How does one possibly write a piece of closure to the last almost 2 years? I have no idea what to even say, and I have to warn you, whatever I come up with is probably going to be horribly cheesy. At this point, nothing feels real and all I know is that time goes by SO incredibly fast I cannot believe it, and that I can’t believe it’s over. I just can’t. But I feel like I should attempt to write out something, no matter how cheesy and boring it may be.
I will start with a poem that I have started my trip with:
Ithaca:
When you set out on your journey to Ithaca, pray that the road is long.
Full of adventure, full of knowledge.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops, the angry Poseidon- do not fear them,
You will never find such as these on your path if your thoughts remain lofty
If a fine emotion touches your body and spirit
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops, the fierce Poseidon, you will never encounter
If you do not carry them within your soul, if your soul does not set them before you.
Pray that the road is long, that summer mornings are many
When with such pleasure, with such joy you will enter ports seen for the first time
Stop at the Phoenician markets, visit many Egyptian cities to learn from scholars.
Always keep Ithaca in your mind, to arrive there is the ultimate goal
But do not hurry the voyage at all, it is better to let it last for many years
And to anchor at the island when you are old, rich with all you have gained on the way
Not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches, Ithaca has given you a beautiful voyage
Without her you never would have set foot out on the road.
She has nothing more to give you, but has not deceived you. Wise as you have become,
With so much experience, you already must have understood what Ithaca means.
Part of me is just devastated that this trip is over. I mean, I have known my entire life this is what I have wanted to do, but now what? I know I should see it as an accomplishment, but it is also so sad, something ending always reminds me that I am getting older and life is passing me by.
But maybe passing me by is the wrong expression for it, because I don’t think life is passing me by at all. I think I have grabbed hold and am careening along with it. I think that I made a statement that day in Boulder, sitting at Café Sole studying for finals, pretty miserable with my life at that time and I randomly bought a ticket to Bangkok. I thought that so many people wish and hope for something to happen to them in their life, or they say they will do something, and a lot of people spend their entire life with this, putting travel off until retirement or what have you. But I decided to choose life at that point, to take control of my life, though I was terrified, and jump. I decided that was the moment that I went from talking about living a life to living it and I decided that was how I would define my life from here on out. It was one of those moments in life that you can see a clear before and after.
And yet, I almost don’t recognize that girl. I have been through so many countries and seen so many things since that moment. But I don’t regret anything. Well, I sometimes regret a few things that I didn’t do, but nothing that I have done. And I can’t complain. I think about all that I have been through and it all feels like a dream, and at the same time I am so sad it is over. Time is cruel, that is for sure.
How many lifetimes do we have in a life? I sit in my hotel room in Guatemala, getting ready to leave for the airport tomorrow morning and nothing feels real. Nothing. It is all a dream, like my whole life is a dream. Since the September before last, I have been caught up in crazy violence in political rallies, swam in the Caribbean, seen horrific violence, been tear gassed and shot at in riots, heard so many languages spoken, had incredible conversations with people from all walks of life, spotted animals in the Serengeti, found untouched beauty in Antarctica, looked at amazing stars from a canoe in Bolivia, thought I would die of malaria, bribed border guards, fallen briefly in love many times, had my heart broken, met people that I will never forget, met people I thought I would never forget but they have faded away, had so many moments with people that could be a lifetime of their own, a private world nobody else could ever understand and known things will never be the same, yet somehow they always are. I have eaten all sorts of incredible food, looked at the Southern Cross which has always given me strength in many countries, stared up at massive mountains in Patagonia, gone to the world’s newest country, seen some of the oldest sights in the world, been helped time and time again by perfect strangers, been in situations I probably shouldn’t have survived, spent more time on a bus or waiting for a bus than most people will in a lifetime, come face to face with death and with life, had disappointments and also moments of untouched beauty, seen things that have changed my spirituality and beliefs in life, walked through sand dunes in the Sahara, watched dolphins jump in the ocean, wrestled with monkeys, laughed so hard I thought my insides would explode, cried so hard I thought I would never stop, listened to the Muslim call to prayer over haunting rooftops, been to church, been eaten alive by mosquitoes and bed bugs, stayed in the most horrific accommodations and not eaten to save a couple dollars, seen more world heritage centers and world wonders than I ever thought I could, trained horses in South Africa, gotten to interview people in another language and found some amazing journalistic stories, been offered a travel advice column, lived with families all over the world and been taken in and invited into their lives, chatted with Hamas, hiked through countless jungles, been to some of the world’s most beautiful beaches, cage dived with Great White sharks, looked into the eyes of refugees, attempted to read Finnegan’s Wake in a pub in Ireland and realized the more beer I drank the more it made sense, found a soul mate of a friend in my sometimes travel buddy Colleen, slept in a baby tent for an extended period of time, danced in a mud hut in the candlelight to incredible music in Zimbabwe, been thrown into crazy rapids and rescued by a kayak, gone on a date with royalty, been spun around Salsa and Meringue dancing in Latin America, been surrounded by penguins and been incredibly close to a Humpback Whale, spoken Kiswahili in front of huge crowds at political rallies, been an extra in a movie, sat on top Mayan ruins alone looking at the jungle before me, born witness to people’s fears and hopes in some crazy situations, I have had incredible times doing nothing more than looking out a bus window, or waking up on a bus with that feeling you get of being headed to an unknown destination and feeling so safe and happy in that, blissfully happy. I have hiked in the Himalayas, been treated like an honored guest, been the first white person many people have seen, gone spear fishing, meditated in a giant pyramid, watched waves crash on rocks as the sun set over the ocean, been scared and lonely, elated and full of life, gotten a new family, had some incredibly difficult times but throughout it all had the best time of my life. Since September of 2007, I have been to 59 (I think) countries. How have I been so lucky?
I am so sad this trip is over, but at the same time, my life has been so incredible that I know it is time to move on to the next step and really give back. So many strangers with nothing have given me all they had. I am absolutely humbled by the endless kindness I have found. My life has been touched by things I have seen and people I have met and I want so much to be able to contribute to humanity and help people as much, or better yet, even more than I have been helped in my life.
I hate endings and I hate time passing, I don’t want to get older. I have always been such a nostalgic person, I still miss high school, college, my horse, etc., but I was thinking about it the other day and if the hardest part of my life is my nostalgia, namely, if my biggest problem is that my past is so good that I miss it and all the people in it, then I think I am doing ok!
But still it is something I really struggle with and most people don’t understand. But with traveling so much, I realize that there is much of my life nobody will ever understand. There is a community in travelers for sure, a camaraderie that nobody else gets, but from the places I have chosen to go and the life decisions I have made, I am very much alone and will always be so. But
I do know I am incredibly strong in myself, especially after all I have been though.
Like I said, I feel like I have had so many lifetimes in this one lifetime, and I don’t know where things end or begin, but I am honored for all the people I have met and experiences I have had. I love my life so incredibly much. But endings are bittersweet.
