I thought for my first blog post I would explain a little more about what next year will look like for me and why I chose to volunteer for a year and specifically why I chose to volunteer with Rostro de Cristo.
Ever since I was a freshman in college I knew I wanted to do a year of service after I graduated from Bucknell. It wasn't until about a year ago, though, that I realized I wanted to spend a year volunteering abroad. I knew I wanted to volunteer in Latin America (I fell in love with its people, language and culture ever since my first visit when I was 16 years old). I also quickly realized I wanted my year of service to have a faith component to it. As most of you know, I am Catholic and my faith is (and always has been) a very important part of my life.
My story of how I ended up choosing Rostro de Cristo is pretty interesting. I ended up applying to a handful of different programs before I discovered RdC. I was so excited when I learned about RdC because it is a year-long service program, is Catholic and is in Ecuador! It seemed liked the perfect match for me! I was heartbroken though when I found out that the application was due the following morning and I needed to email the organization before I could receive the application. Somehow (definitely with God’s help) I was able to have a day extension for the application. A month later I had my interview and after 15 minutes of the interview I was almost giddy with excitement because I felt like RdC was the right fit for me. Later that day I was offered a position and was told I had 48 hours to accept. Most of you know that making difficult decisions in a timely manner is not my strong point so I was very worried at first that I was going to have to decide in two days how I would be spending a whole year of my life. I was panicking at first and wanted to ask for more time to decide, but the more I thought about it the more I realized that I didn’t need more time…I knew that this was the right program for me!
So now a little bit about Rostro de Cristo and what I will be doing…
Rostro de Cristo (Face of Christ) is a lay Catholic volunteer program located in Guayaquil, Ecuador and was founded in 1988. There are 16 of us volunteers and we will be living in three different houses, two houses in a community called Duran and the other house in Monte Sinai. As volunteers we are committed to spirituality, service, community, simplicity and hospitality. If you go on the RdC website (the link is on the top left side of my blog) it explains all of these values more in depth.
After my two week orientation in Boston I will have a two week orientation in Ecuador. Right now I do not know my specific placement since we will be finding them out after our orientation in Ecuador. Some of the service opportunities include: teaching, running after-school programs, leading retreat groups, working at a hospital for Hansen’s Disease, assisting HIV/AIDS education and helping microfinance programs. I will let you know once I found out my placement. For the most part we will be working during the week and having weekends off. We are not allowed to return to the US during our one-year term, but we are able to have visitors. I would love to have visitors (hint, hint)!
Besides helping out in the community, as volunteers we are committed to having weekly spirituality nights (time for prayer, reflection, meditation or discussion), community nights (hanging out with community members), regular house dinners, and Sunday Mass at the local church. I’m looking forward to all of this!
We also commit to living simply. What exactly does that mean? Well, for starters we are not allowed to bring our laptops, cell phones or iPods. Although this will be a huge change from my technology-filled lifestyle at college, I believe that without these things I will hopefully have fewer distractions and will be able to spend more time focusing on building relationships with the people in the community, the other volunteers, as well as strengthening my relationship with God. I will have access to internet cafes in the community, a weekly phone call to my parents, and access to snail mail (I would love letters!) Living simply also includes living on more of a budget than I’m used to. I will be going from not cooking and eating at a college cafeteria to cooking for 4-5 other people on a tight weekly food stipend. So if anyone has any good recipes to share let me know! = ) Also, our housing and transportation will be covered and each volunteer will receive a monthly stipend of $50. I will have the opportunity to learn a whole new level of budgeting!
Well, I think that’s plenty for my first blog post. I’m really excited for next year, but also very nervous. The idea of being away from my family and friends for a whole year is a little scary. I’m going to miss everyone a lot. However, since I don’t really know what I want to do with my life and I don’t have too many responsibilities right now (hopefully I can get my student loans deferred), I think this is the perfect time in my life to do something like this. I think a lot of people have a hard time understanding why I’m doing this, but I really do want to do it and sometimes I need to even remind myself this as I get stressed out thinking about all the challenges and changes that next year will bring. I’m looking forward to volunteering with RdC and committing myself to the RdC values and lifestyle.
My hopes for next year…
Hopefully, I will be able to help the impoverished in the community where I’m serving, or hopefully I will at least positively touch the lives of a few individuals. I also hope to learn from the people I meet – both those in the community and the other volunteers. I also hope to grow spiritually and strengthen my relationship with God. Improving my Spanish is also on my list…I’m hoping to become fluent, but since that didn’t happen after studying abroad for a semester I’m not too hopeful on that one. Improvement would be nice though. I also hopefully will figure out (somewhat) what direction I want to go with my life the year after Ecuador. I’ll keep you updated on whether any of these hopes materialize. = )
