Healing Hands, Healing Heart
On the morning of June 16, 2012, my team and I touched ground in Haiti, prepared for the devastation but also thankful for the chance to help. As we traveled...
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Finding God in Atlanta
Last summer, I was blessed with the opportunity to go on a mission trip with my church family to Atlanta, Georgia through
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The Little Smiles that Taught Me
March 24, 2012, was a day of apprehension and excitement. My stomach churned like the ocean that we were about to fly over. I had learned as much as I could about Bogota, Colombia, but...
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Love: The Right Track to Prosperity
When I think of culture, I think about how a certain civilization lives. Being from Scottsdale and vacationing in places much like it, I see only the upscale sides of destinations....
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An Exchange for Change
A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty. I am proud to say that I am an optimist. I have taken the opportunity to travel to Peru...
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Beautifully Impoverished
Finally landing on the tarmac of the Belizean Airport was such a relief. I am a terrible...
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Remembing Haiti
Throughout the beginning of my high school career I never really knew where I fit in. I’d had my troubles through my freshman year of high school, and I guess you could say I was ready to give...
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A Different Perspective
Last summer, I went on a mission trip to Los Angeles, California with my church's youth group. While we were there, we served at various missions and worked at a daycare for Hispanic children...
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How God Healed me in the Alabama Heat
Last Sunday, my choir and I took a trip that would impact our lives. We were headed to tornado alley in Tuscaloosa, Alabama where a tornado had struck a multigenerational community. Prior to the...
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La Dominica–and 19 New Friends
In the summer of 2010, at the age of 15, I applied for a program with the Boston Red Sox. I had no idea what to expect, no knowledge of who I would meet, and only a small description of what I would...
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A Fire of Hope
Mixed feelings of excitement and fear filled my mind as I came upon my destination. I had imagined a town that was like mine, but it just needed a little push to get back on its feet - to get...
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My Name is Now Mzungu.
Hello! I am writing to you from Kampala, Uganda! It is 7:04pm on Wednesday night. The highlight of the day was definitely the Hospital visit. Katherine and I went to meet Nicolette for a tour of the Hospital.
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Education is the key to life.
Hello, My name is Julia Saravia, I am 17 years old and currently a senior at Oakland High, class of 2013. I have been living in Oakland, Ca for my whole life. I have been victim of crime and abuse...
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My experience at the Rock Quarry Village
Last summer, I had the opportunity to go on a mission trip to Cambodia for a week and a half with my church's youth group as well as my father, the church's pastor. We stayed in the capital, Phnom Penh,...
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“L is for Love”- Summer 2011 in Taiwan
On June 30, 2011, at 3:00 P.M., at the John F. Kennedy Airport in New York, I boarded the China Airlines airplane alone. I was ready to embark on an adventure to Taiwan, ready to teach English as...
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Banjar, India – The Best Experience Of My Life
March 29, 2012 was the day I stepped onto a plane to India. It would be thirty three hours from the time we left Salt Lake City to reach the little village of Banjar in Himachal Pradesh, India. ...
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Finding Joy in Helping Others
This summer I traveled to Zambia with Heart of the Bride. Heart of the Bride is a missions organization...
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Ohio Key Club DIstrict Convention 2012
This past April, I traveled with some of my fellow Key Clubbers from Avon Lake to the Ohio Key Club District Convention in Columbus. I was not excited about going. The convention seemed to be boring...
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“Traveling; it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller”. –Ibn Battuta
Although I have not traveled nearly as much as Ibn Battuta, I have almost as much to tell. Through two short trips to the Middle East, I have gained the knowledge and experience...
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Living Lessons
Just two years ago, I joined a summer program, Project Ascent, which sends American students to Sichuan, China, to volunteer in local communities and familiarize Chinese students with American Culture....
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Neuschwantein Castle and Magical Mystery Tour
A ‘mad’ king and a beautiful castle; it may sound like another one of the Grimm Brothers fairytales,...
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Amidst the Ruin Remains Hope
Landing in the Dominican Republic this past january, I was extremely uncertain. I had never been on a missions trip before, or even experienced much poverty. All at once however, I was being completely...
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Dhanyabaad ????????
Dhanyabaad is a word that I used so much in only two weeks. Dhanyabaad mean thank you in Tharu and the people of Dhurzhanna, Nepal had me using it so much with their outrageous kindness. Living in...
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You Can’t Save a City (N.O.L.A.)
On April 13th , 2012, I embarked on an amazing service-learning adventure to New Orleans, Louisiana, with 35 other kids from my high school. We spent almost a year fundraising and doing...
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Choosing Joy In Uganda
At 16 years old, I looked at my life, and realized I had no clear direction. I was still trying to figure out how and where I was called to serve. So at 16, I made...
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The laugh of a child is worth a million tears.
It was 3am Friday morning when I departed from Indianapolis on my way to meet up with my team before heading to Jacmel, Haiti. The flights themselves were nice and smoothe. The minute we arrived...
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The Week-Long Turning Point
In every person’s life there are events that will change him forever. I had the privilege of experiencing one of these incredible events over the summer of my junior year. My week-long mission trip...
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A Vacation of Giving Back
My family trip to Kanab, Utah, was an amazing opportunity. Though the trip there and back was extremely long (1,600 miles and 25 hours each way), the life changing experience made it well worth it. We...
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“What Are You?”