This trip has all had a sense of inevitability with it. One thing has lead to another in ways that I never possibly have predicted, but somehow it has always been right. I was looking at my old journal and here is what I wrote when this journey started, sitting at the airport in South Africa, waiting for my flight to Zimbabwe:
“Leaving on this journey, I know in my heart I can never go back. I have decided to have a higher quality to my life than before. It is a moment-to-moment conscious decision not to hold anything back. I am on a path with a heart, momentum builds when I trust in my heart. When it is the right thing to do there are no limits. I trust that because I am on a path with a heart, life is opening up to me and new possibilities are being created every moment and I am right where I need to be. I really have this sense of faith/trust that everything comes into my life should be here. It’s all good. I’m going to look back on all the things I used to worry about and see it was a waste of time because none came to fruition. I’ll look back on this trip as the best decision of my life, the beginning of life.”
We can all live this way, all of us.
I want to thank every single person that I have met along the way and thank everyone who may be reading this from home and from other journeys. I don’t know if you could ever fathom how much your emails and support have meant to me throughout this trip. Thank you. I have met such incredible people that have absolutely changed my life and given me faith in humanity, and at the same time, feel so incredibly lucky for all my incredible friends I have at home as well, thanks for keeping in touch and for welcoming me back into your lives when I have come back to Boulder briefly. I love all of you more than you could imagine. I want to thank my mom for her endless support, all that she does for me, I don’t have words for how much I love her and how much she means to me, anything I could say is insufficient.
I have been living such a temporary existence for so many years, always knowing this trip would come, then coming back and touching base only to know I would leave again. I have seen my best friends get married and buy houses. It is strange to have chosen such a different life than the people that I grew up with, but I know in my heart this is the only way it could be for me. Yet it still feels like a dream, does all of life feel that way with time?
One of my goals while traveling was to find what my passion is. I have always been envious of those people who know what their passions are. Finally it hit me and I realized how stupid I have been, it was right under my nose, travel. My passion is travel. So I must, and will, find a way to always keep it in my life, this is what I need to remind myself when I am sad about this trip ending. And I do believe I am ready for the next step, ready to contribute in a big way somehow, though how I have not yet found the way. And I know that I thrive on the outdoors and adrenaline and I do always want to live my life as an adventure.
I have learned so much in my travels and I hope to retain what I have found. One says that travels have hidden meanings that don’t surface until long after the trip has ended. I have yet to see what those are. But I do hope that I, and everyone else who is inspired to do so, to continue to live a brave life. I have always felt deeply, always struggled with having such strong emotions and that has caused turmoil in my life, but lately, I have realized that for me at least, that is not a bad thing, simply my way of experiencing my life without a filter.
“We do not commonly live our life out and full; we do not fill all our pores with blood; we do not inspire and expire fully and entirely enough, we live but a fraction of our life. Why do we not let on the flood, raise the gates and set all our wheels in motion”
So really, I apologize, not only is this cheesy, but it is meandering too. Coming home after extended travel is always difficult, especially after living this temporary existence, as I said, for so long. I don’t know what life has in store for me, but I hope to take what I have learned and apply it to the next step. I suppose there are no words for ending a trip like this. So instead of words, all I have is gratitude. And though some days are easier than others, I am learning to not ever be afraid, and to have nothing but trust. I wrote this in South Africa watching the sun set over the ocean:
“I learned that I will never be afraid again. It’s true. Look at this world, it is so beautiful. I am not afraid. I trust. I completely trust in this beautiful life. Look at how amazing it has been and still doesn’t even scratch the surface. It’s limitless when you trust, soften, believe, dream, let go and allow for space. I am free. The universe is creating possibilities for me as I travel on this path with a heart, it will take m to where I need to go.”
What a crazy couple of years. I love my life and everyone in it so much, I really do. Thank you. Thank you so much.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Thursday, July 16, 2009
The Scream (Belize- this time at least)
It happened early this trip. It happens to me every trip, but I suppose with this really being the final one, it makes sense that it came early. I remember the first time it happened I was in Thailand. I was in the most disgusting hotel you could imagine and I woke up in this nasty bed and looked at the cracked ceiling. Before I knew it, my friend was shaking me awake, completely freaked out, he said that I had sat bolt-upright in my bed and was screaming at the top of my lungs.
The scream. Coming back from long-term travel is possibly one of the most mind boggling things one can ever experience. People that haven’t done it completely could never begin to understand, but anyone who has knows 100% what I am talking about.
It is incredibly strange to have come back from a trip to such a foreign location, to have changed and feel so different than you felt when you left and then to walk back through the gate that you have walked through thousands of times in your life when you get home. It is completely surreal because you feel like nothing will ever be the same again, I don’t know what you expect, but not that it will feel exactly the same as it did before you left. It is puzzling and trying to fit long term travel back into a life at home is almost impossible. I think after something as extreme as some of the things I saw and experienced in Africa especially, it is even harder to fit in.
But you do it somehow. It is great to see people, but strange to have a refrigerator that you can open anytime. I find myself unable to wear anything other than the same 3 shirts I wore my entire trip. I go to the grocery store and usually have a freak-out moment because of the excess of choice. That happens in several realms of life. I wander vacantly around the house, unable to concentrate in this in-between stage that I am not really sure who I am or where I am. Everything feels so familiar but so different.
There are the sleepless nights where all I can do is go outside and look at the stars and try to transport myself back to a balmy tropical night, I can almost feel the warm humid air on my skin and feel like I should panic when I can’t see the Southern Cross, but refuse to give in and keep looking as if it will magically appear in the sky and I won’t feel so lost anymore.
Then the restlessness kicks in. Not changing locations every couple of days feels suffocating. Relationships are different. You don’t spill your deepest secrets, talk about religion and philosophy and the most disgusting of bodily functions within moments of meeting someone. You don’t meet someone on a bus and move on to your next location with the understanding that, “Hi, you are going to be my best friend for the next bit of time and we are going to be closer than we are with almost anyone back at home no matter how many years we have known them. We will completely depend on and trust each other. We are going to spend the next bit of time probably sharing a bed and together almost 24 hours a day, and be eating off each other’s plates and sharing everything.” So there is a new way of adjusting to normal social relationships again.
It’s funny too, most of this trip hasn’t been your typical hostel trip for me, it has been more away from other backpackers and more work-oriented, and it isn’t a fun, but it is definitely interesting and a different experience, but the end of my trip here in Belize is about as classic backpacker as you can get so it brings back all that nostalgia from previous trips like South East Asia that was like this.
So back to the scream. I woke up this morning and was sort of thinking about life as I watched the sunlight come in through the strange ceiling, and it is this very familiar emotion that came that I have had several times now and I can't explain it very well. It is sort of like my whole life flashing through my eyes in the travel world and I know it only takes a second but it feels like eternity.
All the feelings of these images of waking up alone in a strange hotel room, waking up not sure what country I am in, moments with friends where I know I will never be as close to anyone as I am to this person right now and I also know I will probably never see this person again, moments of lifetimes and expedited relationships, and this clink of home and waking up under the same ceiling, seeing the same people, flights home from previous trips and all the emotions swirling there.
And the next thing I knew I was screaming at the top of my lungs (just like i have done at the end of every trip, it is this BIZARRE reaction I have no control of) until the 2 guys in my room jumped out of their bunk beds and start shaking me to bust me out of this trance and more people have stuck their heads in the door to see what the noise is. Then it was all I could do to just not cry because if I started crying, sometimes I think I wouldn't ever stop. How can this all be ending? How can so much have already ended?
