Paulo Coelho

A Sunday afternoon, one year ago, I was reading my blog and thinking how intelligent my readers are. So I thought: why not invite some of them to the party I held every March 19, in honor of my patron, Saint Joseph? Acting on an impulse (as I normally do) I posted the invitation for 10 people on the first come/first served basis. We got over 500 emails, and the first were from different parts of the world. However, the party was to be held in the middle of the Road to Santiago, (Puente la Reina, Spain).
 
Then I asked myself: did these readers understand the invitation? It is only for a party, I am not paying the air ticket, hotel, etc. And it is not easy to get to Puente la Reina.
 
I sent a second email to them, and all said that they fully understood. Thanks to this, I had the pleasure to meet wonderful people, most of them now in my top friends in myspace, and all of them very close to my heart.
 
You can see the photos of the party at Flickr
 
That was when I only had a WordPress blog. I still have a blog, but I am now also in Myspace and Facebook. Meaning: when I release this invitation, it will be read by close to 20.000 people. I was discussing with Paula, and the first come/first served basis does not apply anymore.
 
Lotteries don’t work. And this 19th March, the party will be held in Paris: I am hiring a boat so we can have a good seated dinner, an amazing sightseeing of Paris by night, music and dance to complete the fun.
 
But the boat has a limitation of 120 people. Considering that I am inviting 90 personal friends (that attend this party for close to 10 years), we have 30 places for the readers.
 
Therefore:
 
A] if you want to come, please send an email to [email protected] with a link to your page or your blog.
 
B] please take into consideration that March 19th is in the middle of the Holy Week, and may be difficult to find air tickets and hotels.
 
C] put in the subject the month you are born, and the social community ( for example: myspace/ April or blog/August)
 
D] I will select randomly one reader for each month (and we can squeeze two tables, so we can have 36 readers, 12 from each community – Myspace, Facebook, Blog)
 
E] Paula is trying to manage with the boat to have an extra 20 guests. It is not sure, but we are trying.
 
F] So, if you REALLY can come, send your email during this weekend. If you don’t hear back from me, that means that either you are in the waiting list (the extra guests) or we need to find another opportunity to meet.
 
G] If you can come, you understand that the invitation is only for the party, and for one person.
 
H] I will send the confirmation email by Feb 5th – till then, please be patient.
 
Thank you for your understanding that I cannot invite all of you, even if I want to.
 
This post will be here till Monday, Feb 4th .
 
Love,
Paulo