"You’re too dark, and your Chinese sounds too funny for you to be Chinese, you’re not fat enough to be American... what are you?” bluntly inquired the local six-year-old Shanghai boy at the Global...
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A Week with a Few Half Wild Elephants
I had always wanted a “real” volunteer experience and so, after three years of saving and a dream I thought would never be true, I was now sleeping in the jungle of Chiang Mai, Thailand with my sister,...
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The Innocence of a Child: Mexico Mission Trip
As the shore approached, I reflected on the reason of my being here in Mexico. A group of 11 from my home church of House on the Rock had gathered with the shared goal of spreading God's love on foreign...
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Travel Teaches: What I’ve Learned about Diversity from Travel
You’ve heard: Everyone is “one of a kind”. No mat
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A very different summer vacation
When I was thirteen years old, I took a trip that changed my life. After a summer spent constructing awkward Spanish phrases I was ready to board the plane to Nicaragua. A beautiful country, Nicaragua...
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The Most Wonderful People In The Most Beautiful Place
Ecuador takes my breath away; it is stunningly beautiful. In Ecuador, no one rushes to get anywhere, no one is in a hurry and they are frequently late. But they do not apologize or feel guilty because...
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Day At The Dumps
Some days are always remembered, not because of the laughter or happiness, but because they changed your life forever. Touching poverty like never before, I had the privilege of being part of a volunteer...
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Ordinarily Beautiful: NYC
To a thirteen-year-old girl in the twenty-first century United States, the concept of beauty is something that she has likely been bombarded with for over half of her life. I was certainly one of...
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Hope
Stepping out of that bus and seeing more than a hundred people looking at us was frightening, not because they were staring at us as if we were aliens, but because they looked at us with such amazement...
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Te Sakam Macedonia
Experience is a teacher. Every breath will show us something we did not know could be possible; every step will take...
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Definitions of Success
After leaving my clean room at the Kogelo Retreat Villas and Homes, I walked down a red dirt road in Kisumu, Kenya, dodging goats and stepping over puddles and piles of garbage. I was on my way to...
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El Salvador
As I made my way off the plane, I was more than a little relieved that the excruciating flight to El Salvador was at an end. We...
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Since Jamaica…
The fat white man gave us the last bit of advice: “Rule number three: In Jamaica time is not of the essence. Every meal will be in the morning at noon, and in the evening. The...
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Questions?
Even through a thick layer of smog-laden clouds, I could feel the heat baking my skin. Clouds of dirt rose every time I took a step. Even though sweat rolled down my back and my hair was plastered...
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Appalachia: Just Because It’s Different
Appalachia? Appalachia Kentucky? You’ve got to be kidding me. I can’t imagine anybody in their right mind spending their entire Thanksgiving break there. I mean…it’s just mountains and shacks and...
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My African Escapade
A foreign place is not something one can simply imagine or feel through a book or movie. In order to grasp the true meaning of "foreign," one must experience it first hand. During...
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My Nicaraguan Experience
If you wish to take your family on a one-week adventure that will affect not only your lives but the lives of thousands of children and their families, I have just the trip for you. Last...
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Night and Day
They’re as different as night and day”. I’ve heard those words throughout my life, but they never seemed truer than when I worked on a service project on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. I...
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“A Fire That The World Cannot Explain”
I. Getting There As a junior in high school, sixteen years old, I decided to go on my sixth trip to the state of Kentucky. I had begun taking these trips...
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Regalos Pequeños (Small Gifts)
This last summer I had the privilege to serve in the impoverished areas of the Dominican Republic with many of my fellow youth group members. We touched them with the material gifts and services we brought,...
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Co’ qui?
Rather than waking up to the drone, hackneyed roar of snow plows in Maine, we were carried out of bed by the soothing lullabies of the restless co’ qui frogs and the pungent aroma of juicy, apple-filled...
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Small Voices, Big Hopes
Outstretched as far as the eye could see, stood a sea of colorful little shanties dotting the hillside like confetti. Each one represented a family much like my own; one with hopes and dreams...
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One Precious Moment
The brilliant sun almost blinded me that first day. Walking out of the airport in Johannesburg, South Africa, my senses were bombarded by the glare and the heat. Modern buildings were interspersed with...
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Sawdust
“Hola chico/chiquita! Como te llama?” I say the words hesitantly, and my tongue feels like it is covered with sawdust as I speak the few Spanish words I know. To say that I am loud would...
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Capturing Liberties
I wrote this post over the summer during my one-month stay in Uganda, Africa. As a seventeen-year-old photographer, I had the opportunity to live in an apartment on site...
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A Trip To Honduras
On Febuary 18, 2012 I took the trip of a lifetime. As corny as that sounds, I could not phrase this experience in a more truthful way. An old teacher of mine, seven classmates, and myself traveled...
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Journey To The Dominican Republic
As the runway fell away beneath the plane my stomach dropped with it. I shut my eyes and fought the fear creeping into my mind as the flight attendant alerted us that we'd land in Santo Domingo in two...
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Vietnam and Cambodia
Our first stop in Phenom Pehn was Tol Slong, a former prison during the Cambodian genocide. Before the genocide it was a high school, but the Khmer Rouge converted it into a prison and place...
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Find Your Independence… 6,000 Miles Away in Laos and Thailand!
The reason that banks created credit cards was because everyone was looking for a solution to get away from that noisy, heavy, constant reminder in their front pocket: loose change....
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