Fellow Stories
True gap year stories from Fellows abroad!
Check out the latest blogs from Global Citizen Year Fellows in Brazil, Ecuador, and India!
Category
Class Year
Country
Autumn in Ecuador
Galen Burns-Fulkerson
2012-03-28
I spent part of yesterday afternoon raking leaves into plastic bags. As pieces crunched underfoot, the smell of freshly fallen leaves wafted through the air. Ah, the start of autumn. But wait. I’m in Pimampiro, Ecuador, where springtime is eternal and the only real season change comes with the rain. In fact, the leaves that...
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Premature Good-byes
Lydia Crush
2012-03-28
Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. Repeat. You keep your mind focused on your breathing just to keep it off of what the day holds for you. You are heading back home, but only to pack up your things and leave. It feels like no one knows what will happen so there is nothing left to do...
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Piece of String
Lydia Crush
2012-03-28
As I said my last goodbyes to my family, all the way back in August, my mother gave some last minute advice through the din: “And take that string off your wrist! Please, you want to look nice, don’t you?” Two weeks after receiving this message (and still wearing the string), I boarded a plane...
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Corridors of Connectivity
Joan Hanawi
2012-03-28
Scribbling away furiously, I was doing everything that I had learned not to do in school. I was attempting to copy down every single word my boss said, trying to notate what he was saying without truly processing. However, the sudden silence made me pause. “You know what an eco-corridor is, right?” Sheepishly, I shook...
Read MoreMy EcuaRoom
Lindsey Sepulveda
2012-03-28
http://youtu.be/BADinnqBoZw This is a video of my third room. I have been living with the same host family for the past six months, but we’ve moved houses twice due to landlord and neighbor problems. This is my third, final, and favorite room. Take a look and I hope you like it.
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Mouse-capades
Stephanie Dunning
2012-03-28
October 11 We killed a mouse tonight. Well, not we. My brother killed a mouse. Nancy and I were huddled on my bed. My brother, Ruben, and nephew, Bryan, were running around my room like banshees. The mouse was hiding under my commode. There were towels tucked under the door so it couldn’t escape and...
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Carnaval en Cuenca (Part 2)
Trevor Porter
2012-03-27
It was our fourth day in Cuenca, and Tess and I were once completely lost as to what we were doing that day. When we had ventured out of our hostel onto the streets, water balloons, water, and foam had come careening down from the sky like homing missiles. Then, a couple minutes later, we...
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Investment: A Video Blog From Ecuador
Welcome Frye
2012-03-27
It’s been quite a year! I’ll post another blog update before returning to the states, but here’s a video for you all to watch in the meantime. Enjoy, and thanks for all the support! I can’t seem to insert the video into this blog, so you’ll have to copy and paste this link into your browser...
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Evening Song
Abigail Hindson
2012-03-27
Shadowed mountains trace uneven lines; the golden sky splits & tears– jagged halves, dark & light. All around, the lazy city moves in twilight: deliberate & unchanging, an afternoon ritual. The vegetable man stands expectantly awaiting passerby. His gold tooth flashes, cinnamon eyes crinkle a fleeting smile. He swims through his tomatoes,...
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Breaking the Cycle
Abigail Hindson
2012-03-27
Imagine you are a curious child, about 10 years old. You don’t know your exact birthday, because no one ever cared enough to write it down—you think it’s sometime in February. You long to go to school, but you have never been able to, what with seven little brothers and sisters to be looking after. ...
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Monkey Business
Abigail Hindson
2012-03-27
One vaccine down, four to go. It was a tiny bite—an incensed mono ardilla(squirrel monkey) had drawn just two drops of blood from my hand when I removed him from a tourist at the Parque Amazónico. This tiny scratch, however, ended in an eight-hour round-trip for the first vaccine and four-hour trips for the remaining...
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Carnaval en Cuenca (Part 1)
Trevor Porter
2012-03-27
Imagine yourself walking through a city with narrow cobblestone streets. Buildings flow seamlessly on either side of you, only interrupted by the occasional cast-iron gate leading away into a dusky unknown. A moon floats overhead, but you only know because every so often a beam of light sneaks through the copious covering of clouds to...
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