Where the Sun Shines

Since 2003 I have worked with Canada World Youth and Change for Children in many places throughout Africa and Latin America. This website has served as a medium to share my experiences, to tell my stories from "the field". This year (2010) I will be returning to Mozambique to work as a project supervisor again with Canada World Youth.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

CWY 35th Anniversary!

Busy times have been had here in Camrose! The group has been doing great, but getting everything done in somewhat regular 40 hour work weeks has been a bit of challenge. But that is no surprise as NOBODY told me to expect this job to have "regular" hours. In any case I am enjoying the jobs and the constant challenges it throws my way!

Last week we were lucky to have a retreat to Banff, where me and my counterpart met up with 18 other project supervisors working here in Alberta and BC. It was a great time and I remembered feeling as though I just did a week at Summer Camp, as we had so much fun and made lots of new friends!

Since we have been back in Camrose its been very busy, as we have been celebrating CWY's 35th Anniversary. That has been pretty all consuming and tiring, but also a lot of fun. We had a great open house last Sunday, then on Monday we had a Multilingual Language Class. Tomorrow we are meeting at the local city hall at 8:30am, as the mayor is declaring this week officially CWY week, and then later that evening we'll be at City Hall in Edmonton to celebrate the 35th! Happy Bday CWY!

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

The Honeymoon's Over!

The group has reached the point where the honeymoon is over and conflict has begun. This week has been a little emotional for all of us, as we realize how much effort we need to make in order to stay on track as we continue to learn to live and work together despite our differences in language and culture. Its a tough road but its essentially what I believe the whole program and experience is all about, learnign how to put aside our difference, celebrate diversity and learn froom one another as we work towards CWY's mission and mandate in the creation of a more just and equitable world through the creation of engaged, global citizens who share responsibility for the well-being of the people and the planet.

That said the group has been WAY less stressful than last year! It has really only been recenly where things have begun to get a little hectic, whereas last year it seemed the minute we arrived in the community things started to get busy! Me and my counterpart- Marciana are getting along very well, we both have a stressfree philosophy since we both had difficult programs last year, we are really hoping to have fun this year and to make it as stress-free as possible.

For the most part the group has been really great, we have to date only given out 2 warnings to a counterpart pair who neglected to meet with us regarding their EAD when we had scheduled a meeting! Apart from that everything is more or less under control.

Besides everyone realizing the honeymoon phase is over and that we are really going to have to work to make this happen, the only really big thing thus far has been that today we lost one of our very best participants. A Canadian woman from BC. She has been immensely homesick from day one at the orientation camp, and now after one month into the program she has decided that the program isnt for her and its best for her to go home. She was by far one of our best participants- so its not going to be easy and she will be impossible to replace!