"Experience, travel - these are an education in themselves." - Euripides
A few weeks
ago I took two of my girls to the Brigada Verde (Green Brigade) Southern Conference.
The conference is organized by
environment volunteers and focuses on environmental issues and appreciating the
world around us.
We went to see
some awesome local caves, stargazed, sang around a campfire, and talked about
how things are falling apart and what we can do in our communities to educate
and mobilize people.
I think this
has been my favorite youth conference yet – this group of Dominican teenagers
was just awesome.
Very mature,
very interested and interesting.
I
was so proud of my girls – two 15-year old neighbors who have participated in a
lot of my activities in Tabara, and who have also simply been friends during my
time here.
It is an amazing
feeling to watch another person live up to the potential that you see in them,
to be able to give them an opportunity that they would never get otherwise.
These girls would never be able to
leave their community for a weekend, meet kids and other American volunteers
who live around the country, see new places, talk about new ideas…
open their minds with new experiences!
I’ve
traveled a lot. I’m still missing
some regions, but between visitors from America, Peace Corps adventures,
conferences, and just visiting friends who live around the country, I’ve seen a
good portion of the Dominican Republic.
I’m probably the only person in my community who has. A lot of kids have never been any
farther than Azua (the pueblo 20 minutes away from Tabara). Most people have been to the Capital at
some point, but Santo Domingo is not exactly a beautiful experience. To live on such an amazing island, with
mountains, rivers, lakes, beaches upon beaches upon beaches, desert, forest,
and every other ecosystem, and never be able to see any of it… That’s the
situation for a lot of Dominicans.
Many have never been to the beach, and there’s one half an hour away
from my town. No one I know can
swim.
Meanwhile, Dad,
Dan, and Cari came to visit two months ago and we saw three extremely diverse
parts of the country in the space of a week! We spent a few nights in the Colonial Zone in the Capital,
they came to Tabara for a night, and we traveled up to Samana, the awesome
peninsula in the northeastern part of the island. It was a great
trip. I have an amazing time
hosting my family and friends from America and being a tour guide to this
country, but I wish I could do the same for Dominicans – bring them to America
and show them my country, take them to my mom’s house for dinner (my host mom,
Victoria, has fed each and every one of my visitors), take them to the beach,
to the city… the way I bring Americans here and show them my town, the city,
the beach. This exchange does more
good than I even realize at the time.
People here will be talking about all the Americans they’ve met through
me, maybe forever. No one has been
forgotten yet anyway. And the more
they interact with each other, the more each side understands the other…
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