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
Poco a Poco
Priyanka Rao
2011-12-10
Today, I’m just quieter in general, so I’m getting less Spanish intake; yesterday’s exhaustion and headache justify my taking a break. Today I am sitting next to Alejo, with the privilege of listening to his iPod with him. With his twinkle-eyes and long eyelashes, he is trying to practice his English because he hopes to...
Read More
Change Your Words
Holli Sullivan
2011-12-10
I watched a video once of a blind man sitting on a corner. He was holding a sign that said “I’m blind please help.” He gets the occasional dime n’ nickel, but the majority of the city folk ignore the man and go about their days. A young woman stops in front of the man,...
Read More
39 Hours, Pt. 1
Welcome Frye
2011-12-09
My most recent project at my internship site, Runa Amazon Guayusa, is creating a GPS map of Bosque Colonso, a 22,000 acre rainforest preserve stretching from my village of Santa Rita, past the towns of Archidona and Tena, and through a number of other Kichwa villages. All conversations within the story took place in Spanish and/or...
Read More
Caves
Priyanka Rao
2011-12-09
Today we are going to the Jumandy Caverns- the beloved tourist site of the inhabitants of the Napo province. I have expectations of a little cave, trash, people. We enter with lanterns on our foreheads and the clean but slippy weight of water-filled boots. We reach the rock (i) black and solid, as formed by...
Read More
Boats, and Bulls, and Bravery! Oh, my!
Joan Hanawi
2011-12-09
Las Fiestas de Tena. The Parties of Tena. Dangerous words in any language. One thing that I’ve learned very quickly here is that Ecuadorians are very proud to be Ecuadorian. They love finding reasons to celebrate their vibrant nation, and one of the ways this is done is through the Fiestas. Each province or capital...
Read More
Over the Edge
Abigail Hindson
2011-12-08
I don’t really know how it happened, but suddenly I was in the water. My day had been pretty ordinary before this surprising event: I woke up at dawn and did sun salutations as the insects and birds began their morning serenade. My sister and I ate a quick breakfast of cold empanadas de queso...
Read More
A New Friend
Galen Burns-Fulkerson
2011-12-08
At 10:30 on Thursday morning, with my head hung in defeat and the fresh bag of bread still in my hands, I turned around to head home. After spending thirty minutes knocking on every door in the neighborhood and talking to as many neighbors as possible, I decided to save my mission for another day....
Read More
The Next Step
Charlotte Benishek
2011-12-08
“What is that prescription for?” I ask the nurse at the local health post as she scribbled on her notepad. “Hypertension,” she replies. “Is that a common problem here?” In response, she pushed the record book across her desk and pointed to the “diagnosis” column. Common would be an understatement. Surveying the column, I estimated...
Read More
Montana
Nicolas Freschi
2011-12-04
“Yo voy caminando a la montaña donde nací,” sang out my brother, Omar, and I as we lugged enormous pieces of firewood up the mountain to the family car. No weight was too heavy to bring down our spirits today, for indeed we were “going for a walk to the mountain where we were born.”...
Read More