By the end of my freshman year I started to think about some type of
abroad experience during college. Pretty much everyone I had
talked to who had studied abroad said it was a really amazing
experience, one not to be missed. And I had traveled outside
the United States before and had always loved that. But the
other thing that people always told me about studying abroad was that
there was little to no studying, and what there was just got in the way
of other more meaningful experiences.
I looked at all my options and considered what was the best
opportunity. Pomona College, where I am a student, only
allows study-abroad programs that are approved by the school, and if
they are approved by the school, then you pay the school as if you were
attending the school as usual. It just didn’t make
sense to me to pay for a really expensive education when I
wouldn’t be getting that education and at the same time to
diminish my experience with distractions. So I decided I
would take a year off, go abroad on my own and not study.
I decided I would spend time in a few places to get to know them rather
than just travel. I spent the fall of my year off at home in
Eugene. I took a couple of classes at the U of O, worked and
volunteered, and was active in the Kerry campaign. During
this time I looked for opportunities in Central America. All
the opportunities I found easily while searching online were fairly
expensive. All three of my volunteer experiences came out of
talking to actual people.
In January 2005 I flew to San Jose, Costa Rica. I spent about
a week traveling and then went to work on a permaculture farm, called
Punta Mona, that I learned about from a friend who had spent time
there. I had a really great time at Punta Mona.
Although I wasn’t very impressed with the permaculture
aspects of the farm I learned a lot, not just about sustainable
agriculture, but about how communities and organizations work, about
the natural world and about myself. After a month and a half,
I moved on.
After about two weeks of traveling in Costa Rica and Nicaragua, I
arrived in Ciudad Sandino at the Center for Development in Central
America (CDCA). I spent about two months there as a
volunteer. A family friend had worked there and found the
experience meaningful, and his parents told me about it when I
mentioned I was going to Central America. Spending time in
Nicaragua was probably the best thing I had ever done in my
life. I learned an incredible amount about countless
things. I was living in a little room in the back yard of a
house. I had no windows, very few friends, and
couldn’t walk around at night because it wasn’t
safe and yet was happier than I had ever been. I also spent
two weeks in Bluefields, Nicaragua building wind turbines for remote
rural communities with blueEnergy, an NGO run by a friend of some
friends.
After I finished working, I traveled by bus all the way from Managua to
Los Angeles over about two months. I saw incredible things,
met incredible people and had an incredible time. My time away from the classroom
was the best thing I have every done. I learned a great deal
that would not be accessible in school and came back more motivated to
study than I had been in a long time, maybe ever.
I am now happier, more confident, more able to deal with almost
anything and more able to tie together the things I learn in my classes
with the real world. I would recommend to anyone that they
take time in the middle of college. It is wonderful time to
experience the world.