The scream. Coming back from long-term travel is possibly one of the most mind boggling things one can ever experience. People that haven’t done it completely could never begin to understand, but anyone who has knows 100% what I am talking about.
It is incredibly strange to have come back from a trip to such a foreign location, to have changed and feel so different than you felt when you left and then to walk back through the gate that you have walked through thousands of times in your life when you get home. It is completely surreal because you feel like nothing will ever be the same again, I don’t know what you expect, but not that it will feel exactly the same as it did before you left. It is puzzling and trying to fit long term travel back into a life at home is almost impossible. I think after something as extreme as some of the things I saw and experienced in Africa especially, it is even harder to fit in.
But you do it somehow. It is great to see people, but strange to have a refrigerator that you can open anytime. I find myself unable to wear anything other than the same 3 shirts I wore my entire trip. I go to the grocery store and usually have a freak-out moment because of the excess of choice. That happens in several realms of life. I wander vacantly around the house, unable to concentrate in this in-between stage that I am not really sure who I am or where I am. Everything feels so familiar but so different.
There are the sleepless nights where all I can do is go outside and look at the stars and try to transport myself back to a balmy tropical night, I can almost feel the warm humid air on my skin and feel like I should panic when I can’t see the Southern Cross, but refuse to give in and keep looking as if it will magically appear in the sky and I won’t feel so lost anymore.
Then the restlessness kicks in. Not changing locations every couple of days feels suffocating. Relationships are different. You don’t spill your deepest secrets, talk about religion and philosophy and the most disgusting of bodily functions within moments of meeting someone. You don’t meet someone on a bus and move on to your next location with the understanding that, “Hi, you are going to be my best friend for the next bit of time and we are going to be closer than we are with almost anyone back at home no matter how many years we have known them. We will completely depend on and trust each other. We are going to spend the next bit of time probably sharing a bed and together almost 24 hours a day, and be eating off each other’s plates and sharing everything.” So there is a new way of adjusting to normal social relationships again.
It’s funny too, most of this trip hasn’t been your typical hostel trip for me, it has been more away from other backpackers and more work-oriented, and it isn’t a fun, but it is definitely interesting and a different experience, but the end of my trip here in Belize is about as classic backpacker as you can get so it brings back all that nostalgia from previous trips like South East Asia that was like this.
So back to the scream. I woke up this morning and was sort of thinking about life as I watched the sunlight come in through the strange ceiling, and it is this very familiar emotion that came that I have had several times now and I can't explain it very well. It is sort of like my whole life flashing through my eyes in the travel world and I know it only takes a second but it feels like eternity.
All the feelings of these images of waking up alone in a strange hotel room, waking up not sure what country I am in, moments with friends where I know I will never be as close to anyone as I am to this person right now and I also know I will probably never see this person again, moments of lifetimes and expedited relationships, and this clink of home and waking up under the same ceiling, seeing the same people, flights home from previous trips and all the emotions swirling there.
And the next thing I knew I was screaming at the top of my lungs (just like i have done at the end of every trip, it is this BIZARRE reaction I have no control of) until the 2 guys in my room jumped out of their bunk beds and start shaking me to bust me out of this trance and more people have stuck their heads in the door to see what the noise is. Then it was all I could do to just not cry because if I started crying, sometimes I think I wouldn't ever stop. How can this all be ending? How can so much have already ended?
Quotes from the Road- a tribute to traveling stupidity
This might not be very funny for anyone who has not been traveling with me, but I had to throw it in there for those of you who have if anyone is reading this. Names have been left out to protect the guilty.
"That is so nice of you to come all the way from the US to Africa to see my house"- old woman in rural Kenya"
"Aren't you worried about getting caught?" "This is Africa." - Talking to a Nigerian gem smuggler in Ethiopia
"Safari? Boat trip? Leaf of Wisdom?"- rasta guy in Tanzania
"It's just what you do, you try goat in Kenya, you get a Lady Boy in Thailand." - Kenya
"No, it’s cool, some people bring home stray puppies, you bring home refugees." - Kenya
"When you see something beautiful don't you want to keep looking at it?" "You can't talk to me that way, I'm from the US where romance is dead."- Egypt
"What kind of protection will we have?" "A jeep full of soldiers"- Tutsi rebel on the Congo border
"You're doing what? You are absolutely insane, do you have a death wish?- Marine at the embassy in Rwanda
“Here’s our guns and here’s our cock.”- South Africa
“Want some cheese?”- South Africa
“HELLO! Where’s Jesus?”- South Africa
"Girls don't get drunk, they get tired and confused." South Africa
"When you brought us coffee in our tent, I felt some sort of love for you I have never felt for anyone before." Patagonia
"No, I can't say it. Damm. I have a bad taste in my mouth. Actually, I think a unicorn died somewhere." Patagonia
"Matame guayavo, matame ya que el amor no pudo"- India
"Lasst uns wandern gehen!" - Swaziland
"It's been a while since I had a good meat sweat." Morocco
"Men on bicycles shouldn't be so forward"- India
"The next time I go backpacking I'm bringing a suitcase"- Argentina
"Come on, you know this, no grabbing, no licking, these are the rules of the jungle."- Bolivia
“I had some distractions, I was too busy gaining 20 lbs and sleeping with everyone I saw”- Chile
“Well, he’s just human like anyone else. “Which is a good thing.” “Yeah, I wouldn’t want him to be an alien or something.” “Unless he had a vibrating penis or something”- Chile
“That’s why I love hooking up with you, I never know where your tongue has been. And you never stop thinking about food”- Argentina
“Poor water molecules. Do you ever think about them? They’re like, damm, I’m stuck in a glacier. I can’t move, eh eh, let me out. Woo hoo, I’m free. Yay! I’m in a river. Uh oh, I’m stuck. I’m in jell-o, but I can kinda jiggle.”- Patagonia, referring to our glacier water jell-o
“What I really like is how completely unrelated things are taped to things in grocery stores here. Like you buy a box of cereal and get a deodorant for free.”- Guatemala
“So how did you learn English?” “Well, I learned it because it’s the official international language for Viking re-enactment.”- Panama
“dolphins are just gay sharks”- Boat captain in Colombia
“I train horses, yes, but I am not a horse trainer, there is a big difference!”- South Africa
“I wish I was cool enough to have a nickname from a drink.” “Well, we can start tonight, what are you drinking? That can be your nickname.” Silence. “What are you drinking?” “A Panty Ripper.”- Belize
“Well, my underwater theme music. . .” -Belize
“Oheeo. I have heard it is the most magical place in the world. I want to go there.” “Oheeo?” “Yes, where Obama is from.” “Ohio? Oh Obama.” - Uganda
"No I am not jealous. Honestly, he is a porter, how much do you think he makes? Look at us: oil, finance."- Nepal
And the rest are just too inappropriate to put up there (especially with Rachel). And I know there are some amazing ones I have forgotten which makes me sad. But I want to thank each and every person I got to know on this trip and the others. It is amazing how close you can get to people so quickly and cheesy as it sounds, it’s true, only you can understand that little bit of my life and me with yours, and part of my heart will always be with you. So prost, salud, cheers, shucram, skal, viva, kampai and l’chaim.
