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Portland, Oregon, United States

Hello Friends and Family,

I hope you all are well. Here is your quarterly update.

I still love being an RA. My residents crack me up with the rumors they start and the stories they enjoy telling me. Of course, my inner-mother does worry about them at times as I watch them get stressed or go through hard times. I will definitely miss them all at the end of the year though.

Generally speaking this semester has been more difficult than I initially thought. As many of you know, a friend of mine died of carbon monoxide poisoning January 5th. I found out while at RA training and have been trying to work through and process that for the last two months. Her name was Lauren Johnson and she graduated from UP last year. She was currently getting her graduate degree in Colorado. I knew her from the office of volunteer services, where I still work and because she was also a political science student. Thus, much of my semester has been dealing with that. Many thanks to all of you who have sent cards, emails, and called I greatly appreciate them.

Classes are alright. I really like my comparative immigration class and the income inequality class I am auditing. I think because both relate to the real world and topics I am interested in.

Other than that my time has been dedicated to working. I am editing papers for students in a Biblical Traditions class, which is lots of fun but takes excessive amounts of time. Then working to coordinate the Nicaragua Service-Learning trip that I am going on in May. We are deep in the formation process and even deeper in the fundraising process. We still need to bring in around $10,000 before May (If anyone would like to support us, even if it is just $5, donations can be sent to the Moreau Center at 5000 N Willamette Blvd Portland OR 97203 with checks made out to University of Portland and they are tax deductible!) Ok that was my helpless plea.

As far as next year, I still don't have anything set. I will probably hear back from most places in May, which will be interesting because I am out of the country from May 6th until June 3rd... Soooo... like all important decisions, I will probably be making this one on the run.

That is about all going on in my life. Have a splendid week and for those in Oregon enjoy the snow, sun, rain, and every other kind of weather that we can manage to squeeze into one week :) Also as a side note, I highly encourage you all to invest in carbon monoxide detectors. I think they are $20 bucks at the most. Love you all! ~ Karen
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Portland, Oregon, United States

Dear Family and Friends!

Happy Holidays! I hope you have all spent some quality time with friends and family over the last few weeks! My semester wrapped up two weeks ago, earliest ever I think. For the first time ever I wasn't completely burnt out and ready for break. Logically I finally figure this whole college thing out right before I graduate :)

Interesting happenings from my last semester... On the RA front, I love being an RA. I miss having residents around and being able to walk around the hall on rounds bugging people and seeing what they are up to. But we will all be back soon :) I am pumped for next semester. I really have to work on having more purely social activities, I am bad at those :-P One of the most successful events from last semester was Vegan night. November is Vegan Month so another RA and I sponsored vegan night. We had vegan food for residents to try and passed out information about being vegan. The purpose was not to convert people to veganism but simply to expose people to the lifestyle. I think we had nearly 40 people stop by to check it out and try the food. It was probably the best food I had to eat in weeks :-P. The one nasty discovery from the night was the vegan hot dogs taste just like normal hot dogs, lesson learned, you are not tasting the meat in the hot dogs :-P

Planning for the Nicaragua trip I am taking in the spring is going alright. It is time to really get cracking and get things cemented down. We are planning to spend a chunk of time with an organization called Witness for Peace, feel free to look them up. They will do a lot of the education piece for us on fair trade and US/Nicaragua Economic relations then we are planning to spend a week or so with a place called Seeds of Learning (I believe is what we decided on). There we will be building schools and helping with long-term sustainable type service projects. The remaining few days we will probably be doing a home stay and visiting a coffee cooperative. I am very excited for the trip, though at this point it is so far off I am really not thinking much about it.

I am doing some academics as well, on occasion :) Classes ended well. I again came to the conclusion I usually do better in my classes once I stop worrying about them and do the minimum to get by... You would think I would learn from that and stop worrying, reading, and trying sooner in the semester :-P I am excited for next semester. I will be taking French 102 (Reasoning, since many ask. I wanted to take another language and my school doesn't offer Arabic which was my top choice. Between French or German, the two options, French will allow me to speak to the most people so I went with that); Also taking Philosophy of the Mind- which fulfills the metaphysics requirement at my school. I don't really know anything about the class but was told the prof was the best philo prof we have and I like philosophy so it sounded good :-P Also taking Comparative Immigration, the class I have wanted to take since Sophomore year which I am TOTALLY PUMPED for! For some Spanish in my life I am taking Translation and Interpretation, which should be fun. AND I am auditing a labor economics class called Income Inequalities, which should be very cool. Though I haven't had much econ and haven't had any for more than 2 years, thus I am just auditing the class :)

