Day 28 - The End of the Begining

Bags are left unattended on the parking lot, food is left unattended on the tables, friendships are suspended in time, unfinished, just started.

This morning, 9 am, still confused by the remains of a few hours of sleep, I see the first participant leave. Paola. The rush of bags, relatives, cars, friends, tears. And then it hits you in the face: the experience is over.

After five weeks of collaboration and the creation of a safe space, every single one of our 41 change makers will return to their respective reality. Will they resist the social pressure?  I ask myself the question as a facilitator explains how hard it will be to share their experience and the change they have been through.

This day feels surreal. We all now it has come to an end, it is in the air, but the same rituals take place. Struggle for waking up, rushed breakfast, struggle to gather the students together. I suspect they are trying to slow time down, trying to avoid the inevitable separation. Without each other’s physical support, determination will be challenged.

As we sit down in our last family session, our “Chilaquiles” seem to dread the reflection that is expected from the them. It will probably take them several weeks if not months to digest the amount of information that was given to them in these four weeks. Each of them was touched by something different and they will take this individual experience with them. Saul was inspired by his community service as much as Adriana found her direction during her Social Issue Activity.

An adequate reflexion of the courses content: a source of information and inspiration for further development. Thinking about the future, I can’t help but wonder how we will be able to reduce this experience to three weeks when they agreed they all would have needed more time. Time to prepare themselves for the transition, the resistance and the indifference.

Every issue seems so trivial in these last hours. Distance between facilitator-participant, authority, punctuality.

I remember the collage made by a group of my Visual Arts students: “It’s funny cause we’re all the same”. We are from the same generation, a youth full of hope and will to transform our realities, bring them just a bit closer to this vision we created. As we sit in the last plenary session, it seems to me that these 41 participants are one step ahead of us. As a facilitator, I chose to support Patricio Provencio’s initiative and contribute to it with my input. It is his vision we all worked towards and, with this vision in mind, we gave all we could. Thinking of the open day and the presentation of the social projects, I find myself confronted with the conclusion that for the time being I do not have the strength to initiate such a project in my own community. We all have a lot to learn form these 41 young adults who decided to act upon their society, despite of the fear. I know the memory of the nervous and excited faces will accompany me once I decide to engage on this same path.

Today is a sunny day. Sititng in a living room in Mexico City, I am ready to start the next part of my journey. Destination: Oaxaca, Chiapas. Ready to discover this country that 41 teenagers are so eager to change for the better. In this same morning sun, I know a majority of our participants are sitting in a classroom, reintegrating the immutable routine of schooldays. Hope that the changed they have gone through will be contagious. Hope that it will spread like a disease and become a pandemic. As the mother of a friend said on the way back to Mexico City, maybe only two of them will carry their project through, but for each awareness risen, our common vision is expanding. I have faith that none of the 41 participants will forget the lessons learnt during these four weeks and even when projects encounter too much resistance, I believe our lives have now taken a certain direction and no one could put us off this track.

I think time has now come to close this chapter. The task of writing the last blog entry was my burden. I could have used more time to draw reflections our of this condensed experience, but I realize that I would never get to the bottom of my emotions. I didn’t mention the tears, the cries, and embraces exchanged. I didn’t talk about the promises that were made. These emotions were theirs, ours and so should it remain.

A mountain of challenges is awaiting each and everyone of us, the road ahead will be filled with obstacles. Skepticism, conservatism, pessimism, close-mindedness, racism, discrimination. But we have faith, we do not stand alone.

Catherine Ador - Norway/ Switzerland (AC '09-'11)

Day 27 - Hope for the Future

Though tempered with the sadness, it’s a great joy to see this program achieve its conclusion. It’s been only a month, and a quick one at that, but I don’t think I overstate myself in saying this project has been an incredible sequence of events, and for me, personally, quite an emotional experience. Through this program, I’ve seen a lot of Mexico. I’ve witnessed this country’s horrifying diversity, extreme wealth, crushing poverty, radiant joy, desperation, and as I said in my first entry, these, this country’s many faces, compile the paradox that makes it so beautiful. As I also said in my first entry, this perfect paradox is brilliantly characterized by the complexity of the people, and as such the participants I’ve had the privilege to work with haven’t yet ceased to impress me, with their passion, young wisdom and hope. They’re very obviously teenagers, I should admit, and their natural spirit of rebellion can be at times tough to teach at, especially when it’s ten in the morning and the class is absolutely unresponsive because they didn’t sleep at all the night before. But I’ve seen in them such bold brave souls that I can’t help be let my teacher’s frustration resolve into admiration, particularly this week as they took the spirit of the course into their own hands with their work on their own social develop projects, the final step of Integrando a Mexico’s mission to allow the complex brilliance of this country to become its own savior.

This week, we led the participants through the process of creating a project for social change, and the curriculum, quick but concise, proved quite effective. Participants were divided into groups and led through brainstorming sessions meant to draw out their interests and potential project ideas; they were then individually supported in the creation of a vision statement outlining their goal for the future of their community, a list of long term objectives, a list of short term actions leading up to each individual objective and a mission statement that suggests in a few words how these objectives’ respective actions leads toward the vision. Participants were also taught how to organize a team, fundraising techniques and other relevant management techniques like strategies for risk assessment and project sustainability. The week concluded this Saturday with an open day where participants were able to present to an audience of friends and family summaries of the workshops they’d participated in, and in conclusion, their project plans.

 As a conclusion to our project, I found the open day a truly satisfying success. The participants shared their nearly finalized project plans and most if not all were thoroughly impressive not only for their thoroughness but for their strength in passion and rigor. Some  participants intend to fight for solidarity and national identity with work in elementary and secondary schools, where workshops everything from anti-bullying to artistic expression are intended to act as tools for the development of self-awareness, individual identity, creativity and constructive interaction with the community. Others want to focus on marginalized communities, such as indigenous groups or immigrants, and will strive to spread their stories amidst the centralized Mexican community with the hopes of generating empathy and acceptance. Others intend attack social issues that augment such socio-cultural conflicts by focusing on a community in their home state and attacking issues like poverty and illiteracy directly.

I was particularly excited by two projects from the latter group planned by participants I had in both my poverty workshop and project development workshop were. One will begin with workshops teaching literacy skills to both build trust between community and project facilitators, and prepare their project participants for later workshops which will provide further academic support for the children of these families and resource management training for the adults. The other, more specifically, will attempt to act as an advocate for microfinance in its respective community, to bring both resources and a sense of empowerment to local famlilies living below the poverty line. The project hopes to raise awareness within the local banking community, perhaps even creating a link with the microfinance bank Fundación Realidad which in partnership with the international microfinance web acting through the website www.kiva.org, relays funds from donors around the world to communities like those in Guerrero, where with project will take place.  It will also attempt to culture skills necessary to apply these micro-loans for progress and sustainability, and possibly, as a final goal, encourage the sustainable living technique of the permaculture movement as such application.

Projects like these were particularly inspirational for me, as a facilitator, because in addition to watching these young people, in their projects, embrace, with such intention, real hope, I was also able to watch these individuals, as my students and friends, apply the ideas we’d discussed for the last four weeks, turning theory into reality. With the two mentioned projects, I watched participants take ideas from the consumerism awareness activities and discussions from workshop sessions on poverty in Mexico, and apply them to their strategies for change, planning to teach literacy as a strategy against Oscar Lewis’ ‘Culture of Poverty’ and the application of Muhammad Yunus’ microfinance (covered in the poverty workshop) and permaculture as a dual strategy to bring funds into a community made capable for change and simultaneously leading this community away from the culture of consumerism so often exhibited by the economic class they will hopefully enter. Seeing this as a facilitator was an incredible experience, as I can think to myself, somewhat egotistically, that I contributed to the formation of this powerful plan for action. But beyond this selfish satisfaction, these projects leave me in awe and admiration, for in addition to mastering the concepts covered in our workshops, these participants have plans to actually apply these ideas, something I, personally, can only hope to do in the future. These participants embody a spirit of both hope and action, which, as this project ends, gives me great hope for the work that is to come.

