IGLOW NGAWI 2015

This year, Christmas came early in Indonesia – at least for me! After months of planning and wondering if all of the piece would really come together, my school hosted IGLOW Ngawi 2015. I couldn’t have wished for anything more this holiday season.

Indonesian Girls Leading Our World is a branch of Peace Corps’ popular “GLOW” (and BRO for boys) camps. All across the world, youth gather for empowerment, wellness, and leadership training. It was a privilege to work with my school on developing our own IGLOW camp. I can’t say enough how much the success of IGLOW Ngawi is owed to the teachers and staff at my school, as well as the high school counselors and my fellow-Peace Corps volunteers who helped everything run smoothly (and kept me sane!).

Rather than continuing to gush over how all my “summer camp meets Peace Corps meets Indonesia” dreams finally came true, take a look for yourselves. The smiling faces of these lovely girls as they grew in confidence and as leaders was worth more than all the silver and gold Yukon Conelius could ever put to song.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and a Wonderful New Year to all!

Fear

A fantastic blog post from a fellow PCV that puts many things I have been thinking about into beautiful, compelling words. Check it out! Click here if you are not logged into WordPress, but would like to give it a read.

Never Tiptoe

It seems like every time I go online another tragedy has struck – a mass shooting, a terrorist attack, a black teen killed at the hands of a white cop, or some ludicrous Donald Trump antics. I see people, and consequently their words and their actions, being driven by fear. Fear of guns. Fear of mentally ill people with guns. Fear of police. Fear of black people. Fear of terrorists. Fear of those who are different than “us,” whoever “us” may be. Most of these fears are rooted in real, true danger. Black people fear cops because they are far more likely to be treated unfairly and met with violence than their white counterparts. We fear terrorists because they are killing people around the globe all the time. We fear those toting guns because schools and malls and movie theaters are being shot up and it seems to have become…

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