Lastly, probably the question on everyone's mind, what I am doing next year. Short answer, still no clue :) Long answer, I am applying to a bunch of post-grad service places. 1-Sojourners internship Program in Washington, DC. Here I would be living in community with other sojourners interns in Columbia Heights and working at Sojourners options include as an executive assistant, policy person, in marketing or about seven others. 2- Juan Diego Catholic Worker house in Houston, Texas here I would be working to provide hospitality to the poor in houston, which includes many recent immigrants. 3- Border Corps which also works along the US/Mexico border in either New Mexico or Texas I believe. Here I would work with a local organization. I could be organizing immersion type trips for high school kids in the US or running an after school program for the latino population or working with legal aid for recent immigrants. 4- Jesuit Volunteer Int'l - Here I would hopefully be based somewhere in Latin America, living in community, and probably working teaching english. This is the only one that would be two years. 5- Nuestros Pequenos Hermanos- Or the english Friends of the Children (I believe is what I was told the English version is) Here I would be living somewhere in Latin America working at the orphanage, hopefully in the capacity of a kind of house mom for a group of kids. Being a positive role model and providing love and support. Last option is Americorps NCCC- I am applying to be a group leader so I would be responsible for a group of 10-14 of my peers. We would travel around as a team to 6 different service sites, throughout the year, in our region (Iowa, DC, MD, CA, or CO I think are the options for home base). As a team leader I would be responsible for all the paper work, enforcing rules, maintaining group dynamics, providing an ear to group members who need to talk, etc... Fall back if I didn't get accepted to any of these would be applying to be an Americorps Vista somewhere. The other common question is, which is your top pick? Well, all six are my top picks so I am just applying to them all and hoping the interview process and such will help with the discernment process...

Soo 10 pages later, that is what I am up to and where I am at :) I, as always, apologize for the lack of communication and I am going to try to get back to emails over break :) I wish you all a new year of joy and contentment and a great energy to face any challenges life throws at you!

Much love, Karen
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Portland, Oregon, United States

Dear Friends, Family, and Random Blog viewers,

I am once again writing to update you on my life. Sooo this is not so much a travel blog, because I am not traveling in the the literal sense. I like to think I am still on the figurative journey through my life...

Since I have not updated you all in a very long time, here is the story for the last 3 months.
I have returned to UP for my senior year. I am an RA in a newly renovated dorm and greatly enjoying this experience. I have 21 residents (which I believe makes it the smallest wing on campus). As an RA (Resident Assistant) I plan events for my wing and try to create a supportive community for them to live in. Resident's Life at UP really strives to provide these students with more than just a roof over their heads but also a community they enjoy spending time with and a loving support system as they transition to college or continue struggling through college. I absolutely love getting to be the big sister and it gives me justification to constantly bugging my wingmates and trying to get to know them, while a natural tendency of mine some find it scary when someone is constantly trying to learn their name and such :)

My classes as enjoyable at times. I am taking French 101, which is probably my favorite class :) The prof is awesome, I LOVE LANGUAGES, and there is not a huge time commitment outside of class. I could probably get by without studying for my tests but of course I study anyway :-P I have a Spanish Class as well which is fun but I think I am the only one who is there just because I want to be and I am not sure how much it is really helping my spanish, which I feel slipping away each day and REALLY need to practice more. I have a science class which is also very interesting to me but involves jumping through a lot of hoops... we all know how I feel about that :-P I also have a foreign policy class and a class in which I will be conducting an oral history interview and then putting together a documentary with my classmates on the Civil Rights Movement in Portland. This is a very cool opportunity though I am a little scared of messing something up because these oral histories will actually be archived at PSU and people can cite them in research papers and such. CRAZY! I am the only non-history major in the class too which is amusing.

In other areas of my life... Nothing astonishing. I am currently at Arizona State University visiting my little brother :) I was having trouble adjusting to being in the same place without a plane ticket.

