Thank you. At the risk of sour grapes flavoring my response...how much effort would it have taken to respond with the results to all the entrants? To devote more than half or a whole sentence to acknowleging days or months of work on an entry? How honoring was it for writers who did not win to have to dig twice to find out they lost in the contest? To really acknowlege the initiative and efforts of the writers, would it not have been more generous to give entrants a paragraph or page of appreciation with a few hundred dollars? Might one of the star judges have given a personal comment finding some merit in each essay read? Why do writers in some countries not receive a fair consideration and reimbursement - even if it were to mean setting up an alternative payment system?

I wrote an article after the fact rewarding all entrants with a yearly suppy of non-caloric frosted doughnuts and many kisses on both checks - a total of 10,000. This award goes to you as well, David Pahor and to any of you reading who entered and didn't receive a mention in that forum.