This, of course, is one of the most important parts of our project: success of Integrando a México will not, of course, be measured simply by the size of the dreams presented at our open day. Rather, the defining characteristic will be the number of projects that are actually attempted. Many projects seem much too good to be true, so it’s easy to be skeptical of some of the plans, with school starting this week and the all too discouraging resistance to change yet to be tested. But I choose to believe our participants will at least try.  As I’ve written for the past four weeks, I’ve met beautiful people in my time in Mexico, and if there’s one thing we’ve achieved in this small community of social entrepreneurs, it’s a sense of hope for their hope. As I’ve said before, these young people understand the painful paradox that is this country, they’ve experienced it first hand, and yet they’ve somehow maintained a belief in a better future matched with the willfulness to carry it through. With this as their grounding, I believe that they like our project’s leader Patricio Provencio, can match passion with reality and strive for real hope in their future.

With this as encouragement, I watched the first of the participants depart for home with a sense of satisfaction and pride. I don’t mean to take credit for the participants’ initiative, nor for their spirit, we had an incredible group, and much of our work merely helped them on their way. But to see them leave so hopeful and simply excited, I can’t help but think this project achieved at least the beginnings of its goals. We wanted to culture a mindset of openness, hope and readiness for action all necessary for a successful social entrepreneur, and these participants embody this mindset. Even if some of their projects fail, the raw energy that drives their present will for action doesn’t seem likely to die out, and until they finally realize the beginnings of the change they want to see, I have faith this energy will continue to motivate them. If this is true, we’ve achieved all we could have hoped for, and in this way, I think my fellow facilitators would agree, we have reason to feel content.

Day 26 - ¡Vamos Cambia!

An empty camera battery, a full photo card, a drained mental energy supply and a full day of practice later, our last day at the school facilities and the third to last day with the participants is drawing to a close.

It’s been a full day dedicated to the event’s of tomorrow: the open day for the public of San Miguel and UWC, and more importantly for the family and friends of the participants. I believe it will be an important day, if not the most important day of the course, as it ties everything we have been doing together, in a way that must be presentable to people that live outside of our little bubble. Because just as Atlantic College, life has felt like a bubble. We have been in three places, mainly: at the facilities, in our house in San Miguel, or at the range with the participants. Luckily we were able to escape for nightly strolls and adventures after all the work was finished once in a while. Go for a coffee, ice scream or some salsa dancing and karaoke in town. If we were willing to sacrifice sleep. But a very important difference for me was that I learned huge amounts about the country I am in, we focussed on what we can do out there and many of the participants will actually go and do it. Create that social change.

I am having very mixed feelings about the end of this project. Again saying goodbye to some of my close friends and people I have spend so many hours with, learned from, stimulated me, and have brought tears to my eyes. I cannot look back on life the past five weeks without a heart filled with gratitude. However, I am also more thrilled than ever for live to go on and move to my next phase in life: university. As I was reflecting during one of our family meetings (both participant and facilitator reflect during these half an hour meetings to discuss the course of the day), I realized that I had been putting off being in the community I am from, with a fear of loosing who I have become the past two years at Atlantic College. The participants will have a challenge too when arriving back home - their mindsets have changed unlike to those of the people around them. To truly put your passion and connection with those in need of improvement into action in an environment that might not support that action is a huge challenge, but I have a lot of faith in them, as long as they really want it. For me, the course has made me less scared to act, act with a critical and reflective mind. Of course I still have to proof this to myself but I am looking forward to it with an open mind. Tomorrow will be an opportunity for the participants to demonstrate their changes and make people understand them, before returning to their home lives. As one of the participants told me, she hoped for her parents to come as they seemed to have lost faith in the existence of people who help others unselfishly. She hopes to bring back this belief to her parents. She definitely brought me this belief.

A lot of powerpoint presentations were prepared, many speeches practiced and a lot of songs sang. With the participants we are performing a poem, that consists of many haikus (a japanese poetic structure of a line with 5 syllables, a middle line of 7 syllables and a line with 5 syllables.) Every language has two of these dedicated to them, and together they form a long poem, with the team of Hope and Passion in our country. Having a lack of access to the entire poem, I will just post the two haikus written in Dutch:

Het scheelt ons wel wat

er gebeurd, medeleven

vind je nu en dan

de capaciteit

het is er, het kan, er is

passie maar passief

(if you’re really curious google translate at your service)

Another participant performs two of her personally written poems, visualized with simple, but very powerful body language. There are some songs, some skits, some wonderful contributions.

There is one song that has stuck in my head since the participants performed it during the auditions, with cool guitars with 8 strings from the area of Veracruz. It’s stuck in my head during the many crazy photos that we took. (During the facilitator photo there were about 30 of the participants with each a camera swarming around us - we felt like celebrities. Undeserved attention). It’s been playing in my head while we went to grab a coffee on the way back. It’s been there while I wrote this blog. And it will be there when I start packing as soon as I have updated my last blog entry. It’s a catchy song, called Bamba (you will recognize it as soon as you hear it). But it’s mainly stuck in my head due to one of the phrases, as they adapted the lyrics to the project.

¡Vamos Cambia! (¡unidos!)

Laura Brouwer - Netherlands (AC '09-'11)

Day 25- Just be 'stupid'

At the end of the third day of the Social Project Development Workshops, most participants have already had the working plans, mission statements, and even presentations about their projects ready. But I can hardly give myself any credit, for I could not help them much beyond giving them a few comments. In fact, in the past three days, I had been feeling a bit awkward—“hypocritical”, even, because none of us had actually done a social project. We are guiding the participants to do something that we only know theoretically.

But I continue to be amazed in conversations with participants about their projects: school permaculture greenhouse, community alphabetization programmes, cultural workshops, micro-finance-related project… There are more than a few big dreams, and the visions of the Mexico and their communities are beautifully exciting.  Every day, in every conversation and every “family” meeting about the projects, I asked them whether they honestly think that they can realize them; some gave me possible difficulties, but the “yes” was invariably the unanimous answer. They seemed to have no doubt at all.

However encouraging this is, to be honest, we must acknowledge the high possibility or (or even, the fact that) at least one among the 40 projects planned would not work out. It scares me: would this enthusiastic, idealistic participant lose faith and become cynical to all ¡IaM! talks about if he fail?

It has been said by some successful people that the most important thing that they had done was to be “stupid enough to think that they could succeed”. To have faith in oneself and the chance one has to make that change in the world is one of the determinants (if not the determinant) of the success of a project.

With their faith and confidence, the participants have renewed my faith, motivation, and even the imperative to hold on to believing—how can we not, when they all unreservedly believe in what we have been telling them? This faith alone has allowed us to be optimistic about the future of Mexico.  

I wish the same would one day happen in my country, among my people—in fact, maybe the world needs an “Age of Stupid”. Of course I don’t mean the Age in the sense of the British movie, where the stupidity is in our ignorance or inaction towards the global crisis, but a generation of people to be “stupid” enough to believe in themselves and the others’ ability to change the world.

We need stupid dreamers. We need stupid, idealistic, strong dreamers who are able to take the blow of possible setbacks and failures and say to themselves: “Just do it”. 

“Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.”

Sonia Hoi Ching Cheung (Hong Kong , AC '10-'12) 

Day 24 - Time flies when you’re having fun

It’s as if time is teasing us! The moments when we are bored the most the clock seems not to tick, no matter how many times we look; and those moments that we would desperately like to linger on seem to go by as if the clock’s hands were a high speed train in a hurry. For me the last 4 weeks were definitely most like the latter. I’m still astounded that my last blog entry has come, and I cannot tell you how much my mind resists against clicking on the button “post”. Even though the participants were the ones that were supposed to learn from us (which, in my opinion, worked), I cannot help but notice that I have learned a lot as well.