I will also proactively answer the question that many of you are probably thinking, I have no idea what I am going to do with my life next year. I have many options but am torn as to where I want to be. Pieces of my heart are in Oregon, Spain, DC, and probably a 1/2 dozen other places. A part of it is still wanting to wander as well... So this week while in Arizona I am going to attempt to figure something out since applications are probably due soon to many different organizations and such. The only thing I have really ruled out is grad school because I am not ready to be in an intense grad school program, I have no idea what program I would enroll in, and I have no way to pay for that program...

Well on the happy note of my lack of future :-P I hope you are all doing well! I am attempting to respond to all your emails today as well soooo you should be hearing from me on a more regular basis from now on :)

Much love,

Karen

P.S. If you are not registered to vote Tuesday is the deadline, be sure to register :)
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Washington DC, District of Columbia, United States

Hello All!

So I have not done this in a while... not much happening here. I work long hours... last week I think I set a PR with a total of 75hrs in one week... I really need to start being a little more self centered with my time and not working sooo much. I am almost constantly exhausted, have no time to walk, run, see DC, or do much of anything but work, sleep, and ride the bus to and from work... I am trying to remedy this.

I went to the DC folk festival today where there are three featured 'cultures.' These year they were Texas, Bhutan, and NASA... RANDOM! The dancing and such we saw were interesting and seeing the various cultural things from Bhutan were fun... I am hoping I am spelling that correctly. They are known to be one of the happiest countries around. And seemed like a gorgeous place.

Other than that the only non-work related things I have been up to including going to a grad school fair, where I basically told schools I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and they should sell me on their program. The one program that looks really cool is an MBA program at Brandeis. Though it really would not involve my spanish/love of travelling as much as some of the other programs... Who would have thought that Karen would be interested in business... The financial, accounting, management stuff is a all very interesting to me though, and some of what I am doing now. Though some nights I really want one of those 9-5 jobs. The one advantage to minimum wage, work like childcare or fast food... they don't let you work more than 40 hours a week.

I also did get to go home since I last wrote... Which was great and too short. Being away for almost a yr straight now is getting more difficult. It was great to see those of you I could while I was there, and for those I missed so sorry! I will be back at UP in Aug. which is at least in the same state so perhaps we can meet in the middle :) Good luck with all your summer plans, new jobs, and endeavors! Kb
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Washington DC, District of Columbia, United States

Hello Friends, Family, Random Folks!

First, as has become normal, let me apologize for the many weeks since I last wrote. The semester wrapped up, I went home for...5 days and have been adjusting to life as a working girl.

I am back here in DC for the summer and have few big adventures to report. The end of the semester was pure chaos. I decided to work full time as well as pack, say good bye to friends, and write 3 papers- not my wisest decision. It lead to very few minutes of sleep (45mins my last night before flying out for many reasons).

Now here in DC I go to work... work about 10 hours a day and then go to my current residence (the studio apartment of a co-worker who is so kind as to let me use her futon). I really don't know what to do with myself on a spend no money budget when the only people I know in the area are my co-workers. My boss loves me because I have nothing to do but work- I am hoping to enhance my existence some...

So far I have been working every day which leaves little room for exploring but I hope to check out some more smithsonians and possibly mt. vernon.... I am sorry for such a boring update. I will do my best to spice up my life for y'all.

I will end with my thought of the past week. Some people are soooo generous. This comes from my mother's day experience. For those who don't know my job is at a nonprofit whose biggest program is a furniture program. We pick-up donations and then clients who can not afford furniture and are often sleeping on the floor can come get furniture free of charge. I am the donor relations coordinator there and arrange all that entails. Soooo the Thursday I got back in town this lady called and had all her mother's furniture (her mom passed away). She wanted the furniture to go to a good cause cuz her mom had worked for years (55) at a non-profit and dedicated all her resources to helping those in need. The catch was she needed this stuff out faster then we could schedule a pick-up. She said she could rent a truck but would need help loading it... So I volunteered and a co-worker came along and we loaded up the stuff and took it to our storage facility. It turned out the ladies dad had been a holocaust survivor and her mom sounded like an incredible lady and they didn't want usable things to go to waste. She grew up in the storage room of a store, that her family owned, so they knew what it was like to have nothing. Not only were the husband and wife the sweetest people they took us out to lunch and she found out I was sleeping on someone's couch and offered that I come stay with her and her family where they had a spare bedroom with its own bathroom. I graciously declined but was stunned by the generosity of a complete stranger. She was so impressed that my coworker and I would volunteer to help on a sunday just to get some items for those in need. Moral of the story, never underestimate the goodness of people. Though at times the world seems cruel there are always folks like this who still would lend a cup of sugar to their neighbor.

