Nicaragua

During the summer before my junior year of high school, I had the opportunity to go on a mission trip to Nicaragua. I went with a group of other teenagers and young adults from my parish to work with an organization called Amigos for Christ. We spent a week in Chinandega, Nicaragua working along side the villagers of the rural mountian village, Dulce Nombre de Jesus. On the first day we climbed the volcano Cerro Negro, which was a trying experience to say the least.

We spent the rest of the week digging six foot deep trenches and laying pipe to bring water from a well up the mountain to the village. Four generations of families live in that village, and this past summer (when they finished the pipeline and turned on the water) was the first time any of them had access to clean water without traveling over 15 miles to buy it. The experience was amazing for so many reasons, and even though I sprained my ankle, got carsick for the first time in my life, and suffered from extreme heat exhaustion, I would not have missed a second of it. This trip helped me to grow as a person, learn about another culture that many people will never get to see, and really see how living simply has the ability to instill a deep and lasting happiness in an individual.