The first workshop I gave I was incredibly nervous (for both the Spanish and the teaching). Over time, though I gained a lot of confidence and my Spanish improved to a level that I didn’t expect to reach in such a short period of time. I have to admit as well, that I’m beginning to understand, and even feel empathy, for teachers. I’ve only stood before classes of a maximum of 16, and noticed how annoying (even motivated) students can be! I also, for the first time, had to really take responsibility for a group of people when we went into San Miguel for example, and I can tell you, you suddenly see everything from an entirely different perspective!

But me aside, the past three days the participants have been working on their own projects, and I, like my co-facilitator before me, think that the projects they come up with are mostly amazing! You see that they have actually applied things we taught them before. This is very rewarding. It is amazing to see so many projects rising from scratch! It shows me several things, one that there are so many things that need fixing, which is in a sense depressing, but the positive thing is that there are also people who want to do something about it in their own ways, which is amazing to see, and in a sense gives me hope. I do hope that the participants will carry on the good work they’re doing after this week. I’m kinda afraid though that some of them got a little bit over exited in a sense that they want too much. Nevertheless, their ideas are great and for as far as I can see now they’re doing great!

Now I’ll have to finish a blog entry for the very last time.

It is time to say goodbye now!

“Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery but today, today is a gift (that is why they call it the present)”

-Alice Morse Earl-

I’ll enjoy this project for as long as I can! Hope you enjoyed reading my entries.

Hans van Deursen (The Netherlands, UWC AC 10-12)

Day 23 - 2nd Day of Social Project Development Workshops

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light,
not our darkness that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you.

We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.


-Marianne Williamson

(alternatively substitute the word God with whatever else is the greatest source of inspiration in your life)



Ingvill Maria Daatland Hekne, Norway (AC 09-11)

Day 22 - Time Flies

Last week, wow. We have already put three weeks behind us in the project and I have had more than five weeks in Mexico altogether. And it still just feels like one or two days. During the day, and especially now that I’m writing probably my last blog post on this blog, I feel like the project and my stay is coming to an end. In a way it makes me sad because it’s been such a good time. I’ve made good friends, some of which I probably won’t see in some time. I’ve had amazing food, wonderful cultural experiences, beautiful moments and loads of fun. I’ll definitely miss the openness and happy attitude of the people here, the culture which is so full of life.

But most of all I’ll miss the project. Luckily we still have one week left and quite possibly the most important week. We are primarily running what we call Social Project Development Workshops. In these the participants have to take all the knowledge, creativity and engagement they have gained throughout the course and put it into a social project of their own. In many ways this is the final outcome of the course. The reason we are arranging it is not just for the participants to have fun and get friends, get wiser or even live a happier life afterwards. We are doing it mainly because we want to turn them into social change makers. The project they are creating now they will take back to their communities and hopefully keep on working with, develop, expand or create new projects. As long as they in some way or the other create social change in the societies they’ll be living in in the future.

I’m really impressed by a lot of the ideas that the participants already have. And the fact that all of the people I’m working with all have clear and engaging ideas for projects they want to do. It really makes me believe in humanity to see them embracing the opportunity they have to do good for other people and society around them. And the same should be possible anywhere in the world. The participants are not very different from young people back home. No matter where you go youth are strangely similar: free, full of humour and with a drive to change the world and see things differently, if they are only given the option, the one experience that empowers them. That’s why I like this project so much. It’s basically pure youth-to-youth empowerment. Without any kind of grown up figures telling us what to do and what’s right and wrong, how we should fit into society. Here we are all equals in the way that we all have to learn, explore, understand and figure out things on our own. Of course there is a structure, and some people are facilitators and some are participants. But that is out of practical reasons and the “teaching”-relationship is more of a mutual co-operation build on consent and will to create. Both we and the participants develop and grow together, as a collective as well as individuals.

For myself I’m also trying to develop a social project of solar panels for houses in my local community. It just feels so completely natural as everybody else are developing their ideas and plan how they are going to help their communities. For me this kind of atmosphere is magic. Hundreds of ideas spinning around in people’s heads, near to reach their first step towards realization. It’s the sound of normal youth taking their everyday lives, their communities into their own hands. It’s the sound of change. It’s the sound of a better world.

Thank you a lot, everybody.

Albert Andersen Øydvin (Norway, AC ‘10-12)

Day 21 - ¡Integrando a Mexico! 2011 Conference

Fireworks exploding, bone fires glistening, proud citizens singing.

It is the 1st of August and Switzerland is celebrating. Thinking of home, I long to join my people and commemorate the birth of our confederation in 1291. This urge to rejoice together, the essence of national identity.

Today, the participants of Integrando a Mexico and facilitators attended the 2011 conference held in the Historical Museum of San Miguel de Allende. In the century old building,three young social entrepreneurs shared their love for their communities and presented their social projects, three attempts to change Mexico’s society for the better. Driven by the love of their country but more importantly by the empathy for their people, a writer, a photographer and a student in medicine turned their passion into a mean of social change.
Impressed by the creativity and initiative, we watched in bewilderment as girls living on the streets shared their stories, as elderly people wrote poems of hope to the younger generation, as visually disabled Mexicans were taught photography. Participants and facilitators watched the dream of a student in his second year of medicine provide medical care to more than 70 000 people. Facts and figures were shared but more importantly passion and motivation: the knowledge that it has been done before, that it is possible even at our ages.

Tomorrow, the participants will start planing their own social project, drawing from individual passions which they will have to connect with issues in their home communities. This conference was a perfect introduction and the mostly practical focus of the questions to the speakers demonstrated the readiness of these 42 minds. I would bet brainstorming is already going on. The genuine selflessness and purpose of each example was a reminder of the purpose of this course and a taste of what potential the participants possess. We have now reached the stage where, all the tools having been given, our role will be to support while creativity does its work.
After three weeks of workshops, I have seen the participants develop and evolve. Looking back and hoping that I have given as much as I could, I will now try my best to assist them in the tedious process of reducing their dream to something measurable. Disillusions. Hopefully not.

Roaming the streets, laughing loudly, buying sweets and ice cream. I can’t wait to seem them take responsibilities and become leaders of their own.
But let them always enjoy the occasional silliness.

Catherine Ador (Switzerland/Norway, AC 09-11)

Day 20 - INTEGRANDO a Mexico

From experiencing poverty at a local level to the simulation of debate of legalisation of marijuana at a national level, today has enhanced my personal understanding of the importance of ‘integration’ in a number of ways.

After collecting the right participants of the poverty workshop and four participants of other Social Issue Workshops in the pleasantly lively centre of the city, we set off with a lady from DIF (Desarrollo Integral de La Familia – a government-supported organisation that seeks to develop and help families in the poorer areas of Mexico) to visit a ‘colonia’ near San Miguel, an area that I feel comes closer to the reality of many Mexicans than the wealthy, highly condensed with American and other rich foreigners, centre does. Having visited one of the biggest slums in Africa (Kibera, part of Kenya’s capital Nairobi) I had the opportunity to compare the neighbourhood to my previous experience of severe poverty. What I noticed right away was the amount of space available for housing and that most houses were constructed of brick. The poverty I witnessed in Kenia was a lot worse at first sight, but that does not make the situation of the Mexicans living here any better. Little food, almost no employment and half constructed houses are the strict norms rather than the exception. However, to my surprise the lady told us the neighbourhood is very safe, partly due to the police station that is based right next to it. More importantly though, many of the people seem to have not lost hope in improving their situation and lives and do not resolve to violence, unlike many other neighbourhoods around. There seems to  be a strong support for the importance of education and most of the children have access to schooling ( orat least frequently…). Considering the quality of public education in Mexico, I admire their persistancy and gratitude for their possibility. It made me question the number of times I have lacked attention and passion for learning in the class room, alongside many of my co-years in the Netherlands.