Well enough gooshy, bleeding heart, optimism :) I am off to respond to some of your emails... Sorry I have fallen behind on that. I really only have internet at work sooo I need to set aside an hour to do my own emails.

Have a splendid day! Hope to see many of you when I am home in June :)

Kb
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Washington DC, District of Columbia, United States

Hi All!
I swore I had written more recently than 3 weeks ago. Well sooo I am mentally checked out of school :-P Whats new right? :-P
First I have to share a quote with that I think define my future. My pastor at my church here was talking about doing what you love and how you should ask other people when you have seemed happiest in your life and that is what you should do for a living (if you want to ring in on that feel free ;) ) Then he said so if you grew up and just loved sitting for hours in a cardboard box than a job with a cubicle is for you, otherwise you will probably not be happy there. I laughed, very hard. If you are every in DC I recomend you all go to this guy's mass he is great.

On to more exciting things, in the last couple weeks what have I been up to????
I started babysitting for a couple different families which is great. I have money flowing in, get to hang out with kids, eat other people's food, and other great things :) I also helped this past week at an evening event to raise awareness amongst the latino community about going to college. The event was through Hispanic Scholarship Fund Initiative, one of the places I interviewed at for internships and then turned down :-P It was fun and a little boring. I chatted it up with some people, of course all in english because everyone things the blond gringa doesn't speak any spanish. Although it was fun to respond to people in spanish, especially to the one guy who literally jumped and said, Oh my gosh you speak spanish, HILARIOUS! I think I need a big button that says, Hablo Espanol. Also on a Spanish note we had a few clients at my internship who were Spanish speakers so I got to go into the warehouse to help them out and throw furniture around IT WAS GREAT!!!! Although I still lack spanish speaking confidence. I need to work on that.

I also went in to storage yesterday to go out on pick-ups so I could see how much fits in the truck. Starting a week from tomorrow I will be in charge of all the donor related things in the office (a little scary but I think I should be able to do it). It was so much fun going out on the pick-ups, and amusing because I was the only girl (the send all the big strong men). By the end though I was going to smack the next lady who said, her hun you take the sheets and let the strong guys to the moving, or we girls weren't meant to move things, or anything along those lines. I am perfectly capable of lifting half a sofa, or a twin mattress, or a table, the only issue I have is that I am too darn short. I am not saying I could beat out one of the guys in a weight lifting contest but I am no weakling the main issue is lifting things up to the truck because it it about at my chest level so the tall guys just reach out and set things in and I have to be able to lift things over my head. I am no personally going to start training to strap a whole sleeper sofa on my back so I can move it out on my own the next time some lady goes, oh let someone strong get that. The males we were picking up from never said anything :-P just the women. (Karen's Rant of the weeks past).

I am very excited to start at my internship full time and to not have to worry about school work. School work wise though I am trying to think of interesting speakers. We had this one guy who started DC Central Kitchen, his name is Robert Egger and he was incredible. I really think he should come speak at UP. He is a guy who never went to college and is now having 50 speaking events a year at least and doing some TV stuff he was an Oprah Angel. He was very down to earth though and told off one of my class mates who generally acts like a jerk it was great.

The only other experience I can really think of is today I went walking outside barefoot in the pouring rain (which I do a lot at home but have never done here) we walked down to Starbucks and apparently got many funny looks. I got completely soaked and laughed at all the up tight East coasters. Oh how I love to be the weirdo rebel :)

Well I really need to go to bed though I could rant on Karen's Life philosophies for ages no doubt. I hope you are all doing well! I miss you and will hopefully get to see those of you in P-Town during one of my trips home. I always love to hear from you (You wouldn't be on my mailing list if I didn't want to hear from you). Have a splendid week!
Much love!
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Washington DC, District of Columbia, United States

The last 2 weeks have been busy, fun, thought provoking, challenging, rewarding, and everything in between.

