As a world traveler, this week’s Wednesday's Who's Who is not a stranger by any means to the diversity of both planet Earth and planet Calypso. Even her trusty and faithful dog Charlie has his own passport, and I am sure he would most likely enjoy his travels through Entropia as well if it were possible. Entropia Traveller Birth of a Virtual Traveler In January 2006, LeeLoo LeeLoo Faith began her travels inside the Entropia Universe, and very much the adventurer that explores her real world. The name LeeLoo was derived from the movie 5th Element, and the name Faith from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer series. LeeLoo claims, "It's always good to have a little faith." A colleague from work told her about Entropia right after joining, and showed her how he was going to explore this universe and collect teleporters. LeeLoo figured that since there were no subscription fees, she would give it a try herself. Together they explored a bit, and even joined the same society, Storm Troopers. Storm Troopers was a Scandinavian society founded by MrSmith, and while a small society, most members had been at the same skill level. LeeLoo later became Leader of the society, and eventually renamed it to Ghost Troopers because they all had been wearing Ghost armor. While LeeLoo has maintained a friendship with those who still inhabit Entropia from Ghost Troopers, about a year ago, in January 2008, she joined the Supremacy Reign Family, along with fellow socmate Yari Velox Salvo. She said she received "a very nice invitation PM from the Leader of Supremacy Reign Cadets," Dai Arf Arfster. Since then, she has moved up into the middle tier of the SR family hierarchy, and shares that she has met a lot of nice people, along with making some great friends. First Entropia Experiences LeeLoo says that she didn't have a mentor, because upon arriving at Port Atlantis, one of the first things she encountered was someone out of the blue offering a mentorship request. She was irritated by this initial intrusion and clicked no. When she finally realized that mentorship was a good thing, it was already too late. She recalls an interesting experience in the beginning that caused her to blush a bit. A girl whose name she cannot recall loaned her a gun on her first day. "I tried to go out and hunt, but of course, I died because I had no ammo," says LeeLoo. She sold the gun and got an axe with the intent of hunting to earn money to buy back the gun to return it. However, the axe soon broke, and she had less PEDs than what she had gotten from selling the gun at the trade terminal. It was unfortunate that she found out that she could not purchase the gun at the TT, and that it also had a bit of a markup in auction. It was then that she made her first deposit in order to be able to return the gun. Hunting LeeLoo claims not to be the best hunter, but says the mobs she mostly hunts are Atrox either at Tiny Trox Territory, or Ithaca, and will sometimes hunt Atrax at Atrax Beach. She also enjoys hunting Estophyls with socmate Night Slick Shadow, who had his own EU avatar profiled not that long ago. You remember, Entropia's Bananaman? While LeeLoo may not hunt that often, she is currently hosting an event called "Fun Hunt" which she had actually started in Storm Troopers, but says there are a lot more people in her current soc to make it even more fun. It's an interesting concept whereby soc members choose a n00b weapon like the TT Powerfists, the Mann MPH, or CB5, and without armor, seek out mobs they can handle without dying. She claims that the greatest fun hunts of all time included the Mann MPH hunt for Dones, and the Grenade Launcher hunt on Atrox. "The fun is so great, that it often goes beyond the schedule of 1.5 hours," she says. LeeLoo's other hunting associations have included being a member of the WoF Team Switzerland in 2008. This year she has joined WoF Team Amethera since there is no Team Switzerland or Team Germany for the 2009 WoF. A couple of times she ran an event called World of Sweat (WoS), which was a team sweating contest. The winner of the contest would get their sweat amount doubled, and the rest would go to a soc fund. After about an hour of sweating, they usually take revenge on the mobs and shoot them with their mighty Opalos. Entropia Professions As an adventurer, LeeLoo wanted to try everything. She still has her first melee weapon (Battle Axe 2x0) from when she was exploring hunting. She didn't much like having to run to a half-dead mob in team in order to assist killing it, so she started using a rifle instead. Later she switched to handgun because she didn't like the reload of the long-range weapons. Laser Pistoleer is still her main hunting profession. LeeLoo's curiosity had her trying other things, like crafting weapons. She shares that as a