Amigos Changed My Life!

During my 6 weeks in Matagalpa, Nicaragua with Amigos de las Americas I experienced some of the scariest, saddest, proudest, and most joyful moments in all my 17 (at the time) long years.
I came to appreciate the endless complexities of my rural Nicaraguan host community and its needs.
My other experiences with community service had not prepared me for sleeping in another family's bed, eating their food, sharing their latrine, watching their telenovelas. It was a slow and often awkward process, but, with help from my partner volunteer and loving Nicaraguan family, I began to feel comfortable in my host community. I spoke more often with more people, and I began to feel that I was a part of the daily life of my family. My partner and I worked each day at the school, facilitating educational activities about the environment and community health with los niños, beautiful, infinitely charismatic children who unfailingly brightened even our most homesick moments. My friends in Nicaraguan are some of the warmest, most generous people I have ever met.
Amigos has helped me to appreciate the beautiful process of building understanding between people across cultures. My experiences have inspired me to intensify my focus on social justice and human rights issues, and will certainly guide me in my future studies and career. It is so empowering to dive into such a challenging and unfamiliar experience and manage to accomplish the goals you set for yourself. You come out with valuable new leadership and communication skills and many new friends from across the western hemisphere.