First academically, I have come to the conclusion I am not a school person. I hate academics. :-P Yes, this was brought on by the writing of a paper :-P I thought perhaps this was a new development from this year. Then I realized my favorite parts of college have never been the classes. They have been the other experiences (volunteering largely) or they have been the classes connected to reality (spanish, various poli sci, etc) Then I thought it had started since high school but discovered that was also not true. In High School my favorite parts were never classes. The classes I enjoyed were those who had teachers I enjoyed or related to reality, had comprehensive type projects where I could formulate opinions,etc. Then I thought it was a change since formal academics and home schooled I enjoyed school. (Those of you who knew me as a homeschooler feel free to laugh) I never did my work without a fight. I preferred to learn hands on and forced my parents to tailor academics to reality. So then I started thinking about all the many folks and issue I have been studying here (which I actually do really enjoy) I came to the conclusion the only difference between me and some of these folks that dropped out of school to work or for any number of reasons was my environment. If my family had needed an extra income, I would have probably dropped out of school. If I didn't have teachers who supported me, friends who supported me, family who supported me, and the capacity to 'wing it' fairly successfully I could have ended up in the same position as many of those struggling just to feed their families. Circumstances and environment seem to play a huge role in whether some one 'succeeds' or 'fails.'

Oh self discovery :-P

On the class front, the most interesting experience of the past two weeks was visiting the maximum security prison and minimum security prison in Baltimore. This included a trip to the execution chamber. I left this experience in a very pessimistic mood and incredibly upset with our jail system. We were no allowed to speak with the prisoners in either prison but were simply paraded around in their home, then they tell us how these guys are yelling at us like it is a huge suprise. If we are not allowed to form any sort of connection through conversation, why should they respect us? We come in, poke through their cells, and look around like we are in a zoo! Some people also express perplexity as to why these guys don't come out and enter society reformed. Well friends, when they are not allowed to interact with anyone other than prison guards and other inmates perhaps they do not learn how to interact with society. They even pointed things out like the guys who are in for 30 years will get out and every thing looks different. Buildings have changed, stores have changed, money has changed, our phone numbers are now 10 digits instead of 7, everything is different. There are not many people who like being thrust into a completely foreign environment,. thus imagine having culture shock in your own neighborhood? Sure many of these people have done terrible things but they are not necessarily terrible people. Few people do things for no reason, something leads us to our actions, perhaps we should start being more concerned about what leads someone kill instead of what we can do to get back at them. Even now, almost two weeks since we visited the prison I am still disgusted with the system and seething at the inhumanity. Even more I was disgusted at the reactions of some of the individuals in the class entitled, Justice that we went with. These are the future attorneys of these folks or law enforcement officers who joke about wanting to be strapped to the execution table to see what it feels like or who want to sit in gas chamber. What is wrong with that picture?

Moving on from prisons, we also visited an organization that works with individuals to get them back into productive jobs off of welfare, or coming out of prison, or away from drug dealing. They talk about things like work ethic or even helping these people come up with goals. They are so used to being told by the world they will be failures that even coming up with a few goals is difficult for them. No one has ever asked them what they want to be when they grow up? or if they could do anything what they would do? or any number of questions most of us are asked dozens of times a year. Again, if nothing else this semester is giving me a healthy disgust of the inequality in our society. I come back to my room almost every night with enough stuff floating aroung in my head to write a short book...

On to happier things... Since everyone has been on break (who is involved in academics) I have had many visitors (I already wrote this all once but it disappeared grrrr...) Following the Spanish Friends and my sister my friend Christian from High school was out here for a conference and we were able to hang out early one morning with one of his friends from PSU. It was loads of fun to hang out and catch up, we are both often tooo busy back at home. Though it was a bit cold that morning and I think watching the sun rise over the capitol is an experience I only need to have once... it was EARLY :) The next weekend my second family was in DC for easter. (Also known as the Jettons, My North Carolina Friends, Friends from my Home Schooled Days however you all may have heard of them). It was great to hang out allllll weekend, though I need to work on my tour guide information. The following Tuesday I got to go out to lunch with my Freshman in High school biology teacher, Mrs. Shlaes. She was also the Key Club advisor my Fresh and soph years of HS. I got to meet her daughter and granddaughter as well which was great :) Again I love catching up with folks. It always boggles my mind how one can just pick up years after seeing someone as if it was yesterday. I also got to try Vegan Ribs (what they can do with soy protein is CRAZY). It is always nice to see folks from home. Nothing like Oregonians :) And former oregonians.

