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
Pathways
Galen Tsongas
2012-10-04
This is by no means an easy task. From San Francisco to Stanford, from Stanford to the hostel in Quito, from the hostel in Quito to a new home in Quito. This is my life at this moment, and it’s huge. I understand very little Spanish and am constantly reminded that this is where I...
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A Post From “Tall, Skinny, White One”
Aidan Holloway-Bidwell
2012-10-04
One of the first differences to hit me between the U.S. and Ecuador was food prices. In the U.S. it is, nearly without exception, cheaper to buy dinner at a MacDonald’s or Taco Bell than to head out and buy fresh ingredients for a homemade meal. Here in Quito however, a small salad from MacDonald’s costs...
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Zuleta: A Small Town With BIG People
Kimberly Nerea Tellez
2012-10-03
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I was told that I had been placed in a small indigenous town which is better known for their artisan embroidery and the grand Hacienda Zuleta. But I won’t be visiting as a tourist; I will be living there for a long six months. However, though it was...
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“Is Your Hair Color Natural?”
Brian Riefler
2012-10-02
In the United States people describe me as a ginger. In Ecuador I am a gringo (foreigner). I have not had a problem blending in with the swarm of other sojourners in Quito. Outside the city, however, I realized I am a minority: My host mother in the Amazon, where I am living and working for the next six months,...
Read MoreMindfulness
Meg Crenshaw
2012-10-02
I was exhausted: I had spent the day–from 8am to 4pm–bringing big rocks from across the river to our community in the Ecuador Sun. I was lonely: I saw other workers joking around with their best friends, while I was stuck with five-year-old vocabulary. I was upset: I knew that this was not the day...
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Accepting the Grit
Lydia Collins
2012-10-02
Acceptance. This word has been at the forefront of my mind during the first few weeks of my new life here in Ecuador. I feel as if my every move in this wonderfully refreshing, yet overwhelming country has been internally motivated by the hopeful outcome of “acceptance”. Let me give you some context. This context comes...
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Desire to Learn
Jackie Brown
2012-10-02
I never thought I would wake up every day with my driving motive to get out of bed to be to go to class. Growing up it never seemed to be quite this, and I always I had to find other reasons to peel my eyes open and get the day started. I never minded...
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Who Am I?
Carly Sitrin
2012-10-01
“I’m wild again, beguiled again, a whimpering, simpering child again. Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered am I.” -Kurt Vonnegut Jr (Timequake) Who am I? What a superb question! I am quite glad that you asked! I am everything, and I am nothing at all. I am a convoluted knot of atoms, molecules, elements, and synapses....
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Learning the ABCs of Ecuador
Carrie Hamilton
2012-10-01
Culture is a funny thing. It dictates so many aspects of our daily lives and, whether we realize it or not, it is responsible for many of our values, routines, and social behaviors. When I first arrived here in Ecuador, I was hopeless. I simply could not understand how to conduct myself in such a...
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