[CPM-SPIRE-L] the ultimate Raconteur

[Ricardo Baeza-Yates]

Sadly I do not have one single Apostolic tale. For me Alberto was a tale 
from the beginning to the end.
Here is a summary of this 20+ years tale:

First, he was my external examiner for my PhD thesis in Waterloo in 
1989. However at the end he could not
attend the defense, but I still keep a letter that he sent me at that 
time and his report on my thesis.

I finally met him in CPM'92 in Tucson, 23 years ago. I saw him again in 
Padova when he organized CPM'93
in that amazing old library. The following year in Asilomar he amazed 
all of us arriving in a nice convertible ;-)
So I at least saw him once at least once per year at CPM or later at SPIRE.

In 2001 we invited him to give a keynote at SPIRE 2001 in Santiago. He 
thanked me for the great time he had but
the last day his wallet was stolen, including passport, and, more 
complicated for him, the green cards of his
daughter and him. After telling him that I was really sorry of the 
incident and that the police had recovered the
passport and his driving license, he wrote to me something that only 
Alberto could write:

    /First let me say that I should take at least half the blame for
    what happened as I would not walk around my hometown in Italy in
    such a blatantly touristish attire and attitude. /

He later connected Maxime and I with Levenshtein in 2002 when we were 
co-chairing CPM'03 in Mexico,
to have him as invited speaker (. For me was hard to believe after 
citing Levenshtein so many times!
Sadly I could not attend the conference so I was not able to meet 
Vladimir in person, only via email.

He then organized SPIRE 2004 in Padova and he treated some of us (Gadi, 
Nivio, etc.) to a great restaurant where
I had the best tomato & basil ice cream of my life (right, is not that 
common, but was amazing ;-)

He loved to enjoy life with friends, good food and wine. As an example, 
I attach a nice picture that I took of him
having fun in the banquet cruise at SPIRE 2010 in Los Cabos, Mexico.

The last time I saw him was in 2013, again at SPIRE. I will remember him 
as in the second picture
attached, in the center of our community, relaxed and apostolic in the 
perfect place, Jerusalem.

We will surely miss and remember him.

Regards
Ric

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