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
Paradise Lost
Chloe Bash
2013-04-01
During my first few weeks in Quito, when Spanish classes seemed interminable, and I knew that my lunchbox was packed with congealing french-fries, I would bound down the hill to “El Jardin” or “The Garden” for lunch. In its clean, sanitized air, I would release my protective grip on my backpack and stroll past shops displaying American brands. No...
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A Letter to Myself Seven Months Ago
Danielle Livneh
2013-03-29
Hi there Dani! So you’re just about ready to leave for Ecuador. You’ve got a backpack stuffed to the brim with clothes, ambitions, and expectation. I hope you’re enjoying your clean clothes, because in just a few months every single article will have become a dwelling for an impressive amount of bed bugs. Also you can tell Mom you...
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Women, Sex, and Sexuality
Tsion Horra
2013-03-28
I was raised to be chaste, to wait until marriage, to not discuss sex openly because if I were discussing sex openly then it must be that I have lax moral views towards it. I must not think that it is as sacred or solemn as I was thought to observe through the language our...
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Getting my Joy Back.
Kalea Moore
2013-03-28
“I want my own things/ how i lived them/ & give me my memories/ how i waz when i waz there/ you cant have them or do nothin wit them/” -ntozake shange. “For coloured girls who have considered suicide when the rainbow is enuf” 9am: Wake up 9am-10:30am: Get Sunday ready 10:30am-11am: Drive to church 11am-1pm: Sit in...
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Big Mama’s In Da House
Lydia Collins
2013-03-27
Three weeks. Three seven day spans before I leave Ibarra. Before I leave my siblings, my students, the Andes, everything that was once new but is now familiar. As this intense, raw, and wonderful experience wraps up I find myself spending a lot of time reflecting on the past eight months. In hindsight, I realize that my Global Citizen Year...
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…And sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together
Jojo Guerrero
2013-03-27
“People change so that you can learn to let go, things go wrong so that you appreciate them when they’re right, you believe lies so you eventually learn to trust no one but yourself, and sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together.” – Marilyn Monroe … Incidentally my favorite quote does a...
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Just One
Ely Kadish
2013-03-27
[This was originally a speech given at training seminar. I left it as it was to give the most organic experience.] I have always struggled with the idea of one. I was the kid who could never read one page, only watch one more hour or just eat one cookie. One just never seemed like enough,...
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Saber y Conocer
Mackenzie McMillen
2013-03-27
The summer before senior year I realized that after five years of French classes I could introduce myself and order a meal but that was about it. I attribute this sad fact to 70% my goofing off in class and 30% the weaknesses of the language program at my high school and junior high. I...
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Farewell
Josh Thompson
2013-03-27
As I’m writing this, only two weeks remain until my departure from Pijal – my home for the past 6 months. I can’t help but feel nostalgic. I’d like to share some of the experiences that I will remember best from this place. To you they might just appear to be evidence that Ecuador is a very strange...
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