Perhaps the way we approached the visit wasn’t most respectful towards the community. We were a large group of 15, including two non-mexican visitors (me and Luke), with a big camera and lots of wealth (think about all the cameras, ipods, shoes etc. we had on us). Even the three bananas that were hiding in my bag made my stomach twist a little with guilt. We had questions prepared for the interviews and asked our students to focus on what we had been discussing the last week – how and whether they noticed the larger causes (such as history, bad governance and geographical causes), personal causes (such as a lack of inititative and passive acceptance); which governmental programs were active in the area and how they were working. One of the participants had a healthy feeling of unease, partly caused, as she explained me later, she felt that we did not want to get to know the people, but rather just hear the answers to our questions. We did not have enough time to truely engage with the people, but I agree that the interviews were not conversations. I think the majority of us felt quite intruding on their lives.

The visit did make a great impression on some of the participants, including me. It made me think and reflect on how I want to spend my life creating change. Because, although Integrando a Mexico is for the participants, it has inspired me to explore myself how I can change to become a true ‘agent of social change’ (as we say in the project’s terminology). This includes the question whether I want to help on a more local level, truely engaging and integration with a community or on a more distant, but larger scale in, for instance politics. Both are things I will have to explore during my time at university, which starts the coming month. What is, either way, really important is the concept of ‘integration’. With this integration comes the personal connection you have with what you are doing, wether it’s directly with the people or from a distance. It means diving into the topic and issue you are dealing with, eliminating a selfishness that could distract from truely helping the people.

The afternoon continued with hungry stomaches and a number of final speeches after three afternoons of the simulation of a society. A concept that might sound vague, but was a great success for the participants’ understanding of one current issue in Mexico and how the process around referendum in the government works. The question was whether the sale and consumption of marihuana in private establishments (in Holland these would less elegantly be labled as ‘coffee shops’) should be legalised in Mexico. Unexpectedly the issue was voted against with a one vote difference. The debate involved many intelligent and well developed arguments. Mexico seems to deal with the problem of Marihuana consumption as a criminal issue rather than a public health issue. Would this change, prevention and educational programs would be more accesible and easy to organise. Of course the War on Drugs was an important topic of discussion, with the question whether the legalisation would make the problem worse or would improve it.  It was argued legalisation would lead to a greater consumption and an aggrevation of the violence. I was told later that more or less 50 % of all the drug trafficking in Mexico consists of Marihuana, a number that rather shocked me. More important than the participants gained knowledge, an ability to create arguments (that they might not personally agree with) and the ability to discuss such an issue, is I think the enforced important of Civic Engagement. Many who disliked politics thought of civic engagement and democracy as a politcal action, but did not realize that it can also be implemented on a local level. The activity has served as a great movitation (that of course yet has to be put into action) to raise more awareness and create discussion in home communities about these issues of public concern.

Simultaneously, today’s events made me reflect upon my own civic engagement in the Netherlands. Though having voted in 2010 for the new government, I have not been up to date at all with the national news and events. I realize that if I am asked about the history of the Netherlands my knowledge barely scrapes the surface. And when was marihuana legalized (or decriminalized) in the Netherlands? How was that transition for our society? Neither do I feel up to date or knowledgeable about a lot of issues going on in the world community. I feel more than ever connected with the issues facing Mexico due to the intense interaction we have had with the participants and preparation we have gone through for the workshops. Nevertheless, I feel more than ever motivated to ‘integrate’ more in society, that of my home country and that of the world. And to talk. Because more important than anything, I feel conversation and sharing of thoughts is the most powerful device to meet opportunity and truely make a change.

While reflecting on the past day, I am enjoying sitting here in my room, with the buzz of conversation in the room next to me and Sonia writing post cards on the bed next to me, whilst listening to Juan Luis Guerra (a merengue artist) and feeling excited for a salsa night in San Miguel with my wonderful co-facilitators aka friends. 


Laura Brouwer (The Netherlands, AC 09-11) 

Day 19 - Making an Impact

I volunteered to contribute to Integrando a Mexico because I wanted to make a difference in some way, in some part of the world, but I was fed up with the all too popular aid programs that benefit the volunteer far more than the community he or she is serving. I’d accepted the general naivete of wanting to have an impact, to change the world, or whatever abstract desire for good motivates social work, but I at least wanted to focus such innocent willpower on a legitimate program with farsighted goals. So I signed up for Integrando a Mexico, because it aimed not to strive for the quick idealized social action people like me might have first imagined, like building a house for the homeless or raising money for disadvantaged families (though there are indeed elements of this in our program) but the goal was to educate future leaders of social change from communities all around Mexico with the hope, in the spirit of John Stuart Mill, that they would fight for change in their respective communities in the best way, a way crafted for the community and created by the community.

I won’t be so bold as to say I’ve already seen the seeds of this long term goal planted and thriving, indeed, we’re running a camp for a group of 42 teenagers, and kids will be kids (so I say an 18 year old myself), but this week we went through the most hard-hitting elements of our curriculum, exploring fundamental social issues like poverty, education, and national identity, democracy in practice and consumerism, and today marked a turning point as participants began to shift from the role of a student to the role of an activist. They began today their awareness projects that should seek to spread the information regarding the social issue they’ve studied this week, and next week they’ll begin to plan the social projects they’ll bring back to their home communities. In this way, the goals of this project are now coming to fruition, and I’ll admit, I’m becoming very excited by these prospects on the horizon.

This week was quite an exciting week for me in general as I was able to explore a variety of topics I’m personally passionate about, and in teaching these ideas (as best as I could in my still developing Spanish) the best moments brought the perfect satisfaction of watching this passion spread. In the poverty workshop I led alongside two other facilitators we discussed the identity of poverty in Mexico, the long term causes born from history and the governmental and social systems it developed, foreign influences and the impact all of these had in conjunction with naturally existing geographic diversity. We moved on to discuss the attitudes often observed in impoverished communities, those defined by Oscar Lewis’ famous article on the Culture of Poverty published in the mid-sixties, which often contributes to a vicious cycle of expressed apathy and passiveness that only intensifies a community’s poverty. We continued with a critical examination of Mexican anti-poverty programs; we discussed the ethics of aid giving and how to make aid sustainable, and we ended with a discussion of Muhammad Yunus’ system of microlending which, in much the same way as Integrando a Mexico, attempts to place the power of change directly in the hands of the people who desire it.

The class on microfinance was particularly popular with the participants, perhaps because it was the single standing glimmer of hope left after a week’s investigation of the bleak economic circumstances found in Mexico today, but also perhaps because it illustrated a system of legitimate aid, of empowerment, which rightly so empowered the participants with the hopes of using such a system themselves to create social change in their near futures.

Participants seemed equally excited by the consumerism related activities we offered in the afternoons this week. We started with a conversation on global warming, motivated by the British film ‘The Age of Stupid’ and through the viral Youtube video “The Story of Stuff’ we expanded this conversation to explore consumerism as a culture, a cause of global warming and a frighteningly imperialistic force. This was fascinating for me as an American facilitator as I was able to better understand the impact of what I would admit to be a painfully American cultural value system on one of my country’s closest neighbors. It was thus very strange, but greatly important, to discover the popularity of American clothing like brands American Eagle, Abercrombie and Fitch and Aeropostale in middle and upper class Mexico.   Potent despite a widespread disdain for the country these brands represent, this ironically ubiquitous fashion is, rather, popular for the symbol of wealth these brands bring that makes them marking signs for the in-group. In this way, I was very interested to have my suspicions about the nature of the spread of my country’s empty culture of wealth confirmed, but more importantly I was moved to see the participants take on the discussion of such a deeply rooted international issue with such enthusiasm. They were, again, empowered, because this crisis is one of their own generation, one they can fight in their own daily lives.