This weekend I also got some significant hang out time with folks from my group here. One of my buddies (the one I travelled around NY with) was house sitting soo we had a dinner party at the house and chatted. It was a lovely 5..5 hour experience. Then yesterday I went to the Kite Festival -a part of the cherry blossom festival which was very cool. Thousands of folks flying kites and one crazy oregonian singing lets go fly a kite as she wandered around checking it all out. It was seriously insane how many folks were there. We also go to see the cherry blossom trees. I think I have fallen in love with DC. The tidal Basin is my favorite part of the touristy stuff. It is sooooo pretty and I want to spend more time with the cherry blossoms before they disappear.

That is about it. Many of my friends are talking about grad school and their futures so I have decided we should have a contest. You can all submit your proposals for Karen's life so I have options :) The winner of course will receive a great prize... the satisfaction of knowing you planned my life :) I also always love to hear up-dates on your lives! Sorry this was sooo long... Happy spring! Much love! Kb
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New York City, New York, United States

So I am back dating a bit :) I am sorry I am getting so bad at writing. I keep thinking oh I will write tomorrow and it ends up being weeks later.

Sooo Spring Break was great :) My darling sister Sarah came to visit me :) First I went to NY with my class to visit a school in the Bronx and an afterschool program in Harlem. These were both interesting but nothing earth shattering. Then a couple friends from the program and I went out to eat at this 'world famous' soul food place. They had the best corn bread I have ever tasted. SO GOOD! The next day we wandered the MET with a short jont into Central Park but it was very cold and raining. That evening Sarah got in... met foot got really swollen and hurt (weird) and some random French guy kept trying to convince us to go drinking with a group from the Hostel. We passed on that experience.

The rest of our time in NY was spent taking in the wealth of consumerism. We went to Time Square a couple times. We saw Mary Poppins on Broadway. We saw the empire state building, Ground zero, the statue of liberty (from the free ferry), rockefeller center, went to mass in St. Patrick's........ I decided I do not like NY and now understand why people from there are generally very mean. If I lived in a place like Manhattan with no trees and millions of people everywhere I would be angry at the world too. Sorry to all my New Yorkers out there. Tooo much consumerism for me in one place as well.

The second half of the trip we hung out in DC which included, visiting all the monuments we could squeeze in, a white house tour (rather lame), a capitol tour (hmm... interesting... I guess...), a trip to the Holocaust Museum (well done but after actually visiting a concentration camp in Germany had a different effect on me then many others), We also walked a lot... I think those were our big tourist attractions.

I then spent a lot of the weekend after sister left working on a paper... equally as enjoyable of course.

Well that was spring break! I will post pictures and you will be getting another great blog later today with what I have been doing for the two weeks sinc ethen :-P

Tootles!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kbort/2/1204845420/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kbort/2/1204845420/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kbort/2/1204845420/tpod.html Thu, 06 Mar 2008 18:46:26 -0500 Washington, DC 2008 - Trading in Jeans and Hoodies for Business Suits :P

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Washington, District of Columbia, United States

First I am sorry I haven't blogged in 3 weeks. I guess I am busy or something because I always think it is more recent than that... I hope you are all well.

Sooo I will try to pull out some highlights.

One thing that really sticks out was my trip to the Supreme Court. I got up at... a very early hour to be in line by 6:00 because only like 50 people can get in and so it is competitive. We went to the oral argument on a case involving a man unjustly? fired based on race. It was fascinating and I could actually follow most of what was going on, which was a bit surprising. Scalia is HILARIOUS! Not sure if I agree with everything he says but he is amusing. The Solicitor General of the US is very impressive and I still have no desire to be a lawyer. My prof. was a public defender and we had a class starbucks meeting on law school which made me want to be a lawyer even less. I hate the pressure to compete for grades and the pressure that you are always failing based only on your academics. I was actually thinking today that this year is going to make adjusting to normal school life next year very difficult. There are so many bigger issues in the world and mor important things I could do with my time than sit in a classroom. I feel like I learn far more visiting new places and actually being in the real world.

We also visited a charter school which was very impressive. It was a whole bunch of very dedicated teachers in the same building with administrators who support them and want to give them time to better themselves as teachers. It was also a very cool place just to see what they were doing with the kids. I have never seen kids so well behaved. You enter the classroom and the classroom spokesperson comes and introduces themself and shakes your hand like a little professional. I was very impressed.