"That is so nice of you to come all the way from the US to Africa to see my house"- old woman in rural Kenya"
"Aren't you worried about getting caught?" "This is Africa." - Talking to a Nigerian gem smuggler in Ethiopia
"Safari? Boat trip? Leaf of Wisdom?"- rasta guy in Tanzania
"It's just what you do, you try goat in Kenya, you get a Lady Boy in Thailand." - Kenya
"No, it’s cool, some people bring home stray puppies, you bring home refugees." - Kenya
"When you see something beautiful don't you want to keep looking at it?" "You can't talk to me that way, I'm from the US where romance is dead."- Egypt
"What kind of protection will we have?" "A jeep full of soldiers"- Tutsi rebel on the Congo border
"You're doing what? You are absolutely insane, do you have a death wish?- Marine at the embassy in Rwanda
“Here’s our guns and here’s our cock.”- South Africa
“Want some cheese?”- South Africa
“HELLO! Where’s Jesus?”- South Africa
"Girls don't get drunk, they get tired and confused." South Africa
"When you brought us coffee in our tent, I felt some sort of love for you I have never felt for anyone before." Patagonia
"No, I can't say it. Damm. I have a bad taste in my mouth. Actually, I think a unicorn died somewhere." Patagonia
"Matame guayavo, matame ya que el amor no pudo"- India
"Lasst uns wandern gehen!" - Swaziland
"It's been a while since I had a good meat sweat." Morocco
"Men on bicycles shouldn't be so forward"- India
"The next time I go backpacking I'm bringing a suitcase"- Argentina
"Come on, you know this, no grabbing, no licking, these are the rules of the jungle."- Bolivia
“I had some distractions, I was too busy gaining 20 lbs and sleeping with everyone I saw”- Chile
“Well, he’s just human like anyone else. “Which is a good thing.” “Yeah, I wouldn’t want him to be an alien or something.” “Unless he had a vibrating penis or something”- Chile
“That’s why I love hooking up with you, I never know where your tongue has been. And you never stop thinking about food”- Argentina
“Poor water molecules. Do you ever think about them? They’re like, damm, I’m stuck in a glacier. I can’t move, eh eh, let me out. Woo hoo, I’m free. Yay! I’m in a river. Uh oh, I’m stuck. I’m in jell-o, but I can kinda jiggle.”- Patagonia, referring to our glacier water jell-o
“What I really like is how completely unrelated things are taped to things in grocery stores here. Like you buy a box of cereal and get a deodorant for free.”- Guatemala
“So how did you learn English?” “Well, I learned it because it’s the official international language for Viking re-enactment.”- Panama
“dolphins are just gay sharks”- Boat captain in Colombia
“I train horses, yes, but I am not a horse trainer, there is a big difference!”- South Africa
“I wish I was cool enough to have a nickname from a drink.” “Well, we can start tonight, what are you drinking? That can be your nickname.” Silence. “What are you drinking?” “A Panty Ripper.”- Belize
“Well, my underwater theme music. . .” -Belize
“Oheeo. I have heard it is the most magical place in the world. I want to go there.” “Oheeo?” “Yes, where Obama is from.” “Ohio? Oh Obama.” - Uganda
"No I am not jealous. Honestly, he is a porter, how much do you think he makes? Look at us: oil, finance."- Nepal
And the rest are just too inappropriate to put up there (especially with Rachel). And I know there are some amazing ones I have forgotten which makes me sad. But I want to thank each and every person I got to know on this trip and the others. It is amazing how close you can get to people so quickly and cheesy as it sounds, it’s true, only you can understand that little bit of my life and me with yours, and part of my heart will always be with you. So prost, salud, cheers, shucram, skal, viva, kampai and l’chaim.
Belize Days and Sad Endings
My time in Belize is not indicative of how I have spent the rest of my trip, but it has been a great way to end the last almost 2 years of my life. I feel like more of my trip has been geared towards work or getting off the tourist track. It is funny to see the progression of trips. Australia, my first big trip, was the most fun crazy and wild time of my life. Travels in South East Asia were just so much fun and I had so many amazing crazy stories. Even Central America the first time was full of random moments.
Contrast that to my time in Africa which almost none of it was fun, but it was definitely interesting. Eastern Europe as well. Each trip seems to have a different flavor. And I suppose my last week of this trip in Belize has more of your classic backpacker feel to it.
I met 2 guys on my boat over to the island of Caye Caulker, we decided we were now a group, going to be best friends, hang out together and be a crew until we parted ways. So of course we made more friends at our hostel and have been having a great time in tropical paradise hanging out.
The locals in Belize are all so nice and friendly and have the most amazing accents I have ever heard. We have all been laying in the sun and tanning during the day, listening to the standard reggae music, drinking rum out on the dock of the Caribbean at night, eating amazing lobster and coconut rice and reminiscing about trips. I can’t tear my eyes away from the beautiful Caribbean.
It is your classic backpacker place to stay as well, a social and funky atmosphere, indicative of most hostels. I have literally been eaten alive by bedbugs. I look atrocious with bites all over my face and body and the bump on my head from almost knocking myself out after a rum induced sailing trip on the deck of the boat doesn’t help. There are 2 nasty bathrooms for 50 people. The kitchen is insufficient and dirty and rats have gotten into most people’s bags by now. Oh, nothing like a love-hate relationship with a cheap hostel to bring back classic backpacking memories. It’s too expensive to eat much here in Belize so we treat ourselves a little to the lobster because we have too and don’t eat for the rest of the day. There is always someone laying around in one of several hammocks around the hostel. It is bitter sweet because I don’t think I will do this again, some things you just get too old for.
We went snorkeling the other day which was amazing, sailing out on this boat. We didn’t see the manatees that we had hoped for but it still may have been the best snorkeling I have ever had with stunning coral, huge green moray eels up close, getting really close to sting rays, fish the size of people, schools of fish just following us around, getting close to lots and lots of big nurse sharks, more amazing tropical fish and barracudas. Life is good.
Just another day to hang out beachside and then lots more hours on a bus back to Guatemala and Antigua (oh how much of my life have I spent on a bus?) and then back to reality. But Belize has been a good place to end. If there is such a thing!
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Nuestros Ahijados (Guatemala)
Walking onto the grounds of Nuestros Ahijados, or God’s Child Project as it is known in the US, one finds well manicured lawns, stone buildings surrounded by lush trees, and most of all, tranquility. “We have had people see the place and turn around and walk out because they thought it was too nice looking and a charity shouldn’t be like that, but it’s not like that, it’s about giving the people human dignity,” said Patrick Atkinson, founder of the program.
Patrick Atkinson is a prime example of how with a lot of hard work and a great vision, one person can help thousands.
Part of what makes Atkinson so inspiring is the fact that he never imagined his life would turn out the way it has. He started by going to Guatemala in 1983 to work on a farm. “I didn’t speak a word of Spanish and I thought I was going down for six months to drive a tractor and pick coffee.” It was during the civil war and a group of nuns had purchased some land and thought having an international presence would help deter an attack on the refugees who were staying on the land.
He worked in an orphanage with 35 children on the land. What started small has grown to a nonprofit that has branches in Guatemala, the United States, India, El Salvador and Malawi. In Guatemala alone, he has helped 4,000 children and 8,700 women, mostly single mothers, change their lives and learn to dream.
