The Best 3 Days

I think it was when they all gathered around me in a parking lot with hundreds of tourists watching, picked me up, and started throwing me 8 feet into the air over and over again, all the while chanting, "Angélica! Angélica! Angélica!" that I decided this might be the best camp ever.

So...back in August, we had a meeting as a sector about planning the 2nd annual leadership and civic education camp for youth 15-25 (from here on out, referred to as jóvenes), and I was voted to head the planning committee. Since then, it has been 5 months of countless hours on the phone, so many emails that my hands may be permanently deformed into claws, and enough antacid and ibuprofen to kill a horse. The Peace Corps people are great, don´t get me wrong - everyone worked their butts off, volunteering for whatever needed done, everyone taking a part, THAT was no problem. Working with PYan organizations can be...a bit tougher. When, in the week before the camp, there were jóvenes dropping out and adding on last minute, facilitators cancelling their talks, grant money not coming in, donations being withheld, plans changing then changing again then changing again, I was feeling a little stressed. And then it was here...

Shavonda, who was in charge of logistics, went a day early with Giancarlo, our program assistant from PC, to Ciudad del Este, where the camp was held in a Biological Reserve called Tati Yupi, to buy all the food and get together all the last minute details. When we got there on the tour buses, the rooms weren´t ready, there were workers cleaning, pounding away on construction on half of the building where we were staying, and buzzing around with weed wackers (the thing about Paraguay, one of the many, is that nothing is ever done until the last possible second), and Shavonda and Giancarlo had already sweated through their t-shirts. But the volunteers all rallied - "Ok, we have to fill the next 45 minutes with games. What do we know?" No problem. All during the camp, behind the scenes, we are running around, writing certificates, cooking meals, planning charlas (talks with activities), planning then changing those plans and starting in with Plan G because A-F hadn´t gone down for one reason or another, participating in the activities, and just doing whatever needed done.

And what this did was make an environment for the jóvenes where they felt totally comfortable,
where they could be themselves,
where participating was the cool thing to do and everyone got more out of each activity because of it,
where they formed their own little culture and subcultures,
where drawn-on tattoos became all the rage,
where there was always a good excuse to jump up and down and yell a chant,
where there was a giant poster with envelopes with everyone´s names on them that were stuffed with positive comments from each other,
where the natural group leaders were 2 gay guys (which would not have happened anywhere else in Paraguay),
where we showed them a video of a flash mob in Brazil as an example of another way to have a voice in society and they decided to start one in the parking lot of Itaipú, the giant dam where we went to see the Ilumination Friday night, and danced to Lady Gaga with all the tourists watching,
where couples and deep friendships were being formed,
where they cheered their heads off after every charla and made the facilitator feel awesome,
where they took everything we taught them and instantly made it their own, from games to disparity of justice in the world,
where realizations about how the world can work, their role in it, and what that means for them personally came to fruition,
where they stayed up half the night huddled around picnic tables or on mattresses, talking and joking and laughing together because nobody wanted to sleep and miss a moment of this amazing thing that was happening,
where my jóven Fiorela kept crying because it was all so crazy and amazing,
where Casey´s jóven told me, "These have been the best 3 days of my life. In all my 19 years, the best 3 days, seriously," and
where we changed lives.
WE CHANGED LIVES.
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.
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That´s why I do this. This might be the best thing I´ve done in Peace Corps.

Here´s the link with a bunch of pics: http://www.flickr.com/photos/57741449@N07/collections/72157625737390737