The contest “I, a young Carioca, have a story to tell,” which was run by the Carioca Fund of BrazilFoundation, has come to an end. Designed for the purposes of stimulating a love of reading and creative writing among young adults living in communities under the UPP, the competition asked young writers to develop stories on a theme of their own choosing. More than one hundred young writers signed up and over the course of six months they went through several eliminatory phases, which included meetings with professionals in the creative world and visits to communications firms. The last phase of the competition included 30 participants, 15 of whom were creative writers while the other 15 were artists who illustrated the stories. The newspaper O Dia will publish the works in a special edition to be released on Christmas day.
The top three writers and illustrators, as determined by the jury, won a trip to São Paulo to take in the culture riches of the city. The winners were the authors Israel Matos, Vitor Ferreira and Gabriela Domingues, and the illustrators Gustavo Cardozo, Philip Greiner and Allan Matias. The award ceremony took place at the SESI Theater. Aside from the contestants and their families, the supporters of the competition were also present: the newspaper O Dia, the agency Weber Shandwick, Firjan, a representative from the Secretary of Education of Rio de Janeiro and FLUPP (Literary Fair for the Periphery).
