Archive: A Lesson to be Taught: My college entrance essay

The summer of 1996, proved to be a trip that would truly change my life forever. It made me realize how fortunate we are here in America! I had the opportunity to witness this first hand during my church's Nicaragua mission trip. Nicaragua is considered to be a third world country. Not only are the people extremely poor but they have little hope for a future. In the last twenty years, the people of Nicaragua have battled a civil war which was between the communist Sandinistas and the newly born government lead by Violeta Chamorro. She came into presidency in 1990 and sought to gain and maintain peace. This, however, was not the only problem the Nicaraguan people faced. This country has a history of many natural catastrophes such as volcanoes, earthquakes, hurricanes and severe mudslides. These disasters have left the people destitute and with little hope of recovery.

Our entire mission group was comprised of about ten leaders and twenty high school students. We stayed in a small AmericanUniversityin San Marcos, which was about an hour and a half outside of the city. Our mission was to work in a small elementary school centrally located inSan Marcos. We played with the children, did arts and crafts, repainted their school and the guys worked on making an outside basketball court. In the afternoons, we performed skits that were translated into Spanish. I have never seen such a large gathering of people; it was as if they came out of nowhere. The young and old attended and we got the chance to see a community that was torn apart by war coming together. It truly was an awesome event to have been apart of! Our presence was welcomed even by the president. We had the rare opportunity to meet President Chamorro; we sang some Spanish songs for her and were written up in the newspaper. We made sure to let her know we were supporting her and her plight for freedom from the Sandinistas.

The ending of the trip proved to be quite difficult. Each one of us had made special relationships with the children, which made it very hard to say goodbye. I gave away almost everything I brought with me; however, they gave me more than I ever dreamed of giving them! These people had nothing and were so grateful when they received even the smallest of gifts. The one thing that most of the kids wanted was our love and attention. To give them a hug and by doing that we let them know that they were important. It made me think of all the people here in Americawho feel the same way but nobody takes the time to just care. Lastly, they made me see that everything in life is worth cherishing because you never know what the future will bring.

In giving you some background about what this trip has taught me, I in turn would like to teach others the same thing those Nicaraguan people taught me. You can make a difference and change someone's life. Get involved in what is going on in this world/community and stop making excuses for why you don't want to do anything. You can make a difference. In fact, I practice this in my own life and have seen some amazing results. Once you give of yourself in this way you have a much greater fulfillment and appreciation for life. Being an American can and will spoil us all because we take everything for granted.