God’s Child Project, also known as Nuestros Ahijados, is based in Bismarck, North Dakota, and has its main branch in Antigua, Guatemala. It has proved to be a successful nonprofit even through these difficult economic times because of this. Atkinson takes no salary for himself (he does for business purposes but then donates it back to the program). Most of his employees are in Guatemala and work for stipends. Everything is far more cost effective being based in a developing country. Because the charity doesn’t pay six-figure salaries to its executive and puts almost no money to a marketing or press budget, they are able to maximize their funds with 93 cents on every dollar going directly to the children the project funds. This in turn, makes more people want to donate to the project when they see how efficient it all is.
“There are a lot of people with a lot of money willing to donate, but they don’t want their money to go to waste, they worked hard for it. They often come down and see the program and how it works and then become our biggest donor,” said Atkinson.
Almost all the funds are raised by a direct mailer. “Our direct mailer has been absurdly over successful,” said Charles Moore, Director of Operations for the Institute for Trafficked Exploited and Missing, a branch of the nonprofit. “We don’t buy mailing lists. Everyone that we mail to has had some sort of exposure to the project and said that they want to help. In some way or another, every donor has connected with us as people, so that is probably why it has been so successful.”
It wasn’t always so easy. There were several times when the project almost had to be shut down, but it was only by what looked like a miracle in the last minute that kept it going. At the beginning, Atkinson would sometimes make what he calls, “Hamburger Soup” to feed the children of the project. “I would go to fast food restaurants, buy one or two hamburgers and leave the restaurant with my pockets filled with the two hamburgers and dozens of ketchup packets. I would then cut the hamburgers into small pieces, put them in a soup pot with boiling water and add the ketchup.”
But somehow, the organization always managed to survive, despite several close calls, Atkinson always felt compelled to keep going. The program itself has grown as well. He created the Bismarck Educational System for developing nations which has become an international model, he was asked in 2000 by the United Nations to develop other international programs for AIDs victims.
Nuestros Ahijados or the God’s Child Program acts like god parents to these kids and creates family. The word God is not meant to have a religious connotation; rather it means they act as god parents.
“If you don’t have family, you can get it in Nuestros Ahijados, I am unable to explain how much it helped me. It gave me love and a family. I don’t have words, only love,” said Jose Leon Suruy Valle, who was found in a plaza by Atkinson when he was thirteen and now works as a social worker for the organization to help other families. He will be going to university next year.
The project itself is multidimensional. It includes a shelter for malnourished babies, a hospital, a dental clinic, food and clothing distribution program, educational programs, house building project, a rescue, awareness and rehabilitation program for victims of human trafficking and a school. They also help support local charities in the countries in which they operate.
“Our vision is to form family and to break the poor out of poverty through education,” said Atkinson. “These kids don’t have a culture of success. They need to form a family, to teach these kids how to dream and give them the tools to make those dreams come true.”
It is just this, the forming of family through a nonprofit that makes Nuestros Ahijados so unique and so successful. Unlike other nonprofits which recognize the value of education and strive to help underprivileged kids graduate high school, Nuestros Ahijados realizes that a high school education often isn’t enough to break the chain of poverty. Once a child is accepted into the program, they are sponsored until they choose to stop studying.
“I remember a boy we pulled out from under a park bench when he was seven years old, now he is a doctor,” said Atkinson.
Some of the students go on to study in the U.S. and come back as doctors and lawyers, and many of them return to work for the very organization that gave them a chance and a family. The real family environment makes a huge difference compared to other charities. “We ban vernacular like, ‘you already got yours,’ ‘come back later,’ or ‘we are busy right now.’ These are our children. We create a family for them. We don’t institutionalize them, that’s fine for summer camp, but this is these kid’s only chance for childhood. They want someone that is going to remember their birthday, someone who will remember what they were like when they were 7 when they are 23,” said Atkinson.
Nuestros Ahijados is not a handout charity. They work on an ideological system based on earned rights. Everyone should have access to certain humanitarian rights, but it does no good to set up a paradigm that creates a dependence on help. Through a point system, children are encouraged to read more. For every fifteen minutes they read they get a point and with these points they can “buy” a new toy. Mothers get points for attending lectures that cover common issues regarding raising children or basic medical care. With these points they can receive food and clothing donations. This also helps because Nuestros Ahijados is not an orphanage, so children go back to their parents, or more often single mothers, at the end of the day and the program helps to create positive changes at home as well as at school. Children get more privileges based on their report cards which teaches them take responsibility for their own achievements and work towards setting goals.
The children help with the maintenance of the school and the clinic grounds as well. They, in essence, have built the program so it is in their self-interest to help maintain it. This sets up an environment of dignity and family. This dynamic replaces the donor mentality that resides in other nonprofits.
“A lot of programs fail because they don’t dignify the people, they treat them as caseloads,” said Atkinson. This approach adds to the sustainability of the program.
Though the project has grown from the original 35 kids, the vision as well as the founder has remained the same. “I’m still the same as I was when I thought I would come down here and drive a tractor. The vision is the same as it was originally,” said Atkinson, “The project has grown and my role has changed. Now I meet with presidents, ambassadors and secretary of states from around the world but I have stayed the same. I am just so ordinary. I don’t want to lose that because if I ever start to believe my own P.R. then it’s over.”
And Atkinson does have some remarkable P.R. Now the man who used to struggle to buy two hamburgers for orphans has been interviewed by CNN, LA Times, Christian Science Monitor, and has a book written about him that is currently being made into a Hollywood movie.
He is an example of how one person can make a difference without knowing how. “I say something so much that it has become known as the Atkinson Law and that is that people want to help and they can afford to help, they just don’t know how. And that is why I have never had a problem fundraising. I just give people the opportunity to realize their dreams,” said Atkinson.
He firmly believes that everyone can help. “Everyone has their gifts. Take the time to take a personal inventory of what those are, because someday the time will come when some group will need them. Simply say yes.” That is his advice for anyone who wants to help, “Say yes. The opportunity is going to come your way. It won’t take anything from you.”
Because so many people are saying yes, Atkinson has managed to make a difference in so many people’s lives. Many of the volunteers in Guatemala come back to volunteer several times because it is so effective. The Director of Programs, Luke Armstrong started his involvement with the project when he was 13 and came down as part of a service team to build houses.
Because the program is so affective, donors and volunteers keep coming back to help.
“It has become more of a social movement, I know of at least eight charities that have started because someone came down here and saw how this was run and have started their own charities that work the same way,” said Atkinson.
The sky seems to be the limit as the project continues to grow, and Atkinson is a prime example of how one person really can help change the world. “People want to give. All I am doing is giving them a chance to realize their dreams,” said Atkinson.
Patrick Atkinson is a prime example of how with a lot of hard work and a great vision, one person can help thousands.
Part of what makes Atkinson so inspiring is the fact that he never imagined his life would turn out the way it has. He started by going to Guatemala in 1983 to work on a farm. “I didn’t speak a word of Spanish and I thought I was going down for six months to drive a tractor and pick coffee.” It was during the civil war and a group of nuns had purchased some land and thought having an international presence would help deter an attack on the refugees who were staying on the land.
He worked in an orphanage with 35 children on the land. What started small has grown to a nonprofit that has branches in Guatemala, the United States, India, El Salvador and Malawi. In Guatemala alone, he has helped 4,000 children and 8,700 women, mostly single mothers, change their lives and learn to dream.