complete n00b, she HoF'd on a Cleric Dagger 2A on her second click at the crafting machine. She says that crafting is too expensive and boring a profession for her to consider exploring any further. She has also tried mining for Enmatter, which she still does now and then, but says that she thinks she tried everything except the beauty profession, until she ultimately settled on one that has been quite successful. When it comes to fashion, coloring, and textures, LeeLoo knows her business. She runs a shop out of the Emerald Lakes Mall (Level 2, 13s), and has a client list that reads like Who's Who of Entropia. More detailed information can be found at her website, as well as her ongoing threads at Entropia Forum here and here. She also provides samples of her work in her profile photo albums, so you might want to check them out. She claims that her main profession of all the services she provides, is now coloring. A Fedora hat she owned at one time became the catalyst when she wanted it to have some color and tried coloring for the first time. She said that when she got only a wee bit of orange color on the hat, she was very disappointed and didn't think that she would ever do it again. However, there was a time she needed something bleached, and Sarah Charlton wasn't available. Other Entropians who became known in this profession like Etopia and Nadie weren't on the scene yet, so MrSmith from her original Storm Troopers society bought a bleacher and colorator and did it himself. It was a couple of months later that she tried coloring again and got a nice orange color on a hat. She got excited and tried coloring other items as well. This is when her coloring took off, and she hasn't looked back since. LeeLoo has an interesting method that allows customers to contact her if they need her services. At the end of the hall leading to the interior of her shop, there is a sign … On top of the swirl part of the sign at the right sits a Nutrio Bar for sale. If a customer needs to get in touch with LeeLoo for services, they are to purchase the Nutrio Bar, which in turn alerts LeeLoo that the Nutrio Bar has been purchased and that she has a customer waiting for her in her shop. She stocks a variety of paint colors, textures, and other materials and accessories that she uses in her fashion business, not to mention a nice comfortable chair for her customers to relax in while they wait for her to arrive. She says that her friends warned her not to do coloring as a profession because it was very expensive and slow to skill. "I enjoyed all successful colorings," she shared, "and it was also a challenge for me to bite through the most difficult profession in Entropia." She saw that there was a demand for colorers, and at the time, there was a lack of people who were able to do it, so she embarked upon her color skilling. It wasn't long before she had her first customers, and was incredibly excited when she unlocked her first color, which was a big event in the life of a colorer back then. As the business grew, people kept asking the same questions over and over, so she created an information base about coloring at the before-mentioned website to give people an understanding as to how it all worked. She included content like how to preview things, how the CoS works, and information about the fields on different items. She and Gillberd GT Torotukka, who was a socmate in Ghost Troopers, and now a socmate in Supremacy Reign, developed a unique guide called World of Colors and Textures (WoCaT). LeeLoo also offers a Pet Brushing service out of her shop as a result of personal experiences sometime ago with owning a pet. She realized how difficult it was getting trust from her first pet, so while hanging out at Jason Center's pet stable, she assisted others brushing their pets to gain trust. She eventually purchased a very expensive brush, but when others at the stable started asking if she would loan them her brush, she decided to offer a brushing service, which also turned into a training service as well. Whether in a virtual world, or the real world, LeeLoo has a love of animals. Entropia Reflections In asking what advice LeeLoo would give to new members of our Calypso colony, she says she would advise them to check out Entropia Forum first in order to gain as much knowledge as possible. She feels that this advice would hopefully prevent them from wasting PEDs, and also would advise them to start slow and find a good mentor, which in the long run can save a person a lot of time and money. Her candid comments tell us that with each VU, there are some good things, and some bad things, but that over the years, there have been a lot of nice new features that have been implemented. Being the adventurer that she is, she loves to explore new places and new things that come with each