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
Patience
Madeline Campbell
2011-11-08
Hola, everybody, I first want to apologize for being so slow to update my blog. I’m sure all of you are wondering where the heck I am and what the heck I’m doing. The truth is, I have been busy having the most amazing time of my life, and I have been bursting with things to tell...
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The Power of Tamia
Joan Hanawi
2011-11-08
Wilma is the oldest of my eight siblings, and has been a hard worker her entire life. When she was younger, she was an excellent student, a fast learner, and a dedicated scholar, but her gender constantly held her back. When she wanted to move on to study biochemistry after high school, her father told...
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Saturday Nights
Lydia Crush
2011-11-08
Incidental music has never been so abused. The telenovelas here use all this intense music for a simple scene; things are way over-dramatized. My mom is watching a show and someone broke someone else’s heart, or killed someone, or saw something, whatever happens in soap-operas. All of a sudden this heartrending sad orchestral music pops out...
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A New Family
Elizabeth Warren
2011-11-08
We had been in Quito for four days and the next day, we were meeting our Quito families, who we would be living with for the next month. The night before and that same morning, we were filled with excitement and nervousness, wondering how our stays would turn out and what living with a family...
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Seeing Ibarra
Elizabeth Warren
2011-11-07
Sometimes you may be looking, but not really seeing. This was something I had experienced during my first visit to Ibarra, I was here for a week to meet my family, to visit my job, and also to see where I´ll be living over the next seven months, but even though I was in a...
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Two Machetes and an Axe: We Come in Peace
Kirin Gupta
2011-11-07
Smoke curled under blackened plantains on a wood tray that hung above the open fire. Flames licked up from a pit sunken into the mud floor. It was my first Sunday in Cotundo, Ecuador and my host mom and I had hiked for miles to visit her mother’s farm – the epitome of a campo,...
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Goodbyes
Galen Burns-Fulkerson
2011-11-07
I didn’t expect to get so close to my host family in Quito. Before arriving, I figured I would spend some quality time with them during my training and then move on to my longer home-stay with little trouble. This is not what happened at all. After a month with my wonderfully helpful and incredibly...
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Not Foreign
Jacklyn Joy Byrd
2011-11-02
I’m the first to admit that my Spanish speaking skills are not that great. I’m also the first to admit that I possess incredibly perfectionist tendencies. The combination of these two led to a month and a half of silence: I only spoke when asked direct questions, or felt threatened. My silence ended about twenty...
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While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Welcome Frye
2011-10-28
You are sitting outside watching the last beams of sun disappear behind the mountains when the news reaches you. The man who brings it expects nothing more of you than simple acknowledgement, yet curiosity brings you to the communal building where all are gathered. A woman has died today, and a vigil of silence is...
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Back to High School
Trevor Porter
2011-10-28
My brother’s high school I visited was not at all what I was used to, and the most similar aspect of the school day was that teachers taught and students studied. My brother told me that school started at 7. But this was Ecuador time, and people didn’t start arriving, even the teacher, until much...
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Un Rio
Heather Kurtz
2011-10-19
While in Atacapi, my community, I have discovered many things. There is one that really made me think. This was the river. I never knew all the things that a river can be. Most of you know I have a passion for white-water kayaking. I am constantly watching the river levels to see when I...
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Lily Ellenberg
2011-10-18
The second week with my Napo host family has begun. My family consists of parents, Irene and Juan, and two younger siblings: one boy, Kambic, age nine, and one girl, Nina, age three. They are both rather adorable if I do say so myself. Kambic acted comfortably towards me from the first day, but I had...
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