God’s Child Project, also known as Nuestros Ahijados, is based in Bismarck, North Dakota, and has its main branch in Antigua, Guatemala. It has proved to be a successful nonprofit even through these difficult economic times because of this. Atkinson takes no salary for himself (he does for business purposes but then donates it back to the program). Most of his employees are in Guatemala and work for stipends. Everything is far more cost effective being based in a developing country. Because the charity doesn’t pay six-figure salaries to its executive and puts almost no money to a marketing or press budget, they are able to maximize their funds with 93 cents on every dollar going directly to the children the project funds. This in turn, makes more people want to donate to the project when they see how efficient it all is.
“There are a lot of people with a lot of money willing to donate, but they don’t want their money to go to waste, they worked hard for it. They often come down and see the program and how it works and then become our biggest donor,” said Atkinson.
Almost all the funds are raised by a direct mailer. “Our direct mailer has been absurdly over successful,” said Charles Moore, Director of Operations for the Institute for Trafficked Exploited and Missing, a branch of the nonprofit. “We don’t buy mailing lists. Everyone that we mail to has had some sort of exposure to the project and said that they want to help. In some way or another, every donor has connected with us as people, so that is probably why it has been so successful.”
It wasn’t always so easy. There were several times when the project almost had to be shut down, but it was only by what looked like a miracle in the last minute that kept it going. At the beginning, Atkinson would sometimes make what he calls, “Hamburger Soup” to feed the children of the project. “I would go to fast food restaurants, buy one or two hamburgers and leave the restaurant with my pockets filled with the two hamburgers and dozens of ketchup packets. I would then cut the hamburgers into small pieces, put them in a soup pot with boiling water and add the ketchup.”
But somehow, the organization always managed to survive, despite several close calls, Atkinson always felt compelled to keep going. The program itself has grown as well. He created the Bismarck Educational System for developing nations which has become an international model, he was asked in 2000 by the United Nations to develop other international programs for AIDs victims.
Nuestros Ahijados or the God’s Child Program acts like god parents to these kids and creates family. The word God is not meant to have a religious connotation; rather it means they act as god parents.
“If you don’t have family, you can get it in Nuestros Ahijados, I am unable to explain how much it helped me. It gave me love and a family. I don’t have words, only love,” said Jose Leon Suruy Valle, who was found in a plaza by Atkinson when he was thirteen and now works as a social worker for the organization to help other families. He will be going to university next year.
The project itself is multidimensional. It includes a shelter for malnourished babies, a hospital, a dental clinic, food and clothing distribution program, educational programs, house building project, a rescue, awareness and rehabilitation program for victims of human trafficking and a school. They also help support local charities in the countries in which they operate.
“Our vision is to form family and to break the poor out of poverty through education,” said Atkinson. “These kids don’t have a culture of success. They need to form a family, to teach these kids how to dream and give them the tools to make those dreams come true.”
It is just this, the forming of family through a nonprofit that makes Nuestros Ahijados so unique and so successful. Unlike other nonprofits which recognize the value of education and strive to help underprivileged kids graduate high school, Nuestros Ahijados realizes that a high school education often isn’t enough to break the chain of poverty. Once a child is accepted into the program, they are sponsored until they choose to stop studying.
“I remember a boy we pulled out from under a park bench when he was seven years old, now he is a doctor,” said Atkinson.
Some of the students go on to study in the U.S. and come back as doctors and lawyers, and many of them return to work for the very organization that gave them a chance and a family. The real family environment makes a huge difference compared to other charities. “We ban vernacular like, ‘you already got yours,’ ‘come back later,’ or ‘we are busy right now.’ These are our children. We create a family for them. We don’t institutionalize them, that’s fine for summer camp, but this is these kid’s only chance for childhood. They want someone that is going to remember their birthday, someone who will remember what they were like when they were 7 when they are 23,” said Atkinson.
Nuestros Ahijados is not a handout charity. They work on an ideological system based on earned rights. Everyone should have access to certain humanitarian rights, but it does no good to set up a paradigm that creates a dependence on help. Through a point system, children are encouraged to read more. For every fifteen minutes they read they get a point and with these points they can “buy” a new toy. Mothers get points for attending lectures that cover common issues regarding raising children or basic medical care. With these points they can receive food and clothing donations. This also helps because Nuestros Ahijados is not an orphanage, so children go back to their parents, or more often single mothers, at the end of the day and the program helps to create positive changes at home as well as at school. Children get more privileges based on their report cards which teaches them take responsibility for their own achievements and work towards setting goals.
The children help with the maintenance of the school and the clinic grounds as well. They, in essence, have built the program so it is in their self-interest to help maintain it. This sets up an environment of dignity and family. This dynamic replaces the donor mentality that resides in other nonprofits.
“A lot of programs fail because they don’t dignify the people, they treat them as caseloads,” said Atkinson. This approach adds to the sustainability of the program.
Though the project has grown from the original 35 kids, the vision as well as the founder has remained the same. “I’m still the same as I was when I thought I would come down here and drive a tractor. The vision is the same as it was originally,” said Atkinson, “The project has grown and my role has changed. Now I meet with presidents, ambassadors and secretary of states from around the world but I have stayed the same. I am just so ordinary. I don’t want to lose that because if I ever start to believe my own P.R. then it’s over.”
And Atkinson does have some remarkable P.R. Now the man who used to struggle to buy two hamburgers for orphans has been interviewed by CNN, LA Times, Christian Science Monitor, and has a book written about him that is currently being made into a Hollywood movie.
He is an example of how one person can make a difference without knowing how. “I say something so much that it has become known as the Atkinson Law and that is that people want to help and they can afford to help, they just don’t know how. And that is why I have never had a problem fundraising. I just give people the opportunity to realize their dreams,” said Atkinson.
He firmly believes that everyone can help. “Everyone has their gifts. Take the time to take a personal inventory of what those are, because someday the time will come when some group will need them. Simply say yes.” That is his advice for anyone who wants to help, “Say yes. The opportunity is going to come your way. It won’t take anything from you.”
Because so many people are saying yes, Atkinson has managed to make a difference in so many people’s lives. Many of the volunteers in Guatemala come back to volunteer several times because it is so effective. The Director of Programs, Luke Armstrong started his involvement with the project when he was 13 and came down as part of a service team to build houses.
Because the program is so affective, donors and volunteers keep coming back to help.
“It has become more of a social movement, I know of at least eight charities that have started because someone came down here and saw how this was run and have started their own charities that work the same way,” said Atkinson.
The sky seems to be the limit as the project continues to grow, and Atkinson is a prime example of how one person really can help change the world. “People want to give. All I am doing is giving them a chance to realize their dreams,” said Atkinson.
Guatemalan Healthcare
I have always complained about the medical system in the U.S. I am not alone in this. I do feel very direct effects from suffering from our atrocious healthcare system for sure though. So I thought I would write about my experience with healthcare in Guatemala.
I found their system to be the most efficient system I have ever seen. I do realize that cheap to me is in no way cheap to many Guatemalans, but I still think that my experience in Guatemala compared to the US is illustrative of the atrocious state of our healthcare system in the US.