This theme of consumerism was rounded off in the next two days with a discussion of Permaculture, a lifestyle of absolute sustainability exercised in various locations around the globe, and finally we ended with a discussion of political ideologies (we covered Liberalism, Conservatism, Anarchism and Socialism/Communism) in an overt attempt to educate and furthermore encourage free thinking through applied and supported philosophical thought. I taught the workshop on Liberalism, using John Stuart Mill to discuss the central values of the classical form of the ideology, and I was overjoyed to hear participants respond with, again, such excitement. Many were simply happy to have confusions between the ideologies cleared, but others told me they were very interested to be introduced to a system of thought that they could relate to. On the bus after classes, one participant, Victor, told me he was very inspired by the lecture on socialism and wanted to learn more about how he can apply such ideas to his work in the coming week.

With examples like these, my hopes for the project are proving more and more realistic. Despite their youthful energy, very few participants were overloaded by the weight of this week’s topics, rather most had the opposite reaction; they’ve been inspired: they’re thinking critically about these ideas and in this way they’re thinking about their future. Another participant I talked to, Monica, told me today she’d like to create a project that works to strengthen the weary Mexican national identity through education programs that focus on history. She doesn’t know exactly how she wants to do it, but she’s truly impassioned.  Even more impressive, however, she exhibits a focused sense of seriousness in her inspiration, one much like the kind I experienced when I first arrived in Mexico. For both her work and for that of the rest of the participants, I look forward to next week when, through the development of their ideas, their hopes can begin to become reality, and in this way, propelled by their work, I look forward to the same final transformation of my own.

Luke Pizzato (USA, AC 10-12) 

Day 18- Pajamas. Mordidas. Marijuana? El Fua!

“No lo sabía…”
Our last “theoretical” Social Issue session explored the consequences of low-quality education. Seeing the participants making notes on the figures and facts about Mexico on the whiteboard carefully and conscientiously, I knew that my thirty minutes of continuous writing on the board was not in vain. The facts were shocking to the participants just as they were to us when we were preparing the session: Mexico only has an average of 1.8 years of effective education while the 5 most competitive countries have an average of 9.7 years; research shows that the school is the second most important institution to combat corruption, which is a problem so serious in Mexico that the average “mordidas” (literally “bites”, bribe acts) reached $138 for each Mexican home in 2007, which meant a family that earned up to a minimum salary had 18% of their household income “bitten off” from them in one year.
But the participants have moved forward from being shocked to being motivated. Tomorrow, they will spend the sessions working on their creative projects to raise awareness for the issue. And I am looking forward to it.

Demonstrations 

“¡Marijuana para Mexico!” a boy shouted.
“Di No a Legalización. Huelgo de silencio hasta 11pm…” was written on a cardboard on the other side of the corridor.
The simulation of a society before the referendum of the legalization of Marijuana in the Civic Engagement session was getting more and more exciting.
Interest groups made stickers, put up posters, yelled slogans, protested outside the rooms of political parties and the President’s Cabinet and presented their points of views to political parties. Groups of lobbyists went in and out of the “conference room” of the President’s Cabinet. The first female President of Mexico (in her pajamas, of course, for today was the participants decided that today was the Pajamas Day and that participants and facilitator alike should wear their nightwear) and her cabinet’s “conference” with the lobbyists lasted for more than two hours… The enthusiasm and the quality of the participants’ debates continued to impress us.



“Phew. I’m glad that it’s not chicken…”
It was at lunch in the cafeteria. I guess the movie “Food Inc.” shown in the Nutrition Social Issue Activity was really powerful-- a girl told me that she could not bear looking at the chicken legs for lunch yesterday after seeing how people raise and kill chicken for food.

One more vegetarian for a greener world?


“Swap!”
15 minutes goes so quickly! Liberalism, Conservatism, Socialism/Communism and Anarchism could not be possibly explained fully in such a short period of time. But an introduction to each of the four political ideas was made in today’s evening activity. A graph mapping their positions in the political spectrum was drawn in the auditorium too. I learnt a lot, and I believe the participants felt the same. We just wished that there could be more time.

Pushing the bus

“¿Dónde está el camión?” (“Where is the bus?”)
To our surprise, there was only one bus instead of the usual two waiting for us outside the school at the end of the day. After being “sardined” into the bus, singing and travelling for 10 minutes, we saw the other bus on the side of the road, stuck in a hole. More than 20 of us jumped off the bus and started pushing it while the others helped by shouting the supernatural word “Fua!” in support. Five minutes later, the bus finally moved.

Once again, “El Fua” saves the day.
“¿Cómo no?”



Sonia Hoi Ching Cheung (Hong Kong, AC 10-12)

Day 17 - Identity

We started this week doing the Social Issue Activities (SIA) and Civic Engagement Workshops ((CEW) as you might have read in one of the other blogs).The group I´m facilitating is about the Mexican National Identity. In many ways it is a very difficult topic, firstly because it is a very ambiguous and subjective topic. Nevertheless, it is very interesting. The other day, for example, we were talking about how language is a part of a national identity, and we talked about traditional Mexican languages.  The focus was on Nahuatl, as a creative activity all the participants had to create a poem existing for 25% out of Nahuatl words. It was nice to see, as I´m from Europe I can mainly derive Spanish words, but these words … they could have been Hindi and I wouldn´t have known! We also tried to do something creative in every session, this ended up in amazing mural! In the first activity they had to draw the map of Mexico its borders consisting of words (aspects of a national identity). Subsequently the participants wrote down words that would define regional cultures in Mexico, as Mexico is quite diverse. This was followed by the workshop of westernisation where they cut out pictures of typical Mexican things and things that were influenced by the West. The things that were typically Mexican were close to the map and the others were further away. The other workshop of today was gender roles in the Mexican national identity. With this they created a drawing visualising their aspirations for who the relation should be; all in all a lot of discussions, and a lot of creative exercises where they could apply what they had learned before. All the participant seemed to enjoy these creative parts thoroughly as they even stayed to finish their mural in breaks, we had to make them have breaks, which was very rewarding! Because there is no solid information about the Mexican national identity that we could teach, it turned out more of an exploration which was very interesting for the facilitators too!

Sadly I was not very much involved in the CEW´s, although I did do democracy on the first day. Where I had to, again, confront the language barrier. This was especially apparent in this workshop because my democracy workshop was very discussion based, although I did try and explain some things (the concepts of equal representation and the district system in democracy), I really noticed that my Spanish wasn´t sufficient for such terminology. Despite the fact that there is still a language barrier there definitely has been a lot of improvement (even from the last time I wrote the blog).

I cannot believe it is already the third week! So, unfortunately, I will have only one time left to write on this blog. They say time flies when you´re having fun, and I think, in this case, this is most certainly true!

Hans van Deursen (The Netherlands, AC 10-12)

Day 16 - Ripe Sweetness

New personal record today:

2 hours break

AND I had a complete, homemade, lunch for 10 pesos. (!)

And a bag of fruit for the same price. (conversion to foreign currency: next to nothing)
What a perfect country for foreigners that are obsessed with food but on an anorectic student budget.

The scenario where this, which seems like no less than a miracle to a Norwegian who is accustomed to the idea of spending an hours salary on a slice of bread, took place
is still unclear to me.

But it was a beautifully messy market, at some obscure location.

I felt nearly naughty as I embarked on this solitary adventure. But I didn't feel threatened, despite being reminded by sweet old men to take care. As my hair is not even slightly blonde (at least according to Norwegian standards) I shrugged it off and pulled down my skirt. (No worries mum, it was the decent one.) And I returned safely. Was never really doubting that. Only doubting my capability to manage a confusing public transport system. With reason.

Despite spending half of my break time walking under an aggressive sun, searching alternative buss stops, I was felt happy about my mini journey.

But even more when I returned to the course site, with a mountain of baby bananas and baby mangos.