The best experience I have had in the past three weeks... or one I actually still remember. Was the police ride along I did this past weekend. Talk about an eye-opener. I will give some details on it but if you want to know more I wrote a 6 pg paper I would love to forward to you so just let me know :) The disconnect between the police and citizens was probably the most astonishing factor. I mean everyone 'hates' cops because we only see them when wedo something wrong or had something wrong done to us but this was just... incredible. I went to a Domestic Violence call, a shooting, a stolen car thing, saw someone arrested, and an open container thing. I really can't describe the experience briefly so I am not even really trying. I will just say I recommend you all do a police ride along in your area because it is eye opening.

In other news. I am completely swamped and overwhelmed with all the school work I have to do. I just can't find enough time in the day. The speakers haven't been all that incredible recently or I can't think of any that really stick out. Except for the the assitant superintendent of the school district... I think she is someone I haven't writen about yet. She was amazing and her vision and motivation to really bring back the DC school system was impressive. She is definitely very progressive in her approach but seems to hold the potential to motivate folks. Her brother also plays soccer for UP which was a cool connection.

Internship wise, I absolutely love my internship and wish I was there full time. It has its special moments and areas that could be improved but it is a bunch of people who believe in a cause and are really trying to do the best they can. I think I said this before it is a bunch of go-getters, over achievers, work-aholics, I fit right in :-P The longest day I have had so far is about 9-midnight. I think that will be hard to beat. On part of my internship that has potential to be very enjoyable is the work I am going to be doing with a DC high school Jr. who works with me there. I am going to be helping him with SAT prep and college stuff (because the school here do not do that so much basically the only people that attend public schools in most of DC are too poor to go anywhere else). I am also going to be attempting to help him fundraise for a trip to Brazil. He mentioned to me, when he found out that another intern was from brazil that he really wanted to go there. This is a kid who has not had the growing up most of us have. Soooo me being me and being sick of a world where only the middle and upper class citizens have cool experiences because we happened to be lucky enough to be born into that decided to see if I could find a trip for him. Through my experience here I have become more and more disgusted with the stereotype that people living in poverty are 'lazy' or 'living off the system' because overall they worker harder than your average upper/middle class person, frankly I feel a little naseous everytime I see/hear that stereo type (sorry me ranting). BAck to the story, I found him a trip and just found out about 30 minutes ago he was accepted, which is awesome!
Now we just have to figure out how we are going to fundraise around $6,500 because this student and his family have no way of paying that... Sooo hopefully I can figure out a way to pull that off. If you have suggestions let me know. Also on the theme of internships. I am going to be staying at my Non-profit for the summer. Sooo I will be home in May for about a week for my sis's graduation and then in June for a week for my brothers' graduation. If any of you are travelling to DC this summerlet me know! :)

Well that is enough update now that you are all bored and thinking I should keep my bleeding heart to myself :-P Tomorrow I head up to NY to visit Harlem with my class and then am going to hang out there over the weekend. I hope you are all well. and for those that have emailed I am trying to get back to folks ASAP (though it is not working so well) Happy almost Friday! I will try to add pictures later!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kbort/2/1203269220/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kbort/2/1203269220/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kbort/2/1203269220/tpod.html Sun, 17 Feb 2008 13:07:49 -0500 Washington, DC 2008 - Trading in Jeans and Hoodies for Business Suits :P

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Washington, District of Columbia, United States

Hi All! Sorry it has been two weeks... I thought I updated last week... guess things got busy or something : P Me? Busy? NEVER : P

So We will start with internship news. I really like my internship. I answer the phone a lot! It is fun to talk to people though at times difficult because it is hard to tell someone who is sleeping on a blanket on the floor with all their belongings in a trash bag that they will have to wait 3 monthes to get furniture. It is also at times saddening that these folks have to wait when there are so many people with things to donate we just lack the infrastructure and man power to move things through any faster. Once again it becomes clear that we have no shortage of things in this world only a shortage of funding or time to get them where they need to go. I really do love the experience though and just wish I could get more done in everyday. They make fun of me for being an intern who works 9 hour days and doesn't take breaks... I am psycho apparently. It is nice though the place is only 3 miles away from campus so I can walk in less than an hour which I do in the mornings because in the evenings I usually am not that motivated and it is dark : P