So I figured that in the last, almost 2 years I have been traveling, there is no way I have escaped getting a parasite. I tried to get tested in the US the last time I was back but it proved to be expensive and ineffective. So I thought I would go in Antigua, Guatemala.
I went into the hospital in Antigua and asked to do the tests. I did not have to have a pointless doctor’s consultation before either. They simply had me go up to the lab where I got to speak to the actual technicians themselves. They handed me two glass Gerber baby food jars (ok, so that is a little disconcerting, especially when I went back for another test the next day because one was irregular and they gave me another jar and told me to rinse it under hot water for 5 minutes, but we won’t dwell on that) and had me hand over stool and urine samples. Then, right away we went down for a blood test. The needle was fresh out of new packaging, clean and the nurse was very efficient.
They told me to come back that afternoon for the results. I did, and not only that, but instead of just giving me a sheet of paper of the results, which they did additionally, but the very guy that read my results was there to explain. The whole ordeal cost me about 8$ US and took 20 minutes in the morning and then another 5 minutes when I came back.
Like I said, there was an irregularity so I had to come back the next day with another urine sample, and the lab tech tested it for free, just in case the irregularity was on their part and because I had misunderstood some of the Spanish. He said it was no problem; he was on a break anyways so he could do it for me then and there. That took 10 minutes and cost me nothing.
Let’s compare my ordeal in the US this winter. I tried to make an appointment with a doctor to refer me to a lab but was in too much pain to wait the allotted time so I went into urgent care. Urgent care did my labs (after a wait time, though I have to admit, throwing up in the bathroom right next to the reception desk did expedite things) only to tell me that I should get the tests done and then see a doctor.
5 days later I got my test results back from the labs.
I think it was 2 weeks later that I was able to get into the doctor, but my memory is foggy on this one. There was the usual waiting room time. The doctor told me he didn’t really know what was wrong with me and offered some weak suggestions.
The whole process took about 2 weeks and I don’t remember numbers but am sure it cost over a thousand dollars. God bless America.
I found their system to be the most efficient system I have ever seen. I do realize that cheap to me is in no way cheap to many Guatemalans, but I still think that my experience in Guatemala compared to the US is illustrative of the atrocious state of our healthcare system in the US.
So I figured that in the last, almost 2 years I have been traveling, there is no way I have escaped getting a parasite. I tried to get tested in the US the last time I was back but it proved to be expensive and ineffective. So I thought I would go in Antigua, Guatemala.
I went into the hospital in Antigua and asked to do the tests. I did not have to have a pointless doctor’s consultation before either. They simply had me go up to the lab where I got to speak to the actual technicians themselves. They handed me two glass Gerber baby food jars (ok, so that is a little disconcerting, especially when I went back for another test the next day because one was irregular and they gave me another jar and told me to rinse it under hot water for 5 minutes, but we won’t dwell on that) and had me hand over stool and urine samples. Then, right away we went down for a blood test. The needle was fresh out of new packaging, clean and the nurse was very efficient.
They told me to come back that afternoon for the results. I did, and not only that, but instead of just giving me a sheet of paper of the results, which they did additionally, but the very guy that read my results was there to explain. The whole ordeal cost me about 8$ US and took 20 minutes in the morning and then another 5 minutes when I came back.
Like I said, there was an irregularity so I had to come back the next day with another urine sample, and the lab tech tested it for free, just in case the irregularity was on their part and because I had misunderstood some of the Spanish. He said it was no problem; he was on a break anyways so he could do it for me then and there. That took 10 minutes and cost me nothing.
Let’s compare my ordeal in the US this winter. I tried to make an appointment with a doctor to refer me to a lab but was in too much pain to wait the allotted time so I went into urgent care. Urgent care did my labs (after a wait time, though I have to admit, throwing up in the bathroom right next to the reception desk did expedite things) only to tell me that I should get the tests done and then see a doctor.
5 days later I got my test results back from the labs.
I think it was 2 weeks later that I was able to get into the doctor, but my memory is foggy on this one. There was the usual waiting room time. The doctor told me he didn’t really know what was wrong with me and offered some weak suggestions.
The whole process took about 2 weeks and I don’t remember numbers but am sure it cost over a thousand dollars. God bless America.
Oh Life, What a Tease (Guatemala)
When is it time to give up on your dreams? I know the Disney answer to that is never, and that there should be a happy ending, but who is to say there should be? And sooner or later, money does play into things, you cannot pretend that it is going to magically appear along with the castle and prince charming. A girl has got to pay the rent somehow.
For me, part of the reason I have been traveling is to start a career as an international journalist. Now with less than two weeks of this trip left, I have realized that life has taken me in a different direction. So have I failed? I look at the facts, if I had stayed in one place instead of moving around maybe I would have started that career. It was a huge learning experience to see that I do need to be in one place to get contacts and learn the language, I think I would need that to be a more effective journalist. But I was also compelled to keep moving. So one could argue that I didn’t really give it my best effort. But that is the problem with conflicting priorities.
Life with its ebbs and flows can be interesting, how it can give you something and then take it away in a second. When I got to Antigua, Guatemala, it was sort of sinking in to me how I did fail in a sense. How I didn’t publish as much as I would like, and though being offered a travel advice column was exciting, that isn’t where I want to put my energies, I want to focus on human rights issues, not travel articles.
I enrolled in Spanish classes and quickly one thing led to another, and life sort of teased me again into thinking I could make it as a journalist. The timing especially was strange, right when I was thinking how I failed. I was going to volunteer at an NGO, via the Spanish School I was studying with. They took me to Nuestros Ahijados, or God’s Child project, ran by Patrick Atkinson. It is absolutely the most effective, well-run charity I have ever seen and it completely changed my mind about development work. I decided that instead of just volunteering, I wanted to write about the charity.
Soon I was swept into this crazy world of reporting. I was invited to meet the mayor and the attorney general to interview about the project. I went and followed social workers on their visits and saw how some families live. I met some of the most amazing people of my entire trip that work at the project and even allowed me to move in with them while I was there. I was shocked that these two boys that were my age were in such prestigious positions and did so much, it was truly inspiring.
But Patrick Atkinson himself, who by chance happened to be at the project which is very rare, was the most inspiring. Though he is interviewed by CNN and the Christian Science Monitor and meets with ambassadors and secretary of state’s, he treated me with credibility and dignity and gave me lots of time. He is one of the most amazing people I have ever met.
At the same time, while all this was going on, I started Spanish classes. My Spanish teacher happened to be a journalist as well and for my first class we went to a meeting of the board of directors at the main hospital in Antigua. There, another hot story fell into my lap. So two things are happening, supposedly, Guatemala is exaggerating their Swine Flu cases, so that they can get more aid money. The economic crisis has not only hit industrialized countries, but it has been catastrophic for developing countries who are losing their aid money. So Guatemala has seen the Swine Flu as a way to remedy the situation. I had the director of the hospital on record saying that the national health board has told them to only test one in ten people that come into the hospital with swine flu symptoms. He said that they are doing this for two reasons, the first is because the money that is allocated to the test kits is being funneled into Swiss bank accounts. Second, because they want to make the problem worse so that they get more aid money. I thought it was a pretty hot story to have him on the record saying this. Apparently so did authorities in Guatemala, because my professor who runs his own small paper had someone break in and smash the monitors of this computers while he was working on the story as well.