As anywhere in the world (especially in deprived parts; United World Colleges) food is by far the best way to buy yourself friends. And in this case the satisfaction of that action was tripled by the how little it costed me.

(If it had not been for the fact that exporting food in your luggage is slightly illegal I would have been the queen bee in Norway, considering the WONDERFULNESS of Mexican cuisine. Oh well, I am more than prepared to wrap whole families of mangos in aluminum folio.)

I am doubting whether this tale of my passion for mangos has any moral, but I can certainly say that even though a variation in food and location felt right and energizing, I cant say that it felt any more like a holiday than partaking in the course.

Interacting with the locals at and around the market place felt enriching, but I also missed out on intriguing things happening in the course.

For those who require examples:

Did you know that permaculture is as applicable to your way of living as it is to agriculture?
Have you reflected on what historical and demographical causes there are to poverty existing in your nation?

Whether national identity is a disadvantage, or maybe pure bullshit?

Did you know that ancient civilizations struggled with air pollution?

And what is actually the reasons for poor education? And its psychological consequences?

Can NAFTA agreements be seen to be the major forming force leading to Mexico's nutrition situation today?

More than just thinking we all know, feel, or have at least heard, that we have a certain responsibility to act. To change.

But how?

Today we actually dedicated time to theorize the dynamics of taking action. Cause is the really anything that have more repercussions than passivity? And isn't really terrorism one of the most drastic forms of civic engagement?

What do those to last words even mean?

I believe that I speak for a lot of us when I say that nothing is more painfully enlightening thank those moments where you suddenly understand what you already knew.

And is there anything more moving and meaningful thank for the first time hear a personal story that encounter all the things you chose to believe doesn't really happen, because you have heard its theoretical aspect to many times.

Nothing is more upsettingly beautiful than when you realize what part you play in all this talk about change. That you play a part at all.

Let me incoherently summarize all of this:

All this is meaningful cause we make it be it.

And thank you for making work be the most delightful holiday I have ever had.

Thank you for the sweetness that strangely accompany the moral challenges.

You all make up the other half of my inner mango stone.

and of course it is about sharing, and not about status.

And the pricelessness of that.

I guess that only what’s left is for you to make sense of it all.

Ingvill Maria Daatland Hekne (Norway, AC 09-11)

Day 15 - I Love Tacos

I love tacos. Proper Mexican tacos, straight from the mobile taco cart with the taco people making tacos in it: so delicious and awesome. I also love the special Mexican hamburgers they have here in San Miguel. You buy them from the small hamburger cart in the central square/park, the Jardin, with the hamburger people making hamburgers in it. Yum! The interesting thing about my love for these foods is that they represent a diversity of influence that you find in Mexican food and culture in general. Hamburgers are American (US) in origins, but through adaption they have become a part of the Mexican cuisine and got their own local twist. This makes people associate with them and even sometimes sees them as a part of their local identity. Tacos are a mix of the ancient Latin-American tortillas and Spanish meat and cheese culture. So all the way from the beginning of Mexico as a nation the national identity has been a mix of many different and sometimes contradicting cultures. 

National identity is one of the five social issues we are exploring this week, and it’s my session. The other ones are poverty, nutrition, education and environment. For a week the participants will explore different aspects of one issue, learn, discuss, engage and in the end spread awareness about the topic to people outside of course, in their local communities, schools and basically the rest of Mexico. As earlier weeks I am bitter for not being able to participate in all of the different workshops myself, as all of them are super interesting. I’m also craving to discuss and express my opinions about the different issues; it’s just such a shame that the language is a barrier. The participants are doing the job much better than I would have anyway, and it’s amazing to see the capabilities the participants have to develop knowledge. From a beginning of a really small amount of facts they can create an understanding of different aspects of society precisely and constructively. This is why I love the idea of developing each other through discussion so much more than a “teacher”-figure pouring information into his students.

The other thing we are doing this week is Civic Engagement Workshops. Today democracy and tomorrow different forms and civic engagement. This is the kind of stuff I really wish I learnt properly in school, just because I find it really important.  What do you need to have well-functioning democracy? What are the limitations in the world today? How is power distributed? What are the limitations of democracy itself? And so on and on and on. Personally I love the concept and pursuit of democracy and can keep discussing it for hours and hours, only time puts a limit. And hopefully that’s how it will be with the participants in the future as well, that they’ll keep searching for answers and then throw their passion into realizing them.


Albert Andersen Øydvin (Norway, AC 10-12) 

Day 13 - The End of CSS & CW

On Saturday, participants completed a week of both community service related and arts oriented workshops, and in this way the week, at least from my point of view, was an apt illustration of the ambiguous nature of social change. That is, I led a workshop in construction work on houses planned by the aid organization Casita Linda and a class on Documentary filmmaking in which participants were challenged to apply the ideals of social change to their own documentary films, and with this combination of activities I observed both hope and discouragement as the participants took their first steps toward practical social change.

Both groups, in fact, experienced this frustrating ambiguity. The construction group set out with high spirits and great energy, contributing to work being done on a house of a family with four young daughters, two children of adult age and a tired mother. They quickly befriended the children who would help with the construction work, and they were diligent in both seeking out miscellaneous tasks on the construction site and performing them with energetic attentiveness despite the heat of the midday sun. I was actually quite impressed with the group who despite the difficult working conditions, pushed themselves to contribute as much as possible in the week allotted.

By the end of the week however, I even joined the group with inkling feeling of discouragement as, to our muted frustration, we soon realized the impossible size of the task we all imagined we were taking part in. Everyone who takes part in this kind of construction work does so with, at least, the innocent desire to help, but the detrimental reality illustrated by the end of our week’s work was that this kind of aidwork will always be, on a large scale insufficient. We all grew to empathize greatly with the family to live in the home we were constructing, but we all knew well that after we would leave, and even after the completion of their home, that kind family would continue to live in a neighborhood where water can only be purchased in large plastic containers transported daily by Coca Cola trucks and where a dirt floor, in neatly packed, is a true indulgence especially when the family of stray dogs bringing fleas and yelping puppies living outdoors can no longer mix their excrement with the house’s foundation thanks to the brick walls built to contain the newly lain dirt. After we return to our comfortable lives with electricity and hardwood floor and refrigerators containing cold mineral enhanced water, this family, no less human than us and in the exact same situation as their endless surrounding neighbors would live on as such, without any just explanation for the disparity. We can build a house for a beautiful group of people, but poverty will continue to thrive, indefinitely, so it seems.

My documentary making class met similar roadblocks. One group set out to document the Mexican publics perspective on social change, intending to prove that anyone can be an agent of social change, no matter age, social class or interest. What they found, however, was that barely anyone in San Miguel Allende had a perspective. They found a few willing souls who gave heartfelt answers, but unfortunately that majority of the individuals they filmed on the streets either didn’t know what to say about the problems and potential for change in Mexico, or like the grandson of a onetime leading politician for Guanajuato state, argued there was nothing they could do. This frankly ugly reality was difficult to swallow for the participants and me alike, but as one of the participants, Roberto, remarked, this is all important to learn and should be documented.

Again I was impressed by the resilience of the group and I must admit I agreed. Both in the construction and documentary making workshops, we learned of a discouraging reality, one more imposing than that expected, but such an education, when met with intelligent idealism, can be cause for further action and therefore hope.

Luke Pizzato (AC '10-'12) - U.S.A.

Day 12 - En Mi Corazón

During community service that took place every morning of this week, a group of our participants ran sessions on Critical Engagement of Conflict, very much like what we had done with them the past week,only with a group of local children from one of the communities. The children, coming from very poor backgrounds, were funded by an organization to go to primary school. However, school for them means being told that they worth nothing and will never achieve anything in life. It means being hit by a ruler on the back and on the hands. It means being pulled by their hair and being called names. It means having their confidence beaten out of them, the confidence that they need if they ever want to leave the poverty cycle in which they are born.

