I Always Knew, but Now I Know
The scene that lies before my eyes could best be described as hell on earth. As I walk down the school bus stairs and onto the dusty Guatemalan soil, I can’t take my eyes off what is before me. I...
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Learning Humility
During the summer of 2015, I was selected to participate in Loop Abroad, which is a program that enables students to work with endangered elephants and provide veterinary care for the elephants, Bengal...
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Accidentally Amazing: My Trip to Haiti
Sweat dripped down my temples as I sat perched on the off-balance wooden chair. The street behind me bustled with activity and the foreign language chattered in the background. I glanced around the...
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Survival, Much Like Smiling, Is Universal
My time in Cambodia had brought me many challenges. I had a running fever with no access to trustworthy medical care, I was fumbling with cultural differences and customs, and we worked long days teaching...
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Building Hope in Mexico
Let me back up a little. I come from a family that travels. Sometimes we travel for fun, sometimes for adventure, and sometimes for cultural experiences. About every other year, we travel for missions...
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How to See
Before, I had never left my home. I’ve flown across the seas in my dreams, traversed the highest mountains between classes, but one day, I promised myself that I would travel. Across the nation......
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A Friend 2,790 Miles Away
My eyes pop open as the cooing of roosters awakens my slumber. I roll over on my paper-thin mattress, careful not to hit my head on the bunk above me. Stepping onto the filthy cement floor, I look around...
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Helping Others, Or Getting Helped?
Dancing with children on the dirty streets with the rain pouring over our heads, playing soccer on the dusty roads, and...
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The Trip That Changed My Life
As a human being, I am often guilty of becoming far too comfortable with my circumstances in life. I become comfortable with the house that I live in, the clothes that I wear, and even necessities such...
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I Traveled Incomprehensible
I sleepily opened my eyes to daylight, heard locusts whining, and sat up with my sheets sticking to me. It was 5:00...
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Here’s What I Didn’t Learn In The Classroom – From A Teen Girl Travelling The World
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Rain That Cleanses
When I first walked out of the airport in Kolkata, I felt like I had hit a wall. It had been hot in the airport, but in June in the heart of India it was impossibly humid...
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Mzungu Monday: One Day of Life Lessons for a Foreigner in Uganda
Uganda is troubled with Malaria, a disease not commonly found in America. Despite the risk of entering a malaria zone, I traveled there for three weeks this summer. I was...
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A Musician in Kenya
I’m no economist, no political expert, no social worker, no activist; I am and was a high school student with his mind-set to pursue music and science. Though aware of avoiding the naive thought that...
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The Dominican Republic: Changing Lives
When our team leader told us our first mission work experience was going to be a visit to Pasitos de Jesus girls orphanage; I remained trapped in my timid and overly cautious state...
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Hope For Cambiaso
In late July of 2014, I retracted back to my “home” village in the Dominican Republic for a week. By joining the Village Mountain Mission the year before with my mom, and building homes for impoverished...
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Juan Dolio
On an oppressively hot day in mid-July, armed with hundreds of hastily assembled ham sandwiches and bundles of clothes, I climbed on a bus and rode with thirty other students through the dusty switchbacks...
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Wrong Turn Made Right
During the summer of 2012 I had the opportunity to travel from my suburban town in Minnesota to Chicago with my youth group from church. We...
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Tropical Paradise, Elephant Rides and… Cultural Discovery?
After a mentally and physically exhausting two week mission trip, my team and I were beyond ready to enjoy some well-earned fun in the city of Chaig Mai, Thailand. That morning we...
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Jammin To A Different Rhythm
When you hear the name, "Jamaica," do you see white sandy beaches and beautiful blue...
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Ecstatic Elijah
“First we’ll have to cross crocodile pond, and then we’ll go up ice mountain,” little Elijah said, as he clasped my hand tightly and started to sprint across the gym. The five year old was one...
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Asante (Thank You)
Journal Entry Day 5: “As I step off the bus into an unknown desolate, I...
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The Trip That Has Forever Changed My Life
Most people look at the world as this picture perfect place where everyone lives a life either the same or better...
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The Treasures You’ll Find
I remember hearing the name Bugg’s Island and daydreaming about what treasures were awaiting to be discovered. Since as long as I can remember, my family, and our friend’s...
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The Mission of a Life
The power to change the world. At the young age of 17, I never thought I would have that chance. Now, after a mission trip to Black Mesa, Arizona, I believe anything is possible.Twenty-five people...
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Simple Joy
First time out of the country and I was petrified. My parents weren't accompanying me, I had no idea how to fill out the customs form (what is a customs form anyway??), I was bound to forget to take...
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Learning to Breathe
For ten days during the summer of ‘13, living with the locals and 6 girls I barely knew in the quaint village of Uvita on the...
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The Heart of Honduras
Seeing new parts of the world have opened my eyes to the different people that drift through the world virtually unnoticed by the world around them. Visiting...
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Through the Lens of Panama
Everything about Panama was breathtaking; from the green-carpeted hills to the impossibly blue sky....
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It’s Official, I’m Obsessed with Atlanta!
Arriving in Atlanta at midnight I felt exhausted yet filled with a restless energy. While my friends were socializing I took a moment to myself to let it all sink in. Just months ago we were competing...
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Belize Mission Trip to LOL Orphanage
During the summers of 2013 and 2014 I took a trip to the country of Belize, a country located in central America. Both trips took place as part of a mission...
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The Dominican Fever
The guide’s hand shot up, his fingers slowly curling into a fist. I grasped the side-rail of our two-seater mud buggy, bracing for Josiah to disengage the gas and hit the squeaky brake pedal. ...
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Culture Shock & New Home
For two years, my classmates and I raised money for a Mission's Trip to Peru. We were going to serve at an orphanage in Ayacucho, but since this was a once in a lifetime opportunity, we also decided...
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What the Kids Taught Me
I have recently returned from an amazing journey to Peru. This trip was through my high school and was centered on volunteer work and cultural experience. The first week we spent in the city of Chaclacayo...
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The Soul of Volunteering
In seventeen years I haven’t been very far from my small hometown in Eastern Pennsylvania. Even now, the farthest I’ve ever been from home is Orlando Florida. However, even trips close to home have...
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The Power of Seven Days
When I was 17 years old, I almost died while on a plane returning home from Central America.We were flying directly over the Bermuda Triangle (of course, right?) when the plane started experiencing...
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My Experience at Our School in Tanzania
Community service has always played an important role in my life. From an early age, I have been dedicated to helping those in need. I volunteered at a preschool, a warehouse where food was being packaged...
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La Kay Mwen – My Home
My home is in Dessalines, Haiti. My family moved to Haiti as missionaries in August 2012. Dessalines is a beautiful...
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From a Concrete Jungle to My Dusty Tanzanian Home
As I stepped from the plane that had just carried me across two continents, three countries, and more time zones than my body could recognize, all I could think was, "My life will never be the...
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To Teach and Be Taught – A 30-Day Immersion Into Sichuanese Culture
When we first arrived in the village, our group set individual goals that we hoped to achieve over the span of the trip. I, being my modest self, vowed that I would both find a cure for allergies (since...
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A Place Never Forgotten
Towering, white historical doors awaited us on the other side of the glass windows of the bus. Peace met us at the doors along with our tour guide. Two steps and there I was...
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Le Reve Francais!
The opportunity to attend school and live in the French Alps for a year was too good to pass up. By the time packing was finished and farewells...
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Building Schools, Passing on Education, One Brick at a Time in Malawi Africa 2012
Did you know that 72 million children of primary school age in the developing world are not in school?! It shocked me because in America, every child has access to education. Due to my outstanding...
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