But for me, both of these stories seemed to be a sign that I should keep pursuing the journalism dream. And I have never been happier, I was working nonstop, I had no time to eat and my pants began to fall off of me, I was always running from one place to the next and food and sleep didn’t seem to matter. I loved the adrenaline and I loved thinking I was going to help people. My roommate would come home to find me asleep over my laptop, I was constantly rushing around doing interviews, then Spanish class with every now and then taking a night off to go salsa, mambo and meringue dancing in Antigua, which is by the way, so much fun. And I was so alive and so happy. Then the coup in Honduras struck. And I happened to meet a contact who had some very interesting information. Once again, I don’t want there to be tragedy in this world, but I felt like I was in the right place at the right time, and I love the lifestyle of thinking I have 1 hour to figure out how to tie things up because I am going into Honduras before the borders close.
Despite it feeling like everything was going in the right direction, life was only teasing me. No news source I could find was interested in the Honduras story, and in a different vein that situation ended in a bit of a disaster. I couldn’t develop the hospital story because the director had to clamp down and wasn’t able to talk all of the sudden. And the most devastating of all, after all the time that Patrick Atkinson and his staff gave me, I queried almost 40 periodicals and nobody was interested. And over half of those had shut down because of these awful economic times.
I felt like this dream had been given back to me, and then shattered yet again. It is worse to be so close and have it taken away. And the worst part of it is that I was loving the lifestyle and it felt like everything was going right.
I headed off in a daze to Lago de Atitlan, which is a whole different story in itself of life taking you in crazy directions, and a beautiful place as well. My trip is about to end and I didn’t really accomplish what I set out too. I read a quote by Patrick Atkinson himself actually, “God doesn’t ask that we succeed, only that we try.” And that was sort of a weight off my shoulders.
And I realized that this is really my first experience of failure that I can think of in my life. And then I realized that is something that I need to develop a better relationship with. We are all going to fail in our life, and if I want to accomplish anything I need to relax more with failure and not let it get me down.
But like I said before, where is that line between being practical and making a living, and not giving up on our dreams? Because I know the lifestyle of a journalist is something I am passionate about, but not the freelancing and not making a living at it part. Either way, it was an interesting time in Antigua.
For me, part of the reason I have been traveling is to start a career as an international journalist. Now with less than two weeks of this trip left, I have realized that life has taken me in a different direction. So have I failed? I look at the facts, if I had stayed in one place instead of moving around maybe I would have started that career. It was a huge learning experience to see that I do need to be in one place to get contacts and learn the language, I think I would need that to be a more effective journalist. But I was also compelled to keep moving. So one could argue that I didn’t really give it my best effort. But that is the problem with conflicting priorities.
Life with its ebbs and flows can be interesting, how it can give you something and then take it away in a second. When I got to Antigua, Guatemala, it was sort of sinking in to me how I did fail in a sense. How I didn’t publish as much as I would like, and though being offered a travel advice column was exciting, that isn’t where I want to put my energies, I want to focus on human rights issues, not travel articles.
I enrolled in Spanish classes and quickly one thing led to another, and life sort of teased me again into thinking I could make it as a journalist. The timing especially was strange, right when I was thinking how I failed. I was going to volunteer at an NGO, via the Spanish School I was studying with. They took me to Nuestros Ahijados, or God’s Child project, ran by Patrick Atkinson. It is absolutely the most effective, well-run charity I have ever seen and it completely changed my mind about development work. I decided that instead of just volunteering, I wanted to write about the charity.
Soon I was swept into this crazy world of reporting. I was invited to meet the mayor and the attorney general to interview about the project. I went and followed social workers on their visits and saw how some families live. I met some of the most amazing people of my entire trip that work at the project and even allowed me to move in with them while I was there. I was shocked that these two boys that were my age were in such prestigious positions and did so much, it was truly inspiring.
But Patrick Atkinson himself, who by chance happened to be at the project which is very rare, was the most inspiring. Though he is interviewed by CNN and the Christian Science Monitor and meets with ambassadors and secretary of state’s, he treated me with credibility and dignity and gave me lots of time. He is one of the most amazing people I have ever met.
At the same time, while all this was going on, I started Spanish classes. My Spanish teacher happened to be a journalist as well and for my first class we went to a meeting of the board of directors at the main hospital in Antigua. There, another hot story fell into my lap. So two things are happening, supposedly, Guatemala is exaggerating their Swine Flu cases, so that they can get more aid money. The economic crisis has not only hit industrialized countries, but it has been catastrophic for developing countries who are losing their aid money. So Guatemala has seen the Swine Flu as a way to remedy the situation. I had the director of the hospital on record saying that the national health board has told them to only test one in ten people that come into the hospital with swine flu symptoms. He said that they are doing this for two reasons, the first is because the money that is allocated to the test kits is being funneled into Swiss bank accounts. Second, because they want to make the problem worse so that they get more aid money. I thought it was a pretty hot story to have him on the record saying this. Apparently so did authorities in Guatemala, because my professor who runs his own small paper had someone break in and smash the monitors of this computers while he was working on the story as well.
But for me, both of these stories seemed to be a sign that I should keep pursuing the journalism dream. And I have never been happier, I was working nonstop, I had no time to eat and my pants began to fall off of me, I was always running from one place to the next and food and sleep didn’t seem to matter. I loved the adrenaline and I loved thinking I was going to help people. My roommate would come home to find me asleep over my laptop, I was constantly rushing around doing interviews, then Spanish class with every now and then taking a night off to go salsa, mambo and meringue dancing in Antigua, which is by the way, so much fun. And I was so alive and so happy. Then the coup in Honduras struck. And I happened to meet a contact who had some very interesting information. Once again, I don’t want there to be tragedy in this world, but I felt like I was in the right place at the right time, and I love the lifestyle of thinking I have 1 hour to figure out how to tie things up because I am going into Honduras before the borders close.
Despite it feeling like everything was going in the right direction, life was only teasing me. No news source I could find was interested in the Honduras story, and in a different vein that situation ended in a bit of a disaster. I couldn’t develop the hospital story because the director had to clamp down and wasn’t able to talk all of the sudden. And the most devastating of all, after all the time that Patrick Atkinson and his staff gave me, I queried almost 40 periodicals and nobody was interested. And over half of those had shut down because of these awful economic times.
I felt like this dream had been given back to me, and then shattered yet again. It is worse to be so close and have it taken away. And the worst part of it is that I was loving the lifestyle and it felt like everything was going right.
I headed off in a daze to Lago de Atitlan, which is a whole different story in itself of life taking you in crazy directions, and a beautiful place as well. My trip is about to end and I didn’t really accomplish what I set out too. I read a quote by Patrick Atkinson himself actually, “God doesn’t ask that we succeed, only that we try.” And that was sort of a weight off my shoulders.
And I realized that this is really my first experience of failure that I can think of in my life. And then I realized that is something that I need to develop a better relationship with. We are all going to fail in our life, and if I want to accomplish anything I need to relax more with failure and not let it get me down.
But like I said before, where is that line between being practical and making a living, and not giving up on our dreams? Because I know the lifestyle of a journalist is something I am passionate about, but not the freelancing and not making a living at it part. Either way, it was an interesting time in Antigua.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
