One month of Denver has passed

First of all, for a more real-time update on my adventure I would recommend to follow me via Facebook.

But thanks for visiting me on my blog. So here are some pictures of the last weeks:
The first volunteer project we did was in a homeless stock warehouse, we made food packs. With our Up with People team we did the work faster than they ever expected.


Our first parade with Cast A 2012. It was Martin Luther Kind day, we walked through Denver downtown. Cool moment.






A cool cabin we stayed in for the weekend. No electricity, no heating, just a fire place. You can imagine, a fun experience.




In 24 hour Denver was covered in a big layer of snow. Our first show needed to be cancelled. So on saturday, we had two shows instead of one.
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Some video memories of my tour of 2008

In 2008 I travelled as a participant (US, Mexico, Philippines), a few of the memories were captured on camera.

Philippines (the most impactful experience of the tour):
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Up With People 2011: Here I come again!

As of the 2nd of January I will be heading out for a year of Up With People excitement. On this blog you will find the blogposts of my first tour and as of January I will keep it updated with my new adventures.

One of the exciting new elements is that I'll be a road staff member this time, as education coordinator I will be leading the workshops & coordinating all the impact projects.

Where are we heading?
We'll start in Denver (USA) and visit a few states in the south of the US, as of March we will come to North Europe (Belgium & the Scandinavian countries) and the first tour will end in Mexico. The plan after this is still a big mystery. Read more...

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Doing good in Manila

Our big ending climax has started: the Philippines. There are so many stories to tell: crazy Manila-city-traffic moments, being confronted directly withe poor/rich-gap, my first Asian culture-experience or the total climate change compared to the freezing cold North Platte, aside from that the biggest thing is our volunteer work.

For the past couple of days our group of 19 volunteers has been working at Gawad Kalinga (=GK) Teguig. This site is located in the surroundings of a stinky river (covered with garbage) and slum houses. But the GK project fights against this by building houses in hopeful colors and paid with the sweat of the future inhabitants. Each family can only live in one of the houses if they have contributed to the construction and can only stay if they remain to be active in the GK community. Our site has seven parts and some are at the end of their development, some are just about to start, some contain school or other community facilities.



The first day they explained us the whole concept by taking a look at the different parts of our Gawad Kalinga project and community members shared their experiences. Besides that we were treated with a delicious home-cooked Philippine dish, at first I was hesitant because it looked strange but trying it helps. Another amazing first day experience was being dropped in a local family, everyone single one of us was placed in a different family to meet them for 30 minutes. To me this sounded so pushy. The first moments were indeed kind of awkward, but slowly we started a conversation and eventually I had the best 30 minutes of the whole day. In this half hour we tried to teach each other some words in our language, the kids and I played a bit (I even received a bracelet from the smallest of the 4 children) and just talked about very basic things to get to know one another.



The next days we started with our “real” volunteer work. However I have to mention that one of the GK members made an interesting comment: It is not just construction labor or teaching practical skills to the community moms that should be seen as valuable volunteer work, it is the interaction and interest of foreign volunteers that gives them the hope that people actually believe in their project. Our group was split into 7 small groups. Four groups work on construction sites and did work ranging from painting to sifting to building walls. My site was finishing up for the opening ceremony, which occurred on Monday. The whole community came together to celebrate the entry of the families into the houses, a beautiful moment where our group was part of. Other groups played with the local children or taught them English and just help out with their classes. And the last group is responsible for livelihood workshops, where they teach the local moms and children practical skills or just have fun. During the past days we taught them Up with People songs, someone learned them Japanese writing, everyone danced together, they taught us their language and we taught them some English. For the next couple of days we hope to do some geography, making bracelets they can sell, teaching some more English, etc. So you see, a high variety volunteer project where our whole group can put in its passion for these two weeks.



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Mid-west small towns

Would you ever as a tourist think of a destination like Cheyenne? Or Aberdeen? Or Sioux Falls? Or North Platte? Maybe not, but that is what makes it so interesting to drop a 22-country counting cast inside of them.

Cheyenne
The capital of Wyoming, but only 53000 people, very small compared to the other USA state capitals. But it is famous for it's rodeo traditions, it has the largest outdoor rodeo in the world. Our whole cast got the chance to meet some rodeo-cowboys. I got the opportunity to throw a lasso, catch a goat and ride a fake bull.






Beside this chance to get some rodeo-experience, the opportunity arised to have a 20 minute radio interview. It went really smooth, so a very good first experience. Another great memory was our community impact project in this city. Together with CALC we worked on constructing houses for the homeless, which will hopefully be finished by next month. Our contribution here will last forever, let us hope because we set the walls!



Aberdeen
On the way to Aberdeen our buses stopped at 2 places, first of all Mt. Rushmore. The famous monument of 4 presidents that were important for the American history, i.e. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865). And a real treat was waiting for our cast, a group overnight in cabins in the Black hills



Our stay in this small town mid-west city was made more exciting by our host family, the Halloween-happenings, a surprise birthday party of someone we did not know and a very intense cast-week-game (Up with people Land). This cast game simulated a hierarchical city and was focused on immigration issues, super interesting! Aside from that I worked on educational workshops, about international relations and one about Belgium (!).