On the class front, we have had many classes and have more homework than any other group in our program. I need to increase my productivity levels... or waste less time... Or sleep less... Maybe just because they are recent, my highlight classes were all in the past week. On Thursday or wednesday... we had speakers come and speak on homelessness. One of them was a gentleman who had lived on the streets for 10yrs. He told us his story, which hopefully will break any pre-conceived notions y'all may still have on homelessness, it definitely left me frustrated with our self-centered american attitude which neglects our fellow citizens. So this gentleman was your average guy, he had an associates degree and a decent job. Then both his parents died within like a month of each other or something which was really hard on him. Then his 13 yr old nephew who he was caring for at the time got sick after I believe a ski trip this guy took him on and his 13yr old nephew died. This guy, obviously, had trouble dealing with all this falling on him at one time and ended up out on the street. He also started feeling like someone was tapping him on the shoulder constantly or hearing voices. He spiralled further out of control and as he told us, if you were living on the street you would start using drugs or alcohol to warm up or make your situation seem less dismal. He said he hit bottom when one morning he was standing in front of the white house in his boxers and when the police came and asked him what he was doing there he had no idea, nor any idea how he got there. Which obviously scared him because as he said when you realize you could have hurt someone and not even remember doing it you know you need help. He said that is when many people know they need help, not because they think they may hurt themselves but because they are afraid they will hurt someone else. Just being given the psychological support he needs and a place of his own it was amazing to hear how that helped him out. He proudly told us he saves up all the money he can to fix up his apt. and has purchase 15 pieces of art to make it homey.

Another class speaker or trip I enjoyed (which seems a bit wrong) was to a juvenile detention facility. I have never been a huge fan of locking people up because it seems to just make the whole situation worse but visiting Juvi was an interesting experience. When you see a bunch of 10-14yr olds that are sleeping in these cells the size of maybe three bathtubs you have to think, What is wrong with this picture? One of the kids even asked me, what are you doing here? Did you want to see what a criminal looks like? If this kid at probably 13 is already idenitfying himself as a criminal, is it any surprise that he will probalby end up to be a hardened criminal? They were also talking to us about how many of the children will re offend to get back in because they have a structure and supervision from 6am til 9pm which includes school, extracurricular activities, supervised free time, 3 hours excercise a day and adults who, for the most part actually care about where these kids are going. Many probably come from very low-income families where that kind of supervision is just not available. When a parent has to decide whether or not to be around 24-7 for the kids or work so the family can eat, have water and electricity logically and unfortunately the second option is what has to happen. I really think we need to start some sort of prison support program in which juveniles are given a big brother or sister who they can form a relationship with starting in the prison and who will be there for them after they get out. The DC program is really making great strides to give these kids support instead of cells but they receive a lot of negative press everytime something goes wrong. It is a very sad situation.

The last speaker that I didn't get a whole lot out of just becuase she was hard to hear and didn't really speak to anything I was drawn to was Justice Ruth Ginsberg of the Supreme court. Other students kept asking her about specific cases which really meant nothing to me. I guess I prefer to hang out with the juvi kids and the homeless folks more that supreme court justices and ceos of companies... probably not a huge surprise to many of you :-P I will put up the picture though so you can all see me standing right behing a supreme court justice :)

As far as other stuff... not much very interesting. Last sunday after mass they had free merengue after mass (you were supposed to bring donations for the victims of the hurricanes in the dominican Republic). It was loads of fun. I didn't know anyone so I pretty much forced random people to dance with me:) Good times :-P I am really hoping to go to some of the latin dance places around here... If I can just find the time/energy. Last friday I went to bed at 9pm which kind of hampers the whole go out dancing thing :-P

Oh about a week ago I also did political campaigning handing out fliers and telling people to vote. I had one person tell me they would rather drink posion than vote for the candidate and another very large man toook the paper and then held it about six inches from my face and ripped it in half. I think he was trying to impress me with his strength because he could rip paper in half. I told him to have a nice evening :-P His intimidation did not work and I think I just infuriated him by not being phased. Too bad, so sad. Maybe he will learn some manners some day. The moral of this story is be nice to campaigners even if you think their candidate is a bloody socialist or conservative war fiend :-P

Well that is about it for the news! I hope you are all well!
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