VU. She says that, "Unfortunately, there seems to be at least one or two tweaks that always leave a bad taste, like those that involve higher playing costs, but after a while, people start to adjust and live with it, and some things even turn out to be good in the end." LeeLoo is just as curious as the rest of us about CE2, and what everything will look like. She's actually hoping that it doesn't look too realistic, because she's not sure she will like it if it looks too much like the real world. She's also not sure what to think about the planets, nor how they will be implemented, but will wait for that too in order to see just how much, if at all, it will affect her activities in Entropia. World Traveler It's not just the mountain tops of planet Calypso that satisfy this adventurous soul. LeeLoo has seen many corners of our planet Earth in her travels as well. It might surprise you to know (for those not in the know) that this 30 something Entropian who just celebrated a birthday on February 21st says, "I do IT," which initially caused me a curious chuckle, until I soon realized that she meant that she is one of those sexy geek-types (as I call them) whose real life profession is a Systems Engineer, or Software Developer. The company she works for develops individual software for big companies, and not standard programs that you can buy in a shop. However, LeeLoo doesn't chain herself to her office computer, and makes the time to enjoy world adventures that many only dream of. Travels have taken her to various locations like New Zealand, Canada, Portugal, France, St. Lucia in the Caribbean, Germany where she moved to only this month, Switzerland where she lived for 8 years, and even South Africa as a volunteer for an endangered species project. It's not uncommon to find her standing in a beach cave, or sitting in an ice cave somewhere. When it comes to some of her most favorite vacations, she's quick to tell you that those that involve horseback riding would rate at the top of the list. However, whether she's horseback riding through Iceland, kite surfing on Isla Margharita, or involved in the environmental work in South Africa, she says she's hard pressed in deciding which would be her favorites, because they are all so incredibly different, and wonderful experiences. LeeLoo also enjoys sailing, kayaking, and walking trails, but you can only imagine how many awesome sunsets she has enjoyed in many parts of the world. Her African adventure took place in the Isimangliso Wetland Park in St. Lucia, South Africa. There were a group of 7 people all from Germany and Switzerland who spent two weeks with a Ranger from KZN Wildlife. Field work was being done for a project that wanted to protect the coastal dune forest in the park in order to avoid getting cut down and mined by a mining company. LeeLoo shares that, "The dune forest is very rare in the world, and you cannot build it back because it sits on huge sand dunes." The group also helped for two days at a project called Trees for Life, and planted 200 endemic (native) trees for different schools. During free time, they were able to take exploring to a new level, and had some close encounters with wildlife. Their Ranger took them on walks and drives along paths where no tourists could go. "It was the first time for me doing something like this," says LeeLoo, "but it was a truly amazing experience, and very worthwhile." Travel Companion LeeLoo doesn't always travel alone, but often enjoys the companionship of her trusty and loyal dog Charlie. He too is quite at home in any environment, and finds the fun factor whether he's exploring a beach, or navigating the chilly terrain in snow-covered mountain country. Charlie is a small mixed breed who was brought to Germany from Spain, and LeeLoo found him in a German animal shelter. "He’s a sweetie," she says, "and even has his own blog," but the link isn't being provided here as it's a part of a personal website that LeeLoo would prefer not listing. I can attest to the fact that Charlie is quite the character, as well as quite talented. During the photo shoot in Entropia, LeeLoo joined me on TeamSpeak, and I was privileged to be able to hear Charlie sing. Yes, I said sing. Getting him to bark was a bit more challenging, but getting him to sing took no effort at all. What a fun experience that was. It became obvious to me that LeeLoo and Charlie share a very special bond, and how incredibly unique it was that her ever-faithful four-legged companion has evolved from being in an animal shelter to singer and savvy traveler. Whether LeeLoo is hanging out in the trees in her office, or hanging out on a tree in South Africa … There is one thing for certain. And that is … there will always be … Footprints in the Sand Special Thanks To: MK Design for graphics assistance.