Sioux Falls
This city will always leave a strong memory, because of a great mixture of exciting things. Goofing of at a basketball court on a volunteer project in a rehabilitation center. Another great moment was performing at the half-time show of an important high school football game, we had to bear freezing cold temperatures but we danced our heart out! This week was also my first internship week, what means that I'm helping out the education staff for 6 weeks. It is a great way to learn a lot about up with people, improve some of my educational skills, learn more about volunteer projects we do along the way, etc. And last but not least my host family was incredible. If all people in Sioux Falls are like this family then everyone should visit this city!

Crazy basketball moments


My host family


We performed at a football game, incredible experience (however also really cold)


North Platte
Our last city in the USA was North Platte - Nebraska.

Up with People also performs at parades apparently... A great cast atmosphere moment.


This is the last sunshine in the US shining on the railroad factories. North Platte has the biggest railroad hub in the USA, which makes it the 5th most attractive place to bomb for terrorists in the US (what a random fact to close down...)
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Cruising through the USA

Since 4 cities have passed since my last post, I'll do a quick sprint through them. Our big return to the USA, a 8-week tour from Nord to South. Again the one amazing event after another. A meeting with the history of Up with People, closer look at the presidential events, experiencing the most photographed event in the world, my first radio spot ever, performing as a singing solist for the first time ever and being at the world center of the mormon religion.

Sahuarita
The first city after Mexico had some sentimental value. It was right next to Phoenix, the origin of Up with People. We even got the chance to stay with an alumni, perfect for such an Up with People-tinted week. Exceptional chances we got were meeting the founder of Up with People, the original music-writers and getting a last performance from Jessica (she is an amazing singer that joined us thoughout Mexico till this city).



An interesting part of getting to the USA is the start of the presidential debates. It is really exciting to experience it with an inside perspective. Clearly Obama is a better speaker and however most do not agree with the last 8 years, still more Americans than you would expect are McCainn minded.



Albuquerque
A larger city situated in New Mexico close to Acoma Pueblo, a native american reservation. So one of the cast visits was to this beautiful area filled with gigantic rock-formations.

During this week our volunteer work was with Adelante, a center for people with disabilities. It is unbelieveable how much patience the staff of this center has. At the end all of the Up with People volunteers did a talent show with music from our own countries, poems, dance-acts, etc. After us the persons with disablities got the chance to show there talents, especially jokes and dancing seemed to be popular. One even sang a song for us :)

At the end of the week we had the awesome opportunity to go to the Balloon Fiesta, the largest hot air balloon race in the world. Over 650 ballons were up in the air, an unbelieveable sight, it is not suprising it is one of the most photographed events in the world. Everyone of our cast was spread over the ballons and we could help these balloons out. I got to help with the launch, then chase the ballon and eventually help with the landing. A nice experience.


Colorado Springs
Back into Colorado, it was since staging Denver ago that I had been here. This time we were in the mountains, but expectionally was the chance that we could stay at a military base: Fort Carson. Our volunteer work was in schools on the military base and the show was in honor of the military. The idea behind it is to break barriers.

A cool thing was the chance I got to do a radio-spot, one that was aired the whole week of our stay. A unique experience. Other fun things were a visit to a mountain city park called Garden of the Gods, a hike in the mountains with my hostdad Vernon and Zach (roommate for the week) and a visit to one of the 3 olympic centers in the US and getting a tour by a olympic boxing athlete.

Probably the most memorable moment the week was show day. Since we've been touring for quite a while know you can imagine that the show becomes a habit. More and more you get used to certain show parts and when I looked at the show list I saw it was gonna be a pretty regular day. Some rehearsals in the morning and some random singing of pieces I had practiced earlier on the tour. During the pre-show rehearsal suddenly one of the main singers fell sick. And who did they think of maybe replacing him? The non-experienced guy from Belgium, it made them feel kind of nervous but apparantly no one else even knew the song. A fast course training for the difficult parts (I tought I would never be able) , but I did the rehearsal... and even got a big applause. So, this week for the first time ever a Spanish passionate solo called Oye El Boom by Joris Van Doorslaer :)



Salt Lake City
One of the few cities that we are visiting on our tour that I actually knew something about before the tour began. It is famous for it's winter olympics. But aside from this it is also known for it's mormon community. The original founder of the mormon community based it's first church in this city. A visit to this historic place was something we definitely could not miss.



This week I got to use my previous experience in youth organisations, because we got to work with the Boys and Girls Club. Aside from that there were some exciting experience with my host family. For the first time ever I went to a haunted house, drag queen bingo (for charity, what gives it an excuse) and oatmeal launching (something you do while driving, just ask if you wanna know the details). Again an interesting week, I had loads of fun. Read more...