The community services came to an end this morning, with a lot of tears, smiles, hugs, drawings as gifts for the facilitators. Many participants were extremely satisfied and content with the process of the week and have finished their (for some, first,) service, feeling helpful and capable of making at least a small change. And that is were it often starts. My role the past week was supervising a wonderful group of 3 girls that chose to teach animal rights through art to 6 to 12 year old children in the public library. From full mornings of painting their favorite animals to making an animal rights charter (“Do you need water, food, shade? So does your dog!”), to learning about the vision of children (monkeys in Europe have a different vision than monkeys in the Americas, who knew). The group changed size but reached it maximum capacity with 20 children, all engaged in the art and eager to talk to us. It was a very satisfying week for us, and I can proudly say I can communicate with children in Spanish. But only the basics of course. As one of the participants asked me “Que hora es?” (what time is it) I understood “Corazon” (heart). You can’t have it all.

The Constructive Engagement of Conflict workshops (CECW) changed a lot, both for participant and facilitator. One of the participants briefed me on how it was going with the workshops, as the facilitators were shocked with the situation of the children. A safe space of trust had to be created amongst them in order to have the children share their stories and engage in the activities. They struggled, but managed to do this. The goodbyes sounded almost more intense than the end of a year at Atlantic College. A lot of tears flowed and email addresses and phone numbers were exchanged.

Though the course of the day was very positive, a horrific event hit some of our facilitators very personally. We had an activity planned in the end of the afternoon to share international news, of which the most important and current event was the bombing and massacre in Norway. At the time 20 deaths were confirmed but later that evening it had run up to an unbelievable 90. The shootings took place at a political youth camp, a place where some of our facilitators knew a good number of people. Events like this hit so much harder when it affects those around you on such an intimate level. This was the action of one individual, but the harsh truth in Mexico is that these numbers are almost part of people's daily life; they are embedded in the social structure that is created by the War on Drugs.

However, I cannot lose hope. Rather the opposite: I gain so much more trust in the strength of people as I watch our participants. It is a cliché that needs be said. Yet again this week I was blown away by the dedication of the participants in the CECW, their personal involvement with the students’ situation and most of all their creative and innovative ideas driven by a passion to make change. They put a lot of effort in making the workshops more worthwhile than the original plan by making personal books of all the things they have been teaching this week. Moreover, they got in touch with the organization that funds the children to update them about the situation, which hopefully will make a worthwhile change. They are going to write an anonymous article and try and get it to provincial level. One of the participants was telling me of his plans to continue similar sessions at home and create a network across Mexico to do the same and battle the unjust behavior these children have experienced.

 Though we facilitators are doing the ‘teaching’ in this project, I am not quite sure who is learning the most.


- Laura Brouwer (The Netherlands , AC 09-11) 

Day 11 - Double "rrainbow"

Ever seen a double rainbow? Do you believe in its existence?
My answers to both questions were changed today.

My day started with a 12 year-old girl surprising me by stating that she was a big fan of a Korean pop group “Super Junior”. We were at the Children Rights Workshop in the Public Library held by  four participants, who taught children about the Children Rights Charter.

Children Rights Workshop

On the bus from the library to the school where we hold most of the activities, two participants volunteered to teach me to pronounce the Spanish “rr”, which was one of the things that I had been struggling with since my first Spanish lesson despite all the practice. It was especially frustrating when some classmates seemed to have been born with the ability to do so, and the teachers kept saying that practicing is the only key. Like a lot of people, I was not entirely convinced.

After 20 minutes of diagram drawing, practicing and tips sharing, I was about to give up when the two girls screamed and hugged the ecstatic me despite all the stares and glares on the bus at the moment when I finally felt the vibration of my tongue for the very first time in my life. I still cannot pronounce every word with “rr” perfectly, but this was a step big enough to make my day. I spent all my free time in the rest of the day attempting to say words like “perro” and “ferrocarril”.

At the Radio-making Creative Workshop, the six participants were practically on “autopilot” after all our talking in the last 3 days. They had decided the theme of the radio programme to be “Diversity” and had their working plans ready. In fact, I was amazed and proud to be told earlier this morning that the group got up before 5am to meet and discuss about the radio programme. All I had to do was to set up my computer for them to do research on the Internet, follow them to interviews, answer questions when I was needed and read my book when I was not. The schedule is still tight and I am not sure as to whether we could finish the work by the last Creative Workshop on Saturday, but I am optimistic that the product will be impressive.

We finished the day with “fun but slightly violent games”, according to another facilitator, which ended just as thunder and heavy rain broke out. We went into “familias”, sharing thoughts and comments about out experiences today and “dulce de leche” made by one of the facilitators in a Mexican Candy-Making Workshop in the community service session in the morning.
When we walked out of the classroom and towards the bus, I found that everyone was looking at the sky.

Here I must recount a seemingly unrelated fact: a scene in a movie titled "Echoes of the Rainbow" (2010, Hong Kong) showed one of the lead characters telling his girlfriend there are times when “double rainbows” appear in the sky. I thought it was either a made-up fact to “wow” the girlfriend in the movie, or the directors´ creative imagination.
But that was precisely what I saw in the sky today. Two almost-perfect arcs with one having reversed colours, an “arcoíris doble”.

Amazed and awestruck, I could only gape and listen to a Mexican facilitator who calmly told me that it is perfectly normal in New Mexico—in fact, it is a norm rather than an exception. Five minutes on Wikipedia showed that rainbows always appear in pairs everywhere, though it is not always possible to see the second one. Immediately it seemed so stupid to have even doubted the existence of the phenomenon.

Double rainbow

I did not believe in double rainbows, but today one appeared. I was not convinced that I would ever manage to do pronounce “rr”, but this evening I surprised myself by managing to pronounce “perro” perfectly once at dinner, according to a Mexican facilitator.

I wonder what other amazing things await in the next two weeks?

Sonia Hoi Ching Cheung (Hong Kong, AC 10-12)

Day 10 - Respect

Today was incredible in many ways-- incredibly difficult (at times), but also incredibly rewarding. The day started with the Community Service Sessions: in my case construction. What we do in a nutshell is building a house for people in slums.

To see the participants work like they do in the Construction session is incredible, as they put so much energy in the overwhelming sun with hardly any breaks or food. A lot was done today, two and a half walls were plastered and brushed, real headway was made with the stove and 3 entire walls were painted. It was amazing, but we had to overcome some real problems! There were sunstrokes and 2 absent facilitators (one due to illness, and the other had to bring a participant to the doctor), and overcoming them resulted in my being completely exhausted afterwards.

What followed were the creative workshops, which were, for me, very enjoyable. Although I'm still (like my predecessor in blog writing) very much bothered by my limited spanish, although the participants are really (incredibly) helpful, it is still impossible to be who I want to be as a facilitator due to the language barrier. In my session, however, all the participants were very energised and showed a lot of initiative, which was very good to see!

The Evening Activity that followed was very relaxing as we did some (easy) fun games, which was incredible after such a tiring day.

Another big theme that was visible throughout the day was Respect, with the focus on the Facilitator-Participant relationship. It came up often during the day, for example in my family session, but this was not all! The participants had requested a meeting with both facilitators and participants, in which they wanted to apologise for any disrespect they might have shown the facilitators, and, in particular, Pato, the incredible organiser of this project. What I found very impressive is that it all came from the participants, without any interference or prompts from the facilitators. So I would like to end with saying that I think that the participants have done this amazingly! And that it really was one of the things that brightened up my day!

Even though there were some problems, I still think it was an amazing day! Looking forward to the next one!

Hans van Deursen (The Netherlands, AC 10-12)

Day 9 - A sense of purpose (?)

Second day of Community service and Creative workshops.

As we drove by the bus driver’s house (Already half an hour late, but needed to pick up his phone, obviously..) there was a dead dog in the road. It happens.

