 57.58 all the way up to a high of 58.85, you're talking about a $1.30 to the upside in the price of crude just in 7.30 a.m. this morning, backing off a bid at 58.66 and gold trading at 15.51 and wrapping things up, bank earnings persist, Morgan Stanley this morning knocking it out of the park, they've been trading higher all day now up more than 8% at 57.32 to cap off quite a week of bank earnings. Stay tuned folks, Steve Rhodes coming up live from 1 till 2 with the Trader's Edge, Dave White live from 2 till 3 and Larry Pezzavento filling in for Tom live from 3 till 4 this afternoon, we'll be right back.