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
Saudade: Untranslatable Yet Universal
Nicholas Chieng
2014-11-24
Originally written on October 28th, 2014 Dear Mom, Dad, and Chris, I’ve never been to so many beaches before, and don’t worry; I remember to put on sunscreen every time I go. I’ve already been to more beaches in the span of two months than my entire eighteen years of life. I wish you could...
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We Live in the Flicker
Lindsay Saligman
2014-11-24
Today, my host mom woke up at five in the morning to get on the first bus into town in order to buy food. She wasn’t buying food for my family, but rather, for a group of twelve tourists that was coming for a tour. Santa Rita doesn’t get many tourists, but about a year...
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Photo Blog 1
Yui Lee
2014-11-24
These are pictures of my first couple months in Ecuador featuring Fellows, families, and Ecuadorian nature. The banner is from a road trip I took with my family and their families to Puyo in the Pastaza province. 2. The view of Mt. Chimborazo from the rooftop of my house. 3. One of my workplaces: the...
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A Glimpse of Lagoa do Peri
Kendall Yee
2014-11-24
Have you ever seen an episode of National Geographic and wanted to jump through the screen to be right where they were? Or look through their magazines in awe and wish it was you visiting such a wondrous part of the world? As I was kayaking in Lagoa do Peri, it became surreal to me...
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My Rocky Stream of Consciousness
Elston Tortuga
2014-11-24
Writing used to come easily to me. It does now too; my swiftly improving cursive speaks for itself, but the polished creative writing and analytical essays I used to turn out for Lit & Comp feel out of reach. I suppose the ease resulted from a lacking of qualms when it came to embellishing; stories...
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Kurt Vonnegut is a Genius
Diego Ramos-Meyer
2014-11-24
In a collection of his infamous graduation speeches (found after the previous Fellow Eli left it in my house), there are a few things that stand out about Vonnegut’s brief, insightful, words. He chooses a different theme and moral for each speech, but they always have the same recurring stories to illustrate that theme. One...
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Senegalese Respect
Diego Ramos-Meyer
2014-11-24
I never should have made that French toast. I had missed cooking and American food so badly that I’d spontaneously decided to buy dehydrated milk, eggs, bread, and oil and managed to prepare a half-decent “dinner,” that sweet, thick, crispy dish I used to make every Sunday morning after a late night. Matar, my 26-year-old...
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Everything’s Gone Green
Kamilah Udomsap
2014-11-21
As I brainstorm how to start this second blog, I am flooded with thoughts of simple measure: I am living. A popular response to “cómo estás?” (how are you) is “estoy aquí”, literally translating to “I am here.” There is this mindset here that has become truly sacred to me, and it follows something like...
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My Host Brother, the Metaphor
Lindsay Saligman
2014-11-21
My youngest host brother is six years old. His name is Edy. On September 20th, when I arrived in Napo, Edy came with my host parents to pick me up from Tena, the capital of Napo, and bring me to Santa Rita. While my host parents introduced themselves smiling, Edy clung to my host dad’s...
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