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
River of Dreams
Andrew Poirier
2013-10-22
The song “River of Dreams” by the equally dreamy singer Billy Joel speaks about the human search for “something taken out of my soul, something somebody stole.” This search takes many trails, and even occasionally a stream. One week ago, under a clouded brazilian sky, 16 North Americans decided totake a long walk through the jungle to a...
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So what have I been doing here?
Lauren Guido
2013-10-22
Although I’ve only lived in Ecuador for a month and a half I feel more open, care free, excepting and independent than ever before. I’ve jumped on moving buses. I’ve followed strangers into remote areas. I’ve bathed, washed clothes, panned for gold & gutted a chicken all in the same river. I’ve stayed up all night listening to roosters and...
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Gratitude
Abigail Clavin
2013-10-22
Spanish words fill my ears, dust swirls around my legs, and the colors of Ecuador spin around me as my blue eyes soaks in each one of them. Every day I am awakened by the screaming roosters 10 feet from my door, followed by the rest of the chickens and dogs communicating throughout my small town. I wake up...
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Vision Statement
Alexandra Lines
2013-10-18
My vision for my Global Citizen Year in 3 words is Celebration, Equanimity and Connection. Right now I feel like I’m undercooked. I want to learn to be the best version of self. To be graceful, and to expect the unexpected. To not always have an idea in my head about how things should be,...
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Storytelling
Maximilian Chen
2013-10-18
The following was written at 2:32 AM on October 6th, 2013. This is what Senegal’s capital city of Dakar looks like at first glance, to a first-time observer. In a purely logistic sense, Dakar is the product of two rather arbitrary factors. Factor One is what seems to be the driest, most arid location on the entire coastline of the...
Read MoreThis is Not a “Gap Year.”
JT Su
2013-10-11
“I basically say, ‘Congratulations, you’re in. Now go away.'” — Robert S. Clagett, Former Dean of Admissions at Middlebury College According to the American Gap Association, only 1% of high school graduates across the United States take a year off before attending college. We live in a culture that I believe is too often dominated by what...
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Freedom Writer
JT Su
2013-10-11
“I have received full payment and even more.” — Philippians 4:18 Writing will always be my first love. It is my comfort, my joy, my pastime, and ultimately, my escape. It is there for me in my happiest, saddest, most exhilarating, and most troublesome moments. It lets me play with words on a page–the best...
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My Life Flashing Before My Eyes
Lillie Mayfield
2013-10-10
No, I did not have a near-death experience. The idea of my life flashing before my eyes came to me this morning as I was walking back from my first warm shower since I left Quito almost 3 weeks ago. As I was marveling at the amount of hair I lost to my comb, I looked outside at the...
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My First Week
Neil Singh
2013-10-10
The 12 hour bus ride to my homestay Quingeo in Azuay, Ecuador was full of a lot of excitement and gorgeous, varied landscapes. Beautiful rolling pastures, a wide variety of exotic trees and shrubs, and magnificent snow-capped mountains pass by quickly through the windows. You could smell just about everything as well; some odors intoxicating, others overwhelming. That bus ride...
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