Bumpy road, bumping my head. AUU. Infinitively tired. Meaninglessly depressed.

Arriving at the site of our service session we discovered that there were a third of the kids we expected present. Well, nothing can be done but carry on.

Carry on doing what exactly?

Letting myself hinder by a massive language barrier I feel...

Useless. (That is an understatement)

Feeling the pain of my record breaking sunburn, I let myself to be misled into a purposeless universe

When escaping into the future really just make thing a lot worse.

Lie down and pretend you are somewhere else. Preferably inside someone else’s head.

Revising some spanish grammar as I noticed that the participants (who for have become facilitators for the occasion) do more than fine without me.

Giving it up.

Feeling a little sorry for myself, without any valid reason in particular.

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLNPHqyX06s)

But...
It’s hard to drown in your own self-pity when you have people around you that just out of their awesomeness are so willing to show you that you are not unloved.

It is hard to not be baffled when they prove you such shiny talents.

It is impossible not to be impressed.

And regain your belief in humanity.

Oh, how quickly I recovered..

THANK YOU!

Facilitators and participants. Brilliant, brilliant people..
----
Watching how devoted they are to their work when they are trusted the great responsibility that comes with it, seeing how they connect with the kids. How they are fully present and exhaust themselves cause they are carried away with the feeling that they can give back infinitively.
Witnessing how they put into practice what they have learnt the past week makes me incredibly proud. And after dwelling in this delightful bliss of achievement for a little while I realize that I was really taking a greater share of the credit than what I ought to.

Cause it seems too incredible that they have developed into such capable leaders, enthusiastic friends and empathic listeners in a little more than a week. And it is to surreal to be true.
Giving it some thought, however, I believe we all strand at the truth that this great potential has always been there, and it has been nurtured throughout their individual journeys. And it exists within all of us.

If anything we may have facilitated it to flourish. And in new and thrilling ways. Illuminating at its best. And it would be slightly foolish of us all not to be proud of that.

Expressed with art techniques some never thought of before it was presented to them today. Finding out that you actually are more than capable of filming. Of making radio programs. And would you ever have thought that you so easily, simply by instinct, could present something meaningful and funny in front of an audience you barely trusted? 
Who would have thought
that exploring your vulnerability could result in such growth.

Given the responsibility of constructing a house and taking care of a group of kids, it suddenly turns out that what seemed like a scary challenge was nothing but an opportunity to prove to yourself that YOU can be one of the role models you always looked up to.

As the efforts have a ripple effect, through community service an creative workshops, I came to realize that we can all be a catalysis for positive change in each other lives. It is so bloody worth that extra little effort! FUA!

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLZa0u292nA)

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Trust and respect come in return; and with that an inevitable responsibility always follows.

Today one of the service groups experienced this, as some kids felt comfortable enough to share intimate and, to be honest- dreadful, stories from their day-to-day lives. As emphatic human beings one can of course not let that pass. Being supportive is half way, taking action is fulfilling one’s responsibility. 
Involving oneself in other’s problems, 
Becoming a part of their life and ultimately seeking to improve their reality is a great risk. 
Daunting. At times healthy to avoid.

But is there anything more rewarding and moral than risking it?

As we discussed the situation I came to think about all the small moments and actions that have had such a great impact on me (my moral code, how I see myself, the world and so on) and that add up to be my life.

It is easy to lose hope and get depressed when one witness or hear about how easily one person can seem to destroy another human. Or several. How some, or all of us, have a force within us so destructive that it can crush someone released.

Before getting carried away by this, take a moment to appreciate how some individuals seems to have given your lives so much light. Most of the time almost without realizing.

The participants working at the construction site in San Miguel’s most deprived areas came back half dead of tiredness, some sick, some bleeding a little and several bruised. And all surprisingly happy and shockingly energetic. 
Some you could never imagine being willing to get their hands dirty almost refused to stop working. 
In the most concrete way they had experienced how though it can be to build up again, brick by brick, what has been torn down by time and though circumstances. And what a marvelous feeling it is seeing your good intentions taking shape. The ever so rewarding sense of accomplishment when you settle at sustainable solutions and the results of your work finally become visible.

We can’t neglect the truth that is takes blood and sweat (literally) to repair broken destinies. And although it requires intensive session of (manual) work, it does not end there. The ability to patiently follow up the initiatives and never loose our capacity of empathy is an unavoidable necessity if one truly want to become a change maker.

Let’s remind each other every day. To keep listening. Keep trying. To improve, to grow.

And...

That it is always worth it.
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All my respect, admiration and gratefulness to everyone who make these experiences possible; in particular the course leader, Pato, but also all facilitators, participants and helpers.
We’ll have loads of fun on the way, but
 Let’s not loose sight of what we are trying to do.
Allowing society and individuals to change to the better is truly a struggle, and mostly because it requires us to constantly reflect on our own actions.

But let’s never lose the belief in that there is a purpose to it all, and our search for that purpose is the most meaningful of it all - .

Though they at their best appear to be so tangible ideals may often seem incredibly obscure, vague.

After all, the best place to start will always be a good night’s sleep.

And let your colors determine the day that follows.

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoA8GwHQJgw)


Ingvill Maria Daatland Hekne (Norway, AC 09-11)

Day 8 – Into the Community and Beyond!

Community Service. Community Service. Community Service. I hadn’t realized how much I actually missed that concept. So hard, but still so rewarding. For the last year or so it has been a part of my weekly routine in my school. During my summer break I haven’t thought much about it, but after Mexican candy-making with small children today I realize how much a part of my life it has become. Together with the participants of the course my section is facilitating various art/creativity workshops for Mexican children between the age of 6-11 and more specifically for my group: Mexican candies!

As most of community service, it demands a lot of patience and concentration to help out 11-15 children at the same time. And that is exactly what makes it so good, the fact that you are spending time and energy on somebody else. Not only does it help the people/community you are serving, but it also transforms you and changes the way you think about the people around you in your daily life. In ¡Integrando a México! the participants  do various kinds of community service together with us. Some build sustainable housing, some work with recycled art and flora, some organize Constructive Engagement of Conflict workshops for children, and some do creative workshops for other kids. We’ll be doing it for a week and it all started today.

We had some logistical problems, so not all of the workshops were able to run as planned, but all in all it was a good day. Those workshops that ran were mostly rewarding and a good learning experience. And since the logistical problems (hopefully) will be solved by tomorrow, I’m looking forward even more to the next sessions. After another bumpy ride with the bus back to the school we kicked off another bulk of sessions that will run throughout this week: the Creative Workshops. We got theatre, documentary making, radio production, music and visual arts. Having spent my night in the ranch where the participants are staying I was slightly sleepy at this point. It might have some connection to watching The  Shining, an all-time horror classic, until the late hours of the night. It was a really nice night, and I really enjoy hanging out with them as they are really cool people. But yeah, sorry to my fellow workshop leaders Sonia and Fernando for that!

Despite some tiredness, most of the workshops went very well, and there are promising projects that hopefully will result in loads of creative development and learning, as well as some potentially cool products. At the end of the day we kicked off the first evening activity. They are supposed to be fun, engaging and also slightly more chilled activities at the end of the day. Today we had the Spy Game, a kind-of fake game that in the end turns out to be the Trust Game. In a competition between various teams, the participants became really suspicious of each other in a crazy witch hunt for the spies we had told them that each of the teams had. But afterwards we told all of them the truth, that there actually weren’t any spies. This meant that they had been accusing and sometimes expelling people from their teams without any reason, except for the mistakes they had made in the game. The message was powerful: Accept that people do mistakes and don’t judge them for them. Trust them instead to do their best.

But it’s late, and I have to go to bed. Or I’ll be tired tomorrow. And Pato is waiting. Good Night.

- Albert Andersen Øydvin (AC '10-'12) - Norway